In the beginning, there was nothing, and then George Lucas said, “Star Wars.” Well, not exactly. But on a movie front, a great deal changed industry-wide when the first Star Wars movie came out in 1977. It was created and directed by Lucas, who continued to oversee the series for its subsequent sequels, The Empire Strikes Back (1980) and Return of the Jedi (1983), though both those movies had different credited directors: Irvin Kershner and Richard Marquand, respectively. Lucas returned to the director’s chair when it came time to helm the prequel trilogy, though. Released between 1999 and 2005, that trilogy was made up of The Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones, and Revenge of the Sith.
Things changed at the end of 2012, though, when Disney purchased Lucasfilm, and then went hard on pumping out new Star Wars movies… maybe a little too hard? Between 2015 and 2019, there were five released, so precisely one per year. Maybe some Star Wars fatigue set in, and, as of 2025 (the time of writing), there hasn’t been a Star Wars movie released since 2019; just TV shows on Disney+. It’ll surely come back eventually, but for now, those five titles that have been made under Disney’s banner – and without the involvement of George Lucas – are ranked below, starting with an outright stinker and ending with the stuff that actually proved pretty interesting.
5
‘Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker’ (2019)
Directed by J.J. Abrams
It’s a shame Star Wars: Episode IX – The Rise of Skywalker was so bad for numerous reasons, one of them being that if it’s ever a part of any ranking, you have to talk about it before addressing the movies it works as a sequel to. Episodes VII and VIII had their detractors, but also their supporters, and then Episode IX came around, and it’s hard to imagine who it was for, or why anyone might like it. Worse, it purports to wrap up the entire Skywalker Saga, not just the sequel trilogy (2015-2019), so that makes it even more disappointing as a “grand” climax.
To watch The Rise of Skywalker is to see something tear itself apart and die over the course of nearly 2.5 insufferable hours.
The Rise of Skywalker hits the ground running, hurling itself straight into a wall, losing teeth, taking off in another direction, hitting another wall, losing more teeth, staggering to its feet, raging toward the first wall again, hitting that, losing all its teeth now, then heading in a new direction (same speed) and colliding with a different wall, blood dripping (and eventually spraying) everywhere, speed as fast as ever, flailing itself on shaky feet into another wall, and then the cycle just repeats until the pitiful thing eventually passes out from blood loss 140 minutes later. To watch it is to see something tear itself apart and die over the course of nearly 2.5 insufferable hours. It is likely the main reason for the hiatus on theatrically released Star Wars movies since 2019.
4
‘Solo: A Star Wars Story’ (2018)
Directed by Ron Howard
Compared to something as bad as The Rise of Skywalker, there’s not nearly as much worth criticizing in Solo: A Star Wars Story, as its worst crime is probably just being a little average overall? There wasn’t a ton of enthusiasm for a prequel focusing on Han Solo, either, but there’s a world in which such a movie could’ve been good. Phil Lord and Christopher Miller were originally attached to the film as directors, but infamously got fired during production, with the reliable – if a little unremarkable – sensibilities of director Ron Howard, as replacement, being what got Solo: A Star Wars Story finished.
A little more chaos might not have been what the higher-ups wanted from Lord and Miller, but maybe it would’ve been, at the very least, more interesting. But it’s easy to say that, in hindsight. What you get instead with Solo: A Star Wars Story is a safe but certainly watchable action/sci-fi flick with the younger versions of some memorable characters from the original trilogy. It ends with a bit of a shrug, but it starts decently strong, and there are entertaining sequences throughout. It lacks a certain wow factor, though, and arguably stands as one of the more forgettable pieces of Star Wars content (yep, the dreaded C-word can be broken out here) released since Disney’s acquisition of Lucasfilm.
3
‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens’ (2015)
Directed by J.J. Abrams
Strangely enough, Star Wars: Episode VII – The Force Awakens is a better Han Solo movie than that aforementioned 2018 film with his name in the title. Harrison Ford gets to shine the most out of the original trilogy cast members who show up in this film, and Han honestly serves a similar role to Obi-Wan from the original 1977 movie. Speaking of things serving a similar role to things in that movie… yeah, that’s the elephant in the room when it comes to The Force Awakens. It is, quite plainly, an attempt to recapture those late 1970s glory days, for better or worse.
It’s for the better the first time you watch The Force Awakens. It moves as fast as The Rise of Skywalker, sure (thanks, J.J. Abrams), but, unlike that film, this one does move to some interesting, entertaining, and occasionally emotional places. It’s more on reflection, or maybe on rewatches, where a sense of familiarity sets in. Continuing the story many years later is interesting, and The Force Awakens does do that, but retreading so much familiar ground is a little harder to defend. The Force Awakens is kind of like a magic trick that’s impressive in the moment, but loses that spark when you think about it for a while and realize how the trick was done. It’s still good entertainment, but time has been a little less kind to it than many of the other blockbusters released in the mid-2010s.
2
‘Rogue One: A Star Wars Story’ (2016)
Directed by Gareth Edwards
While The Force Awakens has aged a surprising amount in the span of about 10 years, the almost-just-as-old Rogue One: A Star Wars Story has gotten a little better as time has passed, or at least it’s become more appreciated. And Rogue One certainly had its fair share of fans back in 2016; that should be stressed. It’s a movie that gets off to a slow start, but builds well throughout, and then it, without a doubt, finishes strong. The final act is excellent, and then the very last scene – which goes right into the opening of Star Wars (1977) – is quite well-handled, even with some iffy de-aging effects.
Part of Rogue One’s bump in popularity has been its connection to Andor, which ran for two seasons and itself worked as a prequel to Rogue One (many will say it’s the best Star Wars-related thing that’s been made since Disney acquired Lucasfilm). On its own, though, Rogue One is still a well-made and largely compelling movie, and one that gets admirably tense and dark at times, too. It emphasizes the “war” part of “Star Wars” very well, underplaying the sci-fi and fantasy elements and instead feeling quite grounded. And then, of course, it was this grounded feeling that Andor doubled down on, to even greater success.
1
‘Star Wars: The Last Jedi’ (2017)
Directed by Rian Johnson
Some would say there are more than a few problems with Star Wars: Episode VIII – The Last Jedi, since it might well be the most divisive Star Wars movie ever made. Still, in the interest of finding some common ground, The Last Jedi is not perfect. You can hate it and agree it’s not perfect, and you can mostly love it and agree it’s not perfect. That’s as united as things will get. Anyway.
The Last Jedi does some bold – or maybe even – reckless things. In contrast to The Force Awakens, very little is played safe here, with Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) being very different from who he once was, while both Rey (Daisy Ridley) and Kylo Ren (Adam Driver) start to question who they are and what they’re fighting for. Further, lots of other characters make mistakes, a big villain turns out to be easily defeatable, and some heroes go down fighting, but not passing away in the ways you might expect. Look, The Last Jedi did a lot, and it took some wild risks. If Star Wars were to continue evolving, it might well have been the direction that things should’ve gone in, only for Solo: A Star Wars Story and The Rise of Skywalker to play things safe (well, the latter might’ve tried; it was hard to tell), like The Force Awakens did. The Last Jedi and Rogue One are the best because they feel willing to shake things up a little, narratively, emotionally, and thematically with The Last Jedi, and genre-wise/tonally with Rogue One. If there’s a lesson to be learned, going forward, from the Disney output, it’s that Star Wars movies with something new to offer are probably going to fare better (at least critically, and in public consciousness going forward) than the films that play things too safe.