Last year around this time, Oscar Isaac said he thought Star Wars: Episode IX would be a fulfilling end to the Skywalker Saga. Now that The Rise of Skywalker has come and all but gone, there are many Star Wars fans who would agree with the Poe Dameron actor. However, there are also many fans with complaints about Rise of Skywalker.
Oscar Isaac was a presenter at the 2020 Oscars last night; while on the red carpet, he was asked about the reception to Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker.
MTV noted the response to Rise of Skywalker was extreme on both ends, as always, but was he surprised at all? Here's what the actor said:
Not really, you know, it was the same on the movie before that as well. It means a lot to people.
Yes, if anything the criticism was even louder after Star Wars: The Last Jedi, and Oscar Isaac already shared his thoughts on that.
MTV then asked if any of the Rise of Skywalker criticism seemed justified to him. That's when he broke out some dry humor:
Yeah, look, was there some crying in the shower? Yes.
But that's normal for you, the reporter teased, to which Oscar Isaac replied:
Exactly, that's how I do it.
So he's keeping a sense of humor about the whole thing, which is healthy. (He also made a quip about wanting to kill Baby Yoda, and he might want to be careful there.)
Oscar Isaac must just be happy to have made it to the end of the sequel trilogy. Poe Dameron was famously supposed to be killed off in The Force Awakens, and then plans changed.
Some fans were upset with Poe's storyline in Star Wars: The Last Jedi. He told fans ahead of Rise of Skywalker that they would be surprised by Poe's backstory. In that movie, we met an old ... friend? ... of his named Zorii Bliss, played by Keri Russell. Oscar Isaac told Digital Spy he even improvised that little look Poe gave Zorii toward the end of the movie. So he managed to add some wit and fun into the movie. But he wasn't able to get the Poe/Finn storyline he wanted, because the "Disney overlords" weren't ready for it, as he previously put it.
Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker still has decent-to-good fan scores, but there have been vocal complaints about the movie -- from the mystery of Palpatine's return and that major death, to all the ways Rian Johnson and J.J. Abrams didn't seem to be on the same page, and all the lingering questions.
Oscar Isaac seems to have put Poe Dameron behind him, but he definitely has a bright future ahead. He has Dune coming in 2020, along with Big Gold Brick, and The Card Counter. Hopefully we see him back at the Oscars soon, and not just to make jokes about his name or Star Wars.
