The Rise of Skywalker

01 · Central reading

What an anthropology lens changes

The Rise of Skywalker is preoccupied with inheritance. Rey confronts a biological connection she did not choose, Palpatine attempts to reproduce Sith power through lineage and ritual, and the Resistance survives by creating a coalition larger than its formal organization.

This review does not score the film. It asks what kinds of social relations the story makes visible: who has authority, how institutions reproduce themselves, what counts as family, how belief is organized, who performs necessary labor, how violence is justified, and how people attach meaning to places and objects.

02 · Anthropology lens

Genealogy and social identity

Rey's connection to Palpatine raises a classic anthropological distinction between descent and identity. Biological ancestry creates a relationship, but it does not determine social belonging or moral action. Rey's final choice of the Skywalker name is an explicit claim that kinship can be constructed through affiliation, memory, and chosen inheritance.

03 · Anthropology lens

Sith Eternal as ritual community

Exegol presents the Sith as more than two individuals. Cultists, architecture, hidden fleets, cloning infrastructure, and ritual language support Palpatine's return. The setting expands Sith continuity into a community organized around secrecy, preservation, and ceremonial transfer of power.

04 · Anthropology lens

Relics, archaeology, and authority

Wayfinders, the dagger, ruins, old ships, masks, and inherited lightsabers drive the plot. The characters navigate the present through material traces of the past. Objects do not merely contain clues. They authorize routes, identities, memories, and claims about what earlier generations intended.

05 · Anthropology lens

Coalition instead of centralized command

The final battle depends on civilian and military forces arriving from across the galaxy. Lando's appeal produces a coalition that the Resistance alone could not field. Political capacity emerges through networks and shared opposition rather than through a restored central state.

06 · Anthropology lens

Names and belonging

Names repeatedly matter in the sequel trilogy. Finn chooses a name after leaving the First Order. Ben Solo rejects and then returns to his family identity. Rey is asked who she is and finally answers with an adopted surname. Naming functions as social recognition, not just personal labeling.

07 · Anthropology lens

Death, ancestors, and continuity

Rey hears past Jedi voices, while Palpatine claims the accumulated power of the Sith. Both sides construct continuity through relationships with the dead. The film therefore treats ancestry in more than biological terms. Communities are also built through remembered teachers, ritual predecessors, and inherited narratives.