Welcome to The Morning After, where I share with you what movies I’ve seen over the past week. Below, you will find short reviews of those movies along with a star rating. Full length reviews may come at a later date.

So, here is what I watched this past week:

I, Tonya

The biopic has been a sometimes stuff, sometimes engaging part of cinema since the early days. Every once in awhile, a biopic comes along that’s fresh, engaging, and surprising. I, Tonya ends up being one of the most inventive I’ve seen in some time.

Leading up to the incident that stunned the United States, I, Tonya explore Tonya Harding’s childhood and life prior to the Olympic Games. Harding, played with crass indulgence by Margot Robbie, was at the center of a rivalry with fellow figure skater Nancy Kerrigan. Child and spousal abuse feature prominently in the tale as first her mother, a manipulative and almost-frightening Allison Janney, then with her boyfriend and eventual husband Jeff Gillooly, the mustachioed Sebastian Stan in loving and violent form.

Acted with genuine passion as well as tongue-in-cheek splendor, I, Tonya is a vivid portrait of a child, whose whole life is skating, who grows up abused, yet determined. The details of the case are realized with grim satisfaction and a Coen-like dark comic glee. The film is energetic and creative, most effectively splitting screen on occasion, breaking the fourth wall at regular and fitting intervals. This is a film to experience at least once.

Star Wars: The Last Jedi

When Return of the Jedi released in 1983, no one envisioned a return to the popular cinematic universe of George Lucas. Lucas was content with merchandising revenue and ancillary content, yet it wouldn’t be until 1999 that he felt the need (and the accompanying technology) was there to reboot the franchise and go back in time to explore what happened before Star Wars.

Three lightly appreciated prequels later, audiences were frustrated and uncertain they wanted more content. Then Disney bought Lucasfilms and 10 years after Episode III, Episode VII, a continuance of the original saga was underway. This time, loving detail has infused everything made. George Lucas has removed himself from the entire creative process while others carry forth with his creation.

With The Last Jedi, director Rian Johnson steps away from his popular, though heavily flawed Looper and enters a universe that has far more at stake and a limitation on his creativity, if only a small one. Johnson wrote and directed this departure from the traditional middle-chapter, a sequel to The Force Awakens that almost feels like a stand alone film. All the elements audiences have grown to love are there: soaring music, plot twists, Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) and Princess Leia (Carrie FIsher). Our heroes must skillfully navigate an Empire on the verge of annihilating the Rebellion.

At this point, there are more fans of the franchise than there are non-fans. Those who watched the film as kids are now taking their kids to see it. Even those who aren’t tremendous fans of the Star Wars franchise, can still sit down and enjoy the film with audiences who take each moment and soak it in, relish it, and ultimately embrace it as a new part of the mythos that has grown in popularity and reverence with each passing year. This eighth episode is easily the best since the original trilogy and might even rank closer to the top thanks to its weighty issues, compassionate approach to humanity, and its ability to excite, thrill, and enrapture even when cutting a new path through the universe.

The Big Sick

How do you find humor in a situation that’s inherently sorrowful. Life has a way of handling that for us, but on the big screen, it’s always been a challenge to infuse lighthearted energy into a situation that’s inherently depressing.

The Big Sick explores the relationship between a young comedian (Kumail Nanjiani, based on his own story) falls in love with a graduate student (Zoe Kazan). Their cultural differences become a wedge. A tragic event brings Kumail face-to-face with her disapproving parents (Holly Hunter and Ray Romano) as they struggle with potentially losing their daughter and handling the man who hurt her.

Make no mistake, The Big Sick is a pure romantic comedy. A rich appreciation of form, The Big Sick infuses tragedy into the mix in order to act as a catalyst for introspection and self-recrimination. Nanjiani’s script is hilarious and touching in almost equal measure and while the quirkiness of the situation might seem unrealistic, it’s always rooted in a palpable realism and that’s thanks to its loose basis on the courtship of star Kumail Nanjiani and his wife Emily V. Gordon with whom he wrote the script.