One aspect that’s really striking when you see Andor is how little the Jedi and the Force have to do with it; which highlights how central they are to the original trilogy. (Rogue One does a pretty deft job of bridging those worlds, eg with Donnie Yen’s character.)
And the Force was a big part of the charm of the original movies, right? All the scenes with Luke and Yoda are wonderful, for example. I wouldn’t want to take that away, any more than I’d want to shoehorn the Jedi into Andor.
I think the real problem with the original movies starts with the prequels, which doubled down on all the Jedi business but managed to make it feel very pedestrian, rather than mystical.
The sequel movies could have been great if they had really tried to explore the collapse of the Empire and what the reconstruction would look like, rather than shamelessly retreading everything beat-for-beat. The Last Jedi did at least try to be different, but its ideas were completely scattershot and (I think) not very fruitful.
The less Force, the better in my opinion. Save super-powers for comic-book movies.
In the recent Disney movies (Andor being the exception) it’s like they gave everyone the force, everyone is a super hero, it’s bombastic and annoying.
Let me run around with a rock and a stick for the first hour. Then give me a sword that looks cheap but I will cherish it. Then take it away. Let me earn it when I am awesome in the end.
To many games treat you like a toddler that wants shiny things. Yeah I want shiny things, but I want them when I deserved them. Similarily, yeah, I want powerful heros, but they have to earn it as well.
Sure, you'll be a badass at the end, but you're going to earn it. :)
If your standard for what science fiction is us The Expanse then almost all of what's considered science fiction is fantasy.
Star Wars doesn't even claim to attempt this. It is a world of entirely made up rules and places for the sake of the story. There is nothing wrong with that. But it completely misses this key feature of sci fi.
There isn't a very clear delineation between the two genres. Star Trek also crosses this line into pure fantasy pretty consistently (an anomaly that compells everybody to sing and eventually produces a Klingon boy band performance? Or one that gives everybody amnesia and turns them into actors in Shakespeare drama - costumes and all?).
I'm not saying the distinction doesn't exist - The Hobbit isn't SF and Ringworld isn't high fantasy, but I am saying that between the extremes, it's mostly just vibes. There is no objective reason not to consider Star Wars science fiction, some people just find the space wizards too silly (while having a bookshelf full of "The author's barely disguised fetish or hyperfixation but In Spaaaaace.")
I wasn't in both cases, communists considered it a capitalist propaganda about US might and banned it (maybe just heard about Star wars being US space program, took just first result on soviet gugel so to speak, but fight for freedom at all costs is generally not something you want to encourage in dictatorship).
They are an interesting flick (original trilogy), but nothing really magical for me in them. As mentioned by others they feel like 80s pop sci fi movie, nothing more, characters and acting are... mediocre and it all feels aimed at kids/teens. A lot of creativity with sets, but that's not primary reason for me to watch a movie.
Since I refuse (can't even) to be swayed emotionally of some good ol' memories from growing up, prequels felt even more childish (maybe apart from ep3), and this trend continued with last 3 movies. Rogue one was by far the best experience in whole SW universe, so if this goes even further happy to experience it.