Let’s start with the story, because that’s the most important element of the movie to me. I’ve read a dozen or more Star Wars novels. I know the Expanded Universe (EU) story line pretty well now. There are a lot of great stories within the EU, such as the corruption of Jacen Solo, his seduction by the dark side. But, Disney, in its cartoonish visionary scope, declared the EU no longer canon and decided to create a new universe. Jacen Solo apparently has become Ben Solo, which confuses him with Ben Skywalker. In the EU, Jacen became a master of the dark side, became Darth Caedus, a very powerful figure who kills Ben Skywalker’s mother – Luke Skywalker’s wife. But, Disney has abandoned this story line and many more.
This torture of the previous canon by Disney and its adoption by J.J. Abrams, is a disturbance in the force.
Okay, to the movie, then.
Right at the start, there’s is a First Order that has inherited the spirit of the corrupted Galactic Empire. How did they get all the Imperial spacecraft and stormtroopers? Then we see the “resistance” to this “empire” is the same old resistance, a rag-tag bunch, to the empire in A New Hope. Many have pointed the similarity out, but what I see is that A New Hope has been duplicated to the point that the new empire is apparently as strong as the old Empire and has the resources to build something even bigger than the Death Star. It’s absurd! In the EU, the Empire was vanquished and the rebels create the New Republic. Disney and J.J. have rebooted the EU to start a new universe from roughly the same starting point in the war as A New Hope. Why did they need new movie of so much of the same to revitalize the franchise? It’s as if they decided that they needed to recreate the same Star Wars characters with younger actors so that the franchise would have more of a future in the lifetimes of the actors. That’s visionary.
Star Trek accomplished the same thing, notably accomplished by the same J.J., in 2009, even using the simple movie name “Star Trek”, by going back in time to younger characters, using younger actors. Now J.J. has accepted going forward in time, similar to the aging of the actors, and created a new plot line that creates new characters to imitate the old ones. Why bother? But, for Star Wars, they’ve already done gone back in time, with episodes I-III, so they have to move forward. Unfortunately, this Star Wars reboot is too imitative. To this I only want to add that, while some reviewers say that it is unjustified complaining to make the comparison between Force Awakens and New Hope, I say that those reviewers are being too nice or haven’t viewed the movies enough.
Captain Phasma, which one reviewer rightly called a penguin in a cape, is so weak that one wonders how she could have gotten away with all the chrome and resemblance to Darth Vader.
I think Finn should have been stronger, given he was trained to be a stormtrooper. He takes on some good fights, but often is frightened. Even a fresh stormtrooper would not be so weak. They could have created him as a stronger personality with some challenges that give him pause and make him think, instead of showing stark fear.
Many reviewers are making a lot of excuses for Force Awakens. Reviews that are critical of the movie are valid. People attacking negative reviews are like the glasshole characterization of Google Glass. They are a typical mob reaction to non-conformity. They are peers trying to force adherence to what the in-group is developing as normal. It is a social reaction, not a result of rational analysis.
Just to make it clear how much of a non-conformist I am, let me say that Star Wars episodes I-III are very good movies. They are very well written in describing the earlier era of the Empire and the developments of the characters Darth Vader and Darth Sideous. They were grand visual creations. Episodes IV-VI pale in comparison, but only because they are older movies. Again, like the glasshole bullying phenomenon, a lot of people objected to the Jar Jar character and mischaracterized the entire set of movies from that mob reaction. A lot of people should rejoice in knowing that there’s room in the grand vision of the future of the galaxy for idiots like that.