Better than the prequels, but still far off for the original trilogy

Rating: 8/10 (26 December 2015)

Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens is a film that tries to balance the introduction of new characters and a new storyline, set 30 years after the events in Return of the Jedi, with old characters and story lines that were introduced during the original trilogy and expanded upon in the prequel trilogy.
Most of the film is a pastiche of moments that occurred in the original trilogy. An astromech droid on a desert planet carries a piece of information vital to the Rebellion/Resistance; a lone teenager who dreams of adventure is swooshed into a plot far greater than he/she could have imagined; said teenager meets a legendary figure of prior events who meets his demise at the end of the film; characters meet a wise, 1000 year old small creature who holds clues to their destinies; said droid delivers the information which helps push the plot along; a planet-sized weapon destroys planets and threatens our heroes; our heroes destroy said weapon by lowering its shields and destroying a particular point of weakness; a son confronts his father in his struggle to choose between the dark side and the good side of the Force; said son is the villain of the film and obeys the commands of an evil master who communicates via hologram.
These story elements are what The Force Awakens is composed of, and it suffers because of it. Instead of getting an organic and natural sequel to the events depicted in Return of the Jedi, we get a reintroduction to the universe, which eliminates some previous characters, makes room for new characters, and mixes those characters with the remaining previous characters. For someone with no prior knowledge of Star Wars, if they had just seen episodes 1-7 in chronological order, they would wonder why The Force Awakens seems to spent its entire runtime reorganizing and restructuring all the elements in the previous films rather than telling an original story.
It's not fair to call The Force Awakens a reboot, because it most definitely is a direction continuation of the last six films, but more a restructuring of everything we've come to know, so that the next films can tell new stories with new characters in a newly canonized universe. The Old Republic becomes the New Republic; the Rebellion the Resistance; the Empire the First Order; Darth Vader becomes Kylo Ren, the Emperor becomes Supreme Leader Snoke; R2-D2 and C-3PO become BB-8, and yet all of these characters exist within the framework of the previous ones. Disney and Lucasfilm want to create a rich universe to tell new stories in, and are going to use these characters and these names as reference points going forward.
For those looking for a legitimate sequel to the events of Return of the Jedi, The Force Awakens is not the film you're looking for. At least the prequels, which were terribly told stories, served as legitimate prequel stories to the original trilogy, featuring most of the same characters and expanding upon them (Anakin, Obi-Wan, Yoda, Palpatine, the Hutts, the Fetts). The Force Awakens features many of the same characters too (Han, Leia, Luke, R2-D2, C-3PO, Ackbar) but use them to tell stories of new characters, some of which are related to previous ones (Kylo Ren/Ben Solo, possibly Rey) but many of which are simply new introductions to this universe.
7.5/10