Disney's Paint-By-Numbers Production

Rating: 4/10 (20 December 2015)

Besides the incredible wow factor one thing the original 1977's Star Wars did accomplish was setting the bar incredibly high for any SciFi films to follow, including the series own sequels and thus instantly creating a huge cult following.
Given JJ Abrams notorious reputation of creating shallow, uninspired films i went into "the force awakens" with ZERO expectations. The film didn't disappoint me, it's fairly entertaining here and there. JJ pulls off to deliver a barely mediocre film without the help of massive lensflare effects. Congrats to that JJ!
The good: The Star Wars galaxy is somewhat of a dark and dangerous place again. The production design totally nails that classic Star Wars look and feel. The visuals are already a good 50% of the films appeal. And boy John Williams music is brilliant too!
It was nice to see the oldschool hero cast once more in their classic roles. Especially the Chewbacca character delivered as he always did. Congrats Chewie, and a huge thumbs up to John Williams and of course the production design team!
The Film starts out really strong and powerful having you expect a much better film to follow. Alas that does not happen...
The bad: The Force Awakens loses steam quickly. Around mid to half the film almost totally falls apart. Many of the lines, many of the story elements including the whole ending dynamic are directly looted from the 1977's original Star Wars movie. One could argue that was done to have longtime fans feel directly at home in this new production, however it just yells unoriginal, shallow and creatively bankrupt directly from the screen and into the audience. And thus many of the story elements of this paint-by-numbers production ultimately fail to make sense.
The worst part about Star Wars 7 however is the new villain. It is beyond me how a strong character like Darth Maul gets killed off after only one film yet this laughable excuse of a villain lives to see another sequel. Adam Driver is clearly miscasted and delivers quite an unintentionally funny scene which had the cinema audience laugh out loud as soon as his character takes his mask off on screen.
Bottom line, if you don't expect much the force awakens will not disappoint much during its 135 mins pop corn movie ride. And if you ever asked yourself where all the better halves of the evil empires mischievous personnel are, The Force Awakens answers that question too! They are hard a work of course making the far far away galaxy a much more sinister place alongside their hubbies on the evil evil Deathsta.... errrr STARKILLER BASE i mean!!