A remake of the original trilogy, without the charm of the original.

Rating: 5/10 (1 December 2017)

To preface this review I will say while I am a Star Wars fan I am not a huge Star Wars fan. That is to say I have no real emotional attachment to the franchise although I've rewatched the movies quite a bit. I get more emotional about the sullying of Marvel super heroes and Batman than any other film. I'd lose my sh** if James Bond were made black, but could care less what diversity is put into Star Wars. I'm just not that much of a purist.
So it doesn't bother me than Kylo Ren is not a bada** like Vader, but rather an emo kid. It doesn't bother me that Rey makes the force seem like superpowers, rather than a Samurai code mixed with Eastern and Western religions. Nor does it bother me that a stormtrooper is black despite them being clones, but no longer clones because this movie seems to ignore the prequels as much as possible.
However I remember when the prequels came out there was hype, then finally acceptance that maybe they weren't very good. The prequels problems are easily pinned down however; the two leads lacked chemistry, Anakin's actor(s) was wooden and unlikeable, and Jar Jar Binks. Other than that they were creative, did massive mythology building, and felt like they had the same man (Lucas) behind them.
The originals were this wild fever dream made on a limited budget in a desert. The prequels were the same visionary being made to force will out another three movies, and it showed. The Force Awakens is a board room trying to replicate a formula so they can sell toys, and man does it show.
There's a reason I mention budget. Bryan Singer once noted his restrained budget on X-Men 1 and 2 forced him to write scenes with actual dialogue. Huh? Fancy that. Turns out when you slow down instead of giving the audience cgi whiplash you get a better product. That's one instance where TFA fails; pacing. It moves along at breakneck speed. The closest we ever get to a Star Wars film is a brief interval where Rey meets BB-8. That may be the closest the film comes to actual character development.
The dialogue is all wrong. It can be summed up by Finn asking "do you have a boyfriend" promptly after meeting Rey? Who f***ing cares? Is this Star Wars or She's All That?
In the original trilogy(s) the dialogue is very regal, so much so it makes Han Solo's character stand out. Han Solo is the audience; he's blue collar, doesn't believe what he's seeing, thinks fantasy tropes are for nerds, and loves guns. He's the antithesis of everything that's going on around him. So as we watch him slowly buy into all this "hokey nonsense" so do we. Because at it's core Star Wars isn't about Jedi, it's about friends coming together to fight a great evil. This movies is about...."hey remember that movie Star Wars, man that was great".
The dialogue is very riffy and self aware. They practically break the fourth wall. From the beginning with "who talks first, do I talk first, do you talk first?" It almost sounds like a Star Wars Robot Chicken episode poking fun at the tropes. It doesn't stop there. We are treated to lines like "that's not how the force works" and "is there a trash compactor somewhere" as if people really talk like that. As if the characters in the movie have watched the Star Wars movies. The characters rarely share their thoughts or emotions. Remember the quiet scenes where Obi Wan speaks cryptically about his past, or where the characters get to know each other? There's none of that. The film is so ready to get back to hyperspace it can barely breathe. There's no tension built through dialogue, and the emotions are unearned. Rey crying over Han? Why? You don't even know him. He's a guy you met an hour ago. Even worse he offered you a job on his ship seconds after meeting you. Who's Maz Kanata? Why do we care?
The humor doesn't work either. It's just the same one liners you find in every Marvel movie.
The movie is just flat. It's a good action movie to some degree, but also uninspired and lackluster. The prequels committed the sin of not being very good, but this commits the unforgivable sin of being bland.