Abrams doesn't understand how Star Wars works for women/girls

Rating: 1/10 (30 December 2015)

JJ Abrams has been widely reported as saying that Star Wars was 'for boys' and something they shared with their dads. He has since tried to apologise for this statement and say that wasn't what he meant to say but after seeing this movie the fact that he doesn't understand female characters or how they work in this universe is blatantly obvious.
Let's start with the latest Fanboy crush Rey. Let me start by saying I thought Daisy Ridley did a good job with the material she had so this is in no way a comment on her as a performer. It's just that the character is god-awful.
Rey is instantly (and I do mean instantly) good at everything. Disney try and make us have sympathy for her because she is waiting for a family that abandoned her and she doesn't have enough food. Well she's rather fit for someone on meager rations. She can speak droid and wookie she can fly the Falcon (which has been sitting in the desert for years and flies fine btw)and she can use the force to jedi mind trick people into doing what she wants and to move items. It took Luke 3 movies to do that.
Now I know at this point a whole bunch of fanboys will be saying it's because she was probably trained when she was younger and just forgot, she's Luke's daughter obi-wan's daughter blah blah blah. It doesn't matter it's just not plausible and it makes her character very 1 dimensional.
If you compare her to other iconic Sci-Fi heroines like Ripley, Sarah Connor they had to struggle, they worked hard and they weren't ashamed to ask for or accept help. We went on the journey with them as they learned, in this case we do not.
Phasma was supposed to be the other main female character but aside from killing a few civilians (oh yay) and bossing Fin around that's all she does (and again I don't care what happens in the next movie cos this one is awful). The minute she has a gun pulled on her she caves and does exactly what she's told. Leia never caved in when she was captured but this woman waves the white flag in about 20 seconds.
OK now let's get to Leia. Again this is not a comment on the abilities of Carrie Fisher, I really like her and was so looking forward to seeing her in this movie.
Again JJ Abrams has no idea. In an interview he said Leia isn't a Jedi in this horrible alternate reality (surely that's what it is) because she had other more important things to do. So I guess when Yoda told Luke to pass on what he had learned he must have meant to anyone other than his sister. Obi-Wan in the prequels and the clone wars cartoons very clearly is a Jedi that commands and army. Leia was always a smart woman why couldn't she do the same? In the EU books it takes her a while to complete her training but she does it and becomes Jedi Solo.
Leia is portrayed as an older woman who has had all of her family relationships break down. Her husband and brother left her and her son is now gone. It's like her only point in the series now was to give birth to the new bad guy. Couldn't we have a non-skywalker bad guy just once? I read a comment in one of the reviews on here that the reason Chewie was the only one upset that Han died is because he was the only one close to him. Really??? the mother of his child wasn't close to him??? What utter BS.
And now the Han/Leia relationship. It was one of the corner stones of the trilogy and they just destroyed it. Again it has no point other than providing us with a new bad guy. I say another review that said no one wanted to see an older couple in love, but I really did. I thought it would give those characters the gravitas they deserved. Han's death would have had much more impact then if they had continued to share the struggle for 30 years like the do in the books.
As a little girl I never felt Star Wars wasn't for me. I never felt shut out. I loved Leia. I loved her with Han. It wasn't an issue for me.
This movie casts women as either superheroes or redundant shells of their former selves. Like life just stops for all these characters after about 40.
It's also just turned Star Wars into a series about dysfunctional relationships, which I can get on any TV drama/soap opera.
So disappointing. Hollywood needs to be more realistic with their female role models.