Episode VII - A New Hype

Rating: 1/10 (26 December 2015)

If my expectations for this film were too high, then that's the fault of the Disney marketing (hype) machine which has been relentless in recent months. They set the bar. But even without the hype, never would I would have predicted a 'Star Wars' meets 'Marvel Comics' meets 'Beverly Hills 90210' type of movie. What a let down.
Most of the extremely lazy writing and plot weaknesses have been covered adequately by others, but for me it's the three main characters that are so lazily written it's almost painful. The angst-ridden teenage-looking villain who gets astonishingly weaker as the movie drags on, the affirmative action comic relief storm trooper (who does what exactly?) and, worst of all, Wonder Woman.
Not only can she fly, fix, fight, climb walls, abseil, use the force and keep a calm head when all around are losing theirs, she can also speak 'droid'! 30-odd years ago Luke used a computer program in his X-wing to communicate with R2D2. Apparently, in the years since, it was deemed a good thing for humans to learn the language of the droids rather than equip the droids with human language skills, ala C3PO. Not all humans can speak droid mind you. But lucky for this new Star Wars installment our Wonder Woman does (of course). But then, lucky coincidences seem to be the main staple of the, ahem, plot (and I guess it wouldn't have been so easy to sell a Christmas toy droid that actually speaks). Mind you, not everyone had 'lucky' coincidences. Imagine Finn's surprise when, just after he uses a light saber for the first time, he picks a fight with the only Stormtrooper who happened to be carrying an anti-light saber weapon. Some days you should just not get out of bed.
This has to be one of the laziest written, phone-it-in productions ever. Congratulations to the old guard who got to extend their careers that little bit longer and made some good coin. Congratulations to Disney who'll undoubtedly make a small fortune from this. Congratulations to the new actors who, in my opinion at least, actually did quite well with what they were given. But most of all, my commiserations to all the die-hard Star Wars fans who had hoped for something, even remotely, a little bit better than this tripe.
It seems to me that most of the negative reviews here are based on legitimate points that are clearly articulated and thought out (and could have easily been avoided by the film makers). Many of the 10/10 ratings are given to simply counteract the negative reviews and clearly state as much. That says it all really about who this movie, and the merchandise, is aimed at. As I'm sure episodes VIII through XXIV will be also.