Bit me three time JJ!

Rating: 4/10 (6 January 2016)

Sigh. You know all I've been exposed to for 2 months has been Star Wars and when the movie finally came out all I could hear from friends, family and even trusted reviewers online was "Its amazing!....Well there was this..." Time after time I'd hear "The plot is this..." or "There is a lot of fan..." In fact, the more I heard about how people loved it, the more worried I got about how bad it was. I was so worried that I had convinced myself I had to separate myself from everyone and all media to clear my head before seeing this film. Finally in a stroke of spontaneity I felt like I could see it and my wife and I saw it in 3D. And it was bad, genuinely bad. Not the worst movie, certainly better than the prequels and the Star Trek 2000s films. Still bad though. Bottom Line - - There are two types of plot points in this film: 1) recycled plot points from the original trilogy 2) Coincidences on a Harry potter level of absurdity. - The characters come in three types: 1) Mummified versions of characters you once loved 2) Recycled character types of characters you once loved *cough Ray cough* 3) New characters who can't decide on what kind of character they are - What the hell is going on? Why is there a resistance again? Dark Brotherhood what? Zero explanation to what is actually going on or world building. Not everything is bad though, there are moments that made me laugh like a small scene with a woman bandaging up Chewbacca's wounds, and there are awesome scenes like a moment when a random storm trooper pulls out a high voltage Billy club.
Right and left though the plot is undermined with useless exposition from CG midgets or the sickening fan service that breaks the story up every 5 minutes. Characters are undermined with ill fitting dialogue like Fin's personality which is supposed to be trained out of him (cause he's a storm trooper *spoiler*). Seriously that character could have been so awesome, a turned storm trooper I fell for the idea immediately. But instead of a soldier with a hint of humanity fighting against years of brainwashing and training we get a whinny kid of a character who deals with his surroundings as if the brotherhood had picked him up that previous week, slapped a ST suit on him, gave him a blaster, and said "You're in the army now kid." Killo Ren was like watching the antagonist from Gammas boy get force powers. And Ray....sigh....Lets describe Rays Character shall we? Well she's a girl who kicks butt and she has a British accent.....oh and lets not forget that she is also Luke skywalker except better at everything. Personality traits? Naaa. Unique mannerisms? Who needs um? Flaws? Not in our protagonist! Then there is the modern dialogue filled with smarminess (which passes for wit these days). THEEEEENNNNNN there is the plot.....oh god the plot. Yes it is a rehash of episode IV, but worse than that, there also happens to be no explanation of anything that's going on. Who is the brotherhood? Why is the Republic called the resistance? How did an evil faction with less resources than the Empire manage to build a bigger version of what the Empire built? Why would they do that if it failed twice before? If they knew so much about what had happened why wasn't there better protection against a small group of fighters? Shouldn't that be design priority number one? Why does Ray think Luke is a myth but she knows all about Han Solo? Isn't that like saying you are very aware of the exploits of Tito, but you aren't quite sure that Michael Jackson existed? For an army that can fill a planet sized space station, why would any of the storm troopers that escort the sith lord be rookies? Can everyone now use light sabers except the sith lord that is trained in using light sabers? What is the purpose of BB8? To sell toys? I think its to sell toys. What is the purpose of tiny goggle eyed lady? To give exposition? I think its to give exposition. Why are all the brotherhood people pale British people again? Is this movie racist against pale Anglo-Saxons? Why is everyone so freaking young in this? The Brotherhood general looks mid-twenties at best. When did he start commanding troops, the age of nine? Is he Ender? Why does the new Emperor look like Golum? Why did Han Solo have video cameras around his ship but the brotherhood forgot to put any on their huge planet space station? Money? How did JJ Abrams get my money a third time?!?!?!?!?! And don't give me that "Well that's why they are making more movies". If this was a Marvel movie critics would be ripping it apart for not being able to stand on its own. Again, its not all bad. It really does look like Harrison Ford feels his character again at certain moments. Fin has his moments that are completely undermined seconds later. There is this nice scene when Chewbacca is wounded and...oh yeah. This movie is bad, and it will take some time for people to see it for what it is. In the end the experience reminded me of watching Jurassic World. Everyone praised it and ultimately it was too self-aware, and all style over substance. Yet I enjoyed that one better then this because though the Billy club fight was neat but the T-Rex/Raptor battle was the bomb diggity. If you are still reading, well you can wait till one of your friends makes you watch this along with the other films and a weekend long marathon of steady disappointment. Oh, one last bit. The guys from the Raid Redemption show up for a cameo in this! Awesome! Go watch the Raid Redemption and the Raid 2, those are great!