Disappointed

Rating: 3/10 (31 December 2015)

I saw the originals on VHS when I was about 8 years old and for 25 years I imagined and wondered what happened after Return of the Jedi. This movie could have been so much more and it left me wanting more because it didn't really give me anything at all.
The plot is literally Episode 4 and the planets are Tatooine and Hoth with different names. If JJ wanted a desert planet why didn't he at least show how it differed from Tatooine in some way. We get no perspective on the worlds in the movie. One thing Lucas did great in the prequels is taking us to different planets and really showed how unique each environment was. We didn't get that at all with Episode 7.
The other main issue for me is there was no backstory, info, or anything on the First Order, Republic, Senate, Snoke, etc. What the hell has the galaxy been up to for 30 years? I wanted more mythology... what did it mean for Anakin to bring the force into balance? As the chosen one what's his role now? etc
Shockingly, the other thing poorly done was the music. John Williams killed it in the prequels but Episode 7 really didn't have many iconic musical moments.
Episode 8 has a lot of work to do and hopefully it'll answer a lot of the backstory. It seems like we need Episode 6.5 to show how Snoke came to power, Luke training the Jedi, Kylo's turn to the darkside.... hell that could be a trilogy right there.