Some New Ideas, but Not Nearly Enough

Rating: 8/10 (4 January 2016)

I was definitely excited for this movie, as were most people. When I finally did see it I was a little disappointed.
The Force Awakens feels a lot like A New Hope plot-wise. Several scenes even end up feeling like a copy-paste of the original movie. Although it didn't stand out all the time, some scenes in particular just blatantly stated that it was copied, which made it stand out more in the rest of the movie.
The characters were better than I expected. Kylo Ren himself was a very cool villain. He had different struggles than previous dark side users, and felt more like a real person. He was still a very young character, and he acted as such. Hopefully he'll be further developed in the next two movies. The other characters were quite good too, despite the lack of depth into them that the movie went to. I felt like Han Solo was introduced too early and too suddenly, which didn't make for a very comfortable transition. He had a major role in the movie and he needed to be there, but his introduction could have been far better.
The movie didn't feel original. And not just because of its similarities to A New Hope, but also in the other content. It gave in to several things that are commonly in movies these days. One of which were jokes, and pretty funny ones too. Despite laughing at them, they all felt forced. Most of them didn't need to be there, and were quite out of character. In the old Star Wars movies there were still funny parts but it all just flowed into the dialogue, whereas these ones were just forced in. Because of this (as well as other things) it didn't really feel like a Star Wars movie and more like just another movie.
The movie felt too short and underdeveloped. It went by quickly, which isn't a bad thing, because that typically means that it was well paced. In this case it just felt underdeveloped in the end.
My biggest problem with the movie is also one of my favorite things about it: Kylo Ren. I like his character, like I said above. He's deeper and more troubled than other characters, and his struggle feels real and thus he succeeds as a character. However, he's incredibly weak. I don't want to spoil anything, but let's just say that he gets beaten horribly by an amateur force user, and that really bothered me. It made the climax of the movie a whole lot worse, considering it already copied the end of A New Hope. I understand that he's an apprentice still, but he was beaten miserably by someone who'd barely held a lightsaber, so it really doesn't make a whole lot of sense.
Overall The Force Awakens is a good movie with good characters, but it lacks heavily in originality. Kylo Ren is a character that I both love and hate right now, so I'm hoping that he gets better in the future. Despite it's flaws The Force Awakens was a worthwhile watch. It was lot's of fun and seeing all the old characters from the original trilogy was a great treat. Having them all play a semi- major role was even better, because that way they didn't feel forced. In the end I would recommend The Force Awakens to Star Wars fans, but it's not good enough to save the series if you didn't like them, nor is the best Star Wars.