The Farce Awakens

Rating: 1/10 (20 December 2015)

 The story really moved, almost too fast at times, and resembled the Star Trek movies.  I thought there were way too many coincidences, which IMO was a pre-existing weak element of the other films. Force Awakens took it and ran.  Given the fact that the Empire and the Sith are still there really diminishes the ending to ROTJ and fully qualifies Episode VII thru IX as simply add-on sequels in my mind.  The middle of the film sagged quite a bit, similar to ROTJ. I'm referring to many of the scenes on Yavin and the plan to destroy the super weapon. I cringed during exposition dialogue between Han and Leia. Are they really going to sum up why they've been separated from each other after so many years in a sentence or two and now everything is just peachy? Wasn't buying it.  Speaking of dialogue, I suppose people prefer a healthy "YEAH!" and "WOOO!" to "Yipee!". I don't see a huge difference.  I thought the scene where Finn and Rey turned to the Falcon, revealing the ship (and direct link to the OT for the first time) was cool.  The person I attended with thought there was too much humor in the movie. I did enjoy some of it, but I think it may have been a bit much at times. I think this movie probably had more humor moments than any from the OT, which is probably too much.  I liked some of Han Solo's scene, and the exchanges with Finn were humorous. Other times he seemed like an old goof. I liken it to the way Kevin Anderson wrote the character versus Timothy Zahn in the post-ROTJ era novels. I prefer Zahn, and I didn't see much of that here.  Wasn't buying the sudden obsession that Finn had to save Rey. I could easily see this as a budding romance in the upcoming sequels. That's the only motivation I could reason.  I thought Daisy Ridley did a nice job, but I'm not sold on the central character and heir of this franchise being a woman in what's traditionally been a mostly male fanboy set of war movies set in space. I know some will think that's a sexist remark, however, I think those people are confusing art with social and political standards in our society. If Disney is trying to expand their target audience to include a large majority of women, then just come out and say so instead of pretending that Lucas did something wrong or times have changed. It's insulting to the original fans.  Adam Driver's character was interesting and complex. I welcomed the scenes where he took off the mask.  I liked Poe Dameron based on his limited screen time.  BB-8 was a likable character.  Captain Phasma - meh  Snoke struck me as a giant Gollum or something out of Harry Potter. Not much originality.  Rey and certainly Finn appeared to have acquired dueling techniques a little too quick for my taste, especially when matched against Kylo Ren, who obviously was dedicated to the task.  This movie marks the fourth out of seven where the climax revolves around a super weapon being destroyed. Do people think that's a requirement for a movie to "feel" like SW?  Not much fuss was kicked up around Han Solo's death after it happened. Nobody consoled Chewie and he seemed to bounce back rather quickly. At least Padme got a funeral.  R2-D2 on the other hand was completely distraught and shuts down for years after a bunch of padawans were killed. I would think R2 would bounce back much quicker than Chewie, especially considering we lost HAN SOLO instead of characters that never had any screen time.  Powerful ending with Rey offering the lightsaber to a much older Luke. Leaves you wondering what's he thinking? I'm not sure I want to see more. Some things are better left untold :)
I think ANH, ESB, ROTJ and ROTS were better movies. Not sure where I would rank this one with the rest yet...