The Force did awaken after it flatlined in the prequels

Rating: 7/10 (18 December 2015)

I thought the film was a lot better than the prequels but still wasn't as good as the original trilogy for me as I still took some issues with the film. I'll try and keep my review as spoiler-free as possible, but you still might come across some minor spoilers.
Let me just start off by listing my issues with the film.
1)Captain Phasma. She ended up being quite a lame character. She gets taken down so easily by Han, Finn and Chewie, and the only scene we really get before that is her barking some orders at Finn. That's about it. She really did nothing to further the plot and could have easily been replaced by another stormtrooper.
2)Rey was too powerful. She literally just found out she had the force like an hour ago, and easily was about to kill Kylo. The only reason he was saved is because the scene called for a "deus ex machina". I realize they wanted a cool lightsaber battle in the movie, but I would found it more believable if Rey was the one on the losing side and somehow managed to escape HIM. Then took the time to properly train. There are theories out there that she is also a skywalker, but both Vader/Anakin and Luke weren't THAT bad-ass straight out the gate.
3)The CGI characters. This is a minor complaint, but in a movie where there is a return of practical effects and actors in costumes/make-up, it felt out of place to have 2 prominent characters be CGI. It felt really distracting to me.
4)Some of the humor felt a little out of place. I don't mind that there's humor in the movie (there always were with Star Wars) but there were some moments where the scene felt serious and a joke was added in and just seemed unnecessary to me. For example when Poe first meets Kylo. Kylo had just stopped a blaster in mid-air (pretty cool shot), and now he's captured Poe by freezing him one spot. There's a lot of tension in the scene and it kind of gets ruined when Poe turns to him and basically jokes about how he can't hear him because Kylo is wearing a mask.
5)Domhnall Gleeson. It honestly hurts me to type this, but I was so disappointed in his acting in this. I've seen him put in some amazing performances in other films, but I felt he was easily the worst in this. It's like he read a handbook on how to act as an stereotypical evil dictator and just went with it.
Now let's talk about some of the good things.
1)Daisy Ridley. Wow, she was quite amazing in this. She was very multi-layered and pulled it off quite well. And I liked her character a lot as well.
2)BB-8. I already fell in love with the little guy before the movie, so some of you might say I'm biased. But based on audience reaction it seems like he went down very well and got lots of good reaction. He was funny and oh so cute.
3)Kylo Ren. I thought he was a pretty cool villain. I liked that he's still growing in a sense. Flawed, still having "fears". But he also did some pretty cool things. I already mentioned stopping the blaster mid-air. Or freezing people in one spot.
4)Obviously the special effects were really good. The battles were just amazing.
5)The Nods to past Star Wars. Not just seeing characters like Han Solo return, but other things like "I've got a bad feeling about this" returning or even just parallels with the new characters. Like Rey growing up on a desert planet like Luke/Anakin and obviously being strong with the force like they were.
6)The Plot. I felt the movie did a good job of setting up the story (and stories to come). I felt like it made sense. The movie felt like it was constantly moving forward instead of getting dragged down with senate meetings (*cough prequels *cough*).
So yeah, I did really enjoy it and would easily see it again, but I didn't think it was a perfect film. I still look forward to future installments (including the spin-off movies).