Buried underneath the melodramatic fan reactions, there's a good movie here

Rating: 6/10 (30 December 2015)

My Disney cynicism runs pretty deep - but not unfounded, what with the Mouse's recent announcements of killing Slave Leia merch and banning blasters from their theme parks (hello? It's Star Wars!) - so you can imagine my level of anticipation for "The Force Awakens" wasn't all that great.
Still, certain promises were made in the trailers, and all I really wanted to see was the Millennium Falcon fly again And it does, beautifully. Also, there was a flamethrower Stormtrooper. Talk about hitting the right buttons.
I can't adequately describe my schoolboy glee when Han and Chewie walked in. Harrison Ford is beyond terrific in this movie and he made me want to see the rest of the band back together.
I have a theory that a lot of this movie's appeal (magic, if you will) lies in wanting to see those long-dormant characters. Just their various reveals is enough substance of that. It's very in-the-moment, emotionally rekindling. And who knows how well the this will hold up down the line on rewatch? But as a movie, it's pretty cool. All of the fun aspects of Star Wars are here. Is it fan service? Yeah. A remixing of "Star Wars" (1977)? Absolutely.
But I had a good time.
7/10
Revised 7/1/16:
Sadly, that appeal wears off a bit and the holes tend to be more glaring on the small screen. It's not all that fun as a rehash of "Star Wars", and killing off Han Solo just to give the emo villain some depth is infuriating. Aside from Rey, the new characters are bland, and it functions like most of Abrams' films: frenetic, but empty.
It's not a bad movie, at all, but they were clearly going for fan concession. And that just doesn't hold up after the first buzz. I know it's the first movie in a trilogy, and we have to see where this is going . . . but how many times have we been asked to do that in the past 15 years? This should function on its own.
6/10