Great characters;great story with some minor flaws

Rating: 6/10 (17 December 2015)

Let me start out by saying that I think this is a fantastic movie and that my opinions are only MY personal opinions and shouldn't discourage someone from seeing this movie.
I saw the very first showing of the Force Awakens in my theater, and was practically on the edge of my seat bouncing with excitement the moment the big Lucasfilm logo appeared. This story introduced new characters and reintroduced original characters at the perfect time. Some people will argue that the film contained "too much comedy," but if you really think about it, so did the other Star Wars films (relationship between C3P0 and R2D2, Chewbacca, etc.)
Secondly, the movie had AMAZING special effects. The CGI was spot-on and very interesting. As always, John Williams has composed a masterpiece of a film score. This movie has some pretty emotional moments and I think that you will be satisfied with how it ends.
Now onto some negatives. Just a reminder that these are PERSONAL OPINIONS. My main problem is that I felt like not all of the ideas were original. I felt like Abrams felt the obligation to incorporate TOO much of Episode IV into the Force Awakens. However, I would not say that the two movies are parallel, as there are many twists and surprises.
I also felt like the movie jumped around a lot. The sequence of events seemed to happen too fast and it was a bit hard to follow at some times. In my own opinion, I also feel like Kylo Ren is not "evil" enough. I'll be a bit lenient on this flaw, as Darth Vader is a pretty hard character to live up to.
This isn't really a flaw for most people, but if you have been a true Star Wars geek and followed the Expanded Universe, like I have, you may be a bit disappointed to find that not all the events or people in the Force Awakens match up with those in books/games/etc.
Overall, I give this movie an 8/10 and a big thumbs-up. The story was amazing, the characters were fantastic, and the special effects were spot-on. The only thing that I feel like J.J. Abrams should do to improve the story in Episodes VIII and IX is to not try to make them too similar to the original trilogy, and instead make them their own original stories, while still following the events that happened after Return of the Jedi. This makes them much less predictable and more interesting to see.
Thank you for reading my review. Now if you'll excuse me, my Sith alliance awaits me on The Old Republic! :)