STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS SPOILER Discussion

"You've grown very old."

"And you've grown into something far worse."

Saw the movie last night in IMAX 70mm and I am totally disappointed. I utterly hated that movie, probably even more than I did the prequels. Before you guys label me as a curmudgeon, please listen to my reasons as to why.

This movie relies completely on nostalgia, and it does so in the laziest of ways. The movie leads the audience into feeling a certain way when certain “old cast” characters are on the screen. Ok cool Han Solo and Chewbacca are back together on screen... that's nice, but what are they going to do. Seeing Harrison Ford on screen should not be the pinnacle of excitement for the movie. When “Chewy were Home” is the type of thing that is meant to get the crowd really excited and that's it then you didn't make another episode installment, you just filmed a cast reunion.

The most utterly painful moments of the movie are when Carrie Fisher is on screen. She looks horrible and the fact that she has not acted in 20+ years is more than apparent. Her lines of dialogue are cringe worthy and I really don't quite understand her character. Really all Leia's position is, is General of the Resistance? After the cliff hanger at the end of Return Of the Jedi and all the Yoda prophecy about “there is another” and Luke telling her “you will learn the ways of the Force” your telling me after 30 years all she is is a General of the Resistance and we hear no talk of her being a Jedi? To me that kind of ruins what Yoda and Obi Wan discussed.

What the heck is the deal with Captain Phasma? Your most interesting and cool looking character is not utilized at all? She does nothing in the movie, and what bothers me it that Gwendoline Christie said in interviews that Phasma is a better shot than the Stormtroopers yet she never fires at all in the movie. It was a complete waist to put Phasma in the movie. I guess they just needed another female character and needed and extra action figure to sell.

Build up for the Knights of Ren yet we get absolutely no development and all we get is one shot of them that we already saw in the trailers.

C3P0's Red arm only gets a passing reference and nothing in depth.

The scene with the 2 gangs confronting Han Solo on the Falcon is so bad. Not only is the acting from the gangs terrible and uninteresting, bit the scene where a random monster starts attacking has absolutely no impact and has horrendous CGI.

Finn's reason for changing sides was so weak. What was special about him that he felt affected by the violence of the First Order more than other Storm-troopers? This lack of in depth explanation and clarity, really hurt the movie in this area and others.

This movie does nothing to make the Star Wars Universe feel bigger. In the original trilogy every single movie had new new creatures and planets making the Galaxy feel very big. Obi Wan traveling with Luke on Tatooine we see many different creatures walking amongst them. In this movie the only time we see anything close to this is in the bar scene when we see different creatures, But this is so swift we barely can tell what is going on. I guess you could say the one big “cow type” looking thing drinking the water with Finn on Jakku, was a new addition to star wars wildlife, but if that is all you have to showcase in the vast world George Lucas created, then you don't understand the atmosphere of Star Wars.


A Stromtrooper with an expandable axe as a weapon is not a segment of action that fits naturally into the atmosphere of Star Wars. Plus the standoff that Trooper had with Finn felt like something that belongs in a comic-book movie and not Star Wars. It was meant to be a cool sequence but instead for me it felt they were pushing the boundaries of Star Wars action.


This movie desperately needed more of Luke Skywalker. The lack of Jedi presence in this film made it feel like it totally ignored the Force atmosphere the prequels did well. The use of the “Force” in this movie felt so out of place and well forced (pun intended). It did not feel like a natural “awakening” of the Force. A true Jedi being a big part of the film could have remedied this because they exude the Force so well. I personally would have liked to see Luke at the beginning of the film in a sort of flashback, showing him training Kylo Ren and how Ren fell away from him into the dark-side. Not only would this clear up the the lack of clarity to how Kylo became a Sith, but it would bring more of a Jedi presence to film, while keeping the plot of “searching for Luke” intact.

Seriously the reveal of Luke at the end was so weak. Firstly, after the rumors of him finding a Jedi temple all we see is him standing on this barren mountain? That's it? There literally was nothing else around...... just Luke on a mountain was very corny to me. Also the forced emotionality in the last shot with Rey holding out the light-saber was very annoying. I was like “when is he gonna force grab that light-saber from her”? Is she just gonna stand there emotionally holding the saber out there forever until her rotater cuff snaps? There has to be a better way to end the movie.


This movie completely and utterly ruined the integrity of light-saber duels. Not only was the light-saber duel we got in the movie poorly choreographed, dull, and unexciting, but it threw away all precedent. The fact that Finn and untrained former Storm-trooper, who didn't even know what a light-saber was, could stand 1 second with Kylo Ren who was trained by both Snoke (who we presume is Plageuis) and Luke Skywalker, completely ruins any integrity duels have from now on. Just for perspective, in Revenge of the Sith, Kit Fisto a fully trained Jedi Master on the Jedi Council was taken out and killed by Palpatine in a second during his arrest scene. Yet in this movie I am meant to believe that Finn a former Storm-trooper without any Force powers, and even Rey a girl who is untrained and just learned the Force basically that day, could stand even 1 second in a battle with someone trained by Luke one of the most powerful Jedi ever, and Snoke who probably trained Palpatine. This type of clear deviation from what could be seen as believable from what we now about the characters not only confuses the audience but it effectively ruined the presence that Kylo Ren had as a powerful character. One of the positives of the movie WAS Kylo Ren. Adam driver will be a star because his acting was superb, but they ruined the character in the second half on the movie. By allowing both Finn and Rey to survive a duel with him, it completely voids all that came before in the movie in terms of his power. The first thing we see from him, is him force blocking a freaking blaster shot, then we see him interrogate people using Sith mind tricks. We have all this build up of an extremely powerful character and then he loses to a girl who was waving around a light-saber like a baton. It presents an completely unbalanced view of the power Kylo Ren has. I know they were trying to point out that he was a flawed Sith that was not yet fully trained, but his previous displays of power contradict what we see in the end battle. This overall leaves a sour taste in my mouth about the main antagonist of the film. I would have rather this film have no light-saber duel,because not only would we not have seen what seems to be a lack of athleticism in Daisy Ridley as an actor, which dampers the hopes of good duels in the future, but it would have also kept Kylo Ren a strong character in the minds of the viewer. (Oh and all of a sudden Rey closes her eyes for a few seconds and suddenly is a master with a light-saber? Really?)

I did not buy Hux in this movie. For a movie with solid acting all around I found the actor who played Hux to be the worst. This movie tried to parallel the relationship with Tarkin and Vader to Hux and Kylo Ren and I just did not feel like Hux had Kylo Ren under control like Tarkin had Vader. During the Hitler style speech he gave to the First Order, I did not feel like that scene landed at all because of the acting of Hux. The emotion did not feel genuine and the facial expressions did not portray a charismatic leader. It felt like the actor who played Hux just yelled his lines in front of a green screen.

Ken Leung is an Asian actor who was in this movie as some sort of Captain of the Resistance who is supposed to be in Rogue One, when he delivered his lines during the Resistance strategy meeting, you can tell that he is not a good actor and Rouge One will be affected by that big time.

The 70mm IMAX portion was only 5 minutes long and the scene was Rey flying the Falcon on Jakku, which in my opinion was underwhelming.


For a movie that flaunted it's use of practical affects for a realistic watching experience you would think that the little amount of CGI they had in the movie would be aced. Unfortunately, many of the creatures in the bar scene screamed of poor CGI and the monster in the Millennium Falcon did as well. But most disappointing is the look of the 2 motion capture characters in Andy Serkis's Supreme Leader Snoke and Lupita Nyongo's Maz Katan, Both were a complete eye sore in terms of CGI realism. I mean the prequels 10 years ago nailed Yoda as a CGI character but in 2015 you can't perfect your 2 motion capture characters? Even Darth Maul's death fall back in 1999 looked way better than Han's did in 2015. Disney is the most resourceful company in the world an they can't master the look of the characters in their biggest movie ever? Speaking of Maz Katan.... what a poor character. All the hype around the mystery of Lupita Nyongo's and we get an orange creature with spectacles?

The way Rey encounters Luke's light-saber is done so poorly. Really she stumbles in a room and opens a chest? What is this Narnia? There are so many different ways she can could have encountered that saber that would have been much more impactful.

The only piece of dialogue I remember from the film that peaked my interest even once was when Han said “Luke went to find an early Jedi Temple”. Literally only that line was interesting and made me think “oh cool there going that
direction”. Maybe the Clone Army line was ok. All the other dialogue served the poor plot points and did not interest me.


You would think the one thing that would be a redeemable quality of any Star Wars movie is the score, but it seems John Williams is too old and should retire. We have 4 new main characters is the new film yet no new memorable themes at all. John Williams relied solely on his previous work in the original trilogy and provided nothing new which is most disappointing.


I guess the whole fleet of X-wing pilots attacking Tie Fighters was supposed to be the real top notch action in the film, and even though it looked cool I felt it very underwhelming.

I thought the plot points absolutely sucked. They are really summed up with the Resistance trying to find Luke. The First Order trying to find BB-8. And then the Resistance trying to blow up the Death Star. First of all I think the idea that the Death Star gets its energy from the sun is a pretty dumb concept, also it was unclear and abrupt how the Death Star just decided to blow up 4 Resistance Planets, it had no emotional weight. Worst of all the laziness of having the Death Star be destroyed by blasting a central console again is unbelievable.

While watching this movie, the tone to me, felt not like Star Wars but the first Avengers movie. The humor was not Star Wars like, but full of “blockbuster get the whole theater laughing” jokes. We had the type of action humor that we see in the Avengers where the Hulk punches someone without looking at them or Hawkeye shoots a guy with his bow while looking away. When Han Solo shot a guy while looking the other direction I knew right then that Disney is just fine treating Star Wars just like any other blockbuster property. I think this humor stems from the type of directors, and I think the reason I sensed Avengers so much was because Joss Whedon and JJ Abrams approached the movies in the same way, and brought their nerd catering directing style and made a homage type film. Star Wars should not be treated this way especially a new Episode in the series. Yes little hints at the old movies would be fine, but when your entire movie revolves around nostalgia and nothing new then you have not done enough to constitute a new Episode in the most revered franchises ever.


My biggest problem with the movie is that it plays way to safe. It looks upon the prequels and sees the poor acting and solves that by having good actors for the main 4. However the lack of originality and the fact that the movie adds nothing new at all accept for the 4 new characters is a huge downfall. I feel like JJ said as long as I don't have a Jar Jar and a Hayden Christensen I can just rely on nostalgia to carry the movie and then throw a few new characters in there. The movie added no new aspect to the franchise and just hands a baton the next director to actually make a movie next time. I honestly can only think of a few redeeming qualities: Adam Driver, BB 8, Chewbacca actually did some good fighting, they showed that monster chess table on the Falcon, and they didn't force a romance between Finn and Rey. Other than those small things I can't think of any and compared to the prequels, which are poor movies, they still had a large amount of redeemable qualities.

I commend those professional reviewers or celebrities that actually come out and give Star Wars a negative review, that actually takes courage now. That Fox News lady who poked fun at Star Wars got death threats and Brian Quin from Impractical Jokers said he hated the movie on Twitter, and the outrage forced him to take those tweets down. The hype and blindness about this movie and franchise is out of control.

I'm just pointing out that I hadn't watched the other movies prior to watching TFA (I read some stuff and watched some videos to get a grip on the story during the week) and I loved it. I loved how they didn't sexualize/objectify Rey. I loved how girls will be looking up to her for years (as well as many people will be crushing on her). I loved the action, the special effects. I loved Kylo Ren (and, holy shit, major crush on Adam Driver on the scenes he isn't wearing a helmet). He really sold me as a good villain, but also one in building. I was disappointed by the lack of Gwendoline Christie (as I read, she could have skyped her lines... second franchise this year to cast her, use her name and fame, and then use for 5 minutes). I was also confused about how many coincidences happened. And, something very cool: stormtroopers, apparently, learned to aim!!!

@nrocket3



Now to be fair, I haven't read your entire...essay...yet, but the main gist that I'm getting is that A.) The film didn't perfectly adhere to your headcanon of what a Star Wars movie should be, and B.) That it didn't transcend the art of filmmaking itself, neither of which are an entirely fair criticism of the film itself.

Now, it wasn't a perfect movie, but I would daresay it WAS a good movie, and certainly a whole lot better than what you portray.

I gave up halfway through @nrocket3's post. The same, nitpicky/irrelevant/misunderstood stuff blown out of all proportion I keep reading on other posts. If you apply that same scrutiny to ANY big blockbuster type movie it's going to come up short. I realize this movie was under the microscope being the return to the Star Wars universe, but people are simply being unfair to it imo.

After seeing TFA a third time, I'm convinced entirely that Rey is a decendant (probably granddaughter of Obi Wan). First, think about the perfect symmetry if the next films focus on the Granddaughter of Obi Wan Kenobi helping redeem the Grandson of Anakin Skywalker. Now, after Han, I could care less if Ren is redeemed...he's dead in my book but it would be a very good parallel completing what Obi Wan was unable to do. One major moment to back this up is the flashback/dream Rey has when touching the lightsaber. At one specific moment, you can CLEARLY hear Kenobi say "Rey." IF this is a dream of what Luke experienced, why does Obi Wan say Rey? I'm pretty sure the misdirection of us thinking Rey is Luke's will pay off...

@RorMachine

"The same, nitpicky/irrelevant/misunderstood stuff blown out of all proportion I keep reading on other posts. If you apply that same scrutiny to ANY big blockbuster type movie it's going to come up short."

When Han died there were some very audible gasps in the movie theatre. I think everyone saw it coming when he stepped out onto the platform but to kill of such an iconic character still shocked a lot of people. Chewie's roar was genuinely heartbreaking.

2 minor gripes from me about this film. The first is that I felt Captain Phasma was massively under-utilised. For such a bad ass looking character she barely got 5 minutes of screen time. Perhaps she'll be back in future instalments?

Secondly, I know it's a Star Wars movie but the 3rd act just seemed to follow the typical Star Wars formula of space fight to blow up the big bad base coinciding with a light sabre battle. Every Star Wars film apart from Empire and episode 3 ends this way (They just had a light sabre battle) and I know it's kinda the trade mark climax of these films but it would be nice if they did something a little different. Also, this base wasn't just a Death Star, it was a friggin planet that they turned into a massive canon and it was destroyed by a handful of X-wings? Did the empire/first order not learn their lessons from the first 2 Death Stars about keeping your base's one weakness totally exposed? :-)

Like I said, these are very minor gripes from what is an immensely enjoyable film. I still rate Empire as the best with this coming in a very close second. I have a feeling that episode 8 could actually turn out to be quite dark. The ending with Luke gave me goosebumps. I can't wait to see how this trilogy ends!

I like the way Rey's character development is handled. She's going to be a kick ass Jedi.

Not sure about anyone else, but I thought Kylo Ren was a great villain.

I loved the build-up to his confrontation with Han Solo. Throughout the film we got to see them BOTH dread facing each other, and even during the scene on the bridge you could see the conflict in Kylo. That moment when even after Kylo ran his saber through Han, Han still held his son's face one last time... Great, great scene.

Most definitely wasn't Darth Plagueis? Says who? They don't explicitly say so either way. I'll stick with him being Darth Plagueis until there's a better theory.

What!? Grif didn't like something?! But he's always so positive and happy about everything.