For those of you who haven’t seen the original trilogy or weren’t born yet, then I believe you’ll love the J.J. Abrams directed “Star Wars: The Force Awakens”. However, for those of you who grew up during the time of the original films, and had a genuine love and admiration for them, I’m not going to recommend this new entry for any of you. Save your money. Here’s why:
First and foremost, this is a complete remake of Episode 4: A New Hope. Beat for beat in my book. You have the key droid that houses critical information the rebellion, or in this case, ‘the resistance’, needs to ensure ‘the new order’, i.e. the new version of the Empire, doesn’t get its hands on. Why? So Luke Skywalker can’t be found. That’s right, much like old Ben Kenobi in Episode 4, Luke’s gone into hiding. On top of those similarities, you’ve got a death star in the form of a hardened planet that can destroy other planets as needed, and you also have a poor man’s Darth Vader rip off in Kylo Ren.
Kylo Ren, the son of Han and Leia, is a troubled young man who turned to the dark side after his training with Luke went horribly wrong (this is hinted at by Leia in the film). Much like old Ben trying to train Anakin to stay with the good guy’s, Luke tried and failed with Mr. Ren. I all but rolled my eyes at that plot point as being far too similar to what’s come before in the Star Wars Mythology.
I’m not saying this film is a stinking pile of Jar Jar crap, but come on , even the ending looked like I was re-watching the ending of A New Hope just before the Death Star is supposed to take out Yavin, and the Rebel base. Additionally, (Spoiler Alert so stop reading now) Han’s death scene was as lame and disrespectful to this iconic character as you’re going to get– So as his whiny kid, Kylo Ren, stands toe to toe with him on bridge that leads into a deadly abyss, Han is eventually impaled by Ren’s lightsaber and pushed off said bridge and into oblivion. Sorry, Han deserved a much better fate, and what better way to let him die than letting him potentially fly the Millennium Falcon into this Deathstar 2.0 and save some lives? Missed opportunity in general, and if you reference the George Kirk death from Star Trek (2009), also an Abrams film, it really would have been the more ideal fate for our favorite smuggler.
I would even go as far as saying the special effects were a mixed bag as well. Case in point, several of the Star Destroyer effects shots in space looked completely stagnant. There wasn’t a ton of fluid movement like I’d remembered from the original trilogy’s ships, and that’s just inexcusable for 2015!! There were some shots on the New Order’s planet that looked completely green screen to me, whereas a lot of the stuff Abrams shot on the planet Jakku, out in the desert, looked marvelous. Nonetheless, the look of the film felt disjointed to me because of this. More importantly, even the light sabre battles looked like they were choreographed by a drunken pirate. In retrospect, I gotta give props to George Lucas for at least nailing that aspect of the prequel trilogy by having some really strong lightsaber duels.
As far as the new characters played by Daisy Ridley (Rey), John Boyega (Finn), and Oscar Isaac (Poe Dameron), I’d say I enjoyed Isaac’s character the most– seemed to have the most charisma of the trio even if he had the least amount of screen time. By in large this new cast was much more digestible than the two leads from the prequel trilogy, so that’s a good thing for sure.
Last but not least, why the hell would you blow an opportunity to include Mark Hamill (Luke Skywalker) in this film beyond the 30 seconds we got to see him at the very end? Oh I get it, you’re setting up the next film, but that’s just weak writing in my opinion. Fans would have loved to have seen Luke and Han together again, even if just for one key scene. I know I would have. Instead we get the longest stare imaginable from Skywalker to Rey after she shows up on his once secret location. Felt like a rip off, and overall I really hope it pays off in a big way for Episode 8.
It honestly felt like Abrams took chunks of mise-en-scenes from the originals, along with key plot points from A New Hope, shoved them into The Force Awakens and the end result was a very average, mixed bag. Best I can give this flick is 2 1/2 stars. Nuff said.
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