© Disney 2015
Well, the time has finally arrived!
Yes friends and readers the day when the newest edition in the Star Wars franchise has been carted out. This time “Under New Management,” namely the corporate banner of Disney and the directorial reigns have been given to J.J. Abrams. Its been out for about two weeks now and still going strong, to date it has grossed over 1 billion world-wide. Not too shabby for Disney, and this is after the “tyrannical” rule of Michael Eisner (but that is for another post).
Since I am a former Star Wars buff and nerd extraordinaire I will give you my full take on this film. As always spoilers will abound in this lengthy post so for those who have not seen the film read at your own discretion.
First off lets talk about the film from a plot standpoint.
This film follows two of the seven basic plot lines, the Overcoming the Monster plot with a dash of, The Quest plot line. In other words this Star Wars film follows A New Hope almost to the letter.
The movie is very formulaic and it reuses themes and scenes from the other Star Wars movies extensively. The plot arc concerning the map the BB-8 unit carries mirrors R2-D2’s almost exactly. The capture of Poe Dameron and his subsequent torture at the hands of the Sith Kylo Ren is pretty much Princess Leia’s story as well. The First Order, which is simply a new moniker for the Empire, is still fighting for dominance with the Rebel Alliance… I mean the Resistance…. And there’s a Death Star present but its different now because its bigger.
Literally.
For the sake of brevity I won’t list ALL of the plot points that are mirrored in The Force Awakens because frankly that would be summarizing the entire movie.
However, as I was watching this film there was enough new stuff and interesting characters that held my attention and kept this movie from being a total rehash in the same vein that Superman Returns was a rehash of the first two Superman films. Some of the new characters that were introduced breathe a bit of life into the franchise.
John Boyega as Finn.
Star Wars: The Force Awakens.
© Disney 2015.
I like this character. John Boyega plays it very well. The confusion that he feels after seeing death for the first time is conveyed very well through his actions and body language. His fear towards the First Order is understandable and he wants to do nothing but run. But he finds a kinship with Poe and with Rey and sticks around going so far as to fight his former comrades with Anakin’s light saber.
He is immediately interesting as this is our first window in to what the inner workings of the Empire and the people who live within its borders are like. He’s self-effacing and down to earth without being boring or overly comical. Finn gives us a human face to the faceless cannon fodder that was once the Storm Troopers.
I really want this guy to stick around. Even though he has been the target of really stupid and ignorant internet trash talking about Star Wars becoming “PC” now because there’s a black man in it who isn’t Lando Calrissian.
I hope he’s not dead, but being wrapped in white robes on that slab of a table at the end of the film does not give me hope.
Daisy Ridley as Rey.
Star Wars: The Force Awakens.
© Disney 2016
This character does not infuriate me. She isn’t Bella Swan, thank God. But she’s no Ellen Ripley either.
Rey suffers from the same problems that most protagonists in a story like Star Wars tend to. Compared to the supporting cast she is incredibly boring and she suffers the most when she’s up against Finn and Han Solo. I found myself more interested in Finn’s story and where he was going than her’s. It didn’t help that at many times Finn’s story overlapped with Rey’s thematically. I believe this was supposed to be a red herring from the writer/director. You are lead to believe that the hero of the story might be Finn at times so that Rey’s emergence at the end would come as a surprise.
Except that since Finn is a better written character it ends up feeling like a more interesting story was canned just so we could go back to faffing about with Jedis and have more light saber duels.
Ultimately the biggest problem with Rey, the one that really undermines her as a character, is that she is extremely OPed.
As of right now she is an expert mechanic, pilot, and one of the most powerful nascent Jedi in existence capable of taking on and beating a Sith who is years ahead of her. And no the “he was wounded” hand wave doesn’t work because it only seemed to be a problem when the plot called for it to be a problem. In truth, Finn and Rey should have been Force choked to death minutes into the final fight at the end.
She knows mechanics from her being a scavenger I get that. But she’s a scavenger when does she have time to be pilot? In A New Hope we know Luke is a good pilot because he actually has a goddamn plane. He has a T-16 back home that he used to bulls eye Wamp rats in. What ship did Rey use to practice and hone her skills? Is there a Beggar’s Canyon somewhere in the desert that I missed?
She seems to spend all her time combing the junk yards bringing in valuable parts in exchange for food, not exactly the kind of environment that lends itself to practicing piloting skills. She vouches for herself as being a pilot but it seems more like a plot contrivance than something the story actually supports.
And even if she is a pilot, what makes anyone think that she would just automatically know how to pilot the Millennium Falcon? Especially when she lampshades it by remarking at the end of that particular chase scene that she doesn’t know how she did it. Are the writers and directors implying that the Force somehow did it???
Also her immediate and total control of the Force with NO training was troublesome.
Her being able to resist Ren’s mind dives made sense. Leia was resistant to Darth Vader’s interrogations as well. But when Rey was able to pull stuff out of Ren’s mind is where the movie dove once again into serious “Mary Sue” territory.
She could also perform the Jedi Mind trick with only a little difficulty. The scene telling the Storm Trooper to release her played out a bit like Jessica using the Voice on her captors in Dune. In The Force Awakens the scene was played for laughs but this is a girl who 30 minutes before thought that Luke Skywalker and the Jedi were just myths. How did she even know she could influence the weak-minded through the Force, much less how to actually do it? Luke wasn’t able to perform that until the third film.
The light saber fight with Kylo Ren was especially atrocious and frankly the worst out of the all the other examples listed. You almost can see the writers pulling the Force out of their butts to justify the outcome. There is no way that any of the movies, both the sequels and the horrid prequels, support an untrained padawan beating anyone who is actually trained in the Force let alone a Sith apprentice ( or whatever Kylo Ren’s rank is supposed to be).
Ever.
It didn’t help that 20 minutes before Han Solo smacked Finn with, “That’s not how the Force works!”
Gwendoline Christie as Captain Phasma.
Star Wars: The Force Awakens.
© Disney 2015.
As far as side character go she is awesome! She is by far my favorite side character in the film. She carries herself really well in her armor and she was self-possessed and in control at all times. Her response when being questioned about FN-2187’s insurrection, “It was his first offense,” was delivered with just a touch of irritability. As if to say she knows how to do her job.
She cuts an impressive and imposing figure and that chrome finish is just way too cool. Everything you’d want from a Field Commander. I hope she isn’t dead. Although that would not be the first time a really cool character would be killed off unceremoniously in a Star Wars trilogy (Grand Moff Tarkin and Darth Maul come to mind. What is up with this franchise doing stuff like that?).
Harrison Ford as Han Solo.
Star Wars: The Force Awakens.
© Disney 2015.
For the first time in a long time I was actually glad to see Harrison Ford in a movie and I enjoyed watching his performance.
I saw Ender’s Game and I saw Anchor Man 2 and for the last decade or so Harrison Ford’s performances have felt really stale to me. This time it seems that he has remembered how to act and emote, I felt like I was watching Han Solo, not just Harrison Ford.
I don’t know how I feel about Han getting killed. I wasn’t outraged, nor was I terribly surprised. I didn’t gasp when it happened either. Looking back I felt like there should have been a little more rage from Chewie as this means his Life Debt would never be fulfilled. I think that if Chewie had thrown himself at Ren and gotten killed also that would have made more sense thematically to me at least.
I will chalk it up to just one more body in the list of bodies that Ren has on his resume and one more regret that Luke will have to deal with in the later films.
Adam Driver as Kylo Ren.
Star Wars: The Force Awaken.
© Disney 2015.
Honestly I don’t think much of our new baddie. We see him lose his temper several times and destroy things. He comes off more as child throwing a tantrum than anything else, a very angry and somewhat intimidating child, but a child nonetheless.
He is mired in self-doubt and weakness. He even goes so far as to invoke his dead grandfather. In a very dramatic shot of the twisted remains of Darth Vader’s helmet. A stirring but completely useless shot that was seen in just about every trailer approaching the release of the movie.
Kylo Ren is not fully trained yet he can rip information out of people’s heads and cause unconsciousness in the case of Rey when he meets her that first time.
On a tangent:
I don’t think he should have unmasked himself until Han confronted him on that catwalk. It would have made the reveal a bit more climactic and meaningful, but since he had already taken off his helmet before Han confronted him, taking it off then didn’t really mean anything.
All the rest of them.
I liked seeing Admiral Akbar again and seeing Nien Nunb in the seat of an X-wing was pretty cool. I was left wondering where Lando Calrissian and Wedge Antilles were though. Maybe they’ll make an appearance in the later films? I mean you brought back just about everyone else why not Lando and Wedge especially Wedge, Commander of Rogue Squadron? It doesn’t seem to me like he would be a guy that would be waiting on the side lines when there are battles to fight and a perfectly good X-wing to pilot.
The problems with the movie largely stem from the lack luster abilities of the director. J.J. Abrams is just not a very good director in my opinion. He wiped his ass with the Star Trek franchise largely, and his original material was always meh. His movies have largely been disposable entertainment. His amateurish understanding of film technique and cinematic tension is glaringly obvious in many places.
Having Ren unmask himself to Rey in the interrogation room should not have happened. Like I said before it would have had much more cinematic punch to hold off on that until he met Han on that catwalk.
Using the Force as a Deus ex Machina multiple times, using the Jedi Mind Trick as a gag, having a completely untrained individual be able to defeat a dark Jedi is just lazy writing to me. Especially if you’re going to have a chasm open up to split them apart at the end anyway.
I don’t have to remind you that even with a few months of training from Yoda, Luke got his ass handed to him by Vader. Vader was toying with Luke the whole time in Cloud City. And he had his reasons for keeping Luke alive. Here there is no reason for Ren to want to keep Rey alive and therefore no reason why Rey should be able to win this fight. But she, “used the Force” and was able to win.
I didn’t notice any annoying blur to focus shots that were so prevalent in Man of Steel. And there was no lens flare abuse, thank God! I think there was one or two quick zoom shots but they didn’t bother me. I did love seeing the tie fighters flying toward the camera with the sun setting behind them. That was a really beautiful shot.
Since this movie showed Ren to be a fairly weak and lukewarm character I have to wonder where the trilogy is going to go from here. Rey is already stronger than Ren at this point. Why does she even need training. Is this trilogy going to shift gears and focus more on Ren and his descent into the dark side? And if so is Rey really the ultimate prize for Ren?
Ren is afraid of Rey, why I don’t know. We know Ren needs more training because Snoke (what is it with this franchise and dumb names for important characters?) said that at the end of the movie. But what cinematic value is there when the hero, I assume that to be Rey, already has all the power and control that she could possibly need to defeat the bad guy at the beginning of the story?
Unfortunately, I have a sinking feeling that this is the best J.J. Abrams can do. I don’t think he can improve upon what he’s done here because I simply don’t believe he has the talent for it. Unless his writers can find a way to weave around some of the glaring flaws of The Force Awakens the best I can hope for is another film of similar quality to this one.
On a final note: WTF is up the music? It was largely shit with no exception. It reused sections of John Williams score from the original trilogy and shoe horned them into scenes without any rhyme or reason. Was this arrogance or just that these cheap bastards didn’t want to pay John Williams to make an original score? Which is a damn shame considering even the prequels had Duel of the Fates.
BEHOLD!
This movie made a lot more sense than Episode I: The Phantom Menace ever did. Its strength lies with its simplistic story and well-defined good and bad guys. It’s easy to follow. Where the trilogy goes from here is anyone’s guess. I just hope the First Order doesn’t have another one of these mega super weapons hanging around somewhere. If they do maybe the Ewoks can come back and save the day again in the third film just like they did way back in 1983.
Yaaaaaaayyyy. -_-
Scherrer Madness 