Review: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens

This review of Star Wars: The Force Awakens will contain spoilers. I recommend you see the movie first before you continue to read. Seeing as it has been out for a month, I would be surprised if you cared enough to read this review but haven’t seen the film yet. That said, come to your own conclusions about The Force Awakens, but don’t expect to be surprised by anything this movie has to offer.

Firstly, I want to say that I went into this moving hoping that I would love it. Inevitably, my expectations coloured my reception of the film, and perhaps my expectations were too high. That said, I have seen The Force Awakens twice now and my initial criticisms of the film hold up after a second viewing. Star Wars: The Force Awakens is not a bad movie, but it is not a great movie. I did enjoy it more the second time around and it does many things very well. I especially loved the young new actors, the diverse cast, and the reliance on practical effects. That aside, Star Wars: The Force Awakens has the standard weaknesses all too common in today’s actions movies while lacking most of the strengths of the original trilogy.

Speaking of the original trilogy, Star Wars: The Force Awakens seeks to mimic A New Hope (and indeed, all three of the original Star Wars films) in almost every respect. In fact, the parallels and moments of nostalgia come so fast and often that they seem to be pandering to a fan base that was going to pay to see this movie no matter what. The fan base did not need to be constantly reminded, “Hey look at this thing from the original trilogy!” to enjoy the movie. Yet the movie is rife with self-referential moments that serve to forward an over-familiar plot. We get it: this is a throwback to the original trilogy. Let’s all forget those awful prequels. They clearly did nothing right. But did they?

At least the prequels expanded the universe and introduced us to something new. They created a richly detailed world inhabited with politics, cultures, and social structures that the original trilogy only began to hint at. The Prequel Trilogy was Lucas covering new ground in a familiar universe; The Force Awakens covers familiar ground and plays it safe. The pendulum has swung too far. By trying to avoid the mistakes George Lucas made in the prequel trilogy (and I will admit there were many), J.J. Abrams and company essentially remade A New Hope. This movie felt like a reboot in the same vein as the J.J. Abrams Star Trek movies: The same plot with the same characters, tweaked a little bit. Covering the same ground in a new way has worked for J. J. Abrams twice before, so why not apply the same formula to Star Wars? Short answer: THIS IS NOT A REBOOT. This is Episode VII. SEVEN. This should be a continuation of the story that ended with Episode VI. Yet the original trilogy is nearly made irrelevant by this film.

The ground the rebels gained in the original trilogy is either ignored or it is completely erased by the end of the film. Thirty years have passed since the end of the original trilogy and yet it seems like that intervening time was filled with inaction, regression, and impotence on the part of our favourite Star Wars heroes. The Rebellion is now “The Resistance” but who they are resisting and for how long is very difficult to discern. In fact, at one point the bad guys seem to state that “The New Republic” supports The Reisistance which begs the question: Why is The Resistance, as a separate entity from The New Republic Fleet, even necessary?

The Empire is absent and now a splinter group called “The First Order” is present with little explanation as to where they came from, how long they’ve been around, and what their motivations are. Does The First Order hold most of the galaxy? Is that why The Resistance exists separately from The Republic? Then why would the Republic let it be an open secret that they support The Resistance? The existing balance of power in the galaxy is nebulous at best. However, the destruction of The New Republic makes it clear that the balance of power has shifted.

The final act of the movie is as predictable as it is inevitable. They must destroy the space station before it destroys them. That is exactly the plot of the last fifteen minutes of A New Hope. Nothing, not even the big “twist” is surprising. Han’s death was as telegraphed as plot points can get. I leaned over to my wife after the first scene featuring Kylo Ren and said, “Kylo Ren is Han’s son and Han is going to die at the end of the film.” I hadn’t read anything or seen anything to spoil it for me but it was just so blatantly obvious. The plot doesn’t even attempt at mystery, plopping out key details about characters at odd times and in dialogue scenes sandwiched between strong action set pieces. Snoke just happened to remind Kylo who is father was in one of the most anticlimactic character reveals in cinematic history. If the plan was not to make a big deal of Kylo’s parentage then why not just put that information in the opening crawl?

The best special effects moment in the film happens right at the beginning when Kylo Ren freezes a blaster shot in the air with the force. That was something we had not yet seen in a Star Wars film, but after that, moments where the special effects stand out are few and far between. The understated special effects are a moment of triumph for those harkening back to the practical effects days of yore. But let’s not throw out the baby with the bathwater. We should be able to recognize Lucas’s (and Bay’s, and Jackson’s, et cetera) overuse of special effects and find a happy balance.

There were many times in this film where I wanted a cgi flyover shot of a new planet or city. Everything felt too small for Star Wars. Jakku was just a scavenger village and some decrepit Empire tech. The planet Maz Kanata is on is literally the cantina from A New Hope expanded and built next to a lake. There is nothing else. Does the planet even get a name on screen when they are approaching it? It certainly doesn’t get the dignity of a respectable spaceport. All we get to see are tracking shots inside the rebooted cantina. Good job Abrams! You stood on the shoulders of giants and the best you could do was to plagiarize. The Resistance Base was hardly on screen at all and it only gave the impression of being small. In A New Hope we get a moisture farm (exterior and interior), a Jawa Sandcrawler (exterior and interior), Sand People, Obi Wan’s hut, Mos Eisley, the cantina, and the Millennium Falcon’s hanger and that is all on a single planet (Tatooine), in the first half hour of the film!

The first 45 minutes of the movie are really strong and but after the scenes on and around Jakku, every scene becomes a copy of a scene in the original trilogy. The second half is filled with moments that had me scratching my head. Why the heck did “The Resistance” (a name that is recognized by a scavenger slave that has never left Jakku—so I must assume this group is large and feared in the galaxy right?) send some 17 X-Wings (and only X-Wings—Where are their other ships?! A-wings? B-Wings? Y-WINGS!?) on a vital mission to blow up Starkiller Base and save the galaxy? Why does Leia hug Rey when they have never met and ignore Chewy walking by? Why does R2-D2 magically turn on when the plot needs him? (I know—the force.)

And why is Rey great at everything she does? She is a pilot, mechanic, saboteur, automatic-jedi, who does not need her hand held. That moment where she tells Fin twice not to hold her hand sticks out as a little forced to me—the writing, not the acting—It feels like the committee that made this film said they needed one more explicit line to point out that Rey is a strong independent female ‘who don’t need no man.’ In the post-Furiosa age we need not point out that our female characters are strong. We just need to shut up and let them be strong. The number one rule of writing narrative: Show, don’t tell. In the rest of the film Rey was a complete badass and it did not need to be pointed out. She just was.

Though the worst crime of the film for me was Starkiller Base. The element that was so derivative that the line, “It’s another death star,” is actually in the film. When they were writing this movie how did that line not raise a red flag for them? It would not have been a problem if Starkiller Base was this nebulous threat that was rumored or if it was a main feature in the film but they failed to destroy it. How it was used is what really bothers me.

Number 1. It destroys The New Republic in seconds with no cinematic buildup to that moment, excepting Domhnall Gleeson’s, admittedly awesome, psychotic speech. The effect is something like this: ‘Oh you know that New Republic you know nothing about? Want to find out more about it? Well too bad! It’s gone now.’ The audience does not care about The New Republic because we haven’t even seen it yet.
Number 2. The only purpose Starkiller Base serves in the plot is to erase the last 30 years of Star Wars history so the writers at Disney can continue a new (old) story without the trouble of a detailed backstory (or—and this really makes the nerds mad—sorting out what is canon in hundreds of Star Wars novels and comics). Instead, Disney just hit the reset button.
Number 3. After the events of Episode IV and Episode VI, who in their right mind would set about building a ginormous, world-destroying space station that costs untold heaps of money and then use it at the start of a war before there is any real threat to—the home world? Space station? System?—wherever Snoke and The First Order are based.
Number 4. 17 freaking X-wings.
Number 5. The explanation for how Starkiller Base was not another Death Star was literally, ‘Look how much bigger this thing is.’ The Second Death Star was way bigger than the first Death Star!
Number 6. Why in the name of the force did they use the gun on this thing when the weapon can devour stars? Would it not be better to keep a weapon like the gun in reserve and just devour the stars of your enemies? That would kill people just as dead. I also would suggest that any civilization that has the capability to devour stars would not be threatened by SEVENTEEN FREAKING X-WINGS.
Number 7. It puts the bad guys and good guys on the same footing as they were at the end of Episode IV. Sure the bad guys and good guys have new names now but now we get the same old story instead of a new one.

So instead of a story where the good guys have to deal with the trials and tribulations of being the ones with the power and rebuilding order and peace in the galaxy, we get the exact same underdog story that was told 30 years ago with new actors and a shiny J.J. Abrams polish. Starkiller Base was used as a big eraser, erasing not only the last 30 years of time between Episode VI and Episode VII but also erasing the meaning and triumph of their victories in Episode VI. Now we get to watch two more movies that are forced to play out (in broad terms) like the original trilogy: The next movie will be full of struggle and training for our heroes ending in a defeat, while the third movie will bring an ultimate challenge and a choice for our heroes ending in a victory. I will also predict one of our new heroes will probably die for their friends, if not in the next movie, in the third film. Probably Poe.

So yeah, Star Wars: The Force Awakens was alright. It will not stand the test of time and it puts a ton of pressure on the next director to do something completely different and original for Episode VIII. I hear Episode VIII got pushed back 6 months due to re-writes. Surprise, surprise.