After watching the new Star Wars I was not sure what to think. I have seen all 6 previous films and loved them all including the prequels even though nothing is as good as the original trilogy. This new film I liked but it really left me questioning a lot of the creative decisions and hopefully these problems will be addressed in episodes 8 and 9.
First I will mention the things I loved about the movie. All the new characters are great especially Rey and Finn. They really brought a lot to the movie. The movie was also very well acted which was something that the prequels have been criticized about. The only thing I had a problem with in in the first half of the movie was the lack of explanation for who the battling factions were and why they were battling. Why is the First Order evil? Who is this new republic they basically destroyed as soon as they were mention. Is the resistance then same as the rebellion from the original trilogy?
In spite of this I thought the first half of the movie was amazing and I was all in. Then they brought up that they had to destroy what is essentially ANOTHER Death Star. The writers really couldn't come up with something new at this point. also it's only weekness just so happens to be almost exactly the same as the original Death Star. You think someone in the First Order would have taken note of that in the planing of a third Death Star.
Toward the end of the movie is where I had the most issues. How exactly does Rey almost instantly become a Jedi Master with no training. She can do the Jedi mind trick without being taught to do so or having ever seen someone do so. She uses the force to pull Luke's light saber out of the snow to battle Kylo Ren. This took Luke 3 years to do after having some training from Obi Wan. Also how is she not only on Kylo's level during their battle but she beats him. What? Kylo was trained by both Luke and Snoke. I know Kylo had an injury and they showed Rey having some skills with a staff but this does not add up. Hopfully they address this with some kind of explanation in episode 8.
My last big issue was the lack of Luke in the film. I was really hoping he would have at least one moment to be a bad ass and save the day. This hurt the movie because I spent most of the movie waiting for Luke to return for a big moment but he does not appear until the last 30 seconds. I wish they had explained further what happened to everyone Luke was training as well. I would have also liked some explanation of how/why Kylo turned to the dark side and who are the Knights of Ren. Also having Luke not come back until the last moments of the film robbed the viewers of seeing him have another scence with Han Solo since he was killed. In spite of that fact Han Solo's death was one of the most powerful moments of the film.
I defiantly liked this movie but all of these issues may have stopped me and probably some others from loving it. Hopefully Episode 8 answers a lot of these questions which I believe would make this an even better movie in retrospect.
