Star Wars: 5 Things The Force Awakens Got Right (& 5 It Got Wrong)
After spending billions of dollars on Lucasfilm, Disney couldn’t get a Star Wars sequel trilogy off the ground soon enough to start reaping the rewards of the acquisition. The Mouse House tapped J.J. Abrams to direct the first part of the new trilogy, and the result was The Force Awakens.
At first, the movie was praised by fans and critics alike. However, in the months following its release (and even more so as the rest of the sequel trilogy unfolded), it became clear that The Force Awakens’ main appeal was its manipulation of our nostalgia. Still, it has some merits.
10 Right: Casting The Lead Roles
Although their muddled, inconsistent character arcs and the fact that they shared no scenes together until The Rise of Skywalker prevented them from being a memorable trio, the lead roles in the sequel trilogy were perfectly cast.
Daisy Ridley, John Boyega, and Oscar Isaac were the perfect actors to bring Rey, Finn, and Poe to life, while Adam Driver’s immense talent brought nuance and complexity to the razor-thin characterization of Kylo Ren.
9 Wrong: Copying A New Hope
The most common criticism faced by The Force Awakens is that it copied the plot of A New Hope. Another desert scavenger joined another rebellion to blow up another planet-destroying superweapon created by another evil empire.
J.J. Abrams has defended his decision to rip off the Death Star plot, saying that re-immersing fans in the Star Wars universe required a familiar storyline. But a rough translation of that would be: he played it safe. And worse yet, the ripped-off plot makes the saga’s whole timeline feel out of step.
8 Right: John Williams’ Score
As with any Star Wars movie (even the bad ones), The Force Awakens can be counted on for some awesome John Williams tracks, from “Rey’s Theme” to “March of the Resistance.”
And of course, the main title theme, one of the most recognizable compositions in film history (hell, maybe the most recognizable) will never get old.
7 Wrong: Ignoring The Original Trio’s Character Development
Over the course of the original trilogy, Luke grew from being angry and vengeful following his aunt and uncle’s deaths to being a peaceful Jedi who saw the good in his father, the most evil man in the galaxy; Han turned from a lonesome scoundrel who avoided attachments into a full-on activist who fell in love; and Leia turned the struggling Rebel Alliance into the galaxy’s leading political force.
But J.J. Abrams ignored all this character development. Luke gave up being a hero, Han broke up with Leia off-screen so that he could be a space pirate again, and the rebels were once again struggling for power under the thumb of an evil dictatorship. And the latter two were just to play on fans’ nostalgia.
6 Right: Spectacular Battle Sequences
As the title would suggest, one of the most important elements of any Star Wars movie is its battle sequences, and the battle sequences in The Force Awakens are spectacular.
A number of the space battles take place in the atmosphere of planets, harking back to Lucas taking inspiration from World War II dogfights, while the CG-assisted camera movements recapture the rollercoaster-like intensity of Revenge of the Sith’s opening set piece.
5 Wrong: Not Exploring The New Republic
At the end of Return of the Jedi, the Rebels defeated the Empire and the New Republic was born. However, when The Force Awakens begins, there is no trace of the New Republic as the First Order has taken over the galaxy. It has devolved into the Resistance, another struggling rebellion on the bones of its ass fighting another evil empire.
In order to capitalize on nostalgia for the original trilogy and avoid the uniqueness of the prequels for fear of alienating fans again, Abrams neglected to explore the effect that Return of the Jedi’s happy ending would have on the galaxy.
4 Right: BB-8
While the sequel trilogy was controversial for sidelining C-3PO and R2-D2, who had previously been the anchors that held the saga together, The Force Awakens did introduce a great new droid character in the form of BB-8.
His spherical appearance made him stand out among the crowd, while his voice (provided by Bill Hader and Ben Schwartz) gave him a tangible personality.
3 Wrong: “Mystery Box” Storytelling
Kathleen Kennedy’s plan with the Star Wars sequel trilogy was to hire three directors to make three different movies and just see where the overarching narrative would go. Thanks to his penchant for “mystery box” storytelling (which isn’t really storytelling at all, because there’s never an end in sight), J.J. Abrams was the worst possible guy to start off that plan.
He pulled a bunch of vague ideas out of his mystery box – like Snoke and Rey’s parentage and Luke Skywalker giving up the fight against evil and his lightsaber somehow being in Maz Kanata’s basement – and then jumped ship, leaving it up to poor Rian Johnson to find a way to explain it all.
2 Right: Practical Effects
There’s plenty of CGI in The Force Awakens, but the filmmakers used practical effects where it was possible. BB-8 was a physical prop created by Neal Scanlan, while a number of the big set pieces used scale models and traditional special effects as opposed to CG.
This arrived as a refreshing counterpoint to the overuse of primitive CGI effects in the prequel trilogy, some of which has aged horribly.
1 Wrong: No Luke Skywalker Until The Very End
J.J. Abrams’ decision not to feature Luke Skywalker until a silent cameo at the very end is what led to Rian Johnson mischaracterizing him in The Last Jedi. For the sake of bombarding the audience with mysteries, Abrams began the sequel trilogy with Luke being missing.
Fundamentally, Luke is a hero. He fought to bring peace to the galaxy. If that peace was disrupted, he wouldn’t just give up and mope around on an island. Plus, keeping Luke out of the story until after Han’s death meant that the fan-favorite duo never got another scene together.