Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Thirty-two years after Return of the Jedi, J.J. Abrams handed Disney a $2 billion apology letter. The Force Awakens promised to wash away the prequel trilogy's sins by essentially remaking A New Hope). Another desert planet. Another Death Star. Another scrappy rebellion facing impossible odds. The nostalgia hit like calculated medicine, and audiences lined up to feel something they remembered feeling in 1977.

The problems started with the premise. Rey discovers she's Force-sensitive and defeats Kylo Ren in lightsaber combat after holding a weapon for approximately ten minutes. Finn abandons his First Order conditioning with suspicious ease. Han Solo returns to smuggling because character growth is harder to write than character regression. The Starkiller Base makes the original Death Star look like a firecracker, which misses the point entirely. Bigger isn't better when it's just bigger.

Harrison Ford reportedly lobbied for years to kill Han Solo, and watching his performance here, you understand why. He looks like a man serving a life sentence. Carrie Fisher brings dignity to underwritten scenes, but Leia has been reduced to a worried general sending fighters into space. The film's emotional center, Han and Leia's fractured relationship, gets maybe fifteen minutes of actual development. Their son's fall to the dark side, which should anchor the entire trilogy, happens mostly in exposition.

Abrams directed like a man afraid of silence. Every moment gets underlined twice. The Millennium Falcon chase through the Star Destroyer graveyard on Jakku should have been thrilling. Instead it feels like a video game cutscene, all motion and no weight. The trailer promised mystery boxes Abrams never intended to open properly. Who is Supreme Leader Snoke? How did the First Order rise? Why does Luke's lightsaber call to Rey? Questions pile up like unpaid bills, waiting for sequels that would provide even worse answers. The Force Awakens succeeds at being competent Star Wars product. It fails at being necessary."