Don’t hate. Its the path to the Dark Side. The Blue Ray disc gets to my house on Tuesday. I will have commentary on the print and audio quality and the special features and all that good stuff added to this review Tuesday night! (Because obviously I’m going to watch every minute of movie and special features the day I get it. Man’s got to have standards, you know.)Yes, there are a lot of reoccurring elements from the original Trilogy. (Read any 1 star review for details) It’s not an accident. It’s not laziness. It’s an integral part of the plot and done for a specific reason. Kylo Ren wants to be Darth Vader. He is obsessed with Darth Vader. He makes the declarative statement that he will finish what Vader started. So he runs his sinister empire the same way Vader ran his sinister empire. It’s hard to finish what Vader started if you don’t do the same stuff, otherwise you are just running your own new sinister empire. (All of this about Ren is in the trailer. Nothing is spoiled here.)If you don’t understand the reason for this theme and hate the movie because of it, I don’t know what to tell you. But most of the negative reviews on here didn’t even take into account the purpose of the recurring elements. They just hated it because of them.Anyway….my biggest concern with this going is was that it wasn’t going to feel like a Star Wars movie. Even for all the problems with the prequels, at least they looked like they occurred in the Star Wars universe. For The Force Awakens we were dealing with a new story, developed under a new film studio, with a new director who has a recent habit of giving familiar stories a completely new look and feel (The new Star Trek series, specifically). And with Harrison Ford, who has openly never liked the Han Solo character, involved there was just a fear that this could be the Kingdom of the Crystal Skulls all over again. But it wasn’t. It was awesome!The beginning of the movie has a distinctive look and feel that’s not exactly the same as the other films. It’s still ‘Star Wars’ because there are aliens and droids and spaceships, but it’s done in such a way to make this film stand out as being a little different and to show that it’s been 30 years since Return of the Jedi and things change. I think this was done to differentiate it just a little. At first I was nervous about this, but a little while into the movie they start reintroducing familiar themes and characters and it starts feeling a little more ‘Star Warsy’. As the movie progresses it just continues to feel more and more like Star Wars without giving up it’s newness. By the end I felt completely immersed in the Star Wars saga again and just wanted the next movie to come out right away so I can see what happens.The one thing I was hoping for that wasn’t in the film was Han Solo giving someone advice about how you always shoot first. There was even a perfect scene with Han and Rey that would have been perfect for such a line. It would have brought so much satisfaction…but it was not meant to be I guess.It was filmed in 35mm rather than fully digital to preserve as much of the feel of the original trilogy as possible. That had a noticeable effect to me. The prequels were done digitally and while they looked super crisp and clean, that gave them a ‘newer’ look than the originals. The Force Awakens looks visually stunning by being shot on film, and mirrors the look of the original.The characters from the original trilogy that come back don’t disappoint. Everyone is older, but they are still the same characters. No one has been re-written to have a new personality. They all do their old characters justice.The bad guys are different. Still bad guys, but not quite as disciplined at Darth Vader. There is more raw emotion and internal struggle from Kylo Ren (You are spoon fed this fact almost immediately. It’ not a spoiler.) This is a nice departure from the first 6 movies where the bad guys were always the Sith and had to be fought in the same way, where they were highly focused and unwavering. That is NOT Kylo Ren. Ren is an emotional mess, making him a very different villain who’s just trying to be the old villain.The issue of a black guy being a Storm Trooper ends up making total sense. That was a matter of controversy before the film was released from fans who understood that all Storm Troopers were clones of Jengo Fett. I won’t give away the secret, but it’s explained and it makes sense and there is no plot hole as a result. The short version is that it’s been almost 60 years since the Clone Army was first delivered by the Kaminoans, the government has been overthrown twice (once by the Sith, then again by the Rebellion). Things are bound to change.Episode 7 is largely expositional as the first installment of a new trilogy. It’s setting up the plot of episodes 8 and 9. It doesn’t stand on it’s own quite as well as A New Hope does where there…
Review of Amazon Video HD bundle with Bonus Features 0
Don’t hate. Its the path to the Dark Side. The Blue Ray disc gets to my house on Tuesday. I will have commentary on the print and audio quality and the special features and all that good stuff added to this review Tuesday night! (Because obviously I’m going to watch every minute of movie and special features the day I get it. Man’s got to have standards, you know.)Yes, there are a lot of reoccurring elements from the original Trilogy. (Read any 1 star review for details) It’s not an accident. It’s not laziness. It’s an integral part of the plot and done for a specific reason. Kylo Ren wants to be Darth Vader. He is obsessed with Darth Vader. He makes the declarative statement that he will finish what Vader started. So he runs his sinister empire the same way Vader ran his sinister empire. It’s hard to finish what Vader started if you don’t do the same stuff, otherwise you are just running your own new sinister empire. (All of this about Ren is in the trailer. Nothing is spoiled here.)If you don’t understand the reason for this theme and hate the movie because of it, I don’t know what to tell you. But most of the negative reviews on here didn’t even take into account the purpose of the recurring elements. They just hated it because of them.Anyway….my biggest concern with this going is was that it wasn’t going to feel like a Star Wars movie. Even for all the problems with the prequels, at least they looked like they occurred in the Star Wars universe. For The Force Awakens we were dealing with a new story, developed under a new film studio, with a new director who has a recent habit of giving familiar stories a completely new look and feel (The new Star Trek series, specifically). And with Harrison Ford, who has openly never liked the Han Solo character, involved there was just a fear that this could be the Kingdom of the Crystal Skulls all over again. But it wasn’t. It was awesome!The beginning of the movie has a distinctive look and feel that’s not exactly the same as the other films. It’s still ‘Star Wars’ because there are aliens and droids and spaceships, but it’s done in such a way to make this film stand out as being a little different and to show that it’s been 30 years since Return of the Jedi and things change. I think this was done to differentiate it just a little. At first I was nervous about this, but a little while into the movie they start reintroducing familiar themes and characters and it starts feeling a little more ‘Star Warsy’. As the movie progresses it just continues to feel more and more like Star Wars without giving up it’s newness. By the end I felt completely immersed in the Star Wars saga again and just wanted the next movie to come out right away so I can see what happens.The one thing I was hoping for that wasn’t in the film was Han Solo giving someone advice about how you always shoot first. There was even a perfect scene with Han and Rey that would have been perfect for such a line. It would have brought so much satisfaction…but it was not meant to be I guess.It was filmed in 35mm rather than fully digital to preserve as much of the feel of the original trilogy as possible. That had a noticeable effect to me. The prequels were done digitally and while they looked super crisp and clean, that gave them a ‘newer’ look than the originals. The Force Awakens looks visually stunning by being shot on film, and mirrors the look of the original.The characters from the original trilogy that come back don’t disappoint. Everyone is older, but they are still the same characters. No one has been re-written to have a new personality. They all do their old characters justice.The bad guys are different. Still bad guys, but not quite as disciplined at Darth Vader. There is more raw emotion and internal struggle from Kylo Ren (You are spoon fed this fact almost immediately. It’ not a spoiler.) This is a nice departure from the first 6 movies where the bad guys were always the Sith and had to be fought in the same way, where they were highly focused and unwavering. That is NOT Kylo Ren. Ren is an emotional mess, making him a very different villain who’s just trying to be the old villain.The issue of a black guy being a Storm Trooper ends up making total sense. That was a matter of controversy before the film was released from fans who understood that all Storm Troopers were clones of Jengo Fett. I won’t give away the secret, but it’s explained and it makes sense and there is no plot hole as a result. The short version is that it’s been almost 60 years since the Clone Army was first delivered by the Kaminoans, the government has been overthrown twice (once by the Sith, then again by the Rebellion). Things are bound to change.Episode 7 is largely expositional as the first installment of a new trilogy. It’s setting up the plot of episodes 8 and 9. It doesn’t stand on it’s own quite as well as A New Hope does where there…
Digital HD copy review 0