Star Wars: The Force Awakens

First, what you’ve undoubtedly heard by now is true. The Force Awakens is the sequel all of us Star Wars fans have been waiting for. It’s much better than the cinematic abominations George Lucas delivered between 1999 and 2005. No more awful dialogue, no more leaden acting, and no overwhelming amounts of CGI. The Force Awakens looks and feels like the original trilogy. It’s fun; it’s exciting, and it offers the kind of magic that will make you forget that you’re sitting in a theater. For 2 hours and 15 minutes, director J.J. Abrams transports you to another universe.

The film gives us several engaging new heroes to root for including the fierce scavenger Rey, the Stormtrooper turned rebel Finn, hotshot pilot Poe Dameron, and the thoroughly entertaining rolling droid BB-8. It also delivers a great new villain in the masked Sith called Kylo Ren. And of course several of our old favorites from the original trilogy are back as well, some in large roles, others in cameos.

One of the most refreshing aspects of this new Star Wars is lead actress Daisy Ridley. She carries her scenes with a conviction Mark Hamill never mustered no matter how much I might love the character Luke Skywalker. She’s tough, she’s scared, she’s determined… I believed her every emotion and decision.

As usual, Harrison Ford gets many of the best lines. His return as smuggler Han Solo is a great way to bridge the old and the new in this series. Writers Lawrence Kasdan and Abrams could have easily used the 73-year-old star as nothing more than a nod to longtime fans, but they didn’t. Without giving anything away, he plays an important role in this story and his performance is just as good as it was 30+ years ago.

Adam Driver is excellent as Kylo Ren and he’s something of a change of pace as the new main bad guy. While past villains Darth Vader, Darth Maul, and Count Dooku seemed fully in control of themselves and their use of the dark side, Ren seems almost unhinged. He rages, he doubts, he persuades, and he threatens. He’s a torn young man battling inner demons and striving for a level of power that’s just out of his reach.  Similar to what Anakin should have been in Lucas’s most recent trilogy, Ren actually makes us believe in his character’s turmoil and hatred.

All of this isn’t to say that The Force Awakens is perfect. It’s not. The reunion between Solo and Leia feels too easy when it could and should have been a scene filled with emotional tension and long-simmering hurt. The film’s MacGuffin seems remarkably easy to find given how long it’s been hidden and how many people have been pursuing it. And as much as I prefer the old-school effects over CGI, I could do without the tie-fighters that are clearly just models hanging by wires.

Despite its faults, Star Wars: The Force Awakens should please anyone that enjoyed the original films now known as Episodes 4-6 and will probably be a very pleasant surprise for the younger audience that’s more familiar with the prequel Episodes 1-3. It contains enough sci-fi violence that I won’t allow my younger kids to see it, but you can bet I’ll be in line again next week to take my oldest and his cousin. And I can’t wait to see what happens in the next one due in 2017!