Star Wars 7 SPOILERS review

Star Wars Episode 7 is my favourite sci-fi movie.
The characters, the story arcs, the action, the way that it deals with the old trilogy, it's almost perfect.

The film is great, and it feels like a modern-day kick ass original trilogy movie. It's the best Star Wars movie yet, and I love the pacing as it picks up and just gets better and better, and faster and faster. The fucking emotion of Han Solo's death at the hands of his own son? Man, I almost choked up and looked like a complete pussy in front of my friend in the cinema. AND I KNEW IT WAS COMING. Despite what people say, Harrison Ford has still got it, and the emotion on his face when he died was just... wow. The epic, grand scale of that walkway and that massive drop just made me feel like we lost Han Solo into this massive, giant evil abyss.

Rey was the best character in the film, with Han Solo a close 2nd. The way that Rey was set up reminded me of Luke from A New Hope, only she's much more of a badass, and her character is set up a little bit better than Luke was. The way that she meets BB-8 was great too, with BB-8 running from a completely different story arc on Jakku and connecting those characters together. Speaking of BB-8, his original master (Poe Dameron, the pilot dude played by Oscar Isaac) was absolutely BRILLIANT. He's one of the best actors in the movie, he's funny, he's a badass, he shows us exactly what we're fighting for - and he's basically the face of the Resistance in this film.

Han Solo had a much bigger role in this film than anyone thought he would, as did Leia - without even being in it too much. JJ and his writers made them huge parts of the story by making the main villain their son, which meant that all of their scenes were just so goddamn emotional. Han Solo was even a badass in the scenes he was in, battling with Chewie and the new guys, stealing Chewie's gun because he liked it better... man, it was so great to see them back.

As for some of the additional characters - Supreme Leader Snoke was cool, I guess. He kinda seems like Emperor 2.0 right now, but it will be interesting to see what they do with him in the sequel, and how Kylo Ren's 'training' will go. It seems like the Dark side is a lot more like the Jedi now in terms of training, and Kylo Ren just seems like a much better Anakin Skywalker. He's stroppy, angry, and not as powerful as he thinks he is. I feel like he went down too easy, maybe he just isn't as strong with the force as Rey was - which seemed a bit weird since he's had way more experience. I feel like he'll be some kind of unstoppable villain in Episode 8 after his training, which should spice things up and shock our protagonists a bit. Other people to mention are Maz Kanata the little orange lady, who I feel the movie would have been better either without her, or with more of her. We left her planet just kinda feeling 'meh, she was interesting, I guess'. Leia was just so huggable in this film, she was so relatable and you really felt for her whilst all the shit was going down, and since she had the force, you see her just reel in disbelief as Han dies at the hand of their own son... you know that she knows exactly what happened. It hits you right in the heart strings. C-3PO and R2-D2 were in this, although R2 is in some kinda robot-coma since Luke isn't around (which I find a bit odd) and C-3PO is basically in Leia's position. It was nice to see him, although he didn't do much. But then, when did he ever? I guess he's back to his comic relief days.

Now time to talk about Finn. Finn, man... his story arc was great after he left the First Order, and his chemistry with Poe Dameron was awesome. The way that he just lands in the middle of this shitstorm is great, and he's just along for the ride and basically wants to become part of the resistance now. Ultimately he's a resistance fighter at the end of the movie, and will most likely be a love interest for Rey from here onwards. One thing I didn't like about Finn was him as a stormtrooper and his reasons for leaving the First Order. There was no real reason behind it, and there's nothing that makes him stand out from the other soldiers. He just sorta thinks... 'ah the First Order is kinda crap, let's get outta here and take this resistance dude with me' which begs the question - why don't most of the stormtroopers think that? You know you're working for Mister Death Kill Dark Villain, so why just Finn? Anyway, I liked his character after he left them. I just hope we get more of an explanation soon.

I'm gonna put in a small part about Luke Skywalker here... the ending of the film was very, very weird. I didn't know how to feel about it, because I didn't know what was going on. Has Luke just been sitting in a cave being sad since Kylo Ren turned evil? Has he turned to the Dark Side? Did he take his lightsaber back off Rey or did he refuse it and go back to his cave? Will we see him again or was that last scene a farewell to Luke? Who knows.

I have got to address the directing style in this movie. I've said it before and I'll say it again - JJ Abrams is the best director in the world right now, and he's taking Hollywood by storm. He saved Star Trek with two INCREDIBLY fun movies, he saved Mission Impossible by giving it a compromise between wacky and real with an engaging plot, and now he's saved Star Wars. I would honestly trust this guy to save me if I jumped off a building - he's just God, basically. As a media student, and analysing everything I watch (thanks to those cinematography tutorials), every camera shot that Abrams directs has something extra added to it. He did the same with Star Trek, and it works in this film too. He's brought a classic franchise into the modern era, with great camera work and his typical continuous and dynamic camera shots. They all just work. Then of course, we got the lens flares. Awesome.

There are a few things I thought were a bit iffy about how some stuff looked though. Some of the CGI looked unfinished at times - don't get me wrong, a lot of it was absolutely amazing and I felt like I was there, like the Falcon's first take off when it's bumping into everything? Yeah that was amazing. But some stuff, like Maz Kanata's character and the crash landing on the Ice planet from the Millenium Falcon looked like it was from the prequels, and reminded me of those half-ass jobs that George Lucas shoehorned into the Blu-Rays. Most of the CGI was amazingly done, and I couldn't point it out for you because it was seamless and I couldn't tell, which is the job CGI is supposed to do. It was just that a couple of scenes stuck out to me. That snow and the physics of the Falcon as it slid down that icy hill just looked a bit 'off'. Maybe it's just me. As for that shop owner on Jakku, his deals are a rip off, his face looks like crap and he talks like a cartoon. Pretty sure George Lucas took over for that scene. Hope the guy got killed in the First Order attack.

As a whole, this movie is a solid kick-start to a pretty much dead franchise - although not as dead as Star Trek was. The plot was a little bit safe, but the 'map to Luke Skywalker thing' gave it an extra layer, even though a lot of it has been seen before. The villain was great, and I think he could turn into a better villain than Darth Vader if he's done right (oh please, that would be so good to see a good villain in modern Hollywood). The film was emotional, nostaligic, the characters were great, the directing was great, and there was a minimal amount of bad moments in the film - which is what makes it better than the original trilogy, as some of those films had a few cringey scenes (ewoks worshiping C-3PO spring to mind). I love Star Wars: The Force Awakens, it had everything we wanted and more, it had unexpected twists, and it gives me so much hope for the next 6 years.