But those moments pass, and all it takes is a perfect John Williams music cue to transport you back into the cozy blanket of that galaxy far, far away. And while Abrams captures the lively, hokey and practical visual fun of the originals, he occasionally slips into generic blockbuster mode. Others are less memorable, including Gwendoline Christie’s Captain Phasma, and Andy Serkis’s preposterous-looking Supreme Leader Snoke. (How do empathy, guilt and personality develop in a man who has been trained since birth to be a Stormtrooper?) But that’s taking things too seriously. Boyega is appealing as Finn, too, even if his character doesn’t quite make sense on paper. She is our Luke, and she’s much cooler than he ever was.ĭriver’s Kylo Ren is also a disarmingly powerful presence, whose wickedness seeps through the mask. She is feisty, endearingly awe-filled, capable and magnetic. If only the same showcase was given to Carrie Fisher, who is woefully, inexcusably underused as Leia.Īs for the new characters, Ridley’s Rey is a dream. Ford is in his element - delightful, energetic, funny, brash and fully Han, bantering with Chewie and everyone with the same verve he showed nearly 40 years ago. The action is nearly non-stop, as is the humor, which kicks into gear when Han Solo (Harrison Ford) finally shows up. Those are the first words on the screen and the last we’ll say about the big mystery. This time, it’s all because of Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill). It almost serves no purpose to go into the specifics at this point beyond the fact that the galaxy is in disarray, an evil army is growing (as is a resistance), and a series of coincidences help Rey collect a “Wizard of Oz”-worthy posse to help get BB-8 back to its rightful owners. The plot is as unwieldy and MacGuffin-filled as one might expect. There’s the powerful, masked villain, too (Adam Driver’s Kylo Ren). There’s the cocky pilot (Oscar Isaac’s Poe Dameron). There’s the reckless kid uncertain of his allegiances (John Boyega’s Finn). I do like LEGO games, but to a degree.The problem with LEGO Star Wars the Force Awakens is that to 100 a lot of the levels you have to unlock certain characters, and for that to happen you have. There’s the nobody with the dead-end job and a Jedi obsession (Daisy Ridley’s Rey), who has a life-changing encounter with said droid. There’s the resistance-affiliated droid, who ends up stranded on a desert planet carrying a secret message (BB-8). Abrams has taken everything we adore about that first film, delicately mixed up a few elements, and churned out a reverent homage that’s a heck of a lot of fun to watch.įrom the opening scroll to the sequel-setup ending, he manages to hit each beat of its 38-year-old predecessor.Ībrams has essentially passed the torch on to its new cast by making them amalgamations of the originals. Someone who can see more clearly than even its creator what made it so special to so many people. It’s a movie made by someone who loves “Star Wars” deeply. In this way, “The Force Awakens,” the seventh movie in this improbable yet inevitable series, delivers.
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