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You should see Return of the Jedi first. You'll miss nothing by skipping the prequels.

I've only seen the original three and had no trouble following this in any meaningful way (and the few little jokey asides and references will be cued by your audience's response, I bet). As to swo's suggestion, I'm not sure I remember any info specific to Jedi needed for this film's enjoyment?

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Well, I imagine anyone could fill in the dots there, but you're technically correct

I suspect those revelations are already part of the collective cultural consciousness, though...

I was originally just going to say that stuff outside of spoilers, but I figure if you're going to bother to see this latest chapter, you might as well take the couple hours to see the one that comes in between first (even if it is universally acknowledged as the weakest of the watchable episodes).

Just watch it to see how much better this new one is in comparison!

I think the biggest letdown of the movie was

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that Han, Leia, Luke all returned but the three were never reunited on screen.

Thanks.

Yeah, I think that's why I didn't see Return of the Jedi -- my friends who did were disappointed with it. I don't mind watching it though if it's the only homework required.

[cross-posted. Responding to Domino and swo17]

I think TFA passes Titanic to go #2 Worldwide, but it's another large gap after that to get past Avatar.

It's gonna be playing in first run theaters through at least March, though, so it has a chance.

And I'd say Return of the Jedi is very much required viewing, for the reasons mentioned already.

It also gives greater context to how narrow a perspective our new villain Kylo Ren has regarding Darth Vader. He's certainly either ignorant of or outright rejecting certain factual events that occur at the end of RotJ.

flyonthewall2983 wrote:Just curious, is there anyone here who saw the first film in it's original release?

I saw it in it's second week of release at age 13 and thought it was satisfactory, but it didn't have much of a grip on my imagination. I had envisioned something grander and the smaller scope of the film seemed underwhelming (I should probably add that I was already enthralled with 2001 at this point and wanted to see the clearly superior model effects of Star Wars married to a better science-fiction story). The Empire Strikes Back had the larger scope I wanted from the first film, so I was more willing to go along with the ride for the sequel.

Not being a devoted fan, I think The Force Awakens easily beats them all apart from Empire. Even then, the new film's momentum and it's great performances might elevate it above the second film; only the vagueness of the plot and the retread aspects let this new one down a bit.

And count me as an Adam Driver supporter - I was astonished by how much depth he brought to his role with relatively little screen time. Kylo Ren is easily the most exciting villain the series has delivered.

Professor Wagstaff wrote:

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What is the power that the First Order has in the galaxy? I felt confused because the First Order seems to have stepped in and replaced the Empire as the reigning force in the years since the Empire's was destroyed. The existence of a rebel group would imply that the rebels of the earlier trilogy failed to reestablish a successful democracy after the destruction of the Empire. However I did read somewhere else that one of the planets destroyed was the home of the New Republic, but if it was I either missed it or that wasn't clear to me.

It is mentioned that

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the attack is on the system housing the Republic,

but I agree that the galactic political dynamics are far from clear, and were one of the issues I had with the shallowness of the movie.

Basically...

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In the time since Jedi, the New Republic was established, while the remnants of the Empire reformed in the Outer Rim to become the First Order. Think Nazis in South America if they had got into government control post-WW2. The New Republic doesn't see them as a threat, but Leia does, so they reluctantly allow her Resistance group to fight them, but it's too small to prevent the First Order being built up again.

Also, the attack is on the Hosnian system, not Curoscant. Post-Jedi the New Republic rotates it's capital, and it was there with the Senate covened when destroyed.

This is what I've read online at least, via articles that have dug through the ancillary books and such to the new film.

Personally, I'm glad they didn't big down the film with the political details. The opening crawl says the basics, we know what side attacks which, etc.

captveg wrote:Basically...

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In the time since Jedi, the New Republic was established, while the remnants of the Empire reformed in the Outer Rim to become the First Order. Think Nazis in South America if they had got into government control post-WW2. The New Republic doesn't see them as a threat, but Leia does, so they reluctantly allow her Resistance group to fight them, but it's too small to prevent the First Order being built up again.

Also, the attack is on the Hosnian system, not Curoscant. Post-Jedi the New Republic rotates it's capital, and it was there with the Senate covened when destroyed.

This is what I've read online at least, via articles that have dug through the ancillary books and such to the new film.

Personally, I'm glad they didn't big down the film with the political details. The opening crawl says the basics, we know what side attacks which, etc.

I disagree; the first film had such a simple dynamic (Empire vs. Rebels) that it could breeze over the details, but the information you offer above could have easily been included in the new film with two sentences of dialogue, or even an extra line in the opening crawl. Viewers shouldn't have to have read the ancillary material to understand basic plot dynamics.

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I'm pretty sure that was all mentioned in a passing line in the film, though, because that's what I took out of it and I hadn't read anything online. There was a line about how that that system that was destroyed housed the new republic, and I'll have to watch it again because I'm pretty sure this government was mentioned by Han or someone somewhere. And there were implications this first order built up out of the ashes of the Empire on the outskirts and that no one took them seriously. Though looking online now, it mentions that this resistance led by Leia was built up to hold back this First Order, which I don't recall being mentioned in the film so I'm not sure where that came from. Also I was under the impression that the New Republic was pretty much destroyed, though the real hardcore Star Wars nerds online say the home planet is supposed to be in a different system, so I guess they're still functional. That wasn't clearly pointed out as far as I remember.

In all I really liked this. It's story was very similar to the first but I liked the new characters and it actually felt like a Star Wars movie. I thought the effects were nicely integrated as well. Lucas went batshit crazy on the CGI, so much so, you knew nothing on the screen was real, and everything felt detached. Here they are obviously using CGI (with what I assume is a mix of actual sets and models) but they've been integrated far better, not there to call attention to themselves, and there more to serve the story (as thin as it is, but I cared about what was going on). I actually felt like there were physical objects there. Also, I don't recall any of Abrams' trademark lens flare, so that was nice. I also have to give Abrams credit on BB-8: Lucas probably would have made it insufferably cute, but it was controlled here.

I took my daughter to see this, which was fun. She's had a fairly passive interest in the series but it was fun watching her here: she was completely glued to her seat, sitting on the edge of it. It was fun for both of us.

cdnchris wrote:...Also, I don't recall any of Abrams' trademark lens flare, so that was nice...

The flares are there, but far less than in his previous features. Had I not known about his mania for them, I doubt I would have noticed.

I wonder if anyone else finds irritating that...

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- the fully operational millennium falcon being parked and unsecured in the middle of a junkyard where anyone could access, or the light sabre, along the same line, being stashed in an unlocked chest in a public basement. On a planet where people openly steal from each other, it appears that the most prized objects lie in plain sight yet remain untouched over decades.

- the entire starkiller base being incapable of re-enabling the shield once it’s been disabled by one person.

cdnchris wrote:Also, I don't recall any of Abrams' trademark lens flare, so that was nice.

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I remember a pretty big one coming from the first beam fired from the starkiller base, hehe.

cdnchris wrote: I took my daughter to see this, which was fun. She's had a fairly passive interest in the series but it was fun watching her here: she was completely glued to her seat, sitting on the edge of it. It was fun for both of us.

What was her final verdict? I'm wondering how kids are reacting to this. They might finally have a real Star Wars franchise of their own, after the previous generation got stuck with the disastrous prequels.

Professor Wagstaff wrote:

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What is the power that the First Order has in the galaxy? I felt confused because the First Order seems to have stepped in and replaced the Empire as the reigning force in the years since the Empire's was destroyed. The existence of a rebel group would imply that the rebels of the earlier trilogy failed to reestablish a successful democracy after the destruction of the Empire. However I did read somewhere else that one of the planets destroyed was the home of the New Republic, but if it was I either missed it or that wasn't clear to me.

I'm not sure where this is from, but I found it to be very helpful background material. I'm spoilering it, but honestly I wish I had known this information going in, as it details the political setup for the story much better than the film itself does:

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Again, this information could have easily been included in the film itself, without ruining the pace or bogging the movie down in arcane political machinations like the prequels. We're talking literally 30-60 seconds of explanation.

Trees wrote:
What was her final verdict? I'm wondering how kids are reacting to this. They might finally have a real Star Wars franchise of their own, after the previous generation got stuck with the disastrous prequels.

She liked it a lot. It's probably the first movie I took her to where she wasn't bombarding me with questions and it seemed to have her full attention, she was literally on the edge of the seat the whole time. She seemed only casually interested in the others, where my son (who is 3) really likes them. She wasn't even sure if she wanted to go. But she was excited about the movie and was genuinely disappointed when I told her the next wasn't coming out for another 2 years.

Her only criticism was Darth Vader was a better villain. Which reminds me, Driver probably wasn't a good choice.

BrianInAtlanta wrote: Thu Dec 24, 2015 9:16 pm I've just seen the new one and it's a fine job of revving the series back up although I wonder whether it will fall apart on the second film once the nostalgia rush of the return is over (see, or rather don't "Quantum of Solace", "Star Trek Into Darkness", etc.). And speaking of references

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I enjoyed the outright steal from Kurosawa's "Sanshiro Sugata" for the final light saber battle in "The Force Awakens".

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So since Ren killed his father he now has to have sex with his mother right.

For the US, yes. Worldwide TFA is just at the halfway mark for Avatar's $2.8 billion.