Review of Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015) by Brian H — 16 May 2018

The Force Awakens is the rare movie that is not only let down, but actually damaged by its own sequel. TFA's intriguing mysteries, which once served as the highest point of interest for millions of fans, amount to nothing but misleading marketing in the post- The Last Jedi landscape. In particular, it's difficult not to look back on TFA's epic closing scene as anything but false advertising, in retrospect -- misrepresenting the emotional tenor of the events to get butts back in seats for the sequel.

Other questions left unanswered leave TFA feeling poorly written. Elements such as Snoke's mysterious background or Rey's preternatural ability with the Force could be forgiven when we expected to have the answers delivered by the sequel. In hindsight and still without those answers, Snoke amounts to an egregious rehash of Emperor Palpatine that the writers couldn't even be bothered to justify. Likewise, while many fans suspected that Rey's unnatural abilities would be revealed to be a result of either her heritage or experiences in her early life, The Last Jedi reveals the true explanation to have been lazy writing all along.

What was once a fun if unambitious first step into a larger world is now shown to be a lazy and dishonest marketing tool. The Force Awakens relied too much on its sequels and has been completely let down.