10 Simple Fixes That Would Have Saved The Star Wars Sequels
1. A More Original Start To The Trilogy
Although The Force Awakens was universally praised by audiences and critics upon its release, over the last few years fans have begun to realise that the movie relied a little too much on what had come before.
Being essentially a soft reboot after the disappointment that was the Prequel Trilogy, it was inevitable that Disney's punt at a trio of Skywalker stories would lean heavily on what made the Original Trilogy such a lovable cash cow in the first place: namely, props and sets that imitated a lived-in world rather than shoddy CGI, character-centric stories, and a compelling mythos which left no room for Midi-chlorians.
But JJ Abrams and crew might have taken their exercise in nostalgia a step too far. Rather than just imitating the film-making techniques and principles that cemented the 1977 Star Wars as a classic, they copied the whole story all together.
Of course, some things are different ("This was the Death Star," Poe Dameron says, "And this is Starkiller Base." "Wow!" the audience screams, "it's a completely original idea!"), but the similarities between The Force Awakens and A New Hope are too obvious to overlook.
There's the old mentor figure (Obi-Wan Kenobi, Han Solo), the evil military regime (The Empire, The First Order), the hero from a desert planet (Luke, Rey), ... the list stretches on and on for so long that it warrants an article of its own.
While The Force Awakens served as the perfect franchise reset after the sour taste of the Prequels, in hindsight a lot of its story decisions are just uninteresting. What's more, Episode VII's decision to retell the story of A New Hope only makes the Original Trilogy redundant. All of the Resistance's sacrifices are rendered null given that the galaxy reverted back to the exact same state they had found it in. Boring.
The most interesting part of the trilogy (Kylo and Rey's relationship) could have been maintained in a lower-stakes scenario. The decision to retread A New Hope plagued the rest of the Sequels from the start, as its following movies almost inevitably had to then follow the pattern set out in first three movies.
We get Star Wars is about, well, Wars, but maybe this could have involved a different threat rather than a third galactic civil war? That's a conversation for the next three movies...