8 Problems Nobody Wants To Admit About Star Wars: The Force Awakens

8. All The Villains Suck (Apart From Kylo Ren)

We can all agree that Kylo Ren kicked ass. His whole petulant-boy angle has been widely lauded for adding an element of depth to his character; that kind of unpredictable vulnerability that helps make bad guys more interesting. But apart from Ren, who has a great arc in this movie, all of the other villains fall a little flat. It's fair to say that JJ Abrams was a little pushed for time and therefore we simply don't have the opportunity to round out Hux, Phasma and Snoke. But to make these characters as one-note as they are, it stops audiences from caring about them outside of gaining their comeuppance. Now, I'm not saying that we should care about people who commit planetary-scale genocide, but from a storytelling perspective it would make for a more interesting film if we figured out exactly why Hux loves the First Order so damn much and why Phasma has a thing for all-chrome-errything. (Okay, maybe not that last part). As it stands, Snoke is a bit of a CGI embarassment whose menace isn't rightly stated, Hux is a sneering, snivelling Nazi with no motivations, and Captain Phasma is a waste of a cool character. Thank f*ck that some time was invested into Kylo Ren.