I did my best to avoid forums and other potential spoiler sources until I got a chance to see the movie. I only encountered one minor spoiler along the way and it was my own fault, but I actually turned my head quick enough that it didn't fully sink in and I forgot what I actually saw by the time I watched the movie so that was good. :)

Overall impression: I loved it and thought it was absolutely fantastic. I give it 9/10 since it did have some flaws but if we allow decimal fractions then I might give it 9.5/10 instead. :)

I thought the story and dialogue were quite strong for the Star Wars franchise, and the acting was also pretty good in context. I loved the special effects including the 3D aspects and I was happy they didn't go over the top with special effects or aggressive unnecessary 3D. The focus was more on the story and the characters and I think that made the film better as a result.

It was quite sad to see Han Solo get killed, but I knew it was going to happen as soon as he started walking towards Kylo Ren. Just had one of those "I have a bad feeling about this..." moments. I have a feeling that the rest of the original Star Wars cast will be killed off in episode 8 or 9 also as they're getting older and the franchise will probably want to kill them off out of the story to let the young blood take over the saga. Sad to think that, but people age and die especially in war so it makes sense.

One thing I noticed which my buddies and I always joke/laugh about when watching Star Wars, is that there seemed to be a noticeably higher number of safety railings on dangerously high ledges and safety lights on some of the ships in this movie compared to all previous movies. The Galactic empire appears to finally be taking safety a bit more seriously which was probably prompted by numerous unnecessary untimely deaths in the original films caused by people tripping or falling over high ledges to their death. Another thing we noticed is that unlike the original movies and prequels, almost all of the actors now actually aim their blaster weapons before shooting instead of shooting blindly from the hip. They don't use the attached scopes on them much but they definitely appear to have had higher level weapons training. The bad guys don't seem to be able to hit targets any better than before mind you, but they're at least trying now. :)

Daisy Ridley: Super hot! Ok, I just can't get out of my head how much she looks and sounds like Keira Knightley. Apparently she absolutely hates it when people point that out and considers it to be a comparison. I can't speak for others that notice the uncanny resemblance including voice and accent, but I personally just notice the similarity in look/sound that they have without any comparison being made. Personally if anything I see it as a compliment because Keira is a beautiful and talented actress and telling someone that they look like her IMHO is a compliment, especially if it is meant to be one. Anyhow, I give a thumbs up for Daisy. On a side note while researching the similarity of appearance I found out that Keira played Queen Amidala's double in the Star Wars prequels which I was completely unaware of.

Reason I didn't give it 10/10: Despite totally loving the movie I couldn't help but notice a number of similarities in plot and other aspects to the earlier films/story. Snoke is the new Emporer Palpatine/Darth Sidious, Kylo Ren is the new Darth Vader type character, Daisy is the new Luke (I speculate that she's Luke's daughter). Yet another poorly designed and inadequately protected "Death Star" that is yet even bigger than before and has yet another single point of failure that they figure out what the weakness is and how to bypass it in like 2 minutes. Ok, the new death star looks mega awesome and all the special effects for it were insane including the explosion and reformation into a star when it is destroyed... but we've seen the same general idea happen twice before already. :) I'll give them a pass on these things because they did a great job despite some of the rehashing of ideas, as well as the fact that it's been 23492837432 years since the last Star Wars and I was hungry damnit! :)

I look forward to the next Star Wars movie, but I hope it has more original story elements to it that takes things in a wildly different and unexpected direction of some sort. Obviously Rey will be doing Jedi training with Luke and I have a feeling that together they will re-establish a new Jedi Academy before Luke gets killed off. I think Leia will get killed off also if for no other reason than Carrie Fisher isn't going to live forever. :)

I completely agree. :D :Tries on X-wing helmet:

I had a thought, such a good choice to have a female Jedi lead this time. Also I realized Kylo Ren is actually a fix for Hayden Kristensen, more like how young darth vader should have looked and been like. Being all emo is so right for a dark jedi.

:smashes console to pieces:

I don't think Daisy looks at all like Keira Knightley, but that's just me. Love her little crooked grin.

But their so cute I can't decide, can I have them both?

darth poopypants was my only major with this problem in and of itself. they must have chose him for his physical presence and because he can be a threatening villain later on. there were glimmers of better like in the beginning of the movie when he was so sardonic. but that didn't last long and next thing you know he's pooping pants and punching the wall.

err: major problem with this film

I think of this as the bad guys are rather unimaginative. They are so self-involved and fearful of losing their place at the top that they hastily do everything. The Empire was built way too quickly, subjugation happened to quickly, and the Death Stars were all built too quickly. There's even dialog about it in the old Star Wars. "The Emperor is coming here?"

As I grow older, I have a much harder time seeing a film for what they're trying to show me. I see actors and computers and boom mics and cameras, all under the direction of a director and a script. But if I try to ignore all of that and just take a movie for a what it is, then I see the Empire/New Order as a mechanism run by children for the purposes of someone far more calculating -- and that would be Snoke.

It'll be interesting to see what they do with it.

Sorry, I already claimed them. :)

:freezes tinyE in jedi choke hold:

Sorry, but we all knew you would be the first to go.

*I just realized he was nearly banned, sorry, I should probably stop force choking him, that would be rude.

Finally saw it. I somehow managed to avoid all spoilers, well, except for the biggest one, A New Hope.

Pretty girl and numbskull weren't as grating on my nerves as I thought from the trailer, although pretty girl still felt off. Numbskull, well, I didn't expect him to have such a large part of the movie. Still, I felt that the two distracted from each other's deficits. Each of them on its own would have likely been terribly annoying, but somehow together they were just an unreasonable whole.

I enjoyed Star Trek: Into Darkness as a homage to Wrath of Khan more than I enjoyed this as a homage to A New Hope, because it was too much. Yet another Death Star? Come on! Felt more like a remake than a homage, and not a great one at that, with action trying to cover up the lack of character.

But said action was pretty good. I enjoyed it.

Villain, well, he was still better than Ultron in Age of Ultron, but I agree with phaolo he was too derpy. At least he was reasonably consistent, and I think also consistent with Vader's character. (My son IMO got his temper from his mother's father, so I can definitely see that as reasonable.)

I still think that the best villain and best story is Palpatine's rise to power in Episode 1. It was sadly told in the worst possible manner, but he really was the only smart villain in the series, the only one whose menace doesn't come from being evil and powerful, but from being a successful schemer, which is a lot more menacing.

Got to see it at last. Thought was good. Plot well that was a problem why do they have to rehash the same story from an earlier film and i still cant believe that x wings again get sent into a massive base and it has one weak spot which they use to blow it up least in new hope you had y wings as well.

Like the new characters and it was nice to see some of the old cast but it felt it was a check-list of characters R2 check c3po check which they dont do much to the film at all.

Battles where good and i know that most found the evil kid to be annoying but i did feel for him he tries to act the hard man with his mask on but without it i feel he looks lost he is still an ass but he certainly wasn't as bad as another fallen jedi who hates sand.

Will get it when it comes out on dvd before they start changing it as they have with all the other movies.

Since this thread has revived, that Storm Trooper girl survived the trash compactor and has been verified for Episode VIII. Hopefully she will get a little more screen time because she is a super bad ass and the movies need her.

Yeah, they need her to take Finn away at the end once he's frozen in carbonite.

Bad ass? The girl lowered the shields in a futile attempt to save her own ass at the expense of everyone else on the base. That's pathetic soldiering. She didn't have the will to resist or the smarts to assume that regardless of what she does she'll be eliminated.

So if it somehow turned out okay for her in the end, there would really need to be a good explanation regarding that. Doubly so if she continues to command on the First Order side.

WTF? How was she bad ass? She didn't do jack shit! She's Boba Fett 2.0-a walking prop with no actual character.

This is one of your bestest jokes here on gog :)