Here’s the deal. I’ll kick ass and then people will wonder what happened to me! Deal?
Our attention and focus on tight storytelling doesn’t waver a bit as we are introduced to a new class of Star Destroyer and the interrogation chambers that Poe will have to deal with. He is interrogated by Kylo in a well-acted sequence that made me squirm, and the First Order discover that the BB-8 has the map. Luckily, not everything is lost for our smarmy asshole in waiting, as we have a black Stormtrooper to the rescue! His name is FN-2187, but we will later know him as Finn. Or, to put it even more bluntly, that guy that a bunch of racist nutjobs get around to hating when they stop thinking about their love for Jar Jar Binks.
Meesa gonna love yousa tonight!
These two establish a nice character dynamic as they make their escape, establishing themselves as a pair of super-friends right from the get-go. Ironically enough, this is also where a little bit of blood goes back to my brain. After Finn and Poe are shot down over Jakku, Poe effectively disappears from the movie for no reason.
J.J., what are you doing? Why would you build up this character and the beginnings of a dynamic between him and other people only to throw his story off the screen at the first moment of opportunity? I know that you needed to introduce Rey, but it’s no excuse for punching the balance of the script right in the face. Speaking of which…
Rey Comes On Board.
She was soon told to take her ball and go home.
What follows are a few breather scenes where we come to our resident girl named Jaina Rey. Putting aside the odd choice of name, this character is effectively a hopelessly naïve junk dealer and mechanic that is living hand to mouth, holding out hope that her family will come and rescue her from the desert hellhole that she found herself on. For the sake of movie, she meets BB-8 and Finn in a rapid succession and is subsequently placed under threat from Empire, Mark II. When an airstrike is launched, this second trio makes a run for it and, for reasons of fan service, winds up on board the Millennium Falcon.
Now, some of you might be thinking that a pretentious meanie like moi would be angry at this, but I actually didn’t mind it at all. The Falcon is so iconic and cool that any other ship design might be considered to be too much of a rip-off. The dialogue also explains it later in a few lines about how she got repeatedly stolen and ended up in the Jakku junkyard. Accept no substitutes, this hunk of junk is still the most beloved ship in the galaxy.
No, I don’t mind that. What I do mind is the fact that they don’t seem to have a trained pilot to get out of there. Rey knows how to start her up and get her off the ground, but she flops around this glorious vessel like a fish out of water for a few minutes before masterfully pulling off a series of maneuvers that would make ace pilots blush.
Gee, it’s not like this movie doesn’t already have a hotshot pilot that can fly everything. Specifically, one that the scriptwriters introduced in the first part of this movie!
There’s A Difference Between Suspending Disbelief And Being Dumb.
OH, COME ON! HE WAS RIGHT THERE!
Now, you might be wondering if I am going to focus on the cancer that is the Mary Sue archetype, but I’ll get to that later in this series. What I instead want to focus on are the principles of character development and balance. The Force Awakens criminally wasted Oscar Isaac and cheapened the character of Rey with this one creative decision. Why? Well, the answer is right in front of your face. The fact that our resident female has never flown a ship before is laughable, but the character development between someone that has been billed as a new leading actor and the two leads that we spent the most time with was completely lost.
EDIT: Upon review, it appears that Rey has flown ships before, but never off the planet. How can she develop a skill like that if she is living hand-to-mouth selling scraps? On top of that, wouldn’t that be a more valuable skill than being a scavenger? Better yet, why did she have to stay on Jakku? The saga points out that there are interstellar communications devices.
Luke was at least a farmboy before he began his adventure, so it explains the piloting thing.
We never got to see how Poe reacts to Rey. We never got to see how chummy he is with BB-8 in an extended form. Hell, we never got to have any scenes that the slash fic writers can use out-of-context for their weird stories that no one has ever read. Ever. Under any circumstances.
That being said, not all is lost. The movie takes our mind off of this through the sudden capture of the Falcon, where we meet a pair of familiar faces for the first time in forever.
To Be Continued in Part 3.
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