Saw it a second time last night with different friends, it is definitely worth a second view, you pick up on a few more things, some key, some more Easter egg like little nods. The 501st (cosplay group rather than Vader's personal Stormtrooper Battalion) banner glimpsed at Maz's castle, the pink Astromech droid R2 KT designed as a tribute to a girl Star Wars fan who died of a terminal condition a decade ago makes an appearance, another fitting tribute. With foreknowledge of a certain British super spy's cameo you can actually just about recognize his voice in the key scene he takes part in. The climax of the aerial space battle over Star Killer Base makes more sense the second time round, though that might have just been me, but on first watch it didn't register what the "boots on the ground's" actions allowed the starfighter pilot's to do in that last little bit of action, second time it was, "Ahh, now I see." Also it didn't register for me what the location was that Rey first appeared in when she picked up Luke's old lightsaber, one of the corridors in Bespin Cloud City where the duel took place between Luke and Vader.
Also on the subject of Rey, I'm less convinced than before that she is indeed Luke's daughter (would be more interesting if she wasn't in my opinion), this is due to the way she talks about Luke on first meeting Han, thinking of Luke like a legend that wasn't real. Doesn't sound like what some one who could be his daughter would say. Just didn't seem to ring true, so maybe her origins do lie elsewhere after all. Still this could be a red herring. Still loving the way we were thrown by Finn having the Lightsaber in all the promotional material, a masterful bit of misdirection.
The music also seems a little stronger on the second watch, though still paling in comparison with both original and prequel trilogy soundtracks, but it just seemed to register a bit more this time. Rey's theme and Scavenger tracks definitely coming across like the standouts.
On the negative side, some things also still made little or no sense on an additional viewing. Star Killer Base's primary weapon still doesn't really clearly register as to what the weapon actually does. And why it is better than say the Death Star's superlaser? It sucks the power up from a nearby sun to then fire a beam across the galaxy somehow. So the upgrade is that you don't have to be in system to fire the weapon? And it seems able to take out multiple planetary targets with it's energy ribbon/bolt thing as it splits off strands to take out multiple planets in a system. It all seems a little random to me, and not as cut and dried and clear as what you got with the Death Star's superlaser, it was very clear what that thing did, here it seems more nebulous in what the weapon's capabilities are. And can Star Killer Base actually move through space? Or is it a relatively static object, like a standard planet, and it is just able to fire its weapon clear across the galaxy? As if it could move like the original Death Star's surely that would be problematic for those seemingly living on the surface of the base, as clearly surface and atmospheric conditions would change quite drastically depending how close or far away it was from the nearest star. This then also leads to the other main bit which didn't make sense for me. The fact that these worlds are getting destroyed by the base in a system completely different to where the Resistance base is, yet people there can see all the action with their naked eye like it is something happening in their local space, at least within the same star system, which it supposedly didn't as the target was named as a separate star system. That whole sequence and idea needed work as it just doesn't seem to work on any level.
That together with the broad strokes of the plot being basically a rehash of Episode IV seem to be my main gripes. That and how criminally underused Captain Phasma seems to be. She's meant to be this bad pie, yet we never see her do anything, other than give up secrets like a babbling brook spilling secrets over left right and center with next to no provocation from what we saw. What was all that about? Seems a wasted opportunity, hopefully there is some footage/scene or whatever on the cutting room floor in which Captain Phasma gets the chance to show what a bad pie she really is.
There is probably more to be considered, but this is all I can be arsed writing now.
I still love the movie as there is plenty in there they get right, but there a few chinks in the armour that could have been dealt with better.
Closed Alpha Test & Deth..
