Star Wars Episode 7, or: What a Piece of Junk

When Jerry Seinfeld wanted to end his sitcom, many viewers protested. They wanted the show to continue. Jerry, though in a very condescending tone, responded by saying viewers really don't know what they want, and if you just give in to their demands, they will ultimately be less happy. It might be nice, he explained, for them to have one thing in their life that didn't go on too long and end up sliding into mediocrity.

That brings us to Star Wars.

I don't think I've ever been so let down by a franchise before. Maybe the current James Bond reboot, but even that hasn't left me as pissed off as Episode 7, and the prequels, and the Special Editions, have left me.

The original Star Wars films are probably some of the best examples of storytelling in modern history. Everything you need to know about pacing, structure, characters--it's all there. When Lucas and his cast were hungry and unknown, they produced magic. Now that everybody is a millionaire, we get a steaming pile of Bantha fodder. Problem is, the public seems to like Bantha fodder. A lot. We'll save that argument for another time.

Without going into spoilers, Episode 7 is like having the same Thanksgiving leftovers for a whole week. Eventually even thinking about turkey makes you sick, yet J.J. Abrams and his people have made a film that serves leftover turkey not for five days, but for a month. Instead of digging deep into their imaginations, and maybe even using current events (as the First Order could be a disguised ISIS), they instead mined the other movies (all six for hate's sake!) for ideas and re-used them with younger people playing different parts. Something bad happened in the galaxy a long time ago, AND NOW IT'S HAPPENING AGAIN ALMOST THE SAME WAY AS BEFORE!!!

We even get another whining emo sissy for a Dark Jedi. Do they come any other way?

I expected more. A lot more.

Heck, the Expanded Universe novels that started back in the '90s with Timothy Zahn's excellent "Thrawn Trilogy" were a better follow-up than the steaming pile in theaters now. That's the material that should have been mined. Instead they did the bare minimum and gave us what we've already had for decades.

They also negated everything that happened at the end of Return of the Jedi, and didn't explain how the galaxy wound up in such shambles after the defeat of the Empire. That would have taken thought and maybe a little imagination; all Abrams and his crew had on their minds was "pew pew pew".

What we're left with are a lot of neat visuals to look at, but nothing of any substance.

Worse, Lucas has all but made the unaltered originals impossible to get after "fixing" what wasn't broken. Luckily, I still have them on VHS.

Of course I'm in the minority. I suppose I'm a "hater" that's "gonna hate" or whatever the kids are saying today after somebody else tells them to say it.

But in going full circle with my Seinfeld introduction, there was a time when Lucas was aloof about Star Wars. Maybe he'd do more, maybe he wouldn't, the fans clamored for more, he gave in. And now some of us are less happy, because there was a time when Star Wars was good, and not having any more made what we had even better. Star Wars has completed the slide to mediocrity, and now it's in the hands of Disney who will continue producing Bantha fodder until who knows when.

A few other observations:

Harrison Ford. Dude, if you hated Han Solo so much, why did you agree to do this? You've crapped on the fans. And by the way? You look like a tired, washed-up Mr. Magoo. Yup, I noticed your hand shaking when holding your pistol. Die young, leave a good-looking corpse--that means you.

Carrie Fisher. What a trooper. She did what she could while having nothing to work with, but 90% of the nation's Botox supply is in her face.

Mark Hamill. Where to start? I suppose I can't blame him, per se, but why let your character be assassinated the way it was? You defeated the Emperor and Darth Vader and now you run at the first sign of you-know-who emulating Grandpa? Way to let you-also-know-who get killed along with a gazillion others.

The new actors. It might have been nice just to have the new people in this show and none of the regulars as they deal with the collapse of the New Republic under the First Order, and have to make it up as they go instead of having the "wisdom" of Solo and Leia to tell them what do to. The new characters are certainly worth spending time with, but they're caught in a vortex of repetition, and they're situations are less compelling because of it.

You're probably going to go see the show anyway, but if you must, wait for the DVD.