User:Hyger/The Force Awakens

"Every Generation Has a Story"

- TV spot tagline

Star Wars: Episode VII The Force Awakens, marketed simply as Star Wars: The Force Awakens, is the first film of the Star Wars sequel trilogy. The film is directed by J.J. Abrams; written by Lawrence Kasdan, Abrams and Michael Arndt; and produced by Kathleen Kennedy and Bad Robot Productions. The film was released on December 18, 2015 in North America and December 17 in the UK, Mexico, Latin America & Asian countries. Some North American theaters offered special limited advance showings on the evening of December 17 rather than the traditional midnight showing.

Despite initially claiming that the Star Wars story ended in Star Wars: Episode VI Return of the Jedi, and spending years refuting speculation that there would be another film, George Lucas began work on the story of Episode VII in 2011 in order to increase the value of Lucasfilm Ltd. before he sold it to The Walt Disney Company, although Disney would later elect to not use Lucas's story. The acquisition was finalized on October 30, 2012, and Disney and Lucasfilm officially announced Episode VII the same day.

The Episode VII story will feature the forces of the First Order, an offshoot of the Galactic Empire, aligned against the Resistance, sprung from the Rebel Alliance. The story material will not be based on Star Wars Legends, formerly known as the Expanded Universe, rather, it will be an original story set after Return of the Jedi. The film stars Harrison Ford, Mark Hamill, Carrie Fisher, Anthony Daniels, Peter Mayhew, and Kenny Baker reprising their original roles. The original actors are joined by a host of new actors including Adam Driver, Daisy Ridley, John Boyega, and Oscar Isaac, amongst many others. The film will be presented in RealD 3D and IMAX 3D where available. It will be able to be streamed on Netflix in Canada in 2016.

Synopsis
"We wanted to tell a story that had its own self-contained beginning, middle, and end but at the same time, like A New Hope, implied a history that preceded it and also hinted at a future to follow."

- Director J.J. Abrams

Thirty years after the Rebel Alliance's victory over the second Death Star, the galaxy is still at war. A New Republic has arisen, but the First Order has sprung from the ashes of the Galactic Empire. Many of the heroes of before, Leia Organa, Han Solo, Chewbacca, R2-D2 and C-3PO are all still active and fighting in the Resistance against this group. They are joined in the fight by new heroes, including Poe Dameron, a starfighter pilot; Finn, a former First Order Stormtrooper who has taken up the lightsaber that once belonged to Anakin Skywalker and later Luke Skywalker; Rey, a scavenger; and a rolling droid known as BB-8. They are opposed by powerful new forces, including Captain Phasma of the First Order and Kylo Ren, a fearsome and mysterious dark side user wielding a red lightsaber of unusual design.

Plot
Approximately thirty years after the destruction of the second Death Star, Luke Skywalker, the last surviving Jedi, has disappeared. Both the First Order, a successor to the fallen Galactic Empire, and the Resistance, a military force backed by the Republic and led by Luke's twin sister, General Leia Organa, scour the galaxy in an attempt to find him.

In a village on the planet Jakku, Resistance pilot Poe Dameron meets with village elder Lor San Tekka to obtain a map with coordinates to Luke's location. Stormtroopers under the command of the mysterious Kylo Ren infiltrate and destroy the village, before capturing Poe. His droid, BB-8, escapes with the map hidden in his memory and comes across a scavenger named Rey at a junkyard settlement.

After Ren uses the Force on Poe to learn about BB-8, Stormtrooper FN-2187 defects and helps Poe escape. Their stolen TIE fighter crashes on Jakku, and the stormtrooper, dubbed "Finn" by Dameron, appears to be the only survivor. He encounters Rey and BB-8, and says that he is part of the Resistance. The First Order tracks Finn to the settlement and launches an airstrike, forcing Rey, Finn, and BB-8 to steal a run-down ship, the Millennium Falcon, and flee the planet.

The Falcon breaks down and leaves them stranded, and they are soon found by Han Solo and Chewbacca. Han explains that Luke disappeared after an apprentice of his turned to the dark side and became Kylo Ren, destroying all that Luke had built. At Starkiller Base, a planet converted into a superweapon capable of destroying entire star systems, Ren learns from Supreme Leader Snoke that to overcome the call of the light side, Ren must kill his father, Han Solo. The Falcon crew arrive at the planet Takodana and meet Maz Kanata, who can help BB-8 reach the Resistance, but Finn decides he'd rather flee on his own. Rey ventures into a vault and finds Anakin Skywalker's lightsaber. She receives a mysterious vision and recoils in horror, rejecting Maz's attempt to give her the lightsaber. Finn takes it for safekeeping.

The First Order, tipped off to BB-8's presence, attacks Takodana. Meanwhile, Starkiller Base destroys the Republic-controlled Hosnian star system and its main planet, Hosnian Prime. Han, Chewbacca, and Finn battle the First Order with help from a squadron of Resistance X-wing fighters led by Poe, who survived the crash on Jakku. Rey, however, is captured by Ren and taken to Starkiller Base. Ren attempts to force the map from Rey's mind, but she resists him, and later escapes her cell with a Jedi mind trick. Han is reunited with Leia when he, Chewbacca, and Finn are brought to the Resistance base on D'Qar. BB-8 encounters the droid R2-D2, who has been dormant since Luke's disappearance.

Starkiller Base prepares to fire on D'Qar, and the Resistance devises a plan to sneak onto the surface and lower the planetary shields so the fighters can attack the superweapon's weak spot. Using the Falcon, Han, Chewbacca, and Finn infiltrate the base, lower the shields, and reunite with Rey. However, the X-wing fleet cannot penetrate the weapon, so Han and Chewbacca use explosives to create an opening. Ren arrives to stop them. Han confronts Ren, addressing him by his birth name, Ben, and implores him to abandon the dark side. Ren kills Han, whose body falls into the reactor shaft below. The X-wings damage the weapon, starting a chain reaction that ultimately destroys Starkiller Base.

Ren chases Finn and Rey onto the surface, where Finn tries to fight him using Anakin's lightsaber. When Finn is wounded, Rey takes the lightsaber and overpowers Ren with the Force. She then boards the Falcon along with Finn and Chewbacca, managing to leave the planet as it explodes. The Resistance celebrates their victory while Leia, Chewbacca, and Rey mourn Han's death. R2-D2 suddenly awakens and reveals that he holds the map to Luke's location, with the only piece of the map missing being the one BB-8 was given by Poe. Together they complete the map and reveal the location of the planet on which Luke Skywalker is hiding. With R2-D2 and Chewbacca in tow, Rey follows the map to the distant planet, where she comes across Luke and presents him with his father's lightsaber.

Reception
Theater tickets became available for pre-order on October 19th, with many online retailers experiencing outages due to heavy demand, including top sites such as Fandango. By the time of the film's release, over $100 million in pre-release tickets were sold, bypassing the previous record held by The Dark Knight. Some theater chains chose to set limits on the types of cosplay allowed at screenings of the film. For instance, fans at AMC and Cinemark weren't allowed to wear masks or face-paint, or carry simulated weapons. Some chains also issued a blanket ban on the carrying of lightsaber toys.

The film carries a 95% fresh score at the review aggregation site Rotten Tomatoes, with 268 reviews and average score of 8.3/10. Manohla Dargis of the New York Times stated that "The big news about “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” is — spoiler alert — that it’s good!" and that the film "takes off with a battle and closes on a meaningful moment of quiet." John Wenzel of the Denver Post graded the film at 3 1/2 stars out of 4, calling it a "'masterful symphony" and praising the film's emphasis on "practical effects and honest-to-God sets." Richard Roeper gave the film four stars.

Credits
"We are so excited to finally share the cast of Star Wars: Episode VII. It is both thrilling and surreal to watch the beloved original cast and these brilliant new performers come together to bring this world to life, once again. We start shooting in a couple of weeks, and everyone is doing their best to make the fans proud."

- J.J. Abrams

Notes and references
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