The Force Awakens *Possible Spoilers*

[Juan Anderson's Mixtape]

Somehow, Maz ended up with Luke's blue lightsaber. The one that was given to him by Obi-wan. Obi-wan acquired it because it was originally Anakin's before their last encounter where Obi-wan defeated Anakin and took it. Correct, Luke lost it and his hand in Cloud City. Somehow, we haven't been told, Maz ended up with it.

Luke, almost assuredly, still has his green lightsaber.

Every jedi makes/creates their own individual saber. Luke, through the first two movies, used Anakin's. It wasn't his own. So, when he lost it (and as he should be expected to) he made his own - which was green.

Yes, I know all that.  But how did it go from hurling into the abyss of Bespin to Maz's?   This point is completely unexplained.  Did it conveniently land in Lando's lap somehow?  It is such a leap from point A to point B that you need to explain that.  Accepting convenience at face value=lazy story telling.  There better be one hell of an explanation in VIII or IX.

[jesmu84]

Yes, I know all that.  But how did it go from hurling into the abyss of Bespin to Maz's?   This point is completely unexplained.  Did it conveniently land in Lando's lap somehow?  It is such a leap from point A to point B that you need to explain that.  Accepting convenience at face value=lazy story telling.  There better be one hell of an explanation in VIII or IX.

I think it will get explained. I was okay with the backstory not coming out yet. Like you said, as long as it does get explained eventually. If it doesn't, I'll jump on the wtf train.

[mu03eng]

The Force Awakens was entertaining and did a good job of introducing the new characters while bringing back some old favorites.  But overall the movie was a bit too formulaic with old plot themes, old character lines/moves, parallel settings, and plot holes you could fly a Star Destroyer through.

The one thing that bothers me most: Why is Rey's lightsaber blue?  I didn't catch it at first because during the movie I was trying to figure out why Luke's lightsaber ended up abandoned and locked in the basement of the Mos Eisley Cantina, err Yoda's basement, err the basement of Maz's bar.

In the movie, they explained the lightsaber belonged to Luke Skywalker, and Darth Vader/Anakin before him.  Which would explain why the lightsaber is blue...except that lightsaber was lost when Vader sliced off Luke's hand in Empire!  So how the F did it end up halfway across the galaxy 30 years later???  Shouldn't Rey have a green lightsaber like Luke's from Jedi?  What happened to Luke's green lightsaber?  And how did nobody catch this from a continuity perspective?

I'm wondering how many more plot holes I missed during the first viewing.  Still, this movie was better than the abominations that were 1 and 2 (besides Darth Maul but even he was underused and killed off way too soon).  I'd rank it 5th.

1. Empire
2. The Original
3. Sith
4. Jedi
5. Force
Tied for last: I & II

I'm sure Luke has his green saber with him.  The blue saber was Anakin's and Luke lost it when Vader cut off his hand in Cloud City, and you see a shot of the hand+saber falling through the clouds in Bespin (when Luke lands on the antenna).  So presumably someone went and found the saber and it ended up in Maz's hands

If my theory of the Rey/Luke story is correct then I think Luke himself found it and left it with Maz.  I think Max Von Sydow's character was Luke's father in law and he was playing the Ben Kenobi role for Rey and had a map for Rey when she was old enough to find Luke and begin her training.  Luke hid Rey after Ren killed his wife (Mara Jade like character) so he couldn't find her and turn her and she can develop as he did and become a powerful jedi.  Luke also found his saber and hid it with Maz knowing eventually it would get into her hands.

We know Luke and Anakin have both had force visions of the future, which I don't believe is a general skill of the jedi public, Yoda was the only other one that could call visions in the current canon.  Luke could have "planted" the vision on the lightsaber to guide Rey(or it's an accidental vision like the Empire cave) and that was to "awaken" the force in Rey.  Luke was then able to reach out to her through the force aide her in the fight with Kylo.  This is why Leia and Chewie let her take the Falcon and be the one to meet with Luke first.

I think 8 will be flashback filled which also makes sense given someone(can't remember who) that had read the script(maybe Daisey Ridley?) saying that the script was awesome but going in a weird direction we hadn't seen before.  So we'll see why Luke leaves, how the First Order and Snoke came to be (Darth Plagies????), and what turned Ben


Side note: if they are plucking EU stories, a Solo force user killing Luke's wife and becoming Sith is a definite story line from the EU

[mu03eng]

Favorite subtle call back that I think a lot of people missed, "we think they are splitting up...."

As I think Jes pointed out, one of, if not, the main theme in Star Wars is choice. 30 years later people are having to make similar choices because of history repeating itself(not unlike the real world) so will they learn to make the right choices.

I do hope we get more backstory on the fall of Ben Solo....what is the driving force and why is he trying to keep the light side out?

I'm talking myself into VII being just behind Empire the more and more I talk about it.

[MU82]

I'm sure Luke has his green saber with him.  The blue saber was Anakin's and Luke lost it when Vader cut off his hand in Cloud City, and you see a shot of the hand+saber falling through the clouds in Bespin (when Luke lands on the antenna).  So presumably someone went and found the saber and it ended up in Maz's hands

If my theory of the Rey/Luke story is correct then I think Luke himself found it and left it with Maz.  I think Max Von Sydow's character was Luke's father in law and he was playing the Ben Kenobi role for Rey and had a map for Rey when she was old enough to find Luke and begin her training.  Luke hid Rey after Ren killed his wife (Mara Jade like character) so he couldn't find her and turn her and she can develop as he did and become a powerful jedi.  Luke also found his saber and hid it with Maz knowing eventually it would get into her hands.

We know Luke and Anakin have both had force visions of the future, which I don't believe is a general skill of the jedi public, Yoda was the only other one that could call visions in the current canon.  Luke could have "planted" the vision on the lightsaber to guide Rey(or it's an accidental vision like the Empire cave) and that was to "awaken" the force in Rey.  Luke was then able to reach out to her through the force aide her in the fight with Kylo.  This is why Leia and Chewie let her take the Falcon and be the one to meet with Luke first.

I think 8 will be flashback filled which also makes sense given someone(can't remember who) that had read the script(maybe Daisey Ridley?) saying that the script was awesome but going in a weird direction we hadn't seen before.  So we'll see why Luke leaves, how the First Order and Snoke came to be (Darth Plagies????), and what turned Ben


Side note: if they are plucking EU stories, a Solo force user killing Luke's wife and becoming Sith is a definite story line from the EU

Wow! I like Star Wars. Some of you guys really LIVE Star Wars.

(Not a criticism at all, just an observation. I can name the name, number and position of every Miami Dolphins player on the 1972 and 1973 championship teams. We all have our hobbies and obsessions!)

[mu03eng]

Wow! I like Star Wars. Some of you guys really LIVE Star Wars.

(Not a criticism at all, just an observation. I can name the name, number and position of every Miami Dolphins player on the 1972 and 1973 championship teams. We all have our hobbies and obsessions!)

I was 8-14 during the height of the EU literature coming out....it was a big deal for me and my brother as voracious readers.

[jficke13]

I was 8-14 during the height of the EU literature coming out....it was a big deal for me and my brother as voracious readers.

I know the feeling man. I tore through a lot of pages of the EU back in middle school.

[Juan Anderson's Mixtape]

I'm not an EU reader so those story lines must be told to the viewer; I don't want EU readers to tell me, the movie needs to do that, especially since we were told the EU is not canon.  My best friend was an avid EU reader and I've had enough surface level conversations to recognize some of the character names.  They still need to tell the story to the movie viewer whether it is the exact same as the EU, a modification of the EU, or completely different than the EU.

I can accept some of the mystery around Rey, Snoke, etc. but this lightsaber thing is so fantastical that it better be explained and the explanation better be something worthwhile.  Because if Luke retrieved his blue lightsaber, why did he build a new one?  If building a lightsaber is part of the Jedi training, why not use both in Jedi?  Some things still aren't adding up.

[mu03eng]

I'm not an EU reader so those story lines must be told to the viewer; I don't want EU readers to tell me, the movie needs to do that, especially since we were told the EU is not canon.  My best friend was an avid EU reader and I've had enough surface level conversations to recognize some of the character names.  They still need to tell the story to the movie viewer whether it is the exact same as the EU, a modification of the EU, or completely different than the EU.

I can accept some of the mystery around Rey, Snoke, etc. but this lightsaber thing is so fantastical that it better be explained and the explanation better be something worthwhile.  Because if Luke retrieved his blue lightsaber, why did he build a new one?  If building a lightsaber is part of the Jedi training, why not use both in Jedi?  Some things still aren't adding up.

First, EU references are not canon and those who know EU are only mentioning it as something that MAY come into the movies because they've said they like some of the content.  You are correct, any EU material will have to be explained either in the movies or in the extended material (books, cartoons, etc)

Second, if Luke got his original saber, he did it after RotJ I'm sure

[jesmu84]

I'm not an EU reader so those story lines must be told to the viewer; I don't want EU readers to tell me, the movie needs to do that, especially since we were told the EU is not canon.  My best friend was an avid EU reader and I've had enough surface level conversations to recognize some of the character names.  They still need to tell the story to the movie viewer whether it is the exact same as the EU, a modification of the EU, or completely different than the EU.

I can accept some of the mystery around Rey, Snoke, etc. but this lightsaber thing is so fantastical that it better be explained and the explanation better be something worthwhile.  Because if Luke retrieved his blue lightsaber, why did he build a new one?  If building a lightsaber is part of the Jedi training, why not use both in Jedi?  Some things still aren't adding up.

Did you overwhelmingly question how Obi-wan got Anakin's lightsaber in A New Hope? Guess what, that was NEVER explained in any of the original trilogy.

[mu03eng]

Did you overwhelmingly question how Obi-wan got Anakin's lightsaber in A New Hope? Guess what, that was NEVER explained in any of the original trilogy.

Kenobi did say Anakin gave it to him.....from a certain point of view.  Or are you referring to after the father reveal since clearly Anakin/Vader wouldn't have given Obi-wan the saber?

[drewm88]

I agree that it would have been cooler if Ren waited until he was with Han to take off the helmet, but two thoughts on that.

--Would it have been too derivative of the end of ROTJ? Maybe they wanted to edit out those repetitions wherever possible because they knew they were already pushing it.
--Did the removal of the mask go hand-in-hand with Ren's struggles to read Rey's mind? (I don't remember the timing.) Perhaps it was symbolic of how Ren wasn't at Vader's level yet--he had his mask off when Rey bested him in the mind reading and when he failed in his lightsaber battles.

[ChicosBailBonds]

Some Hollywood types already complaining the Harrison Ford was paid so much for this movie and Carrie Fischer so little....claiming gender bias. 56X the amount.

This just in kids, very few people went to see the movie because of Carrie Fischer....many many many people went to see it because of Harrison Ford.

[brewcity77]

Just viewed TFA for the second time. Here are a few thoughts between the thread and the movie:
.

• The Blue Lightsaber: Not a worry at all. Maz specifically says it's a long story, but a story for another time. It will be explained. Definitely Luke's weapon from Cloud City. In the original scripts, I guess there was a scene cut of the lightsaber falling to Jakku with Luke's severed hand still clutching it. Interesting sidenote, the reason they made Luke's lightsaber in RotJ green was because the blue didn't show up as well in the battle against Jabba on Tatooine.
  
• Rey's parents: This still has me befuddled. The problem with her being a Kenobi or Jinn is that both were Jedi that seemed to mostly live by the rules of the order, which included not taking a wife and having children. Luke I suppose is possible, but the last name Skywalker would probably resonate with her sooner (and she says "I thought he was a myth"). Abrams said the name was left out deliberately, so it has to be familiar. I think Obi-Wan breaking his vows seems most likely in his later years, perhaps he left a young Rey on Jakku knowing another conflict with Vader was coming, which would make Rey 33-35, possible if her mother was long-lived, like Padme. It would also be appropriately circular if Luke trained Obi-Wan's child, just as Obi-Wan had once trained Anakin's child.
  
• The Dark Side: Kylo Ren has his struggles to stave off the light side, but what really struck me was just how dark Rey looked in her final battle with Ren. I thought it on my first viewing, but it kind of slipped my mind in the fanboy "It's Luke, it's Luke" moment after. If not for the earthquake, I think there's a good chance Rey kills Ren. I wonder if we'll end up with a huge bait and switch that leads Rey to be the actual villain while perhaps Ren is drawn back to the light and is the true hero.
  
• The EU: I know they have largely dismissed the EU, and I don't expect it to take hold. Really comes down to Rey's parentage. If she's Luke's daughter, I'll be curious to see the explanation. Also, HttE took place relatively soon after RotJ, so it's entirely possible they could fit that into the history.
  
• The Movie itself: I liked it better the second time than I did the first. I was watching looking for holes and reasons to not like it, so I'm encouraged by that. I felt like Poe's survival was a bit sloppy and rushed, and the map still irks me a bit. Total MacGuffin that R2 just happens to wake up at that precise moment (when BB-8 couldn't wake him up before with the same exact information about Luke) and just happens to have the rest of the map. But all in all, good movie. It did borrow heavily from the 4-6 trilogy, but it's a starting point.
  
• New Force Users: I am a bit disturbed how Rey picked up the Force so quickly when seemingly 5 minutes earlier she thought it was all a myth. Also, unless everything they ever said about Jedi was false, Finn is absolutely a force user. No way he is that good with a lightsaber otherwise. And I realize Rey was better, but here's a guy who's been a Stormtrooper for 5 minutes and been in one battle where he didn't fire a shot and suddenly he's holding his own with a lightsaber in a melee battle with a trained, veteran Stormtrooper, followed by holding his own for awhile against Kylo Ren, a trained Dark Jedi, to the point where he even wounded him. The moment Ren turned to Finn on Jakku, and subsequently immediately knew exactly that FN2198 was the Stormtrooper that betrayed him. Why? Because he sensed the light side in him.
  
• See it twice: At least if you're a Star Wars junkie. I missed a lot the first time around. I also was unsure of the pacing the first time I watched it and much more satisfied the second time.

[MU82]

Some Hollywood types already complaining the Harrison Ford was paid so much for this movie and Carrie Fischer so little....claiming gender bias. 56X the amount.

This just in kids, very few people went to see the movie because of Carrie Fischer....many many many people went to see it because of Harrison Ford.

I just hope Carrie Fisher (no "c" -- she isn't related to THAT Luke) didn't get paid less than Mark Hamill, who was in the movie for about 12 seconds.

Otherwise, if she didn't like what she was getting paid, all she had to say was No. She probably would have said it with more emotion than anything she said in the movie.

[MU82]

I was 8-14 during the height of the EU literature coming out....it was a big deal for me and my brother as voracious readers.

I am so not a Star Wars nerd that I didn't even know what EU was referring to until I just googled it.

[Juan Anderson's Mixtape]

Did you overwhelmingly question how Obi-wan got Anakin's lightsaber in A New Hope? Guess what, that was NEVER explained in any of the original trilogy.

But it was explained.  Obi-Wan knew Anakin.  From Wookiepedia:

Luke receives his father's lightsaber, as Obi-Wan recalls his own friendship with Luke's father. Luke is told that a Jedi named Darth Vader betrayed and murdered his father.

Ergo it is easily understood that the lightsaber went from Anakin to Obi-Wan directly, though the how wasn't fully explained until Sith.  And there were some half truths that concealed the big reveal and those were explained to be lies later on in the OT.  Still, a loose and vague explanation is better than nothing.  In Force we have the lightsaber appearing after its last known whereabouts were somewhere on Bespin with no explanation about how it got there.

I'm actually starting to simmer down a bit on this and will wait for an explanation.  I hope it's more satisfying than Luke saying something like, "Funny thing.  The lightsaber landed on Lando's ship before he escaped Cloud City.  He tried to give it to me after RoJ but I told him to take it to Maz for safe keeping."

[jesmu84]

Just viewed TFA for the second time. Here are a few thoughts between the thread and the movie:
.

• New Force Users: I am a bit disturbed how Rey picked up the Force so quickly when seemingly 5 minutes earlier she thought it was all a myth. Also, unless everything they ever said about Jedi was false, Finn is absolutely a force user. No way he is that good with a lightsaber otherwise. And I realize Rey was better, but here's a guy who's been a Stormtrooper for 5 minutes and been in one battle where he didn't fire a shot and suddenly he's holding his own with a lightsaber in a melee battle with a trained, veteran Stormtrooper, followed by holding his own for awhile against Kylo Ren, a trained Dark Jedi, to the point where he even wounded him. The moment Ren turned to Finn on Jakku, and subsequently immediately knew exactly that FN2198 was the Stormtrooper that betrayed him. Why? Because he sensed the light side in him.

I still don't buy it. Finn may turn out to be a force user, but as of now, everything that happened in TFA could be the result of his stormtrooper training. Remember, he says he was taken as an infant, genetically-modified and trained basically from birth - so he hadn't been a stormtrooper for "5 minutes", he'd been on his whole existence. His training includes the weapon the stormtrooper fought him with - some sort of shock-baton? That weapon appears, at least from my reading, to be specifically for battling a lightsaber. Ergo, Finn was intimately familiar with sabers. Note again, he got his ass-kicked by that stormtrooper. Further, Kylo was clearly toying with Finn, not to mention Kylo was severely injured. Once Kylo began  trying, the fight was over quickly.

For more precedent, there is significant canon-based evidence that non-force users can use lightsabers, vibroblades, etc. - mandalorians being the prime, but not only, example of this.

If anything, what seems more outlandish to me, is after all the modification, reprogramming, etc that Finn goes through to become a stormtrooper and guarantee his loyalty, he can just turn his back on it all of a sudden

[jesmu84]

But it was explained.  Obi-Wan knew Anakin.  From Wookiepedia:

Luke receives his father's lightsaber, as Obi-Wan recalls his own friendship with Luke's father. Luke is told that a Jedi named Darth Vader betrayed and murdered his father.

Ergo it is easily understood that the lightsaber went from Anakin to Obi-Wan directly, though the how wasn't fully explained until Sith.  And there were some half truths that concealed the big reveal and those were explained to be lies later on in the OT.  Still, a loose and vague explanation is better than nothing.  In Force we have the lightsaber appearing after its last known whereabouts were somewhere on Bespin with no explanation about how it got there.

I'm actually starting to simmer down a bit on this and will wait for an explanation.  I hope it's more satisfying than Luke saying something like, "Funny thing.  The lightsaber landed on Lando's ship before he escaped Cloud City.  He tried to give it to me after RoJ but I told him to take it to Maz for safe keeping."

Fair, but eh. Connecting a lot of dots that you found out later. Obi-wan and Luke's father had a relationship, ergo the saber went from Anakin to Obi-wan.

I could just as easily connect that Luke lost it in Bespin and Maz had it in TFA, ergo Maz found it on Bespin - she is force-sensitive afterall.

[Juan Anderson's Mixtape]

Fair, but eh. Connecting a lot of dots that you found out later. Obi-wan and Luke's father had a relationship, ergo the saber went from Anakin to Obi-wan.

I could just as easily connect that Luke lost it in Bespin and Maz had it in TFA, ergo Maz found it on Bespin - she is force-sensitive afterall.

I was born a few months after Empire was released so my first OT experience was condensed in rapid fire viewing as a young child.  I didn't have to wait years to connect the dots and as a child I didn't take the same critical thinking viewpoint I have now.  Now I'm an adult with a different viewpoint and I have to wait years for the explanation. 

I'm also now recalling the line "It's a story for another time" that brew77 posted.  Probably why I glossed over it the first day or so.  As I rehashed things in my mind, I clearly forgot that line and brew77 jogged my memory.  So I'm less riled up than I was during my original post.

[jesmu84]

I was born a few months after Empire was released so my first OT experience was condensed in rapid fire viewing as a young child.  I didn't have to wait years to connect the dots and as a child I didn't take the same critical thinking viewpoint I have now.  Now I'm an adult with a different viewpoint and I have to wait years for the explanation. 

I'm also now recalling the line "It's a story for another time" that brew77 posted.  Probably why I glossed over it the first day or so.  As I rehashed things in my mind, I clearly forgot that line and brew77 jogged my memory.  So I'm less riled up than I was during my original post.

I will 100% admit that I am very intrigued by that particular piece of the puzzle. It just falls below other mysteries like Rey's parentage, the backstory of Kylo/Luke, etc

[Litehouse]

Total MacGuffin that R2 just happens to wake up at that precise moment (when BB-8 couldn't wake him up before with the same exact information about Luke) and just happens to have the rest of the map.

Does R2 wake up when they arrive with Luke's blue light saber?  The presence of the saber may have kicked him into action.

[brewcity77]

I still don't buy it. Finn may turn out to be a force user, but as of now, everything that happened in TFA could be the result of his stormtrooper training. Remember, he says he was taken as an infant, genetically-modified and trained basically from birth - so he hadn't been a stormtrooper for "5 minutes", he'd been on his whole existence. His training includes the weapon the stormtrooper fought him with - some sort of shock-baton? That weapon appears, at least from my reading, to be specifically for battling a lightsaber. Ergo, Finn was intimately familiar with sabers. Note again, he got his ass-kicked by that stormtrooper. Further, Kylo was clearly toying with Finn, not to mention Kylo was severely injured. Once Kylo began  trying, the fight was over quickly.

For more precedent, there is significant canon-based evidence that non-force users can use lightsabers, vibroblades, etc. - mandalorians being the prime, but not only, example of this.

If anything, what seems more outlandish to me, is after all the modification, reprogramming, etc that Finn goes through to become a stormtrooper and guarantee his loyalty, he can just turn his back on it all of a sudden

Seems like an agree to disagree type thing. Finn also mentions that his job on Starkiller Base was as a janitor. I really didn't get the impression that he was a badass Stormtrooper but rather the new guy that worked his way up from scrubbing toilets and freaked out the first time he was in a battle. That just doesn't strike me as someone that could competently wield a lightsaber. Further, I don't think the average Stormtrooper could wield a lightsaber.

Could others have used them? Sure. General Grievous and the Mandalorians are exceptions. But they are rare exceptions. They are by and large a Jedi weapon that are used exclusively by Force users. Both Wookieepedia and StarWars.com list lightsabers as weapons used by Jedi and Sith.

Also, there's been a lot of talk about how these are intended to mirror the first set of movies. That includes the three main characters, Luke, Han, and Leia. I think it's pretty clear that Rey is the new Luke, the powerful force user who doesn't understand the extent of her power, while Poe seems pretty obviously the new Han, the handsome, wise-cracking scoundrel of the series. That leaves Finn to take the role of Leia. Let's not forget, Leia is also a force-user, though I will admit a little disappointment that Luke doesn't seem to have trained her.

Regardless, I'm sure we could be having this debate for the next two years or so until Episode VIII comes out

[brewcity77]

Does R2 wake up when they arrive with Luke's blue light saber?  The presence of the saber may have kicked him into action.

It could be that, it could also be the presence of Ren (if she's Luke's daughter). I hope they explain that, because there really wasn't any reason for R2 to wake up the second time when BB-8 had already shown up earlier with the same piece of the map in his memory banks and tried to rouse R2.

[mu03eng]

Just viewed TFA for the second time. Here are a few thoughts between the thread and the movie:
.

• The Blue Lightsaber: Not a worry at all. Maz specifically says it's a long story, but a story for another time. It will be explained. Definitely Luke's weapon from Cloud City. In the original scripts, I guess there was a scene cut of the lightsaber falling to Jakku with Luke's severed hand still clutching it. Interesting sidenote, the reason they made Luke's lightsaber in RotJ green was because the blue didn't show up as well in the battle against Jabba on Tatooine.
  
  Yep
  
  
• Rey's parents: This still has me befuddled. The problem with her being a Kenobi or Jinn is that both were Jedi that seemed to mostly live by the rules of the order, which included not taking a wife and having children. Luke I suppose is possible, but the last name Skywalker would probably resonate with her sooner (and she says "I thought he was a myth"). Abrams said the name was left out deliberately, so it has to be familiar. I think Obi-Wan breaking his vows seems most likely in his later years, perhaps he left a young Rey on Jakku knowing another conflict with Vader was coming, which would make Rey 33-35, possible if her mother was long-lived, like Padme. It would also be appropriately circular if Luke trained Obi-Wan's child, just as Obi-Wan had once trained Anakin's child.
  
  I don't get where this Shmi and/or Qui-gon and/or Obi-won as the parent of Rey theories are coming from......seems like a lot of explanation to make the pieces fit, when Luke as the father is much neater or easier. Remember Finn's name wasn't originally Finn....who says Rey has the last name Skywalker on Jakku?  Ultimately, Star Wars is centered on the Skywalker family....to have Rey not be part of that family and be part of the redemption/fall story seems to go against the spirit of Star Wars.
  
  
• The Dark Side: Kylo Ren has his struggles to stave off the light side, but what really struck me was just how dark Rey looked in her final battle with Ren. I thought it on my first viewing, but it kind of slipped my mind in the fanboy "It's Luke, it's Luke" moment after. If not for the earthquake, I think there's a good chance Rey kills Ren. I wonder if we'll end up with a huge bait and switch that leads Rey to be the actual villain while perhaps Ren is drawn back to the light and is the true hero.
  I am really really really intrigued by this theory.  I assumed that scene was Rey channeling the force via Luke.  Only hitch, if you murder your famous father and a huge fan favorite, can you ever be redeemed?  What could possibly occur for Rey to become hated and for fans to cheer for Kylo.
  
  
• The EU: I know they have largely dismissed the EU, and I don't expect it to take hold. Really comes down to Rey's parentage. If she's Luke's daughter, I'll be curious to see the explanation. Also, HttE took place relatively soon after RotJ, so it's entirely possible they could fit that into the history.
  
  I don't think they will take whole chunks from the EU like HttE, but certainly I think concepts are in play, especially within the anthology series of movies and the space between RotJ and TFA.  They can go full Marvel's MCU here.
  
  
• The Movie itself: I liked it better the second time than I did the first. I was watching looking for holes and reasons to not like it, so I'm encouraged by that. I felt like Poe's survival was a bit sloppy and rushed, and the map still irks me a bit. Total MacGuffin that R2 just happens to wake up at that precise moment (when BB-8 couldn't wake him up before with the same exact information about Luke) and just happens to have the rest of the map. But all in all, good movie. It did borrow heavily from the 4-6 trilogy, but it's a starting point.
  
  Poe's survival bugged me the most of anything I saw.  He just abandoned BB8 and his secret mission to hitch a ride back to the resistance???
  
  Again, with the Rey is Luke's daughter and he left crumbs for her, I think R2 activated when Rey showed up, but it's definitely something to be explained.
  
  
• New Force Users: I am a bit disturbed how Rey picked up the Force so quickly when seemingly 5 minutes earlier she thought it was all a myth. Also, unless everything they ever said about Jedi was false, Finn is absolutely a force user. No way he is that good with a lightsaber otherwise. And I realize Rey was better, but here's a guy who's been a Stormtrooper for 5 minutes and been in one battle where he didn't fire a shot and suddenly he's holding his own with a lightsaber in a melee battle with a trained, veteran Stormtrooper, followed by holding his own for awhile against Kylo Ren, a trained Dark Jedi, to the point where he even wounded him. The moment Ren turned to Finn on Jakku, and subsequently immediately knew exactly that FN2198 was the Stormtrooper that betrayed him. Why? Because he sensed the light side in him.
  
• See it twice: At least if you're a Star Wars junkie. I missed a lot the first time around. I also was unsure of the pacing the first time I watched it and much more satisfied the second time.