This!!
This is what I think is being so totally missed.
We know the good years between Han & Kylo existed on paper, but they are not real to us emotionally. So Han's decision seems foolhardy to us on the sidelines. We can hear about the whole picture of what went on there, but we cannot feel it.
Daddy, you should listen to batguy, he knows the score.
Fair enough but there is a major difference. One is opinion and speculation as to what is happening and the other is the reality of what is happening. You can make general comments like "people don't like the film" and "the film is suffering from bad word of mouth" without any qualification. You can say "they should have made bolder narrative choices and the film would have made $3B" without any means of proving that point. Instead, we do have qualified, imperial, real data as to the reality of the films performance and overall audience reaction to the story. And that reality is different from your speculation, profoundly.
After the numbers were in for the third weekend, it became clear that TFA would not have the legs of Avatar or Titanic--it would instead follow the box office trajectory of traditional blockbusters like the TPM, LOTR, etc. The first reason is because film critics, bloggers, and other social media outlets were turning on TFA, calling it an egregious ripoff of ANH, and lambasting Rey (not Daisy, but Rey) for being a Mary Sue. The second reason is because bad word of mouth (everybody down a beer! lol) was catching up to the film, discouraging people from seeing the film if they hadn't yet seen it, or from seeing the film a second (or third, or fourth) time if they had seen it. The movie feels old after one viewing, maybe two if you're a diehard. Why? Because you've already seen the film a million and one times when you factor in all your viewing of ANH dating back to the summer of '77.
This is why TFA, while a commercial mega-hit for sure, is stalling out at the box office, and has no chance to catch Avatar--something it could've easily down, if they'd just made a good movie worth seeing over and over and over again.
Not sure how you missed this, Bryan. It was in all the papers.
In fact, I even posted about it at the time, when I wrote:
The reason Titanic, and then Avatar, ended up with their colossal hauls of 2.2B and 2.8B, respectively, is because they had very small percentage drop-offs from week to week to week to week to week, et cetera, for a long time. TFA performed great out of the gate, but it is slowing down so precipitously, that it will not follow the highly unusual trajectory of the two aforementioned Cameron films, but instead will follow the trajectory of traditional modern blockbusters, that have huge opening weekends, even huge first fortnights, but then they fizzle out at the box office.
TFA has another problem, besides fitting into this more common blockbuster box office trajectory, and that is the critics are turning on the film, and the bad word of mouth amongst moviegoers is catching up to the film. Every review, article, blog post, or other blurb about the film on social media is ripping TFA now for ripping off A New Hope, and ripping it off poorly, at that. People who haven't seen it are now happy to wait for the DVD (or not see it at all), and those who have seen it aren't seeing it over and over and over again, the way they did Titanic and Avatar.
TFA will not be the biggest movie worldwide of all time. It just won't have the legs to get there.
The Wook
I literally just made a post on the last page about how I didn't like an aspect of the film. And in the post release thread I put out a one million word essay on what I like and DISLIKED about the film.
The irony is astounding when you realize that all of the haters have ABSOLUTELY nothing positive to say about this film.
Well, Josh my friend, I don't have a million words of praise for TFA. But, you're wrong, because I've included the things I like, and indeed, loved about the film, in several posts in the Post-Release thread. Perhaps you're seeing only what you want to see? Here's just one example, which I posted weeks ago in the Post-Release thread:
Oh I get the business angle of it. And there's no denying it's a commercial mega-hit. But they played it waaaaaaaaay too safe, in making it waaaaaaaaay too derivative (a nicer word for ripoff). I'd be kinda okay if they'd made a good derivative film, but it stinks. It stinks from top to bottom...with just a handful of pearls in between: Daisy (not Rey's absurd powers, but Daisy's performance), BB8, Finn (although his humor bordered on being too much), Chewie getting up to play Dejarik, Luke was awesome at the end (he looks totally badass), I loved the "That was Lucky!" line as well as the "Stop holding my hand!" lines (see I told you I like girl power!), Kylo's fits of rage, the lightsaber duel choreography looked old school like the weapons were heavy instead of twirling batons, the TIE fighters flying towards us with the sun behind them, 3PO stepping between Han & Leia was funny, the laser blast halted in mid-flight was cool and novel...I really can't think of anything or anyone else that was good, and I've seen the movie twice.
The filmmakers could've accomplished everything you listed that they needed to accomplish and turned out a better, a MUCH better derivative to reboquel the series.
The Wook
). Wasn't there a song in that Frozen movie about this? (I didn't see that either) 
