Personally, I feel that such a minor and rather irrelevant detail is best left for a book or comic where there is more time for such bits of extra detail. In a movie you run the risk of slowing the pacing down or boring the audience with such bits of errata.
Pretty much this. I mean, I agree that it's frustrating for them to introduce the question at all and fail to answer it, but I think that, realistically, this won't be answered in the film, much the same way that the whole "What's the deal with the Resistance, the Republic, and why the Republic isn't fighting the First Order itself?" thing was largely ignored.
It wasn't really central to the story of these characters or how they fit in the larger scheme of things. It's an annoying thing not to answer, but it's notreally
essential to the film.
That said, I think that there are compromises which can be struck, where the film itself alludes to something without going into great detail, and the external material expands upon that reference.
A couple of lines, a mention in the opening crawl, just something to help provide a bit more context, and then you can flesh things out more. Like Leia saying "The Senate has refused to act. That's why we're here. You all know we'll get no support in this, but make no mistake, we are fighting for the freedom of the entire galaxy. May that thought and the Force guide us all in this fight." Or whatever. Something like that.
Just don't leave it TOTALLY unanswered, because that's a distraction, and an unnecessary one at that. My hope, though, is that now that we're freed of the need to "bridge" the old films and the new ones, there will be more time for material that stands on its own, and therefore more time to answer some of the questions introduced previously (e.g., "Why is Rey so clearly powerful?" "What's her backstory?" "Who are the Knights of Ren?" "Who is Snoke?" "Why did Ben turn to evil?" "Why did Luke go into hiding?" "What the hell was up with that vision?" and so on).
Most of these questions, I think, need answers, but the answers themselves need not be particularly elaborate. So, like, "Who is Snoke?" The answer to that question doesn't need to be a long song and dance that connects back to the old films. It could be as simple as "A former Old Republic officer who supported the Empire, and later organized the creation of the First Order," within the film. Likewise, "Why is Rey so powerful?" could be answered with "The Force is alive and has imbued her with power." Her backstory doesn't need to have her be related to Luke, or Kylo, or even Ben Kenobi (although I still think it'd be cool if she was the child of Luke and Ben's daughter). But we do need to know what the story is with the vision. That
definitely can't go unanswered. Likewise with Kylo/Ben's backstory, because his backstory is central to his character motivations, as is Rey's backstory. The vision is purposefully cryptic, and therefore will need to be contextualized. But again, it could be as simple as Rey talking to Luke about it, and Luke explaining what it all means, with Rey filling in the details. "My parents left me with Unkar Plutt when I was eight years old. They never told me why. They only said it was to protect me."
But stuff like "How'd the lightsabre make it from Bespin to Maz's?" falls into the same realm as "Why is 3PO's arm red?"
