The article raises a lot of general concerns , did Disney and JJ play it safe , absolutely but some of the blame there has to lay at the doors of the Star Trek fans who would have stoned him to death for what was done to THEIR precious Trek series.
not wanting to see a repeat they have played it safe to guarantee we all return for a second viewing at least ( that will cover the cost of buying lucasfilm)
and remember it's fans abuse that caused Lucas to release lucasfilm , who now works on personal projects that he won't share with the world?
we all want to see fresh stories and ideas , dumping the expanded universe freed them up to surprise us at the cost of a lot of fan disappointment .
but they did not deliver , I've read a couple of the novels , I don't intent to read any more THEY ARE CACK ,
The villain is great , what I dreamt of. A villain that has lost control , not always super cool under pressure.......he will be interesting.
phasma at the moment is a nod to older films , disappointing considering the build up.
The other characters worked great together , but there definitely was some chopping and cutting with where they were meant to go, speeder chase looks like it got cut out, maybe even including Poe, constable zuvio etc etc. And the reduction in the rebels numbers is not clearly enough understood.
i enjoyed the film, technically very good, and it was without doubt a Star Wars film, humour excitement and action.
its lacking a broading universe , in that is seems limited to most characters and situations we've seen before ( in a Star Wars movie )
but I think that is what we as fans asked for .
it will be interesting how the next two chapters are handled , I am hoping they will be more risky with the storyline .
not all the marvel films are good films , I still rate winter soldier above avengers now, the more I watch that the more I'm impressed and I was never a captain America fan , I thought initially he was portrayed very weakly.