Force Awakens Complaining.

[APlayerHater]

((SPOILER WARNING: HERE BE DRAGONS))

Thought I'd take my overlong complaint from the episode 7 thread and stick it in its own thread. Delete this one at your leisure if you want. Just though there were some things worth mentioning. Forgive the wall of text. If this comes across as angry it's more meant to be sort of exasperated.

Me? I had a few beefs with this movie.

A: I don't understand what the resistance is supposed to be. What happened to Ackbar's mon calamari fleet? Now they have what looks to be 10 x wings with which to destroy an entire planet. How can you have a resistance when your faction is in control of space politics? Or is the new republic so limp wristed useless and weak after only 20 years that they just let the Knights of Ren walk all over them and kidnap children en masse to form their army?

A1: Why is the New Republic, and it's entire fleet, all stationed on some random planet somewhere I've never heard of. Shouldn't their fleet be out, I don't know, patrolling the galaxy or something? Or at least on coruscant? Can Abrams not make a movie without destroying a planet?

B: Starkiller base: Why do we need another death star? Can starkiller base move? Did they convert an entire planet into a giant gun only to be able to fire like 2 shots? Because it looked like it had totally absorbed the star at that point. So basically, there was no point in destroying it because after it had fired its second shot it would have been rendered useless anyway.

B1: How did the remnant possibly have the resources to build an entire planet into a deathstar in 20 years without anybody noticing? Is that why they didn't want the rebels finding the plans to the deathstar in ANH? Because now it seems completely rational to think that the rebels in ANH could have used the Deathstar plans to build their own Deathstar to counter the empire's Deathstar. I mean, at this point why not? Makes equal amount of sense.

B2: How are they main characters able to see the beam shot from starkiller base? Should it take thousands of years for the light to reach them? Or was Maz Kanata's base conveniently in the same solar system as the republic's home planet?

B3: Was starkiller base just a lame excuse to destroy the republic in 1 second so the empire can be in control in time for episode 8? How do you destroy the republic by blowing up one planet? Why was the fleet parked on a planet? What is going on?

C: Phasma: Boba Fett, but at least Boba Fett didn't come across as a traitor and a coward. Weren't these people supposed to have some kind of mind control mental conditioning from birth? But between TR8R, Finn and Phasma, it doesn't seem to have worked. Is this whole movie have a stealth scientologist anti-psychology message?

C1: They threaten to use clones in this movie if the stormtroopers screw up. Pause. Is there any reason they're not using clones? As I recall, the clones in the clone wars worked perfectly. They were perfectly loyal soldiers. They were programmed with secret orders for years and none of them ever spilled the beans about order 66. Sidious trusted them enough to carry out the most important part of his plan to kill the jedi so he could overthrow the republic. But no, kidnapping and brainwashing children seems to be going much better for them.

D: Finn: A janitor who remembers the layout of an entire planet. He can walk around with a lightsaber out in a warzone without getting shot. He can go toe-to-toe with a force user in a swordfight and not instantly lose, and yet is shown throughout the entire movie as being totally useless. He is soldier trained from birth, and if every stormtrooper is as much of a socially awkward, poorly trained basket case as he is that would explain a lot. He can't shoot, he can't fight, he can't fix weapons and seems to have no experience with weapons. And yet he was brought on Kylo Ren's secret mission to find this map for some reason, and he is allowed to go out into the field on missions despite having in depth technical data for the KoR's secret planet destroying base.

D1: That fight with Finn and TR8R: What is this weapon that TR8R is using? I recall him getting several hits in on Finn and Finn doesn't even notice. Is that shock prod even a weapon? That fight isn't even fair: If TR8R hits Finn, which he does, a lot, Finn isn't even fazed, and if Finn hits TR8R TR8R instantly dies. Wow, what a good fight....... . . . . . . Maybe he should have just shot Finn with a gun.

D2: Stormtrooper armor is now susceptible to poison gas attack. Um... Aren't these space suits? Why would you ruin stormtrooper armor in a throw away line, especially when using gas against stormtroopers isn't even a plot point, Rey and Finn are just panicking and about to accidentally kill themselves.

E: Kylo Ren: I found him to be potentially interesting, but everything I find interesting about him might have just been a mistake on the writer's part, and they might totally ruin him in the next movie. I assume he touched Darth Vader's helmet, had some kind of vision and assumed he had some great destiny and thought uncle Luke was holding him back or something.

E1: That whole fight with Finn and Rey made no sense. People say: Well, he'd been shot. But the one who should be shot is the fight choreographer, because at no point during the fight was he moving sluggishly, or barely staying awake, or suffering from debilitating pain or anything. He does a samurai thing and punches his own wound, but otherwise he seems to have no problem moving around. But at the same time he inexplicably barely keeps up with a janitor who has no force powers and whose only experience with a lightsaber is awkwardly hold it and walking around a battlefield like he was lost. Either show him being wounded and losing the fight that way or don't and have him win.

Here's how that fight should have gone down: Kylo Ren walks up to Finn, knocks the lightsaber out of his hand and steps on his face, then maybe picks him up with the force and slams him against a tree. Same outcome, saves you confusion and wasting 10 minutes.

Either that or have him, clearly, barely staying alive and conscious, and moving very awkwardly and sluggishly, to make be believe that Finn could stand a chance. Film is a visual medium, so show me some visuals telling me the story that Kylo Ren has been shot.

F: Rey: Now Rey was a fine character, but she is a Mary Sue. She had secret jedi training as a baby that was conveniently mind wiped, making her the best at everything. She's better at shooting a gun than Finn (trained from birth as a soldier). Given a pistol she misses once, then immediately kills every storm trooper that enters her line of sight, despite the fact I don't think she's ever held a gun before. She mind controls Daniel Craig despite not even knowing the jedi mind trick is a thing that exists. She can fix the millennium falcon and can understand both BB8 and Chewbacca, despite no character ever in the history of the series ever having been able to understand Droid speech, and only Han could ever understand Chewie. She can pilot the millennium falcon well enough to hit a tie-fighter with the main turret just by doing a backflip and having Finn pull the trigger, with the gun unable to turn, and in atmosphere on a planet with gravity. Anakin's lightsaber also literally calls out for her, and seemingly flies into her hand of its own accord despite Kylo Ren's attempts to pull it (how kylo can stop a blaster shot in mid air but can't move a 1 pound piece of metal 5 feet is beyond me. Was he out of force points? Did he need to recharge his batteries?).

You might defend Rey. You might say: Oh, well, she worked as a scrapper. Yeah? Well by that logic Steven Avery should be some kind of renaissance man savant. She has no training, none, nobody (except for bs flashbacks) in flying, shooting, hacking doors, using the force, sword fighting, stealth, and yet it's only the first movie in a trilogy and she can already outpace all the OT characters in their fields of expertise. Just look how many times Luke and Han totally miss in the ANH shootout scenes on foot and in the scene where they are using the turrets to fend off the TIE Fighters tailing them.

And if Rey did have secret training then wow. Looks like Luke trained a 5 year old better than his star pupil Kylo Ren. No wonder Kylo turned to evil.

G: Maz Kanata: Yoda, except even older(Unless she's not 'literally' 1000 years old like they say in the movie) and wiser(?) because she doesn't have a speech impediment. Where did she get Anakin's lightsaber? Did she just find it floating around Bespin? How does she have Anakin's podracing flag at her base? Is she a huge Anakin fangirl?

H: That one spy in Maz Kanata's bar: Could you dress more like an obviously evil spy? Why does the empire even have a spy at this bar?

I: Poe Dameron: Seems fine. The scenes with him and Finn were fun.

I1: Do TIE fighters not have keys? You can just climb into one, boot it up, and the only thing stopping you from just leaving is if you forget to detach the fuel line? Star Wars wasn't smart science fiction but it was rarely ever stupid enough to insult my intelligence.

Come to think of it, the millennium falcon didn't have a key either. And they left the door wide open while it was just sitting there. You'd think one of these slaves working for bread rations on this planet could just walk in, start it up, and go literally anywhere. Go to Tatooine. Go anywhere. The new republic is so great that being a slave is now worse than ever.

J: Snoke: Why would you hire Andy Serkis to play a character who doesn't move? Does Serkis have to play your CG character for you to get any street cred?

J1: And here I thought Darth Vader's destiny to bring balance to the force and destroy evil had any meaning whatsoever. Thanks for making the prequels noncanon, JJ. No, really. Thank you.


This all being said, I didn't dislike the movie. Eh. On the fence about it.

[NecronLord]

I'm sure someone will be along shortly to address each point. On the other hand, welcome to what everyone else realized ages ago; the movie is a lowest-common-denominator product in terms of plot and worldbuilding, aimed at appeasing the fans and the prequel haters by re-doing almost everything about the original movies. Little thought has been given to explaining many of its key aspects such as the starkiller installation, and some things are pretty dumb.

That said, I do have to ask:

D1: That fight with Finn and TR8R: What is this weapon that TR8R is using? I recall him getting several hits in on Finn and Finn doesn't even notice. Is that shock prod even a weapon? That fight isn't even fair: If TR8R hits Finn, which he does, a lot, Finn isn't even fazed, and if Finn hits TR8R TR8R instantly dies. Wow, what a good fight....... . . . . . . Maybe he should have just shot Finn with a gun.

Since when were all good fights fair?

Also, if we're having a bitching thread, Kylo Ren's shuttle looks crap. It just does.

[APlayerHater]

Since when were all good fights fair?

I really only posted to complain about that weapon TR8R was using. What is that thing? I know electricity is the go to element for cartoon violence where nobody actually gets hurt, but come on. I'm only thinking about it now because I think I had a dream about it.

Why does the empire even have a weapon that can block a lightsaber? Did they expect to run into any jedi? Were a team of specially trained shock prod users going to kill Luke? Maybe that's the problem: The prod was on the default 'incapacitate old man' setting.

Also: I don't even remember what Kylo's Ship looked like. I seemingly can only find picture of the lego of it online. That being said, the wings look like a huge inconvenience. The ship could fit in a much smaller docking bay without them.

[LastShadow]

I'm sure someone will be along shortly to address each point. On the other hand, welcome to what everyone else realized ages ago; the movie is a lowest-common-denominator product in terms of plot and worldbuilding, aimed at appeasing the fans and the prequel haters by re-doing almost everything about the original movies. Little thought has been given to explaining many of its key aspects such as the starkiller installation, and some things are pretty dumb.

That said, I do have to ask:

D1: That fight with Finn and TR8R: What is this weapon that TR8R is using? I recall him getting several hits in on Finn and Finn doesn't even notice. Is that shock prod even a weapon? That fight isn't even fair: If TR8R hits Finn, which he does, a lot, Finn isn't even fazed, and if Finn hits TR8R TR8R instantly dies. Wow, what a good fight....... . . . . . . Maybe he should have just shot Finn with a gun.

Since when were all good fights fair?

Also, if we're having a bitching thread, Kylo Ren's shuttle looks crap. It just does.

That shuttle irked me to no end. It makes no logical design sense. Why such large pointless wings? I might have let it slide if they hadnt felt the need to make them so large they had to essentially pop in half and slide down to fit into landing bays, and why did it need to do that to land? Stupid shuttle.

But overall the plot of the movies irks me. None of it truly makes any sense. Sure i really like Rey, she seems like a fun new character. But the rest? Finn is fucking inept as shit, and Poe is OP as hell. When they designed Poe its like they said "Hey can we roll all of Rouge and Wraith squadron from the novels into one guy?" and someone said yeah why not. Like i liked him but i think some of his awesome and some of Rey's could have been given to Finn. Poor guy.

But i have seen plenty of good fair enough fights, not usually in SciFi, but i have seen them.

There are so many questions the movie posed and never answered, all to sell more cross section books and novels.

I sat through the whole movie just wondering why this, why that, i couldnt even enjoy it. Shoot even the opening scrawl was confusing, why does it feel like they are fighting some little proxy war, yet the First Order is hell bent on destroying the Republic, like would you not take that threat a hair more serious?

[APlayerHater]

I read somewhere that in a prequel comic promoting the force awakens movie Finn was in the top 1% of all stormtroopers and was on the way to becoming an elite stormtrooper. This despite the fact that he seems to lack any special knowledge or skills, and even a random scavenger outclasses him in every way. And I guess the comic's writer wasn't informed Finn was assigned to the elite custodial knights.

[biostem]

From my understanding, that prod-thing that TR8R was using is similar to the double-ended staff that Count Dooku's elite droid guards used, which could also deflect/parry lightsabers. Those also delivered a painful, though chiefly non-lethal blow, when hitting a person, (holding it against someone for a prolonged period would kill them, as depicted in TCW).

I'm not a fan of the "wait for the next movie to see why Rey isn't a Mary Sue"... that just smacks of poor writing.

The shuttle and its huge and useless wings annoyed me as well - at least the Lamba shuttle's didn't make the thing taller when they folded up.

I can only assume that Kylo Ren was intentionally taught abilities that would be useful for intimidation and/or against non-force users - give this guy a suite of abilities that impress the lay people and inspire the troops, and worry about the counter-Jedi stuff if and when such a need arises, (perhaps Snoke knew he wasn't emotionally mature, and as such, focused on flashy and intimidating stuff, instead of what could be used against him, should Kylo try a double-cross).

[APlayerHater]

Clearly Snoke is Luke
Because Supreme Leader Snoke is an anagram for: Luke Sensed Me a Roper

[NecronLord]

I read somewhere that in a prequel comic promoting the force awakens movie Finn was in the top 1% of all stormtroopers and was on the way to becoming an elite stormtrooper. This despite the fact that he seems to lack any special knowledge or skills, and even a random scavenger outclasses him in every way. And I guess the comic's writer wasn't informed Finn was assigned to the elite custodial knights.

I strongly suspect that when we learn more about production that Finn was originally conceived as a death-squad trooper who shot babies in front of their mothers, and who had finally had a change of heart (See Teal'c from Stargate SG1 for that character concept done so well that even ten years later his crimes still haunt him) and someone then said that having new Star Wars movie won't take the risk of having a mass-murderer be a protagonist.

So that Finn got changed from an experienced trooper to a neophyte who'd never seen combat before.

That's just my hunch though.

That said, Finn being indecisive is perfectly plausible, it's not really cool, I've ranted on here many times about the virtues of competent protagonists, but fish out of water is a thing too.

[Khaat]

Wow. I missed this thread and saw the title this morning and thought, "Damn Jedi! Get off my lawn! Where's my coffee?!"

1) Resistance is an "off the books"/illegal paramilitary group opposing the Remnant First Order while the Republic trades fashion and make-up secrets. And plays nice with eh Remnant. Politics.
A) New capital to break with the Old Republic. Probably in that "we couldn't make our new capital Berlin!" way. Yeah, not useful.
B) Blowing up planets takes less time than a real war. Yes, it would have to be able to move, but interstellar space is cold, so I don't see it ending well.
B1) The Universe Is Big. Hells, this planet could have been where they were manufacturing components for the other 2 Death Stars. The Republic are supposed to be the good guys, so No Terror Superweapons
B2) The Starkiller weapons was mentioned in One Throw-away Line Of Dialog to be a hyperspace beam weapon. Otherwise, Move Plot One Space Forward.
B3) Yes. It was the capital, Stuff Was In Session, so the Republic has to get new talking heads to talk. Fleet presumeably destroyed by taking a planet to the face.
C) Conditioning is not mind control, it's trained way of thinking: ask an average working-stiff conservative to have an original thought. Phasma and TR8R are loyal to the Remnant, see the promise of Order as a good thing. Phasma's a political officer, so, yeah, that.
C1) Clones are expensive, cause bottle-necks in army production, and are subject to the Republic saying "stop making those, or you won't get a gold star this week." Sidious needed a created-in-secret army under his specific control to purge the Jedi, Snoak doesn't, he's gone child-soldier route, instead.
D: Odds are "the entire planet" is mostly automated, and the parts people inhabit are fairly standardized in layout. But yeah, city-sized bases, still. Finn-as-contrast-to-Mary-Sue-Force-Rookie. Ren needed troopers, Finn came up on the duty roster. 'Nuff said.
F) "The Force" (no, really, that'as the common excuse!) She did work on the MF for the salvage boss (so she knew about his mods, and why they wouldn't work), but no droids, no wookies on Jakku, so... The Force? Zips around on a repulsorlift sled so is possibly capable of flying the MF, but otherwise... The Force? she'd heard "the stories" about Luke and the rest so... The Force?
G: Someone Has To Know This ShitTM. There was a clip shot to explain Luke Anakin's saber being anywhere but the bottom of the gravity well on Bespin, but it was cut. So... The Force? Anakin's pennant at her castle was a SFX/CGI shout-out. Or a regional thing/corporate sponsor logo(?), but I like the "Anakin Fangirl" option....
H: Obvious Spy Is Obvious (it's the goddamned Mouse, they have to spell it out with a song, color, or costume. Just be thankful it wasn't a song!) Great well drink prices and appetizers.
I: "Poe seems fine" *snerk!* Apart from the Gary Stu 5-TIEs-in-30-seconds bit. "Oh, hey! Did I forget about a secret mission and mission-critical data left behind on Jakku? But, hey - PEW-PEW!"
I1: "Yeah, sorry control, could you tell the hostile fleet to just hold up a second, we've lost the keys to the TIE fighters!" Military vehicles like planes don't have keys, they have men with guns ready to shoot you if you don't belong there. Not that this helped this time. The MF was considered a piece of garbage - even Ray thought so, and she was used to making anything work.
J: The Forc... no, probably because Serkis is the First Name in CG Characters. Yes.
J1: Yeah, that.

[Khaat]

GAAHH!

[Khaat]

sorry, fucked up a fix it!

[Adam Reynolds]

I read somewhere that in a prequel comic promoting the force awakens movie Finn was in the top 1% of all stormtroopers and was on the way to becoming an elite stormtrooper. This despite the fact that he seems to lack any special knowledge or skills, and even a random scavenger outclasses him in every way. And I guess the comic's writer wasn't informed Finn was assigned to the elite custodial knights.

Finn was rather ironically quite skilled as a gunslinger, its just that he spent the overwhelming majority of the film without a blaster. In the chase with Rey he spent the entire time desperately looking for one and ended up in the duel with the fellow stormtrooper as a result.

Rey, by contrast, failed to realize how a safety worked. Though she was still impressively accurate with a blaster once she got to using it.

[Simon_Jester]

I will say one thing. I know it's invoking old, decanonized EU, but when I saw twelve X-Wings coming in at wavetop height on Takodana (The planet with the wacky tavern-castle), my heart cried delightedly, "It's the Rogues!"

They can call it Blue Squadron all they want. To me, it's the Rogues.

In my headcanon, Wedge Antilles trained Poe.

A: I don't understand what the resistance is supposed to be. What happened to Ackbar's mon calamari fleet? Now they have what looks to be 10 x wings with which to destroy an entire planet. How can you have a resistance when your faction is in control of space politics? Or is the new republic so limp wristed useless and weak after only 20 years that they just let the Knights of Ren walk all over them and kidnap children en masse to form their army?

My impression is that the Resistance is a deniable "no sir, not affiliated with us" organization spun off by the New Republic to deal with the First Order. Perhaps the New Republic only controls a fraction of the galaxy and can't afford to intervene too aggressively outside its borders because it has other enemies.

I mean, people have been being downers for years about how realistically, blowing up the Emperor wouldn't actually destroy the Empire and would at most cause it to fragment. Maybe that's precisely what happened.

A1: Why is the New Republic, and it's entire fleet, all stationed on some random planet somewhere I've never heard of. Shouldn't their fleet be out, I don't know, patrolling the galaxy or something? Or at least on coruscant? Can Abrams not make a movie without destroying a planet?

This is a valid concern in my opinion. I can understand the New Republic's capital not being on Coruscant, but that doesn't explain them having no other armed forces.

B: Starkiller base: Why do we need another death star? Can starkiller base move? Did they convert an entire planet into a giant gun only to be able to fire like 2 shots? Because it looked like it had totally absorbed the star at that point. So basically, there was no point in destroying it because after it had fired its second shot it would have been rendered useless anyway.

Presumably it can move. It literally never even occurred to me that it couldn't move, given that we see it shoot twice and we see it consume a star to fire. Why build it otherwise?

B1: How did the remnant possibly have the resources to build an entire planet into a deathstar in 20 years without anybody noticing? Is that why they didn't want the rebels finding the plans to the deathstar in ANH? Because now it seems completely rational to think that the rebels in ANH could have used the Deathstar plans to build their own Deathstar to counter the empire's Deathstar. I mean, at this point why not? Makes equal amount of sense.

The First Empire may have more resources or a more secure base of operations than the Rebels had in Episode IV, because the New Republic probably lacks as much power to hunt the New Order as the Empire had to hunt the Rebels.

B2: How are they main characters able to see the beam shot from starkiller base? Should it take thousands of years for the light to reach them? Or was Maz Kanata's base conveniently in the same solar system as the republic's home planet?

Since the beam itself clearly travels faster than light, maybe it generates faster than light radiation as a side effect, which can be seen after it strikes a planetary atmosphere?

B3: Was starkiller base just a lame excuse to destroy the republic in 1 second so the empire can be in control in time for episode 8? How do you destroy the republic by blowing up one planet? Why was the fleet parked on a planet? What is going on?

You don't have to destroy the Republic to throw them into chaos. Killing the government, giving everyone reason to be terrified, and giving any enemies who live close to the New Republic's core territory an opportunity to strike are all valuable short-term goals. And between them, they help explain why no one in the New Republic was able to respond effectively when Starkiller Base fired its first shot.

C: Phasma: Boba Fett, but at least Boba Fett didn't come across as a traitor and a coward. Weren't these people supposed to have some kind of mind control mental conditioning from birth? But between TR8R, Finn and Phasma, it doesn't seem to have worked. Is this whole movie have a stealth scientologist anti-psychology message?

Phasma surrendering off screen really does seem a bit weak; I was hoping a Gwendolyn Christie character would get more opportunity to shine. Maybe Episode VIII will redeem the character a bit.

C1: They threaten to use clones in this movie if the stormtroopers screw up. Pause. Is there any reason they're not using clones? As I recall, the clones in the clone wars worked perfectly. They were perfectly loyal soldiers. They were programmed with secret orders for years and none of them ever spilled the beans about order 66. Sidious trusted them enough to carry out the most important part of his plan to kill the jedi so he could overthrow the republic. But no, kidnapping and brainwashing children seems to be going much better for them.

Snoke might have to hire expensive experts or build expensive facilities to start producing clones in adequate numbers.

D: Finn: A janitor who remembers the layout of an entire planet. He can walk around with a lightsaber out in a warzone without getting shot. He can go toe-to-toe with a force user in a swordfight and not instantly lose, and yet is shown throughout the entire movie as being totally useless. He is soldier trained from birth, and if every stormtrooper is as much of a socially awkward, poorly trained basket case as he is that would explain a lot. He can't shoot, he can't fight, he can't fix weapons and seems to have no experience with weapons. And yet he was brought on Kylo Ren's secret mission to find this map for some reason, and he is allowed to go out into the field on missions despite having in depth technical data for the KoR's secret planet destroying base.

He shoots pretty effectively and, as noted, can survive at least a short time in a lightsaber duel; calling him "useless" strikes me as silly. Why would you say he's "useless" in a fight?

As to why he's "useless" for things that aren't fighting... well, soldier trained from birth.

And why would you say he has "in depth technical data?" He knows the broad outlines of where it is and how it works, that its shields stop ships and that they have a generator in a particular region of the planet. These are all things that for all we know are relatively common knowledge among people who have served on the base.

D2: Stormtrooper armor is now susceptible to poison gas attack. Um... Aren't these space suits? Why would you ruin stormtrooper armor in a throw away line, especially when using gas against stormtroopers isn't even a plot point, Rey and Finn are just panicking and about to accidentally kill themselves.

Fair criticism, though we've never seen evidence that stormtrooper armor in its default form is a working space suit designed for hostile environments.

E1: That whole fight with Finn and Rey made no sense. People say: Well, he'd been shot. But the one who should be shot is the fight choreographer, because at no point during the fight was he moving sluggishly, or barely staying awake, or suffering from debilitating pain or anything. He does a samurai thing and punches his own wound, but otherwise he seems to have no problem moving around. But at the same time he inexplicably barely keeps up with a janitor who has no force powers and whose only experience with a lightsaber is awkwardly hold it and walking around a battlefield like he was lost. Either show him being wounded and losing the fight that way or don't and have him win.

Here's how that fight should have gone down: Kylo Ren walks up to Finn, knocks the lightsaber out of his hand and steps on his face, then maybe picks him up with the force and slams him against a tree. Same outcome, saves you confusion and wasting 10 minutes.

Either that or have him, clearly, barely staying alive and conscious, and moving very awkwardly and sluggishly, to make be believe that Finn could stand a chance. Film is a visual medium, so show me some visuals telling me the story that Kylo Ren has been shot.

Valid complaint; they should have played up his injury.

F: Rey: Now Rey was a fine character, but she is a Mary Sue. She had secret jedi training as a baby that was conveniently mind wiped, making her the best at everything. She's better at shooting a gun than Finn (trained from birth as a soldier). When was that again? Given a pistol she misses once, then immediately kills every storm trooper that enters her line of sight, despite the fact I don't think she's ever held a gun before...

Not so sure she hasn't. Also, frankly, Force users are like that in Star Wars; remember Anakin being able to drive, while a child, vehicles of types normal humans can't operate?

She mind controls Daniel Craig despite not even knowing the jedi mind trick is a thing that exists. She can fix the millennium falcon and can understand both BB8 and Chewbacca, despite no character ever in the history of the series ever having been able to understand Droid speech, and only Han could ever understand Chewie.

Luke understood Artoo well enough to carry on meaningful conversations with him.

Anakin's lightsaber also literally calls out for her, and seemingly flies into her hand of its own accord despite Kylo Ren's attempts to pull it (how kylo can stop a blaster shot in mid air but can't move a 1 pound piece of metal 5 feet is beyond me. Was he out of force points? Did he need to recharge his batteries?).

I thought you were just complaining that Kylo didn't seem weak enough after getting shot... Plus, Rey was pulling in the same direction as Kylo Ren, and apparently managed to surprise Kylo by pulling the saber past him when he was expecting it to settle neatly into his palm. Kylo doesn't react well to surprises.

[SolarpunkFan]

I'm not quite sure why I didn't like Ep VII. I think maybe the atmosphere of the preceding films were more to my liking. I just don't know, all I know is that I didn't like VII.

[APlayerHater]

I guess callling Finn useless was a bit of a stretch, but he did pretty much seem like the load in comparison to almost every other character. I feel his backstory is infinitely more interesting than Rey's BS 5 year old jedi master backstory and it was a shame we didn't get to see it.

I guess I'm just bummed because before it came out I was excited that we might have a stormtrooper as a protagonist. Yet we learn nothing about the order, including whether it's even an imperial remnant. I don't think it even is. All of the officers look like they're in their 20's/30's if I remember correctly.

[Elheru Aran]

I guess callling Finn useless was a bit of a stretch, but he did pretty much seem like the load in comparison to almost every other character. I feel his backstory is infinitely more interesting than Rey's BS 5 year old jedi master backstory and it was a shame we didn't get to see it.

I guess I'm just bummed because before it came out I was excited that we might have a stormtrooper as a protagonist. Yet we learn nothing about the order, including whether it's even an imperial remnant. I don't think it even is. All of the officers look like they're in their 20's/30's if I remember correctly.

It's not so much an actual descendant of the Empire as it is "inspired by". Sort of like if a modern-day American group started wearing Nazi uniforms and goosestepping their way towards the polling booths. (...well, they're not quite *that* blatant yet)

[Vympel]

D1: That fight with Finn and TR8R: What is this weapon that TR8R is using? I recall him getting several hits in on Finn and Finn doesn't even notice.

He didn't get a single hit on Finn until the end, which won the fight since it knocked Finn back several metres. Also:

E1: That whole fight with Finn and Rey made no sense. People say: Well, he'd been shot. But the one who should be shot is the fight choreographer, because at no point during the fight was he moving sluggishly, or barely staying awake, or suffering from debilitating pain or anything. He does a samurai thing and punches his own wound, but otherwise he seems to have no problem moving around. But at the same time he inexplicably barely keeps up with a janitor who has no force powers and whose only experience with a lightsaber is awkwardly hold it and walking around a battlefield like he was lost. Either show him being wounded and losing the fight that way or don't and have him win.

The assertion that he 'barely keeps up with a janitor' is complete nonsense. He dominates Finn for the entire fight. The moment Finn lands a graze on him, he ends the fight.

Here's how that fight should have gone down: Kylo Ren walks up to Finn, knocks the lightsaber out of his hand and steps on his face, then maybe picks him up with the force and slams him against a tree. Same outcome, saves you confusion and wasting 10 minutes.

Either that or have him, clearly, barely staying alive and conscious, and moving very awkwardly and sluggishly, to make be believe that Finn could stand a chance. Film is a visual medium, so show me some visuals telling me the story that Kylo Ren has been shot.

You mean like the fact he's sweating profusely in the freezing cold, his blood in the snow, or him beating on his wound? Its totally unnecessary to have him be awkward and sluggish. The logical inference to draw, given that he dominated Finn and dominated Rey until she 'fell into the Force' or however you want to term it, is that he's an exceptionally dangerous combatant even when grievously wounded, and he would have been even more dangerous had he not been. That he was nowhere near the peak of his abilities is made obvious in the movie over and over and over - leaving aside the obvious visual cues above, there is also the fact that where he casually intercepts blaster bolts thrown his way by both Poe and Rey without concern, in the aftermath of Han's murder, he doesn't even move to stop Chewie's shot. This was also explicit in both the shooting script and the novel - he was weakened by the act of killing Han.

F: Rey: Now Rey was a fine character, but she is a Mary Sue. She had secret jedi training as a baby that was conveniently mind wiped, making her the best at everything.

There's no evidence for this at all.

She's better at shooting a gun than Finn (trained from birth as a soldier). Given a pistol she misses once, then immediately kills every storm trooper that enters her line of sight, despite the fact I don't think she's ever held a gun before.

And before she fired the pistol she forgot the safety was on. And Finn missed how many people with a gun, by the way? Since you're asserting she's 'the best that everything', surely you have something in the film that shows Finn missing constantly while Rey is so much better?

She mind controls Daniel Craig despite not even knowing the jedi mind trick is a thing that exists. She can fix the millennium falcon and can understand both BB8 and Chewbacca, despite no character ever in the history of the series ever having been able to understand Droid speech, and only Han could ever understand Chewie. She can pilot the millennium falcon well enough to hit a tie-fighter with the main turret just by doing a backflip and having Finn pull the trigger, with the gun unable to turn, and in atmosphere on a planet with gravity. Anakin's lightsaber also literally calls out for her, and seemingly flies into her hand of its own accord despite Kylo Ren's attempts to pull it (how kylo can stop a blaster shot in mid air but can't move a 1 pound piece of metal 5 feet is beyond me. Was he out of force points? Did he need to recharge his batteries?).

You might defend Rey. You might say: Oh, well, she worked as a scrapper. Yeah? Well by that logic Steven Avery should be some kind of renaissance man savant. She has no training, none, nobody (except for bs flashbacks) in flying, shooting, hacking doors, using the force, sword fighting, stealth, and yet it's only the first movie in a trilogy and she can already outpace all the OT characters in their fields of expertise. Just look how many times Luke and Han totally miss in the ANH shootout scenes on foot and in the scene where they are using the turrets to fend off the TIE Fighters tailing them.

And if Rey did have secret training then wow. Looks like Luke trained a 5 year old better than his star pupil Kylo Ren. No wonder Kylo turned to evil.

All of these complaints are garbage, and have been dealt with in the other thread. She's no more of a 'Mary Sue' than Luke is a Gary Stu, if you're even remotely objective about the original trilogy as opposed to wearing rose colored glasses.

- Everyone could understand Chewie in the OT, what are you talking about? How did you think Obi-Wan met Han? Leia, Lando, and Luke all spoke to Chewie freely.
- Why shouldn't she be able to fix the Millennium Falcon? She has clear mechanical aptitude coming straight from her experience as a scavenger and has a demonstrated, obviously keen interest in the ship and its history both before and after it fell into Unkar Plutt's hands.
- She said she's a pilot. Why don't you believe her? Any reason?
- Yes, Rey's prodigious Force powers are a major plot point ('The Force Awakens' - 'there has been an awakening, have you felt it'). Why is this bad? So were Lukes. Why couldn't Vader shoot down Luke when he was right on his six, while he mutters "the Force is strong in this one"? Why is this ok, but Rey triumphing against a wounded and emotionally disturbed Kylo Ren is somehow just not believable?
- Luke and Han kill over a dozen Stormtroopers between them, so I have no idea what you're on about. Luke in particular is a dead eye shot with a blaster and has no convincing justiifcation for being one apart from being Force sensitive. Somehow, no one complains.
- Hacking doors - the part she pulls to open the doors is the same part we see her pulling when we first meet her. This is crystal clear, obvious story telling.

[Simon_Jester]

I guess I'm just bummed because before it came out I was excited that we might have a stormtrooper as a protagonist. Yet we learn nothing about the order, including whether it's even an imperial remnant. I don't think it even is. All of the officers look like they're in their 20's/30's if I remember correctly.

An Imperial remnant would be able to keep recruiting without undue trouble. By this point, with something like twenty-five years having passed since Endor, the only people they'd have in their armed forces who personally participated in the Empire/Rebellion era would be senior officers (captains and admirals) and senior noncoms. Neither group is particularly numerous.

[APlayerHater]

- Everyone could understand Chewie in the OT, what are you talking about? How did you think Obi-Wan met Han? Leia, Lando, and Luke all spoke to Chewie freely.

- Obiwan did appear to have a conversation with Chewie off screen, but no one else can understand Chewie except Han and C3PO. They all sort of just smile awkwardly whenever he roars anything at them. Han/3PO are the only one who ever react as if Chewie has actually said words.

I mean, everyone speaks to R2 too, that doesn't mean they understand his beeping. There's a scene where Luke talks to R2 in an x-wing and it shows that R2's text is being translated on the screen, but otherwise luke talks to R2. Luke never appears to understand R2 and repeatedly needs C3PO to translate.

- Why shouldn't she be able to fix the Millennium Falcon? She has clear mechanical aptitude coming straight from her experience as a scavenger and has a demonstrated, obviously keen interest in the ship and its history both before and after it fell into Unkar Plutt's hands.

- If she had a keen interest in the ship, why did she literally call it garbage? She had heard of the millennium falcon, but she didn't know that the ship that was sitting around there 'was' the falcon. If there is any evidence that she worked on it this is news to me. And if she knew it was running and knew its workings I doubt she would have second guessed it.

- She said she's a pilot. Why don't you believe her? Any reason?

I don't know how she could have learned to fly a ship, but luke just has to mention his T16 to get a free pass so fair enough.

- Yes, Rey's prodigious Force powers are a major plot point ('The Force Awakens' - 'there has been an awakening, have you felt it'). Why is this bad? So were Lukes. Why couldn't Vader shoot down Luke when he was right on his six, while he mutters "the Force is strong in this one"? Why is this ok, but Rey triumphing against a wounded and emotionally disturbed Kylo Ren is somehow just not believable?

- Luke is really only in a dog fight against Vader personally for a few seconds, and then Han saves him. Multiple ships get shot down as Vader moves up the column of x-wings to reach Luke. Luke is doomed and gets saved in the 11nth hour. It's a completely different situation. Luke never bests Vader, and he also was receiving supernatural help from Obi at the time.

We never even see Luke use his lightsaber in ANH, outside of that thing with the training orb doohickey. He takes another movie until he's even proficient with it. Obviously if a normal person just started swinging a lightsaber around in a combat scenario they would just get killed immediately. But someone trained by Luke barely holds his own against a janitor. The fact that Finn even gets a hit in is the problem. If they had had time to introduce Finn's melee weapons training from the comic I would have found that whole sequence more believable.

Luke learns to trust the force rather than a targeting computer, and he makes one accurate shot in his X-Wing when he really needs to, proving that the force is the ultimate power in the universe or whatever. Some people say he curved the torpedo with the force but I find that really far fetched. I mean, we do see the torpedo turn and go into the exhaust port, but I'm sure everyone has their own opinion about whether or not Luke physically turned it mid flight.

Rey totally wipes the floor with Kylo Ren and makes him look like a fool, because she heard the words "the force." And then she becomes the avatar of the lightside or something apparently.

- Luke and Han kill over a dozen Stormtroopers between them, so I have no idea what you're on about. Luke in particular is a dead eye shot with a blaster and has no convincing justiifcation for being one apart from being Force sensitive. Somehow, no one complains.

- I wouldn't call them dead shots. They seem to spray fire wildly, and they also seem to rifles rather than a handgun. And Luke and Han at least seem to have owned guns and presumably had some experience with them. Then again, the protagonists in ANH actually appear to try to use cover instead of just walking out in the open while all the storm troopers try to run at them with their guns lowered. There is that part where Han runs down a hallway at the stormtroopers fleeing, but that is shown to have been a really bad idea.

-Anyway, I rewatched the Finn TR8R fight, and I guess other than elbows and fists he only gets in one hit with his staff thing. So fair enough, although I will complain the Finn was still conscious after that. I guess it would have broken up the scene if he had lost consciousness.

-Rey's secret jedi training that doesn't exist seems to be what people tend to bring up when they defend her. And I agree, there is no evidence for its existence. But if I didn't mention it people would think I wasn't aware of the fan theory.

You mean like the fact he's sweating profusely in the freezing cold, his blood in the snow, or him beating on his wound? Its totally unnecessary to have him be awkward and sluggish. The logical inference to draw, given that he dominated Finn and dominated Rey until she 'fell into the Force' or however you want to term it, is that he's an exceptionally dangerous combatant even when grievously wounded, and he would have been even more dangerous had he not been. That he was nowhere near the peak of his abilities is made obvious in the movie over and over and over - leaving aside the obvious visual cues above, there is also the fact that where he casually intercepts blaster bolts thrown his way by both Poe and Rey without concern, in the aftermath of Han's murder, he doesn't even move to stop Chewie's shot. This was also explicit in both the shooting script and the novel - he was weakened by the act of killing Han.

This all comes down to opinion of course. There was coverage of Kylo Ren at least bleeding, and he was wearing armor of some kind, but they make it a point to talk about Chewie's bowcaster and make it a Chekov's gun of sorts. Han and Chewie talk about it earlier, and Han uses it to shoot someone and we see how powerful it is, throwing people through the air. Kylo really should have been blasted off that walkway at least, instead of suffering some kind of minor puncture wound. His guts should be a pulp right now.

Everyone in that scene is panting and sweating. It doesn't take that much physical activity to sweat in the snow, and every character there was taking part in a fight scene. Kylo clearly has completely unrestricted movement despite his injury and still gets wounded by Finn. If his movement is unrestricted then his wound doesn't really exist for the purposes of that fight, so Finn getting a hit in seems odd. He also threw Rey against a tree effortlessly, so his force powers had to at least be intact, but then he stops and decides to sword fight Finn for some reason, and never uses his powers again.

[Vympel]

- Obiwan did appear to have a conversation with Chewie off screen, but no one else can understand Chewie except Han and C3PO. They all sort of just smile awkwardly whenever he roars anything at them. Han/3PO are the only one who ever react as if Chewie has actually said words.

Yes, but see TESB and RotJ.

I mean, everyone speaks to R2 too, that doesn't mean they understand his beeping. There's a scene where Luke talks to R2 in an x-wing and it shows that R2's text is being translated on the screen, but otherwise luke talks to R2. Luke never appears to understand R2 and repeatedly needs C3PO to translate.

Only in ANH, not the subsequent films.

- If she had a keen interest in the ship, why did she literally call it garbage? She had heard of the millennium falcon, but she didn't know that the ship that was sitting around there 'was' the falcon. If there is any evidence that she worked on it this is news to me. And if she knew it was running and knew its workings I doubt she would have second guessed it.

The Falcon is garbage, in many ways - heck, the entire plot of TESB is pushed forward because of the Falcon's notoriously poor mechanical reliability, and which we saw again in Episode 7 when it almost killed them with poison gas. The Falcon is a high performance jallopy, but a jallopy all the same. Its unreliable and is called by Leia a 'bucket of bolts' even in TESB - where she knows very well what the ships got under the hood.

Her keen interest in the ship is demonstrated - she knows all the modifications that have been made to it. Why would she know that its the Falcon? The source of its fame is an event 30 years ago, before she was even born. She can still have heard of it and not have any idea what it looked like, and its certainly not unreasonable to not even think that Unkar Plutt's collection includes a famous ship.

- Luke is really only in a dog fight against Vader personally for a few seconds, and then Han saves him. Multiple ships get shot down as Vader moves up the column of x-wings to reach Luke. Luke is doomed and gets saved in the 11nth hour. It's a completely different situation. Luke never bests Vader, and he also was receiving supernatural help from Obi at the time.

There's no indication that Luke is receiving supernatural help from Obi-Wan, unless you count advice beyond the grave 'use the Force', 'trust your feelings', which is really all about Luke using his own abilities. And its a completely different situation in another way, in that Darth Vader is a Dark Lord of the Sith and Kylo Ren isn't even fully trained, and definitely isn't a Sith. Both situations are 'unbelievable' on their face. Vader was on Luke's six for ages, relatively speaking. The reason he couldn't close him up in time is because of his strength in the Force. And that's fine.

We never even see Luke use his lightsaber in ANH, outside of that thing with the training orb doohickey. He takes another movie until he's even proficient with it. Obviously if a normal person just started swinging a lightsaber around in a combat scenario they would just get killed immediately. But someone trained by Luke barely holds his own against a janitor. The fact that Finn even gets a hit in is the problem. If they had had time to introduce Finn's melee weapons training from the comic I would have found that whole sequence more believable.

Luke learns to trust the force rather than a targeting computer, and he makes one accurate shot in his X-Wing when he really needs to, proving that the force is the ultimate power in the universe or whatever. Some people say he curved the torpedo with the force but I find that really far fetched. I mean, we do see the torpedo turn and go into the exhaust port, but I'm sure everyone has their own opinion about whether or not Luke physically turned it mid flight.

Rey totally wipes the floor with Kylo Ren and makes him look like a fool, because she heard the words "the force." And then she becomes the avatar of the lightside or something apparently.

We already saw Finn fight the Riot Control Stormtrooper earlier in the film. He lost that fight too, but he clearly knows how to fight in melee.

Though its a matter of opinion, but the complaints about Rey being able to best Kylo Ren (after he, even though wounded, drives her back the entire duel) is based on a prequelized view of lightsabre combat, whereas Episode 7 returns to the original trilogy.

In essence - we never saw Luke train to duel with a lightsabre. Not once. It simply wasn't important - raw ability with the Force informs the ability to duel. Training merely refines it, and is not necessary. How else to explain Luke defeating Vader in RotJ?

The same thing happens in Episode 7 - Rey felt the dark side calling to her in that duel. We can see it in the anger on her face, and its in the script and novel as well.

- I wouldn't call them dead shots. They seem to spray fire wildly, and they also seem to rifles rather than a handgun. And Luke and Han at least seem to have owned guns and presumably had some experience with them. Then again, the protagonists in ANH actually appear to try to use cover instead of just walking out in the open while all the storm troopers try to run at them with their guns lowered. There is that part where Han runs down a hallway at the stormtroopers fleeing, but that is shown to have been a really bad idea.

They only miss with any great regularity in the detention block, after they've rescued Leia. This is easily explainable because they can barely see the Stormtroopers shooting at them as as it is. But any other time Luke shoots, he hits on the first or second shot. In particular, post Obi-Wan's death, he nails Stormtrooper after Stormtrooper, standing out in the open, without concern.

-Rey's secret jedi training that doesn't exist seems to be what people tend to bring up when they defend her. And I agree, there is no evidence for its existence. But if I didn't mention it people would think I wasn't aware of the fan theory.

Fair enough.

This all comes down to opinion of course. There was coverage of Kylo Ren at least bleeding, and he was wearing armor of some kind, but they make it a point to talk about Chewie's bowcaster and make it a Chekov's gun of sorts. Han and Chewie talk about it earlier, and Han uses it to shoot someone and we see how powerful it is, throwing people through the air. Kylo really should have been blasted off that walkway at least, instead of suffering some kind of minor puncture wound. His guts should be a pulp right now.

Everyone in that scene is panting and sweating. It doesn't take that much physical activity to sweat in the snow, and every character there was taking part in a fight scene. Kylo clearly has completely unrestricted movement despite his injury and still gets wounded by Finn. If his movement is unrestricted then his wound doesn't really exist for the purposes of that fight, so Finn getting a hit in seems odd. He also threw Rey against a tree effortlessly, so his force powers had to at least be intact, but then he stops and decides to sword fight Finn for some reason, and never uses his powers again.

My interpretation (and its in the script as well) is that he was basically toying with him. That's why the fight was over the moment he got grazed. There was nothing stopping Kylo from killing Finn the first time he knocked him down - he just wanted a duel. Rey he had to incapacitate, because Snoke had ordered him to bring her to him.

I've seen the movie a few times, and Kylo is definitely looking decidedly unhealthy compared to both Finn and Rey. I'll take screenshots when the blu-ray comes out.

[APlayerHater]

I've seen the movie a few times, and Kylo is definitely looking decidedly unhealthy compared to both Finn and Rey. I'll take screenshots when the blu-ray comes out.

That would be pretty helpful actually. Cool.

[Batman]

You DO know It'll be several months before that happens, right?

[Vympel]

You DO know It'll be several months before that happens, right?

Its only about two weeks or so actually. April 5.

[Batman]

So it appears. Looks like I turned out to be mistaken. I could've sworn last I checked the release date amazon gave was in June.

[Simon_Jester]

I mean, everyone speaks to R2 too, that doesn't mean they understand his beeping. There's a scene where Luke talks to R2 in an x-wing and it shows that R2's text is being translated on the screen, but otherwise luke talks to R2. Luke never appears to understand R2 and repeatedly needs C3PO to translate.

Luke repeatedly listens and responds to R2D2 during the trip to Dagobah, unless I am sorely mistaken.

- Yes, Rey's prodigious Force powers are a major plot point ('The Force Awakens' - 'there has been an awakening, have you felt it'). Why is this bad? So were Lukes. Why couldn't Vader shoot down Luke when he was right on his six, while he mutters "the Force is strong in this one"? Why is this ok, but Rey triumphing against a wounded and emotionally disturbed Kylo Ren is somehow just not believable?

- Luke is really only in a dog fight against Vader personally for a few seconds, and then Han saves him. Multiple ships get shot down as Vader moves up the column of x-wings to reach Luke. Luke is doomed and gets saved in the 11nth hour. It's a completely different situation. Luke never bests Vader, and he also was receiving supernatural help from Obi at the time.

We never even see Luke use his lightsaber in ANH, outside of that thing with the training orb doohickey. He takes another movie until he's even proficient with it. Obviously if a normal person just started swinging a lightsaber around in a combat scenario they would just get killed immediately. But someone trained by Luke barely holds his own against a janitor. The fact that Finn even gets a hit in is the problem. If they had had time to introduce Finn's melee weapons training from the comic I would have found that whole sequence more believable.

Finn fights effectively with a blaster, and while he doesn't win his duel against the electric-mace-guy, he at least holds his own for an extended period. I'd say they put considerable time into establishing that Finn is a competent hand to hand fighter, even if he's better with blasters than in hand to hand.

Meanwhile, they DO establish Rey's hand-to-hand competence; didn't you see her performance with a quarterstaff on her home planet?

Rey totally wipes the floor with Kylo Ren and makes him look like a fool, because she heard the words "the force." And then she becomes the avatar of the lightside or something apparently.

This happened not 'because she heard words' but because she was actively struggling against a Force-powered telepathic intrusion. Gee, it's not like a mind probe might wake up any hidden potential or talent in a person...

And, frankly yes, Rey is able to best an injured Ren in the first movie, whereas Luke was not able to best Vader. But seriously, this mostly just establishes that Kylo Ren isn't as tough and badass as Darth Vader, which was explicitly a plot point in the movie, to the point where even Kylo himself is torn up about it.

- I wouldn't call them dead shots. They seem to spray fire wildly, and they also seem to rifles rather than a handgun. And Luke and Han at least seem to have owned guns and presumably had some experience with them. Then again, the protagonists in ANH actually appear to try to use cover instead of just walking out in the open while all the storm troopers try to run at them with their guns lowered. There is that part where Han runs down a hallway at the stormtroopers fleeing, but that is shown to have been a really bad idea.

...Of course Han uses a handgun... and yes, they do spray a lot of automatic weapons fire, but the point is that Han (who is at most the equivalent of a Wild West gunslinger) and Luke (who so far as we know has no combat training whatsoever) manage to take down numerous stormtroopers.

Even if we grant something like "Vader told the stormtroopers to let them get in and out because he wanted to track the Falcon to the rebel base," this still reflects some surprising battlefield prowess for a kid like Luke. Why is Rey doing the same thing surprising?

This all comes down to opinion of course. There was coverage of Kylo Ren at least bleeding, and he was wearing armor of some kind, but they make it a point to talk about Chewie's bowcaster and make it a Chekov's gun of sorts. Han and Chewie talk about it earlier, and Han uses it to shoot someone and we see how powerful it is, throwing people through the air. Kylo really should have been blasted off that walkway at least, instead of suffering some kind of minor puncture wound. His guts should be a pulp right now.

You know, I actually kind of agree with this.

What would have been nice is if Kylo had tried to duplicate his blaster-stopping trick and had it not work, in a way that made it clear that either Kylo was weakened by his emotional turmoil, Chewie's blaster was just that much of a hand cannon, or both.

Which would also explain how Kylo was only slightly wounded- he would then have partially deflected or diminished the power of the bolt.