https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_e-fYfBKgOE

The hype is real. Still really hard to tell what is going on which is fine by me. I am more than happy going into another Star Wars movie basically blind as to what is going on.

Only 2 more months!

I honestly can't forgive what they did to Han, Leia, and Luke in Episode VII. I'm honestly surprised how well the post VI movies are received by even long time fans, when Episode VII trashes so much of Luke, Leia and Han's character. Think about this.

1. The New Republic learned nothing from the Old Republic or the battles of the Rebellion. Within on Generation and under the guidance of Leia herself, the New Republic allowed a superweapon 6x as powerful as the Death Star to be constructed under their noses and wipe out several civilized planets.

2. Luke apparently attempted to create a new order of Jedi Knights, but they were wiped out by the Knights of Ren. It's unfathomable to me that Luke-- a person who had but a few moments of training with Master Yoda would allow his own new order of Jedi to not only train someone so defective, if not powerful in the force and learn nothing from history, just like in point number 1 above.

My point is this, the new, post VI Star Wars movies have completely trashed our trio of heroes, made them learn nothing from their own battles and history, Episode VII is a safe played remake of Episode IV for nostalgia and nothing more. Remove the Starkiller Base, rewrite a few things about the First Order and don't make the New Republic so stupid, and I would have liked the movie perhaps. . . if not for Luke's implied failure.

I honestly think that all this new. . . Trilogy (Unless we actually get six new Post VI episodes instead.) is trying to replace the old generation of Star Wars with a completely new one, but a new one which disses on everything learned by the last generation to save the Galaxy, and at the cost of everything they've ever learned, transforming them into shallow plot devices.

With characters like Han and Luke replaced by completely new heroes which this generation of children in real life can watch. . . it seems to me that the entire point is to remake Star Wars into something that creates a ton of money, but doesn't exactly tell a good story.

Even as I say this, I have to admit that I liked the trailer, but knowing what happened, and how incompetent Luke, Leia and Han were upsets me. I'm not even mad that Han was killed, or that Kylo Ren is a sith, in spite of being Leia's child. Given Han and Leia's character, I see them actually having this sort of problem with their child due to their character flaws as seen in the Original Trilogy. (I honest do see them struggling to be the best of parents given Han's past life, and Leia's committed life to politics. (You don't think she would be extremely busy once the New Republic rose to power and she had to help keep several systems in order?)

There are plenty of other problems I have with the movie, which is strange, because after I watched Episode VII, I had nothing to say about it for months.

Yes.

Months.

Then one day, it dawned on me. I had watched a retold Episode VII, with new characters for a new generation of fans, and it completely undermined everything the old characters would have learned from their struggles with the sith and the empire.

Now I just can't get hyped about anything that happens after Episode VII. When you look at the Expanded Universe lore and how amazing Luke had become in that, how he had achieved his destiny, walked between the light and dark. I'm not saying that the EU had the best of lore, or that even the books impressed me most of the time. I think that even they caused drama where it was unnecessary and the canon became a terrible mess thanks to how openly Lucas accepted various writers. The books were really hit and miss.

The still understood Luke, Han, and Leia much better than the new movies are. They actually praised them as characters--not try to brush them aside with incompetence just to create new characters for a new generation of Star Wars fans--most of the time anyways.

I think you've built up Han, Luke and Leia into something their not. Sure they were important main characters to the story but in reality they weren't the ONLY pieces to the puzzle. Honestly, only Luke is really essential. The rest of the group could have been changed out and the story would have been basically the same.

I agree that Luke got knocked down a LOT in the new movies based on the little information we have. I am really hopeful that Luke gets to show off his power in the next movie. He became one of the most dominant force users ever but we never get to see that in any movie so far.

So, while I understand the frustration with the new movies I'm not going to be upset with new content from that universe. The movies have surpassed my expectations so far and as long as they continue to do that I'm going to keep seeing them.

geeogree : I was extremely worried about Episode 8 when I saw the first trailer. "The Jedi need to end" and all that. My main worry is that the integrity of light side vs. dark side won't be maintained. I felt the same way about Kingdom Hearts II. When I played that, the story felt ambitious but overall, shallow. It didn't feel like it held firmly to what made I's plot so enjoyable. Same with any Harry Potter 3 and up. Yes, the dark elements may have been a good contrast to the light elements of the first two. But no Harry Potter movie 3 and up just felt so...delightful as 1 and 2.

But as for Star Wars, I have to say, I really liked this trailer. I felt my worries slip away. Now, I'm not entirely sure I will like it as much as I loved episode VII, which, in my viewpoint, was the best Star Wars movie. Perhaps my hopes that midichlorian levels won't be mentioned have been misplaced. But we'll see.

Based on the trailer I am going to guess:
1. Luke or Princess Leia die, maybe both of them.
2. Someone good will turn to the dark side or vice versa.

I think Rey will get trained by Luke I probably know based on the title of the movie.
I'm really excited to see this film me and my family love star wars.