How The Force Awakens Tricked an Entire Generation of Star Wars Fans - Part I (WCB)

A decade after its release, Star Wars: The Force Awakens is still widely credited with “bringing Star Wars back,” but that narrative doesn’t hold up. This video essay breaks down how the film was marketed, why audiences embraced it so quickly, and how its reliance on nostalgia and emotional cues masked deeper structural problems in the story and characters.



Disney Star Wars. The Force Awakens was a close copy of the original story, but with many dumb elements that broke with canon. It seemed more like an inept high quality fan film than something put together by sophisticated storytellers. For some, it was a near unwatchable film. For less critical viewers it was somehow embraced. 

Before this film came out there was debate over the quality of the George Lucas made Sequel Trilogy films. Many people had huge issues with them and this was objectively worse. 

What the entire situation shows, one might argue, is that there seems to be a disconnect held by both movie creators (storytellers) and many fans when it comes to identifying what is a good product over hype and nostalgia. 

The disaster of the following Prequel films highlighted the fact that what Disney was producing was low quality, in terms of storytelling, as they moved further away from canon and good sense. Each of the later two films drove established audiences away where fans watched them once and did not come back again for repeated viewings. 

[Posted at the SpookyWeather2 blog, December 22, 2025.]