Film
Star Wars: The Force Awakens
The one that brought Star Wars back from the dead by copying its own homework and daring you to mind. New scavengers pick through old wreckage — literal and emotional — while familiar faces hand over the reins one last time. It's comfort food dressed as event cinema: fast, funny, unashamedly nostalgic, built for anyone who wanted space opera to feel like home again.
Should you watch it?
Watch it if you love a big, sincere space saga where the pleasure is in rediscovering familiar characters, practical-feeling spectacle and a hero's journey told with old-fashioned earnestness.
Skip it if you want something lean and surprising; it leans hard on nostalgia, reuses a lot of the original trilogy's beats, and its nearly two-and-a-half hour runtime can feel stretched.
What it asks of you: Settle in for about 136 minutes of mostly brisk action, with quieter reunion scenes breaking it up, and let it be a crowd-pleaser rather than a slow-burn puzzle.
Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.
If you liked this
Guardians of the Galaxy2014
Same appetite for scrappy underdogs banding together against galactic evil, but traded reverence for a mixtape and a wisecrack. Pure, colourful fun with real heart humming underneath the jokes.
But The comedy is wall-to-wall — if you wanted Force Awakens's more solemn, mythic beats, this trades gravity for gags almost entirely.
Star Trek2009
Same director, same trick: take a beloved, aging universe, cast electric young unknowns, and relaunch it with breathless energy and lens flare to spare. Watching Abrams pull it off twice is oddly comforting.
But It rewrites established canon fairly aggressively — hardcore Trek fans have never quite forgiven it, and some of those scars run deep.
Jurassic World2015
Released the same year, chasing the identical high: resurrect a beloved 90s blockbuster, hand it to new leads, hit the old beats hard enough to make you tear up a little. It works, shamelessly.
But It's even more openly a remix of its original than Force Awakens is — if that bothered you here, it'll bother you more there.
Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Star Wars: The Force Awakens
The wildcard
Something you would not have found on your own.
The Hidden Fortress1958
George Lucas has said outright this is the film that gave him Star Wars's structural trick of following the epic through its lowliest characters. The droids'-eye moments in Force Awakens trace straight back to this — the great-grandparent of the whole saga.
Two squabbling peasants stumble through a hostile kingdom escorting a disguised princess and a general's hidden gold, the whole epic filtered through the eyes of the little guys. Swordfights, comedy, and scale on a scrappy budget.
But Black and white, subtitled, and made in 1958 — the pace is patient in a way modern blockbusters have trained us out of expecting.
People
Cast
Daisy RidleyRey
John BoyegaFinn
Oscar IsaacPoe Dameron
Adam DriverKylo Ren
Carrie FisherPrincess Leia
Harrison FordHan Solo
Mark HamillLuke Skywalker
Lupita Nyong'oMaz Kanata
Andy SerkisSupreme Leader Snoke
Domhnall GleesonGeneral Hux
Anthony DanielsC-3PO
Max von SydowLor San Tekka
Directing
- Scott OwenAssistant Director
- J.J. AbramsDirector
- George WalkerFirst Assistant Director
- Jason BlumenfeldFirst Assistant Director
- Tommy GormleyFirst Assistant Director
- Jasmin MoradianScript Coordinator
- Dawn GilliamScript Supervisor
- Gladys San JuanScript Supervisor
- Lizzie PritchardScript Supervisor
- Aaron C. FitzgeraldSecond Assistant Director
- Andrew MannionSecond Assistant Director
- Ben DixonSecond Assistant Director
- Chloe ChestertonSecond Assistant Director
- Christophe Le ChanuSecond Assistant Director
- Frazer Fennell-BallSecond Assistant Director
- Joey CoughlinSecond Assistant Director
- Albertine SelvikSecond Unit Director
- Grace McInnesSecond Unit Director
- Laura WoottonSecond Unit Director
- Roger GuyettSecond Unit Director
- Stephanie JollySecond Unit Director
- Andrew VanneckThird Assistant Director
- Barnaby RiggsThird Assistant Director
- Clare GlassThird Assistant Director
- Edward BellamyThird Assistant Director
- Eileen YipThird Assistant Director
- George Max TrummlerThird Assistant Director
- Holly GardnerThird Assistant Director
- Rickie-Lee RobertsThird Assistant Director
- Siggi KjartanThird Assistant Director
- Stephen GodenzieThird Assistant Director
- Tarik AfifiThird Assistant Director
- Teariki LeonardThird Assistant Director
- Tom ReynoldsThird Assistant Director
Writing
- George LucasCharacters
- J.J. AbramsWriter
- Lawrence KasdanWriter
- Michael ArndtWriter
Production
- Michael ArndtAssociate Producer
- Alyssa WeisbergCasting
- April WebsterCasting
- Nina GoldCasting
- Jessica ShermanCasting Associate
- Theo ParkCasting Associate
- Ben RosenblattCo-Producer
- John SwartzCo-Producer
- Lawrence KasdanCo-Producer
- Michelle RejwanCo-Producer
- Pippa AndersonCo-Producer
- Susan TownerCo-Producer
- Tommy GormleyCo-Producer
- Jason McGatlinExecutive Producer
- Tommy HarperExecutive Producer
- Leifur B. DagfinnssonLine Producer
- Caterina BoselliLocation Coordinator
- Bryan BurkProducer
- J.J. AbramsProducer
- Kathleen KennedyProducer
- Vanluke WatsonProduction Assistant
- Jason PomerantzProduction Director
- Martin JoyProduction Manager
- Megan MatousekProduction Manager
- Adam TeeuwProduction Supervisor
- Andrew C. KeeterProduction Supervisor
- Cory Bennett LewisProduction Supervisor
- Karl CaffreyProduction Supervisor
- Khaled ZaazouhProduction Supervisor
- Celia BarnettResearcher
- Gary BunnSenior Executive Consultant
- Tobin HughesUnit Manager
- Alex DarbyUnit Production Manager
- Finni JohannssonUnit Production Manager
- Mark SomnerUnit Production Manager
- Simon EmanuelUnit Production Manager
- Susan TownerUnit Production Manager
Recommended by
Star Trek, Star Trek Into Darkness, Red Rising, Mortal Engines