The locations in TFA aren't lazy choices. Here's why/

It's generally accepted, even by people like me who love TFA, that it's a sort of "soft reboot" of Star Wars. A big reason for this is the locations. We have Psuedo-Tatooine (Jakku), Psuedo-Endor/Cantina (Takodana), Pseudo-Yavin (Q'tar) and Pseudo Hoth/Death Star (Starkiller Base).

Some dismiss this as "lazy filmmaking," but I think there's actually a lot going on with the locations and the way they reflect the theme. Keep in mind, this wasn't just a lazy choice. A glance at the "Art of" book shows you how many ideas they went through before landing on these ones.

So what's the theme of The Force Awakens? It's about passing the baton to a new generation. It's about young heroes living in the shadow of the past (Rey in her too-big Rebel helmet, Kylo and his Vader mask).

And so, for most of the film, our young heroes inhabit the visual world of the Original Trilogy: desert, snow, jungle. They're literally living in the shadow of the past.

But then there's a turning point. Han faces Kylo. He tells Kylo to take off his mask, shedding the shadow of the past. Outside, the sun goes dark, the visual tone literally changing as Han dies. Han's death brings a transformation to the film's aesthetic. Kylo has shed his mask. The world has gone dark.

We spend almost the entire rest of the film in a new visual space. We're in the snowy woods at night, fighting in the glow of lightsabers. We're on a mountain island on an ocean planet. We didn't see anything like this in the Original Trilogy.

The past--symbolized by Original Trilogy locations and by Han Solo himself--has died. From this point, it's the new generation, symbolize by new locations. As Kylo says to Rey and Finn, "it's just us now."

With the death of Han, the film's locations shift from the old to the new. The film itself passes the baton to something new. It's just us now. The old guard is gone. The old look is gone.

That's why the location choices in TFA work so well for me. They reflect the theme on a deep level.

 

Oops lol. Need to edit.