Warning: Spoilers ahead, but is there really anyone out there who hasn’t seen this yet?

Since Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens dropped into cinemas all around the world back in December, the Internet and nerd culture as a whole has been mired in argument and controversy around the plot of the newest movie. Many, including several of my close friends, feel that it was a beat-for-beat rip-off of A New Hope, the first Star Wars movie.

These accusations are not without pretty significant evidence: the droid carrying secret information wandering a remote desert planet, the iconic cantina scene, the planet-annihilating superweapon, a trench-run through the enemy base in starships, and even the death of the mentor while the protagonists helplessly watch from afar. There’s a lot here that calls back to the original movie, and there’s really no question about whether or not JJ Abrams, the director of The Force Awakens, did this on purpose — he directly admits that he took inspiration from A New Hope. The real question here: is this movie more of a rip-off, or a homage to the classic film that spawned it?

Abrams himself has addressed the haters, saying, “What was important for me was introducing brand new characters using relationships that were embracing the history that we know to tell a story that is new — to go backwards to go forwards.” This makes sense to me. To make another chapter in a saga like Star Wars, something so deeply ingrained in popular culture and held as sacred by a whole lot of different people, you cannot ignore the source material.

Abrams’s decision to go back and base much of the new movie on the old one is a decision that I have a lot of respect for. It shows that he has a healthy respect for the original film, for the nostalgia of his audience, and the integrity of the new movie. To me, a rip-off is something done disrespectfully. In my opinion, this was not a move made to cash in on old memories, but an artistic decision from the director.

As an enormous Star Wars fan myself (I’ve seen this new one three separate times in theaters), I’m just relieved that Episode VII lived up to the hype more than the prequel trilogy did in the 2000s. The fact that the new movie took some inspiration from a classic film in the same franchise is, to me, not nearly as important as the stellar overall quality of the film. Thank you, Mr. Abrams, for doing your job. He killed Han Solo, but at least he didn’t bring Jar Jar Binks to life.

What do you think, readers? Is The Force Awakens a rip-off, or just a quality film? Let us know in the comments.

Creative Commons photo source: https://www.flickr.com/photos/joi/1088700233/in/