Quote Originally Posted by a completely inoffensive name View Post
Also @PVC, remember that space politics really bogged down the plot and pacing of the prequel trilogy. I would not be surprised if this new trilogy left out the details on the Republic's constitution and just focused on the exciting conflicts.
About the only thing we know about the Republic is that it had a Fleet and now it doesn't.

Star Killer Base blew up multiple planets, possibly most of the Core Worlds.

Or did it?

I'm not asking to see the Republic Senate (they're all dead now anyway) but I would have liked a map after Star Killer base blew up showing us Republic territory and the planets that were hit just so I could get an idea of the size of the Republic and the impact that one strike had on it overall.

For a conflict to be exciting you need to know what's at stake - and the movie doesn't really give you enough to get invested in that. I was invested in the characters and the Resistance base not getting blown up but I have no idea what it means that the Resistance is apparently down to a dozen T-70 fighters.

Presumably destroying the Republic Fleet and the Capital will cause upheaval but because I don't know what the Republic was like before it's going to be hard to gauge the impact.

The destruction of Hosnian Prime was a great opportunity to key the audience in on what the First Order had actually achieved - without that it's hard to know exactly how to feel. The film doesn't even really establish that the Republic is the dominant power (territorially) in the galaxy.

The movie makes the audience work really hard if they want to understand what went on.

Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed it and I'll probably see it again before is closes but the omission is glaring and could have been easily fixed with another 2-3 lines.