Some things I will say in defense of this movie I otherwise hate:

I don’t think cut scenes should necessarily be used to evaluate films. The creative process involves following all kinds of ideas. Bad ones or ones that don’t work get cut out. Should we downvote ESB because George Lucas had them shoot a pointless 5 minute Wampa subplot? That said, there is more than enough evidence in the final cut of the movie itself to betray the filmmakers’ intentions- and it’s not good.

I also applaud them for making Rey not related to anyone else. The egalitarian ideal that anyone anywhere can become a Jedi, and that you don’t have to be related to a Skywalker or a Kenobi or some other past Jedi bloodline, is a noble one. So I would disagree with people who say it’s a flaw of the movie that Rey’s parents are ‘nobodies’.

All of that said, the criticisms of this film far far outweigh any deserved praise, but I did want to be fair in these two cases.