Since this movie came out, it has been harder to stick to my lurker pledge. I feel compelled to add several ideas I’ve had in more organized fashion. I know I shared some earlier, and I will repeat some of them here. You see, the more I think about it, the more I enjoy the movie (I’ve only seen it once, since it’s so hard for me to get a babysitter). I find myself becoming more and more defensive about it when reading the criticisms of others. Sometimes it makes me really irritated with the nature of our own forum where we are far too critical of movies. You see, I still enjoy the prequels far more than most here, and simply am grateful that fan editors have made them better, though they will never match the OT. I fall into the camp that really loves ROTJ as well. And with all this, if I had been a more casual fan, never hooking up at this site, I have a feeling I wouldn’t have been so critical of TFA when I saw it if I hadn’t been tainted by the cynical nature of this site. Don’t worry, I love it here, but we’re too harsh at times, I feel.

Anyway, I’m rampling because I’m trying to be quick, so let me share my ideas:

Give more backstory. My biggest complaint was my lack of understanding of where the Galaxy stood in TFA times. I’m sure that deleted scenes will assist with this, and more can be explained in a better opening crawl. Check out this link I found, which really explains a lot, including how the First Order became so powerful, the rotating nature of Republic capitals, the literal awakening of the Force, etc.

http://io9.gizmodo.com/all-the-backstory-you-desperately-want-to-know-about-th-1751196966

Introduce the concept of the Starkiller sooner. Both Death Stars were mentioned in the respective crawls of their films. The Starkiller appears out of no where, with no reference to its existence until it gets used to destroy Hosnian Prime. That truly annoys me. Just throw it in the crawl and let us be aware of its danger.
On top of that, let us see more Hosnian Prime. Its destruction is almost meaningless to the audience. If we saw Leia’s envoy go there, get to understand the relationship of the Resistance to the Republic, this would truly help the movie. Again, this would probably require different wording in the crawl and the use of deleted scenes we know exist and will hopefully be present on the Blu-ray:

http://www.slashfilm.com/star-wars-the-force-awkens-deleted-scenes/

Distinguish the Starkiller from the Death Stars. I think this shouldn’t be too difficult. It’s name is “star” + “killer” after all, and besides a reference to early Star Wars concepts/Luke’s original last name, it could easily be changed to a weapon much like the Centerpoint Station of the old EU, which was stationary but fired a powerful beam at distant stars and caused them to supernova. I imagine a little technical wizardry could easily fire that beam at a star instead of the planet, cause a supernova (witnessed from the ground of Hosnian Prime), and have the supernova destroy the system. Meanwhile, remove our heroes actually witnessing this from Takdona.

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Centerpoint_Station

Not sure if this is possible, but remove Kylo Ren’s face from the Rey interrogation scene. I’m not sure if he could be shown placing his mask on the table but avoiding his face, or perhaps simply splice in a few shots with his mask still on, because obviously that scene needs to stay, but I really feel the impact of seeing him would have been stronger if we as an audience saw him the first time when facing Han.
Slow down the pace a bit with additional scenes just to pad things out.
Use musical cues from previous Star Wars entries, particularly the prequels, which I think are far better than people credit, and certainly better than TFA.
I don’t remember if this is possible, but it should would be great to remove Phasma’s lowering of the shield. It makes her a weak character who tried to save her own life at the cost of likely millions of her compatriots. She doesn’t do much anyway and was only cool in the beginning. It’d be better to introduce her there, and since I believe there are plans to use her later, save her as a cool character only teased at in this first of the new trilogy instead of wasting her as a weak-willed coward in the end.
I think I do like the idea of Hosnian Prime’s destruction to the end of the movie as well, as that would distinguish it further from ANH and create a powerful ending with some strong emotions for good and ill.
I’m sure there are little cuts here and there that could improve the movie, but I’m not as adamant about these. I read too many complaints in the review thread about too much fan service (I don’t mind mentioning the original Death Star–we are in the same universe with the same characters, after all; it’s not like their history was erased), and too many complaints about the humor. It’s not Jar Jar humor, and all the Star Wars movies have cheesy jokes–that’s part of the appeal! I hate it when editors remove all the humor in the PT, and I’d hate the same done to this. I’d probably suggest little trims in the rathtar scene, particularly how nice the one is to Finn to not devour him instantly as he did the others, and reduce or cut the circling helicopter shot of Luke at the end.
Edit in some shots from trailers, if possible, such as Kylo Ren igniting his saber in the forest.
Find some way to provide a better explanation for why R2 wakes up. Not sure how this could be done, but the fact that he did was far too convenient.

That’s really it. I can’t complain too much about other things and in fact enjoyed some things others did not. I don’t care that Snoke was CGI, though I know there are practical effects purists on this site. This is 2016 and all movies use it extensively these days, and it really didn’t look as bad as people complain. I didn’t mind a number of things and feel people are being way too picky, overlooking equivalent “problems” when they are present in the OT but tearing them to shreds for TFA, as if they theymselves are expert storytellers.

I may have more ideas when I see it again (probably not till BD), but for now these are my thoughts.