It’s a bit showy, I’ll admit. I’m guessing that it was an Abrams decision rather than Kasdan’s. I can see why people criticise it, as actually freezing a blaster bolt in mid air isn’t something we’ve seen even Vader do. But if I wanted to justify it “in-universe”, I’d probably do so by pointing out that when Vader blocked blaster bolts, he caused them to dissipate/disappear. Maybe that requires a greater mastery of the force than just holding it in place temporarily.
Maybe? :p
It’s in the script that they were meant to ricochet on to the walls when Vader blocks Han’s Blaster in the dining room of Cloud city. The Ricochet Lasers changing direction were not painted in. But the Blast marks on the side walls from the squibs are physically there on the set.
So what Vader did was not really any different to what Kylo Ren did to be honest it’s just the mistake that they made in Empire Post production so peoples view of that scene has been skewed since the films inception.
The 2 other shots that have the lasers not present was in Echo Base when Han pulls 3po through the door you can see the squibs going off in the shot and when 3PO run’s up the ramp of the Falcon in the Hanger. (you can hear the sound mix was cut to mute) the lasers were meant to fly past him. The sounds were probably still in the mix hence why you will hear no sound apart from music as he climbs the ramp because they altered the scene order and change the sequence about of their escape of being chased and shot at to not being chased and not being shot at.