Once again there will be spoilers for Star Wars, The Force Awakens.

A few weekends ago my brother, his girlfriend and me went to see The Force Awakens in the IMAX theater at ”Mall of Scandinavia” in Stockholm. It was an interesting experience since it’s the first feature film that I ever saw in iMax and also the first time I saw a whole movie in 3D.

I am nearsighted and ever since I started wearing glasses I think going to a movie in a theater lost something for me. I can easily start obsessing over almost non-existing smudge on my glasses, to the point that I loose focus on the movie. This problem has been solved since I stared using contact lenses.

Why do I tell you about this? Because the 3D makes this problem a problem again and in a big way. Not only am I wearing glasses again, I’m wearing glasses that has been used and smudged by someone else. Given the look of the glasses the person using them before me must have tried to wipe them clean using a potato chip. So the glasses were gross and that took me out of the movie from time to time.

Even disregarding that, the 3D didn’t do it for me at all. I think it made the movie seem less real, not more as I hope is the intent. It is something about when the depth of a shot, and size of a person in it doesn’t match the apparent distance to which he/she is standing from me that makes my brain cringe. In 2D a great movie can feel like I’m watching actual events unfold. In 3D The Force Awakens felt more like watching a video game from time to time.

Ignoring the 3D, rewatching the movie was great. I had been slightly worried that it would be as great the second time but I do think it was. Yes I laughed/gasped slightly less at somethings but I also feel like I appreciated the story and the whole of it more.

In my earlier review I criticized the movie for the Starkiller Base plot-point.

Which brings me to the Episode IV rehashing. The whole idea of this new super weapon (The ”Starkiller”) and the comparison between it and the Death Star felt silly. I think the plot didn’t need this. The search for the map to Luke Skywalker had been enough for me. That would probably also meant that the filmmaker had found a better way to get the story to the point of the meeting between him and Rey.

It felt really jarring when a super-weapon was suddenly fired after General Hux’s Hitler speech and felt the whole operation against it felt rushed. I felt a whole lot less of this is the second viewing. Now that I knew there would be a super-weapon the pacing of the movie around it felt much better. Because of that I do think that it should have been introduced in the opening crawl. Just a quick sentence about how the First Order is working on getting its super-weapon operational would have been enough for me, I think.

All in all the movie was just as great the second time around and I do want to watch it again and again, maybe even once more in the theater. But I do not recommend anyone to see it in IMAX 3D. Use the money from the expensive tickets to see it twice in a regular 2D theater instead.

Oh, one more thing. Something that I sort of missed the first time was how badly injured Kylo Ren is before his battle with Finn and Rey begins. Off course I didn’t missed the fact that Chewie shot him but on the first viewing I didn’t really think about how clear the movie makes it that Chewie’s bow-caster is a really, really powerful weapon. Everyone that’s being shot by it in this movie is not only dead but also literally blown away from the spot where they stood. Worth noting for those who think that Rey is ”overpowered” and that she should have been crushed by Ren.