Excellent writing. However, I have up reading it because I really don't care much about Star Wars. I had read the previous six. I like Shakespeare and thought the previous six books worked well but like I said, not really a fan of Star Wars. Good for Star Wars fans who also like Shakespeare. ( )

It's really charming and hilarious. I loved how the clothing the characters wore were altered a bit to make it more Shakespearean Space Opera.

FN-2187
--Ay, I shall not fail!
Didst thou see? Ha! My finest shot! Didst see?

POE
I saw, forsooth. Thy hearty, joyous laugh
Is like the tintinnabulation that
So musically wells up from the spheres!
What is thy name, O worthy rescuer? ( )

Always a treat to blend the Bard and Star Wars ( )

(Note: This review includes spoilers for the film.) Ian Doescher does well to create an enjoyable rendition of the latest Star Wars movie (not counting the anomalous Rogue One spin-off), which is remarkable considering Episode VII is the worst film of the whole saga (yes, that includes the prequels). I could rant geekily for hours about Abrams' fan-fiction Disney film, a Star Wars in motley, which rips entire elements from better episodes in the saga but adding even more unoriginal names (Starkiller?), an approach better suited to those Asylum-made 'mockbuster' films (Transmorphers, Atlantic Rim, Operation Dunkirk, etc.) than a series with such a dedicated (and long-suffering) fanbase. The much-maligned prequels, flawed as they are, were at least trying to tell a different story. Suffice to say, for his seventh William Shakespeare's Star Wars book, Doescher has been played a hospital pass.

Doescher is game, however, and he does make improvements to the story. Partly this is just because of the majesty of Shakespearean prose, and even cringey lines from the film ("Do you have a boyfriend?") approach eloquence ("Need'st thou thy family, or paramour/A paramour most fine, with golden locks?" (pg. 55)). Elsewhere, it is through more dedicated patching-up of the film's holes that the story – so derivative on the screen – becomes a bit more accessible. The clumsy and unearned character "growth" of Episode VII becomes more realistic when fleshed out in Doescher's soliloquys and asides, whilst some of the film's more glaring clunkers, such as Rey's Mary Sue tendencies (exacerbated by the "feisty" performance of the actress) and Han's cheap death (if there was any justice in Hollywood, Han should have died at the helm of a stricken Millennium Falcon), are rendered more palatable in Doescher's capable hands. If Doescher's book is better than the film, it is because the writer is solely concerned with writing a good story. He is not concerned with the box-ticking or the marketing and merchandising agenda that drove the Disney film.

I do appreciate that I am writing this review on LibraryThing and not on IMDb, but it is important to recognize that, as with Doescher's previous instalments, much of whether the book is a success is reliant on how coherent and original the corresponding film is. Episode VII was not only bad, it was lazy and unoriginal. And, most frustratingly, it was needlessly so. With the opportunity for a fresh start and with boundless goodwill behind them, the new films could have been something to behold. The sequels had so many possibilities, conceptually speaking, for storytelling.

For example, rather than the First Order just emerging fully-formed at the start of the film, you could have had the Republic struggling to reassert itself after a lifetime of war. It has lost its sense of purpose – fighting the Empire – and the outlying colonies and planets no longer see why they should follow its centralized government. Mirroring contemporary fears about the decline of the West and the weariness in our society, not to mention the increase in populism as a response to globalism, you could have had the First Order move in to fill the hole vacated by the weary Republic. The old soldiers – cameos from Leia and Han Solo – are weary, not able to fight as they were when they were younger, and yet they are also not confident in the ability of the emerging generation to tackle the problems that are arising.

In this scenario, the glorious technologies have become obsolete – the scrapped Millennium Falcon rusting away on Jakku and, in a moving scene, the noble X-Wing could be decommissioned, put out to pasture in a way reminiscent of the Turner painting The Fighting Temeraire. The technique of duelling with lightsabers is being lost, because the young do not have the patience or discipline to learn its ways (Finn's plotline could become this, including training by Luke Skywalker). Kylo Ren could be torn between the old Republic won by his parents and the more vigorous, exciting, but morally-suspect First Order. (Rey you could discard, because she is a crap character.)

To keep an adventure plotline in the mix, Kylo Ren could be sent undercover to spy on the First Order, only to fall for its charms and become its leader (much as a young, disillusioned Adolf Hitler was sent by the army to report on a German worker's party…). Mirroring the original trilogy, a second film could see the Republic plunge into darkness, having lost its leaders (Leia and Han Solo) and without any others emerging. A third film would see the good emerge triumphant.

Neat and fairly original, though I do say so myself, and mirroring contemporary fears and ideas, as good art should do. And, to be honest, it only took me about ten minutes of thinking about it. Reading this book last night and preparing my criticisms of the film, I thought: well, if I'm going to criticize Abrams et. al., could I have done any better? I thought about what I liked to see in the Star Wars films (X-Wings, mainly), got the idea of these old technologies being mothballed, and the idea rapidly expanded from there. If I could have such an idea just by offhandedly thinking about it, why couldn't Abrams? A successful filmmaker, with a huge budget at his disposal and a story-rich universe to work with, and we got cheap action and the shameless recycling – or rather, rebranding – of old ideas (which were themselves stock adventure tropes), all pushed using marketing and hype.

I'm sorry: I said I wouldn't rant, and not only have I done so, I've also ended up pitching my own idea. But the point remains: the source upon which Doescher must rely for his Shakespeare mash-up is not fit for purpose. Doescher, for all his ability as a storyteller, can only polish up the turd so much. With Episode VII as the material he has to work with, he is forced to spend too much time playing script doctor. It says a lot that the highlight of the book is a scene entirely of Doescher's creation: a humorous dialogue between two stormtroopers who lampshade the film's lack of originality (pp122-4). It is a wonderful sequence, chastising the film far more gently than I have done. It is by far the best scene, outshining any that are imported from the film, and shows that the fault in the Star Wars lies not in dear Doescher, but elsewhere. ( )

In William Shakespeare's The Force Doth Awaken: Star Wars Part the Seventh, Ian Doescher continues to tell the story of the Star Wars saga in Shakespearean style. Particularly noteworthy sequences include Rey's lines referencing the concept of a ray of light as well as theories surrounding her family history, Finn's lines including the letters of his Stormtrooper designation, and Poe evoking specific lines of Shakespeare. Returning characters Han and Leia speak in quatrains, R2 again has English asides to the audience, and Chewbacca's lines include a translation. These translations are particularly nice in his interaction with the Resistance doctor and his lengthy soliloquy following Han's death. One of Doescher's most stirring lines occurs when Han Solo paraphrases the St. Crispin's Day Speech from Henry V prior to the assault on Starkiller Base (pgs. 118-119). The trooper played by Daniel Criag gets some 007 references in his interaction with Rey: "I'll tighten thy bonds, make thee a specter" (pg. 115). Prior to this line, the first word of every sentence he speaks spells out D-A-N-I-E-L-C-R-A-I-G. Those willing to look will find plenty of other clever bits from Doescher in the latest volume of what has become one of the best on-going Star Wars tie-in series yet! ( )