There's also the fact that entire antagonist team seems desperate to be bigger and badder than what came before (with the possible exception of Snoke who is som

There's also the fact that entire antagonist team seems desperate to be bigger and badder than what came before (with the possible exception of Snoke who is somewhat mysterious). I took the new super-weapon to be a symptom of this. A healthy number of tropes were both subverted and upheld by the film, a pattern I hope continues.