This year marks the 10th anniversary of the release of Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens. It was a monumental movie not just for the franchise but pop culture as it broke the record for being the highest-grossing film in North American history.
It also reached new heights in filmmaking. When it was time for Academy Awards nominations, the film received five. It was the most for a Star Wars film since 1977 when A New Hope received 11. The nominations marked a turn for the franchise as it proved that Star Wars once again could be viewed as a cinematic and critical achievement as much as a box office smash.
The categories the film was nominated for were film editing, original score, sound mixing and editing, and special effects. The nomination for film editing was the first time a film in the franchise was honored in the category since A New Hope. The two editors, Maryann Brandon and Mary Jo Markey, had partnered with The Force Awakens director, JJ Abrams, on other films such as Mission Impossible III, Star Trek, and Star Trek into Darkness.
The nomination for sound mixing would mark three years in a row that a film in the franchise would be honored in the category. Rogue One: A Star Wars Story in 2016 and The Last Jedi in 2017 would also be nominated.
Said one of the nominated sound engineers, Stuart Wilson on working on the film, "To this day, the smile on my face when I first ran The Force Awakens with J.J., just because I felt he’d gone back to…tapped into the real magic of what Star Wars was, I’ll never forget that moment. I had a smile on my face through the whole time we worked on that movie." Wilson won an Oscar in 2017 for his sound work on the World War I film 1917. Ironically, he beat himself in the same category for The Last Jedi.
John Williams was also nominated for the film for his original score. It was the first time that Williams was nominated for his work in the franchise since The Return of the Jedi in 1983. He would go on to be nominated for each of three sequel trilogy films.
The Mandalorian and Grogu returns the franchise to the big screen in 2026. We can only hope that it reaches the same heights at the Oscars like The Force Awakens.