JJ Abrams wasn’t entirely right when he suggested that the original Star Wars movie was something of a “boys’ thing … that dads could take their sons to”. Some of us still remember the scenes in the 1977 original movie in which Carrie Fisher’s unflinching Princess Leia stands up to Grand Moff Tarkin and Darth Vader, and later shows Han Solo and Luke Skywalker how to use a blaster. And yet, far more people (including Fisher herself) remember how the character was reduced to a “love interest” role, and forced to wear that golden slave-girl bikini, by the time 1983’s Return of the Jedi rolled around. Beyond Leia, female characters only speak for 63 seconds of the 386-minute running time of the original trilogy, which, let’s face it, is pretty poor.

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To detail just how much matters have changed in Abrams’ The Force Awakens requires the mention of minor spoilers, choice details – mostly from the early part of the movie – that won’t ruin it, but might nevertheless irritate those hoping to go into the movie entirely fresh. So full warning is duly given. I promise not to even get close to giving away any of the major twists.

Still with us? OK, here we go.

It becomes obvious that Abrams is on a different path to his predecessors in the first 10 minutes of the movie, when John Boyega’s Finn spots a damsel in apparent distress – Daisy Ridley’s Rey – and rushes over to intervene. It’s to Abrams’ credit that not only does the young woman fight off her aggressors without help, but that the director uses the subversive shift in tone from previous outings to comic effect. Even this early, it’s abundantly obvious that our new hero is more than capable of matching the men for combat skills.

It soon becomes clear that the Force is a wonderful equal-opportunities tool. “Men’s rights” enthusiasts have dismissed female action heroes on the basis that women are physically weaker than men, but that argument rather goes out of the window in a saga where we’ve seen the tiny Yoda lift an X-wing purely through the power of his mind.

No damsel in distress … Daisy Ridley as Rey in Star Wars: The Force Awakens. Photograph: Allstar/Disney/Lucasfilm

Still in the first act, and the wise but diminutive alien figure in The Force Awakens is a female: Lupita Nyong’o’s orange-skinned, bug-eyed Maz Kanata. While she doesn’t show obvious Force capabilities, this extraterrestrial does provide the movie’s first Bechdel-test moment: when two female characters talk to each other about something other than a man. Indeed, the test is passed umpteen times over the course of the movie, though it must be said that if there were an R2-D2 test (which could only be passed when a human spoke to a droid), it would probably rear its head just as often.

A little further into the movie, and we meet important figures on opposite sides of the fight who are both female. One is a familiar face, Fisher bringing warmth and heart to the role of Leia, now a powerful military general in the Resistance. The other is an imposing mega-stormtrooper, Gwendoline Christie’s Captain Phasma, whose chrome costume may well be the coolest new outfit seen since Darth Vader boarded Leia’s command shuttle in Star Wars.

Phasma’s casting is a moment of real joy. This is a role that might well have gone without notice had Abrams chosen to cast a man, but now looks likely to gain cult status. Still, Episode VIII director Rian Johnson might want to think about considerably upping the character’s screen time with the next outing, or Christie’s presence risks being seen as a token gesture.

In terms of minor characters, we now also get female X-wing pilots, spies and bounty hunters, though never in over-the-top proportions. In the original trilogy, all of the above were male.

None of the improvements in diversity feels contrived, incidentally. It’s all part of a naturalistic storytelling process that, in the era of Katniss Everdeen and Imperator Furiosa, finally helps bring much-needed balance to the Force.