There were two options to fight in Hoth: By ground troops or by heavy bombardment. Vader kills his admiral because he was clumsy and stupid and proceeded to battle the rebellion by landing ground troops.
Only two option? Interesting. Where does it say this in the movie?
Fact is, you're looking at a piece of dialogue and in your head and with it creating another piece of dialogue which isn't actually spoken. Ruling out one plan doesn't mean that it was THE plan.
Is it unreasonable to think they would bombard Hoth from orbit? No. Is it stated in the movie that this is their intention? No. Darth Vader isn't specifically angry at the Admiral because the rebel shield is up, he's angry at the Admiral because the Rebels are "alerted to our presence".
In fact you're making two assumptions:
#1 That the Imperials were planning to bombard Hoth and would recommence this plan once the shield was done
#2 That the intent of the bombardment was annihilation, rather than say destruction of Hoth's defences and means of escape.
Remember what the captain of the Star Destroyer says upon seeing the Rebel Transport? "Good, our first
catch of the day" (emphasis mine).
Now of course this is just an expression, but given that they're looking for Luke Skywalker and he could be on a rebel transport in the same way Leia and the plans were on the Blockade Runner, it's not unreasonable to assume they planned to disable and board it and this piece of dialogue supports that.
And if the intent of the bomardment is to cripple their defenses and destroy their transport before they can board them (so he can capture Luke), then starting the bombardment when the shield is down is both useless and redundant.
Guess what the **** he wanted to do in the first place. Wait, you don't need to guess, you just need to watch ANH again.
He wanted to capture Luke Skywalker. Capturing someone, precludes destroying a transport when he may potentially be onboard. Or destroying an entire base from orbit.
e: but at least I'm glad you admit by omission that the landing on Degobah was ludicrous.
I've never felt it was ludicrous. The only thing that's ever bugged me is that an apparently uncontrolled landing was survivable (and that I find Dagobah pretty boring). Though the fact that he loses control of his craft and lands near Yoda suggests that Yoda is guiding his craft in.
Incidentally in the Force Awakens, there's the incident of Finn coincidentally landing near Rey's settlement and running into her. This doesn't bug me. Nor does it bug me that Po apparently survived and got back somehow. The story about Po is a bit lazy and convenient but I give it a pass because it's secondary to the main story. But the thing with Rey and Finn meeting is essentially destined by the story. One can look at it another way, if Finn and Po landed in the middle of nowhere and died. They wouldn't be in the story in the first place. If they landed near another settlement, then the movie would have told the life of whoever they met there instead of Rey. So Finn crossing paths with the Jakku's resident whose life has been established is believable.
That said, C3PO and R2D2 being picked up in a transport makes more sense than Finn walking to Rey's marketplace.
And having ANH not show Luke until we meet him makes his meeting with C3PO less of an apparent coincidence than Finn meeting Rey does. In fact we're introduced to Rey before BB8 even meets her.
If anyone has a problem with it everyone running into Rey, it's because JJ Abrams put Rey in the movie before there was any reason to introduce her. He puts it in the movie, tells the audience on faith that she's important, care about what she's doing and then everyone finds her. This is a problem for some people, not for me. It's a storytelling choice which works, but is not necessarily the best. Clearly though the film wants to focus on Rey.
This is getting silly. You keep answering the wrong objections. If they don't answer the question, that's fine. But it is a plot hole that no one asks it!
Han Solo is a famously cynical guy. Put yourself in his place. You meet two people aboard a ship that was stolen from you. They recognise you as a famous rebel general and admit to having stolen it from the people who stole it from you. You tell them that you're going to stick them in an escape pod and jettison them on the nearest inhabited planet. And then they say that even though you met them completely by coincidence they tell you that they have a map leading to your long lost best friend. Of course you would ask them NO QUESTIONS about where they got it from, or how they they know it's genuine.
If you find that believable, that's fine. I absolutely don't. I don't think there are many humans who would do that, let alone one with Han's character. In fact, many people might assume that it was a lie made up so that they can steal the ship again.
Yeah that doesn't make much sense though watching the movie and thinking about it later, it didn't bother me. Perhaps because the map is ultimately so inconsequential to the story despite being presented as central to the plot. It of course bothers me when R2D2 turns on and solves the mystery for no problem, but that may be why it doesn't bother other people. The story doesn't talk about the map, so when it's solved for no reason why should the audience care?
It's also laughable than the movie wants to present Luke Skywalker as basically King Arthur, a hero who disappeared and will return at our time of greatest need. And yet the movie has no sense of mystery in it. It's too busy with gags and explosions to care about mystery
EDIT - Also the lack of questions is representative of the movie as a whole. The characters don't ask questions because the audience already knows the answer. And they know the answer because they've been introduced to everyone and everything from the start.
One of the problem's I've mentioned is that Rey trusts Finn too easily.
Imagine if the first 30 minutes of this movie focused solely on Rey. Imagine if Rey was having a fight then this dude shows up and pulls her away. We as the audience would wonder "what the hell is she following this guy for? Don't trust him" instead we think "oh finns a good guy, and rey's a good guy, so it makes sense they're instantly best buds" because the audiences knows them even if they don't know each other.
If this story were told like ANH was told, more people would have problems with it because the problems with character motivation would stand out for more people. Instead the movie treats the audience like a character or mediator who in their head reconciles all the problems of the movie with their own narrator-like knowledge of what's going on. This makes the movie "work" for most people in so far as it receives a passing grade.
