So, does it bug anyone else that the First Order is so shriekingly, mustache twirlingly evil?
The Empire was kind of Order Personified, existing to bring everything to order and regulation, but you never really see them be EVIL with the exception of Tarkin, Vader, and the Emperor. Captain/Admiral Piett, General Maxmillian Veers, Captain Jerojod, Captain Needa, etc.; all the soldiers we see are just guys who engage in "9 to 5 villainy" in that they are just soldiers doing their jobs and trying to make the galaxy a peaceful place in their own ways. They do their jobs, and at the end of their tours of duty they go home to whatever home life awaits them. Well, unless those Rebel Scum blow them up before they get there.
And then the First Order has General Hux, who couldn't be a more smug leather and satin clad uber Nazi if he tried. He manages to make Grand Moff Tarkin, probably one of the most sadistic and evil characters in the whole film saga, look like a moderate guy with good intentions. Also, I have to question Hux on his choice of attire: leather and satin will make people ask questions.
As opposed to the Empire, the First Order can easily be understood to be a sneering, gestapo-patrolled oppressive extremist state, like if the Nazis became infected by Islamic State ideology and methods. The movie does a good job of communicating that the First Order isn't just an Imperial Remnant -- it's a remnant that has been made more extreme by the collapse of the Empire, as if they decided that the Empire fell because it was too nice to people. And Hux is their bloody poster boy.
But they've gone so extreme as to be almost comical from a narrative perspective. It's like they are AWARE of their evilness and take pride in it, and meet in isolated locations in the dead of night to have clandestine seminars on how they can be MORE EVIL. They're like Power Rangers Villains bragging about how they're more evil than their comrades, or
Robbie Rotten in Lazy Town singing and dancing about how it's "Good to be Bad".