Rogue One (With Spoilers)

Firstly, spoiler-free review:

Seriously, that was a really well-done film. I had avoided reading anything about it and I really was convinced that was Peter Cushing. I did not know he was dead- we just couldn't understand how he didn't age LOL. I can't believe they did that with CGI. That and some of the other effects were incredible.

I loved that it was a single story and that it had such closure. Great back story. Ending was thrilling. So, how did they do Leia at the end? CGI also? And can they do that to my face, please? I'd like to go back to 25 or so!

I enjoyed it overall. Pretty grim ending. And does Alan Tudyk have some clause in his Sci fi movie contracts that he has to die near the end?

It earned the PG13 rating for sure. I think the violence was more graphic and brutal by far than any other Star Wars film. For instance in that one early scene where there's a stormtrooper starting to get up from being injured and one of the rebels casually shoots him point blank in the face. It had a feeling like the beach invasion scene in "Saving Private Ryan".

There was an actress playing Leia but I think they dubbed in her voice at the end.

Not for little kids for sure, but I'm sure a lot of little kids will be seeing it anyway.

I loved that it ended like it did. So many movies leave everything hanging so there can be potential sequels. I liked to see something bold and different. That's it- they had a story, they fought and did something meaningful but war's not pretty and they died.

Does violence in a movie like Star Wars really bother people? It's a sci fi movie- equivalent of carton violence to me.

I would agree that in most of the Stars Wars film series the violence has been cartoonish. "Pew! Pew!" and watch faceless stormtroopers fall down! Watch Han blast a bug-eyed alien before it can blast him! Planets and starships explode!

But this movie, I think, completely changes that. For one thing the stormtroopers are humanized (the one guard who is clearly dozing in the prisoner transport, the two troopers chatting idly about the T15s getting discontinued) before getting killed. In the scene I described in my earlier post the one trooper is clearly wounded and struggling to get back up. He's not much of a threat anymore but someone shoots him point blank in the face.

Cassian coldly murders his informant when he realizes he won't be able to get away pretty early in the movie. Another human being who just helped him and who is now gripped with panic. And he's one of our heroes.

The deaths of ALL the main characters are all pretty realistic. Watching Cassian and Jyn getting enveloped in a fireball at the end is not exactly cartoonish to me.

They also deal with the idea of friendly fire ... it's an Alliance X-Wing that kills Galen Erso.

My point is it looks to me like the writer and director took a pretty grim and realistic story about the violence and horrible choices people have to make in warfare and set it in the Stars Wars universe with futuristic weapons and starships. I think it was well done but this movie is not the same kind of kid-friendly cartoon fantasy of the earlier movie.

Interesting thought about the stormtroopers being humanized. I'm not entirely sure if the ANH stormtroopers were originally meant to be clones as they do have different voices. In ANH, i think simply putting them in dehumanizing outfits was enough for 1977, but obviously someone started to think about it as by the time ESB came out, the story of stormtroopers being clones had been released (along with the Vader being disfigured on a volcano planet story).

The chatter about T15s being discontinued sounded to me like the conversation you can just overhear between the two stormtroopers in ANH guarding the control panel to Tractor Beam 12.

...

Actually I just looked it up. It totally is a nod to that conversation as it goes like this:

"You seen that new BT-16?"

"Yeah, some of the other guys were telling me about it. They say it's… it's quite a thing to see…"

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/BT-16_perimeter_droid

In other words in Rogue One, they're talking about the decommissioning of the BT-15, and the new BT-16 in ANH.

ridski said:

In other words in Rogue One, they're talking about the decommissioning of the BT-15, and the new BT-16 in ANH.

Cool shout out and good pickup ridski. That one hadn't made it into the imdb trivia section for the movie.

Where did that Vader disfigured by lava story first come out in the late 70s? I remember hearing other kids talk about it when I was in junior high or thereabouts. Al Gore hadn't invented the Internet yet so it must have started with something like an interview with George Lucas or something. Maybe in like Cinefantastique?

I know Lucas had it in original character and story notes ... I just don't know how that information get disseminated down to the 12-year-old nerd level.

mrincredible said:

ridski said:

In other words in Rogue One, they're talking about the decommissioning of the BT-15, and the new BT-16 in ANH.

Cool shout out and good pickup ridski. That one hadn't made it into the imdb trivia section for the movie.

Where did that Vader disfigured by lava story first come out in the late 70s? I remember hearing other kids talk about it when I was in junior high or thereabouts. Al Gore hadn't invented the Internet yet so it must have started with something like an interview with George Lucas or something. Maybe in like Cinefantastique?

I know Lucas had it in original character and story notes ... I just don't know how that information get disseminated down to the 12-year-old nerd level.

I had a copy of this, because I was (was?) obsessed with Star Wars...

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/The_Empire_Strikes_Back_Official_Poster_Monthly_2

It had a poster on the back and little articles in it with tons of pictures. That's where I found about Vader's volcano battle.

A lot of thinly veiled references to WWII.

I also think there were some references to modern wars. For instance the Alliance working with an extremist to fight a vastly more powerful enemy.

It takes a two-dimensional Good v Evil fight and makes it three dimensional, which is why I loved it so much. It's the closest thing to the Star Wars I played as a kid with the figures and the RPG and stuff I've ever seen.

I liked seeing Tarkin again. During recess every kid wanted to be Han Solo or Luke Skywalker or Darth Vader. I wanted to be Tarkin. He was Darth vader's boss and the dude in charge of the death star. Best badguy ever.