Rogue One (with SPOILERS)

My general rant really doesn't apply to SW or this site -- sorry guys. You just caught me at the end of finals and dealing with a multitude of excuses. I expect more out of 22 year old graduate students. I know it makes me sound like an old man, but things really are different than when I graduated 12 years ago.

I think it should be fairly noncontroversial to note that there is a lot less originality and risk taking in film making. Is it all due to the cash cow of working with established properties?

Space Ghost wrote: I think it should be fairly noncontroversial to note that there is a lot less originality and risk taking in film making. Is it all due to the cash cow of working with established properties?

For established properties, I think yeah....I don't necessarily think that's a bad thing....Because it seems once a director/producer get's enough pull to do "their unique take" on a franchise it almost always get's dodgy, if not out right silly. Snyder's Grimverse Batman vs Emo-Superman. Batman and Robin, Batman Forever, and the unexplainable Spiderman 3........was there no one in LA LA Land that could have pulled the plug on the beatnik emo Peter Parker sequence?

I think the obsession of commercial film with toy lines, comic books, and YA novels is not good for cinema, nor for literature. (Curmudgeonly, I agree in general that kid/YA stuff should be left to kids and that adults ought to aspire to more sophisticated things.) But that's probably another thread for another time.

Mad Dog wrote:

Michael Barnes wrote: None of this discussion has anything to do with the fact that Chirrut shot down a TIE fighter WITH A BOW. Please correct the course here, folks.

He was one with the force and the force was with him.

Should force be captalized like Force?

It was in our subtitle. I'm just thankful it's not translated. I'd have flipped.

Liked it the first time I saw it. Loved it the second time. My 2nd favorite Star Wars movie now.

My son and I just came from the theater. I think we might have to spend some money on psychiatrists, because is he's 6.5. But he was counting days for the movie, his mom bought the tickets, and he loved it. Didn't seem to be bothered at all by the death of all characters, but said he was very disappointed with the fact that they didn't blow up the death star in that movie. When I said they'd blow it up in New Hope, he argued that it could have been another death star - which, you know, given the fact that the Empire keeps churning Death Stars at a rate of 1,5 movies per death star, doesn't seem unreasonable.

Anyway, I enjoyed it way more than TFA, I think that despite all the fan-service it is ballsier and just the fact that the action scenes are not directed by JJ Abrams makes them less predictable/derivative. That space battle was amazing. I also liked the performances and the actors - it is a pity they don't have much to do with their stuff. Which is a damn shame, because Diego Luna could have been great, and ditto for Forrest Whitaker. Even that bad guy Kernik (if that's his name) had an amazing first scene, and then kind of immediately withered away.
And, absolutely agreed with the rest of the comments that this no Space Dirty Dozen. There's very little character development for us to truly care about them. The only one we both felt sad about was the robot. I wonder how this movie will hold up for the second viewing.

The best part of the first half of the movie was that they borrowed liberally from Heart of Darkness / Apocalypse Now for the plot. Saw = Brando / Kurtz and Captain Diego Luna / Cassian Andor = Martin Sheen / Captain Benjamin L. Willard. Background and comic relief from the various soldiers and droid. Tarkin from Empire = Robert Duvall / Lieutenant Colonel Kilgore. It's interesting to know that Harrison Ford played in Apocalypse Now and that George Lucas and Steven Spielberg were involved with Apocalypse Now.

Ok I saw it last night. Please forgive me if I get a bit verbose here but I really want to talk about this movie.

I haven't read through this thread so i might repeat stuff that's been said, i've only skimmed comments for now.

I've posted a spoiler-free review here:
fortressat.com/articles-five-second-revi...-five-second-reviews

I'm going to be a bit all over the place with my comments. i sort of want to talk about it as a movie a bit, but mostly I just want to talk about Star Wars.

Firstly, i really want to thank Grudunza for his initial comments in the movie thread where he was SO CAREFUL not to spoil the CGI-characters. I think if he had said that, i would have DREADED seeing that. Instead, when Tarkin first starts talking I was like, "oh NO, this is what Grudunza was alluding to!" I knew RIGHT away he meant that. I hope we can all agree that the worst part of Tron Legacy was Jeff Bridges' CGI characters. In my review I have alluded to this in that the technology is overstepping the story telling. I could go off on Tarkin a bit here but I think the problem is WAY more obvious with Leia. Firstly, the screenwriters really should be asking themselves, "is it worth doing this?". And the answer should have either been "no" or "it depends how we do it". IF on the bridge of Tantive IV, we see the back of Leia, and we ALL KNOW IT'S LEIA cuz Jimmy Smits already alluded to her earlier. And of course we know its her cuz we're familiar with the Tantive IV. So, if instead of showing her face, she just turns her head slightly, we see her hairbun and she says, "Hope. We're bringing hope" or whatever her line was, that would have been PERFECT. But instead, we have to see this ridiculously bad CGI?! BUT it wasn't enough to ruin that movie cuz the Vader stuff just happened (will talk about in a sec). With Tarkin, I honestly felt it didn't look that different than what his character would look like in Clone Wars cartoon or Rebels cartoon and that's a HUGE problem. Look, the CGI is amazing on Tarkin, i readily admit that, but I am VERY AWARE I am watching a CGI character, that's a huge problem.

Tarkin and Leia will the biggest detractors of the movie for me. Nothing else bothered me as much as this did. I really felt it was unncessary, but I still have to admit it was cool to see Tarkin, especially with his interactions with the movie's main anatagonist. That was actually scary, cuz we know Tarkin and Vader are chummy so i really feared for the direktor's life when he went off to visit Vader. I was thinking Tarkin told Vader, "this guy is in my way, take care of him".

While i'm on that, Vader's first appearance was very disappointing to me. Cuz I was sure THAT WAS IT. I am sitting there like, "oh no, that's it?!" and I found James Earl Jones' performance a LITTLE shaky.

But then when Vader shows up later on the star destroyer, i was like "ok cool, glad I got to see him one more time". I can't EXPLAIN my excitement and sense of horror when the hatch gets blown and you just hear him breathing. i was honestly SO SCARED. And then the saber lights up and I'm like, "OMG" and then it shows the doomed rebel troopers faces that are all, "OMG!" and holy crap does that monster of a sith ever tear through them as we know he can. That whole sequence excited and scared me so much that it took me hours to calm down after. I was rooting so hard for those brave troopers "OPEN THE HATCH!! GET THOSE PLANS OUT OF THERE!" I was transfixed in that scene. It was amazing and everything I'd ever want to dream of seeing as a lifelong fan of Star Wars.

...today my brain is giving me a few fits over that scene though. If Vader decided to lead the charge there and deal with that, why then only TEN MINUTES later would he send all those stormtroopers to storm Tantive IV? If Vader failed the first time, why would he trust stormtroopers to do any better? The plans are clearly important to him. So that bothers me a little, but not much. But a little.

I can't explain how happy I was to see jimmy smits in this (I think jpat spoke of this). It basically SAVES episode III from being stupid and irrelevant. What an amazingly gutsy thing to do, to bridge the gap between III and IV like that. When he says, "there's no one I'd trust more than her", i was so happy.

In fact all the throwback stuff was great. How about seeing Gold Leader and Red leader again? How amazing was that? The shot of 3P0 and R2 was cute, and i'm so glad it was ONLY that. When the fat x-wing pilot screams and crashes, i had to check if it was the same callsign as Jek Porkins (red 6), turns out it was Red 5 (Luke's callsign!). But that would have been SO FUNNY if they made Red 6 once again meet its end at the helm with a fat pilot.

The droid character was amazing, I laughed all the time and loved that thing. I found his death VERY tragic and the most tragic of all the deaths. When we think that this is probably the character thrown in 'for the kids', it really makes it rough for me cuz his death was also the most graphic.

anyway, so much to talk about but I really loved this movie. I can see how Force Awakens is the better movie and I can understand why critics have trouble with Rogue One (cuz they're not fans!), but this was MY Star Wars movie and it's what I've always wanted. It made me SO happy.

Vlad wrote: Anyway, I enjoyed it way more than TFA, I think that despite all the fan-service it is ballsier and just the fact that the action scenes are not directed by JJ Abrams makes them less predictable/derivative. That space battle was amazing. I also liked the performances and the actors - it is a pity they don't have much to do with their stuff. Which is a damn shame, because Diego Luna could have been great, and ditto for Forrest Whitaker. Even that bad guy Kernik (if that's his name) had an amazing first scene, and then kind of immediately withered away.

I agree, I liked it way better than TFA. Abrams seems incapable of telling a story that doesn't rely solely on lazy nostalgia to hit its emotional beats.

As a sci-fi blockbuster action movie, it totally delivers. As a "Star Wars movie" (whatever that might mean for you), I think it succeeds.

Thematically, I felt like they touched on a couple of meaty issues ... and then immediately shied away from them. In particular, the idea that the Rebel Alliance has done some ugly shit. Maybe they had good reasons for it, maybe it was all for the good of their glorious cause ... but those things still have consequences, both politically and personally. Cassian brings this up briefly, then it's never really brought up again. Maybe that would have been too heavy for a Star Wars flick.

Here's the thing, i liked this movie MUCH better than TFA but do we mostly agree here that TFA is actually a better movie? Doesn't mean we like it more.

I started reading reviews of Rogue One and the critics are really getting on my nerves. They keep saying what Joebot just said of how Rogue One is relying on lazy nostalgia to "nerd fandom" to hit its marks. But that's the thing, i find the nostalgia marks are all integral to the story (placing C3PO and R2, showing Leia and Tarkin, Jimmy Smits, Red Leader, Gold Leader, the ACTUAL shot of the Death Star plans, the exact same process by Death Star Gunners on how to commence primary ignition!!! All of this stuff is important to get right, story-wise.

In fact when the movie decided to stray from the nostalgia stuff by having Vader slice through rebel troopers like butter, it actually HURTS the story a bit.

When the spanish guy shoots the guy with no arm or hand in cold blood, i agree that Joebot that there is some important story going on here regarding how the rebel alliance got to where it is. With Forest Whitaker being a fringe element cuz he's too rough (also his decision to not be saved really annoyed me since it seemed to only make the plot move forward in an easier way). But yeah, i like seeing these problems with the Rebel Alliance, very cool stuff.

i'm really looking forward to the deleted scenes.

That tentacle thing that extracts truth really scared me. i felt bad for the pilot.

I also like how cold-blooded that bounty hunter was in ALL of his scenes. Super consistent cool character.

The production values were simply over the top (aside from the two blemishes already mentioned). The classic look and feel of Star Wars is on point. Overall I thought it was a noble effort and finally feel like I got the level of quality I expected from the Phantom Menace. If anything makes the Lucas prequels look even more like shit it's this. I need a second viewing to fully judge it but for now it's a solid 4/5 stars. Shit, I didn't even see the Ghost in there.

In no universe is TFA a better movie that R1.

Oh, what a missed opportunity during the beach scenes for a character to say "I don't like sand".

The Ghost- Look all the way to the left the first time they show the Rebel HQ, its parked out there. You can also see it in the Battle of Scarif.

Chopper is also Yavin IV. And "General Syndulla" is paged over the intercom, which would be of course Hera.

The screenwriting was just so solid for Rogue One, everytime I start thinking about it I'm impressed about something new.

For instance, here was my revelation from today that hit me:

It's a mission where they need to get through a shield to do a FULL ASSAULT on an Empire-controlled installation. How were they planning on getting out? There's no way they can trick the shield gate guys to open it up for them on the way back. So everything about this mission screams of it being a suicide mission. Every movie where there is a suicide mission, they will mention AD NAUSEUM that it is a suicide mission to make the audience (who they think is dumb) understand that the mission is DANGEROUS.

Never once in Rogue One do they refer to this as a suicide mission yet you get the very strong impression and FEELING when Rebel Command says no, and then the feeling of the volunteers in the shuttle, getting the pep talk from Felicity Jones and stuff, that this is VERY MUCH a suicide mission. But they never call it a suicide mission.

As a guy that watches his fair share of movies, i REALLY like that.