Saga RO or TFA?

These two films really are difficult to compare because they aren't trying to do the same thing. R1 was a pure standalone story so it was able to tell a more concise story than TFA was. While at the same time TFA was more about introducing these new characters into the Star Wars universe.

I'll just say that I enjoyed the story of R1 more but I far and away prefer the characters in TFA. R1 wasn't trying to give us the depth of characterization that TFA was while at the same time TFA wasn't trying to give us a complete story like Rogue One did.

 

TFA. Loved seeing Harrison Ford back, strutting his stuff. I also prefer the new characters of Kylo, BB-8, Rey and Finn. The soundtrack is better too. I like RO, but TFA just has more 'magic' to me.

 

T H I S

In fact Rogue One complemented the Original Trilogy. Things, that I wasn't particularly asking, were explained or elaborated on.

1. Return of the Jedi, various sources say the Alliance Fleet won't come out of hiding for anything, short of a shot at the Emperor. Now we know why, a cruiser, blockade runners, the Ghost, starfighters, all went to Scarif - when the Rebel Alliance decides to send backup, they go to town.

2. Admiral Ackbar in charge of the fleet. Now we know why there was a vacancy.

3. Where were all the Rebel aliens before ROTJ? There were a few here. Though shame that that U-Wing gunner got cut.

4. The female pilots from the Endor battle!!!

5. We know why there was a Red Five number available for Luke.

6. Y-Wings actually doing something useful.

7. Great to see a Juggernaut again!

Thank **** nobody tried to jump through the shield at ultralight.

I love the two leads in The Force Awakens, and hope that both are Force Sensetive, but the story that they were in, shat all over the rest of the Saga, and the three OT leads, as well as denying forever, a chance for fans to again see Luke, Leia and Han, on screen together.

 

While I like both films, I would have to give the edge to TFA.

I agree with several here that TFA starts strong and has a weaker ending while RO starts a bit weaker but ends better.

The acting is in the whole good but in RO it got a little much telling rather than showing.
Jyn's whole relationship with Saw is just told to us and they have one scene and then he dies.
Krennic and Galen's relationship is also just telling and not much showing.
And I never got why Jyn's mother just leaves her daughter to run back and get herself killed. I guess to make Jyn's life more tragic.

As for main character, I would go with Rey over Jyn, Felicity Jones does an ok job but doesn't make her character very interesting nor did I much care about her.

Now it is possible that since I knew the basic story and pretty much figured that most if not all of the main characters would die, that this made me less interested in them. I did like many of the side characters but Jyn wasn't that good.

One thing I will give RO over TFA is no lame and uninteresting Phasma and Tarkin, even CGI, outdoes Hux.

Lastly, I don't get the idea that TFA panders to nostalgia and reuses stuff but RO doesn't.
RO has both the rebellion and the Empire from the OT. You have X-Wings, ISD, the DS, Walkers, TIE's.
You also have several know SW characters, Vader, Tarkin, Leia, Bail, Mon Mothma, R2, C3PO plus a number of little nods and winks.
I mean the basic story of RO is totally known, they steal the DS plans and get them to Leia.
I don't mind it in either film but I find it a bit odd to praise RO and yet slam TFA in this regard.

In closing, say that you have a spinn-off film set 40 years before TPM, the events it features has never been mentioned in any SW film and the only know SW character in the film is a younger Valorum.
Would that do as well as RO?

Bye for now.
The Guarding Dark

 

TFA. You could Lach on to those characters more easily and care for them. RO was full of clichés with their characters and they were not fleshed out that much.

 

I loved both...

I was going to break them down via which story, planets, characters, weapons, ships etc I liked more, but then I thought about which I have/would watch more = Rogue One. I saw both 3 times in the cinema (self imposed max for any LOTR/SW/Indianna Jones films) but have only watched TFA twice since owning the Blu Ray. I am itching to watch RO again several times! I think also I way prefer the timeline of the OT over any other in the galaxy far far away

 

For me, it is definitely Rogue One. It was was a well thought out film with fitted really well into the lore of the universe and was simply beaming with that Star Wars feel. TFA failed in this, since a lot of it felt like OT rehash more than Lucas' rhyme-instead-of-copy which resulted in the first of the Sequels lacking in its own specific atmosphere that OT and PT delivered so well. TFA was all mystery (unlike ANH or TPM), with very little connections to the lore. Rogue One on the other hand was rich with lore - a real treat for the fans, and thus accomplishing what I'd expect from new SW films.

TFA is also in contradiction with characterisations we've seen from the OT, neglecting the character growth people like Luke and Han have gone through during the previous films (i.e. now everybody flees responsibility), but Rogue One did pretty well on reprising and building on established characters: both PT's Bail and Mon Mothma, and OT's Tarkin.

 

Rogue One - most definitely.

However, I love TFA and both of them rank higher than ROTJ in my top 5 (ESB, ANH, RO, TFA and ROTJ - in that order)

 

I liked R1 better, mostly because I thought more effort was put into the worldbuilding. Neither movie succeeded in feeling like an essential new entry to the saga for me, though.

 

Easy. For me it was the more original, less "IN YO FACE" and mystery box free R1.

 

TFA. Even without acknowledging that TFA is part of a larger saga and thus must repeat certain themes, etc, it was just generally a more enjoyable movie experience with a better spirit for it's conventional story telling. R1 was far too ambitious and serious to be as conventionally told as it was.

 

I like them both for different reasons, I personally don't prefer one over the other.

 

Rogue One...

 

Rogue One is a film that exists for the right reasons. It tells a story in an existing universe, with characters that act both unexpectedly, but also consistently. They have depth, present in the way they convey themselves and the choices they make. You never doubt their motivations. The story adds to the overall saga without stepping on any toes or outright flying in the face of established lore. It doesn't just 'feel' like a Star Wars film, it slots seamlessly into place.

Watching TFA for the first time left me in mild shock. Hollow is the perfect word. It was the baked-in cynicism that hurt the most - this wasn't a story that needed to be told, it was a sequence of situations that felt calculated to make the most money. There are the impressions of decent characters in Rey and Kylo, but they need to be built on. And there's plenty in this film that I'd be happy for future films to ignore entirely.

So yeah. Rogue One by so many parsecs that it's not even a race.

 

Darth Plagueis

 

I like TFA better only because I like the lighter tone. I love both movies though.

 

Rogue One cause it reminded me while I loved Star Wars and connected the bridge between The Prequels and The Originals like a perfect bridge. I love The Force Awakens too but I feel it could have been so much more then it was. I could nit pick all day but my points would not change.

 

RO. It wasn't afraid to be Star Wars.

 

I prefer TFA, basically for the tonal range. Related to that, my hype for RO has diminished much faster. I think both are strong, however, and a common quality I love is the grounding they add to the series.

 

Yea Rogue One was a better film for sure, but TFA is still a good movie. The end of RO saves it.

 

There are many ways to tackle this but on every level I place Rogue One at least as good and mostly better than The Force Awakens.

In no particular order:

Story and situations, characters, visual storytelling, design, tone and texture, originality, editing, music, sound effects, script, acting etc.

The basics are that R1 is actually set in that time and so there are things that it HAS to do by that and the story they are telling.

You need to have the Death Star in the movie. It's actually important to the story and in ANH.

TFA does not need to have a Starkiller Base. If anything it hurts the movie because it's such a total nothing and that is just one example.

 

I have come to terms that there's a great percentage of the fandom that loves TFA. But I've not met anyone personally that loves TFA, quite the contrary, and so it's hard to relate to people that love TFA.

In contrast, everyone I know that went to see RO liked it or loved it. Myself included.

To me it's not even close.

And l think because they decided to make RO very closely tied to ANH, it was a huge risk that the movie may not pan out. So much so that the extensive re-shoots and re-tooling of the story was likely done to address some concerns regarding this. But because it had a prequel and a sequel (ROTS, and ANH), they could tie all loose ends nicely. I won't say more so as to not spoil anyone.

TFA is a great success and many love it, so kudos to Disney and JJ A. But to me it's the weakest of all the episodes.

 

While The Force Awakens was a solid entry into the saga, they played it way too safe. We didn't need to see another planet destroying super weapon, have Han and Leia get a divorce, or omit Lando and the new Jedi Order. What made Star Wars so good was that it borrowed ideas from older movies and made something new out of it, TFA's inspiration was just ANH. I can tolerate a Star Wars film doing this once, but if The Last Jedi opens up on an ice planet with giant walkers, this series might be in trouble.

Rogue One was just phenomenal. They actually took risks with the inclusion of certain characters from the Original Trilogy. Would've been nice to have the opening crawl, seeing it as a traditional element for Star Wars movies (even older video games and the new Marvel comics have it), but all the high points are so high that the low points just don't matter here. The dark tone was a nice touch as well, it captures the horrors of war and how the characters react to these situations helps the audience connect with them. I hope we see more spin offs after the Sequel Trilogy, a plot centered on the origin of the force would be great.