Discussion Rogue One [Non Spoiler] Reactions and Reviews

Seen it. Loved it. Word of advice - there's no point in comparing it to TFA. TFA, like the other Star Wars films, has the luxury of slow pacing and leaving questions unanswered. Rogue One is a self-contained story so it needs to establish characters, plot, tension and reach a resolution within the one film. It isn't reasonable to compare it to TFA because some of the flaws in this film are unique to a film of this type.

Overall:

What I loved:

Spoiler

- "Guest" appearances by Jimmy Smits and Ben Daniels

- Terrific lead character to drive the film

- Excellent action

- Best final assault mission since ROTJ

- Ben Mendelson

- Lightsabers and force kept to a minimum. In its place, hardboiled militaristic action

- Grittiness ahead of darkness. That is, it is a visceral Star Wars movie without the hellish overtones of ROTS or the dour feel of AOTC. It's a serious Star Wars film but without losing that sense of escapism.

- Not too much Darth Vader. This was the aspect of the film I was looking forward to the least. In actual fact, they handled it REALLY well.

- The ending: utterly bittersweet. It was realistic, true to the gritty story but also with a wink of optimism which leads directly into the opening moments of ANH

What I liked but felt could have been done better:

Spoiler

- The entire first third of the movie. Lots of story exposition, introduction of characters and a lot of jumping around of settings. For what is meant to be a fairly straight forward story, there was a lot of information thrown at the audience.It possibly could have worked better with a little bit less. The first third of the film felt a bit jumbled (this leads into my next point)

- Too many characters. Although there are some great characters here, some felt wasted because of the need to give as many characters as possible a decent amount of screen time. This didn't always work (such as Donnie Yen's character).

- The opening credits: i'm glad that they have done away with the opening crawl for the Anthology films, but the opening title felt far too brief. I would have liked a title sequence, kind of like a 007 film.

What I strongly disliked:

Spoiler

- The droid. The screen time on this character should have been used on one of the other characters which could have used more depth.

- CGI Cushing and Fisher. Nope, not one bit.

 

Ok, thx. But its not as different as Rebels right?

 

B99: If you mean Vader ...

Spoiler

then no, it's way better in Rogue One in my opinion.

 

Awesome. Thx, since I have watched Vader in Rebels I have worried about his voice in r1!

 

My review is in my signature below.

 

On my to see Rogue One in two and a half hours!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

May the Force be With You !

 

What a Great SW movie! At this point after 1 viewing, I'm guessing for my self it ranks right around the middle.. Great War/battle scenes! The scenes with Vader are just beastly. Music was pretty good and lastly it feels like no other SW movie!!

 

For those who still hasn't seen it yet, i would say that it is worth the price of a theater ticket for showing. I found it quite good, somewhat murkier than the previous Star Wars films, inserting some of the real-world shades into the Star Wars universe. .

Regarding the violence and the "darkness" of the subject matter, the final battle is fairly intense, but is suitable for a family audience. There is no blood or gore, for example. As for myself, I haven't found it darker than previous Star Wars films.

Spoiler

The fates of the characters may be somewhat sobering but not disturbing in my view.

 

EDIT!

 

well, added spoiler tags just in case it gives away too much.

 

Easily the best air/space battle I have ever seen in a movie. The land battle is probably third best, behind Saving Private Ryan & Bravehaert.

Although the first 1/3 might be a little clunky, definitely worth a rewatch in the theaters,

 

Imo one of, maybe my fav ending to a sw film.

 

It's my favorite Star Wars standalone film.

 

And also your least favorite Star Wars standalone film?

 

No, there is The Clone Wars movie.

 

Oh yeah. I completely mentally blocked that movie.

I agree that Rogue One is the best standalone.

 

So, I haven't seen it yet. Will see it on the Chinese premiere (January 6th), and it's like torture for me waiting that long.

Reading all your comments about it makes me even more excited. It definitely sounds like the Star Wars film we both needed and deserved.

 

I may be in the minority (I'm sure I am,) but I rank it as the worst SW film to date. 9th place out of 9. (Yes, below TCW. And TPM. And AOTC.)

Okay, so here we go:

Spoiler

I... didn't like it. Never thought I'd say that about a Star Wars movie - I mean, I liked TPM for crying out loud. That said, this will be the first SW movie I likely only see once in the theater - and it all boils down to the laziest storytelling I've seen since Suicide Squad. Every character was nothing more than a plot device. Every. Single. Character.

*Let's start out with Jyn. Her dad paves the way for her and Mommy to get to safety, but Lyra... sacrifices herself? For what? Neither of them were in imminent danger (especially not Jyn,) and Krennic was surrounded by his Death Troopers. What was she hoping to accomplish? I'll tell you what. Making Jyn an orphan so that her life of crime... makes sense?

*Cassian. Let's establish that he's ruthless so that when he eventually and predictably doesn't shoot Galen we see him as a hero.

*Saw. He'll do anything, sacrifice anything, to make the Empire pay. He's all about revenge. And standing there when explosions go off. Because... it's his time? More like it was Edwards's time to get rid of him.

*Even Vader was bad. I mean, his first meeting with Krennic was... I guess it was there. His second scene with the rebels, while badass, was dumb. He could have used one Force blast to knock them all out and over each other, walked up, picked up the plans, and boom - no more ANH.

*Then all the other Rogue deaths were so pointless. It all boiled down to being too lazy to explain where they were in ANH, or give them a way off planet. The Force will guide Chirrut safely to the magic switch, but it abandons him immediately afterwards. Bodhi? Well, I'm sure the Imperials figured there weren't any enemies in that friendly shuttle, but we might as well lob one of our limited supply of grenades in there just in case. Baze is alone, so why not take that big gun out onto the beach and make a nice target of yourself? I don't even mind that they killed off Jyn and Cassian (because by the end of the movie I really didn't care about what happened to them,) but they did it in such a stupid way! Why not just have them die in the tower's destruction? Is their hug on the beach THAT important? And why the HELL did Tarkin turn the Death Star onto his own base to prevent the plans from being transmitted, when he could have turned it on the Rebel fleet and take away their place to transmit it TO? (Eliminating tons of rebels in the process, but saving his own troops.)

There were some really cool parts. I loved K2. Chirrut was interesting, if under-utilized. There were just so many bad or head-scratching moments (combined with an uninspired soundtrack that was forgettable at the best of times, downright distracting at worst) that I couldn't suspend disbelief long enough to enjoy the movie. Lyra gives Jyn a crystal. Holy crap it's a Kyber Crystal! Ermagherd, Chirrut wants the crystal, and he used to be a temple guard! Is he going to build a lightsaber during the last scene to try (unsuccessfully) to slow Vader down during his assault on the beach? No - we're just going to ignore those plot points entirely. The whole movie felt like that to me.

Finally - Tarkin was cringe-worthy, and Leia made me audibly say "EW!" Overall, worst SW movie to date. Far worse than TPM or AOTC. I just can't believe this movie is being praised for the same things that people knocked TPM or AOTC for.

 

I also didn't like it. Really wish I could get those 2+ hours back. I was 'meh' on it to begin with, but I hoped it'd be better than the prequels for me. It joins TPM as the second SW movie I can't bear watching. Though TPM might have a slight edge over R1, since it spawned one of my favorite games (and the reason I still have a Windows98 PC) Episode I:Racer.

I agree with Big Bad Yoda Daddy on all points except one.

Spoiler

I didn't mind CGI Tarkin or CGI Leia. Yes, they're not a 100% match to what we see in ANH, but they pass well enough. In many ways, Tarkin gave the best performance of the whole movie. He's almost a blend of realTarkin & TCWTarkin...in a way that does work. I guess I also am used to RebelsLeia, which might be why CGILeia didn't bother me that much.

My biggest questions of all is.....
WHY title it "Rogue One"? Especially when you have all those great Rogue Squadron novels. Using that title didn't add anything to the mythology of SW. WHY? If they were going to use that title, why not make a movie about....gasp....Rogue Squadron. Sometime between ANH & ROTJ, if they really wanted it in that timeline. Or even after ROTJ, like the novels. Could be a completely different story.

 

Spoiler

The Squadrons were named after those who sacrificed on Scariff