Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (Gareth Edwards, December 16, 2016) Movie • Page 41

Jesus these movies have to let go of the original trilogy. Not only are the easter eggs noticeable to the point where they take you out of the movie (really? we needed to see fucked-up-nose guy and redbutt lips again?), but they literally try to capture exactly what people liked in the original films with that creepy CGI Peter Cushing performance and young Carrie Fisher. It left a really bad taste in my mouth every time Tarkin was onscreen, it felt like they were stealing a performance from the grave and it was just so off-putting.

As far as Rogue One as an actual film, it's literally halfway decent. The first hour is just not entertaining to watch. Surface level character introductions, macguffin chasing, one comic relief character in a midst of bleak, dark, gray cinematography. It was just lifeless. Now, part of that was intentional because things liven up a lot in the second half and when the team comes together everything gets bright and peppy so I get it on that level, but I have no desire to sit through that first hour again.

But then there's the weird/fucked up morals of the film. Mads Mikkelsen agrees to build a weapon that kills billions of people because... they would have built it without him and he can booby-trap it? Even though he's still responsible fort the death of literally billions? That's a really, really tough bargain to buy into. Not to mention how his intentional sabotoge of the Death Star fly in the face of the thematics of A New Hope. The Empire thought their weapon was so unstoppable, they never even bothered to care about that one tiny little weakness. It's the hubris of imperialism, and the ingenuity of scrappy upstart rebels to come up with a way to topple them. Now it was an inside job. I'm going to pretend this movie doesn't exist for Star Wars fanboy reasons.

Then there's that scene where Mads sticks up for his fellow engineers. They all helped build the Death Star, right? So they're all responsible for a machine that can and does kill billions? Mads knows this and wants to stick up for them anyway? It's a disconnect that makes that scene feel weird tonally.

Then there's Darth Vader. I actually enjoyed almost everything involving him, except he didn't really need to be in this at all. You'd lose some cool action with a lightsaber and a fucking god-awful parody James Bond villain level pun, but he doesn't really play into the thematics, just the structural stuff of all this playing into A New Hope.

On that level... I have mixed feelings. I want so badly for a Star Wars movie, especially a spin-off that isn't part of the generational saga, to be its own thing. This movie is about redemption, and sacrifice for something so much larger than yourself, though. So having it all end with Leia having the plans and running away from Vader, while so historically charged that it overwhelms the rest of the film in the moment, makes sense. But it is so triumphant and so, so, so deeply connected to the following iconic/legendary story that it feels like it undercuts everything that came before.

So if this really is a film about redemption, we should see more of it. Mads guilt over building a weapon that, again, literally can kill billions, should show more. We should have gotten more of Felicity Jones being a selfish badass criminal, instead of passively sitting in jail and then when being presented with a moral crisis (a little girl crying amidst a shootout), immediately doing the noble thing. She's a good person ready to sacrifice herself from the jump, we have no idea what her previous convictions were aside from Forrest Whitaker abandoning her when she was 16, and none of it is dramatized, it's just expositional dialogue. There's some fascinating territory (relative to the black and white morality of Star Wars stories) in "just following orders" and following bad orders that the film touches on, and Diego Luna's character has a pretty solid arc in that regard. But his (and the Imperial pilot's, I guess) are the only ones with dramatized psychologies and actions that play into those ideas (and Mads, but again, I have issues with his willingly accelerating the construction of a weapon that he knows will be used to blow up planets).

I loved Gareth Edwards' Godzilla. I love love LOVE Ben Mendelsohn. I was ready to love this movie. But it's kind of bad. Better than the Force Awakens, I think, absolutely more interesting, but not as purely entertaining, which is a problem, and not written up to its ambition.

 

Some goods points made above about the morality of a certain character's decisions and one ill-advised pun. I thought this was solid, though I didn't enjoy it as much as TFA last year.

 

Fucking loved this movie. Def has some issues but overall, such a great time.

 

Also holy shit some of you are overthinking this. I know I'm going to get shit for that comment but is there no moral issues with blowing up the death star (twice) either ?

 

I thought this was a great addition to the Star Wars universe. It starts out rough for the first 30 min or so and the Tarkin CGI was not great, but overall the highs made up for it in the end. I think Catalyst really helps to know more about Krennic and Galen and explains the opening very well and while it's not required, it enhances this movie more than any of the new canon books ever have.

 

The first hour was definitely boring, but once things finally get going it's one hell of a ride. Overall I enjoyed it, just not the same overwhelming positive feelings I had after leaving TFA.

 

I liked it.

 

I liked the Tarkin cgi.

 

Thinking about it now, it seems like very little from the original teaser made it into the final film, which is kind of disappointing. The tone of that initial trailer was so incredible.

 

Random thoughts, totally out of order. Let rambling commence.

I thought Leia looked/felt SUPER weird. Luckily it was a very quick shot.

I felt Tarkin was presented visually a bit better but still felt off.

Vader wrecking shit up was wonderful even if it was such a fanboy moment.

I was initially torn on Casian's moral issues. Him killing allies was odd to me. I am trying to think of any other canon examples where a good guy took out an ally to further themselves and I am coming up empty. It adds a new shade to the Alliance and I'm not sure that I like it or not. It did help his arc as stated above, so I did enjoy the character within the film. But adding that kind of thing to the bigger context is harder for me.

I think most of us figured everyone would bite it by the end, but it was still weird to see actually go down.

It seems like most of the fleet didn't escape but some must have. Red and Gold group need to escape. I need to see this again to see who all gets out alive. Especially since the Ghost was in the battle.

Fun hearing Hera get name dropped.

And uh... Long live be milk.

 

I didn't think the first hour was boring fwiw

 

I thought it moved a bit slow at first (I think for the sake of setting up these characters), but I am enamored with ending/third act!

So satisfied and filled with joy. The good outweighs the nitpicky bad.
Go see this movie! I loved it and I love Star Wars.

 

why did this movie feel the need to repeat threepio's odds line from Empire like, seven to eighteen times

 

It was apparently vital to understand that K2 was a droid?

 

maybe this is nitpicky, but why would Leia say that "Hope" is in the Death Star disk. In "A New Hope," she seemed pretty distressed and not at all optimistic like at the end of this. Maybe I'm just misremembering, but that seemed super cornball.

 

I mean, she got captured, so she should be in distress. But she knows what it can mean for the alliance, so calling it hope makes sense.

 

Fair enough

 

Great addition to the Star Wars universe. Understand some of the gripes, but I couldn't care less about many of them. May post more thoughts later. Hope everyone enjoys!

 

Loved this, can't wait to see it again. Lived up to my expectations.

There's something deeply appropriate about the only consistent source of humor being a malfunctioning robot; in the midst of this war, only a machine is capable of humor.

 

Sensational. I loved it. I like that this movie's characters ventured into moral gray areas, unlike the typical black/white morality of previous films. It takes a while to get going, but the payoff is more than worth it. As a fan, the fan service didn't bother me one bit. Can't wait to see it again.

Sorta spoiler? I'm so disappointed that the scene from the trailer of Jyn walking along the protruding walkway and the Imperial ship popping up in front of her didn't make it into the movie. Damn I loved that shot. Seems like a lot was shot that got left on the cutting room floor.

 

Double post. We got these cool little posters at my showing.

 

yeah the first half was kinda a slog. agree with whoever said they respected the movie more than TFA but enjoyed that a lot more. the ending/last 45 minutes definitely felt earned and i liked the choices made story-wise, but everything envolving saw, tarkin (wtf even was that), and galen (unfortunately bc mads rules) kinda bummed me out.

bonus points for bail tho

 

It was a little slow in the beginning, for sure. It didn't feel like Star Wars for the first several scenes - it just felt like some space movie, which was my biggest fear. Then when it actually started to feel like Star Wars, it reminded me of the prequels more than anything. Once Yen's character was introduced, I felt like it picked up significantly.

Almost had a panic attack in the final 15 minutes, even though we already knew the outcome.

 

I liked this one a lot. It had the right amount of comic relief to balance out the very understandable bleakness, and the whole cast was great. I want to know a lot more about Chirrut and Boze. The last 20 minutes or so are incredible.