Directed by Gareth Edwards, Rogue One is the eighth film in the Star Wars series, but chronologically falls in between the third and fourth movies (Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope). The movie serves as an explanation for part of the opening crawl of A New Hope, “During [a] battle, Rebel spies managed to steal secret plans to the Empire’s ultimate weapon, the DEATH STAR…” This, combined with the fact that something people could not get over was the Death Star, something capable of destroying planets, had such an obvious flaw, led to the creation of Rogue One.
Rogue One follows the story of Jyn Erso, played by Felicity Jones, the daughter of the man that created the Death Star. By the time the movie’s plot picks up, she has not seen her father in nearly thirteen years and joins the rebellion reluctantly. From there Erso is joined by a colorful cast of characters, the most notable of whom are Rebel captain Cassian Andor (Diego Luna) and the newest droid, K-2SO (voiced by Alan Tudyk). Tipped off by a former Imperial pilot, Bodhi Rook (Riz Ahmed), Erso and Andor assemble a team to retrieve the plans to the Death Star and, spoiler alert, they succeed.
Every actor delivers a solid performance, with Jones and Luna shining as the film’s leads and Tudyk delivering rejoinders with perfect comedic timing. The overall tone of the movie has a grittier feeling, reflecting a more realistic wartime story. Another interesting thing to note is that none of the main characters in Rogue One are Jedi or related to the Skywalker clan. Ever since its inception, Star Wars has followed one lightsaber wielding family, the Skywalkers. To see this movie turn away from that was a breath of fresh air and further introduced the notion that normal people did actually have the ability to be a hero in the Star Wars universe.
Due to the fact that the ending of the film has been set in stone since 1977, most of the plot is fairly predictable. However, there was some new technology to be seen and more insight into both the Rebellion and the Empire, something that had surprisingly not been touched much upon in previous films. It also brought back characters from the original trilogy, something that was both exciting and a little strange.
CGI was used to recreate the characters of Grand Moff Wilhuff Tarkin and a younger version of Princess Leia (Carrie Fisher). The man who originally played Tarkin, British actor Peter Cushing, died in 1994 and Fisher was too old to reprise her role. In order to recreate both characters, Edwards had stand ins do the physical motions before using CGI to place Cushing and Fisher over the stand in’s faces. Some people felt that Edwards had gone too far be recreating Cushing and feared that CGI would be used to bring back other actors.
The biggest criticism of the film itself is that the characters are poorly developed. Some have commented that they feel the acting was flat and there was little emotion in the characters, and I agree-to a certain extent. Given the amount of time the movie had, I feel like they did a decent enough job with the characters and gave them the best backstories possible.
Personally, I really, really liked this movie. Like every other Star Wars fan, I always thought that the Death Star’s flaw (a small thermal exhaust port that when fired into, would blow the entire station up) was a little...obvious. But now that Rogue One has given that flaw an explanation, and a rather heartfelt one at that, I feel more at peace with it. The other thing that I really appreciate is that Rogue One ends directly where A New Hope picks up, with Princess Leia making her escape from Darth Vader, so watching it now makes it more meaningful. Ultimately, I think that’s the value of the film, it contributes to and expands upon the legacy of Star Wars. I would see it again and recommend it to anyone that wants to enhance their Star Wars experience.
Image Courtesy of The Verge