As always, there is a possibility of SPOILERS, so stop reading if you want to go into Rogue One Fresh.
Rogue One isn’t necessary for our Star Wars canon. However, I was excited for it because of the fan service it could provide, and because it could provide us a compelling look at the battle between the Rebel Alliance and the Empire. Rogue One does put the war in Star Wars, but will probably leave you feeling little during the payoff for the characters the movie wants you to care about. But hey, Darth Vader is back, so no worries!
Rogue One is about the rebels stealing the plans for the Death Star that they will use to blow it up in a New Hope. Key to this plan is Galen Erso (Mads Mikkelsen), a weapons engineer the Empire used to build the Death Star. Even though Galen was coerced by Director Krennic (Ben Mendelsohn) by threatening his daughter Jyn (Felicity Jones), Galen built a design flaw into the weapon and gave the message to a pilot (Riz Ahmed) who delivers the message to Saw Gerrera (Forest Whitaker), a rebel extremist. Jyn, now grown up, is freed by Cassian Andor (Diego Luna) and K-2SO (Alan Tudyk), her identity is discovered, and she is given a mission to retrieve this pilot and his message (since she knows Gerrera) for her freedom. Along the way, the team picks up blind Force supporter Chirrut Imwe (Donnie Yen) and a gun toting supersniper Baze Malbus (Wen Jiang), then tries to evade the Empire while discovering the truth behind Galen’s message.
If you can believe it, it’s rare that a Star Wars movie has an actual war in it. Much of the movie takes place in besieged cities. There’s sneak attacks, bombs, and the threat of Death Star use looms at every corner. You really feel uneasy every place you go with the cast, because the places they live in are occupied by a hostile regime. This tone really pays off in the third act, when the giant battle to retrieve the plans commences. The excitement, scares, and heroism become elevated because we have no idea who might live or die. In addition, that battle is fantastically shot, with compelling moves and counter moves, particularly in space and on the beach of the planet with the battle. Though it takes a while to get there, I was pretty riveted for the last 30-45 minutes and revereted back to my 10 year old self for a brief period of time.
Because Rogue One is essentially a connective tissue movie between Episodes III and IV, fan service is going to abound. Fan service in general is tricky though, because if a movie dives too deeply in, you risk losing parts of the audience. Rogue One is a mixed bag of fan service, mostly pretty bad. Many cameos exist to clearly have people point and say LOOK IT’S …., etc. This is particularly jarring if the previous actor has died (that technology isn’t ready yet, one more iteration and I think we won’t be able to tell).That being said, the highs of the fan service are so high for me they forgive any quibbles about pointless cameos. Darth Vader has a scene in this movie that reaches heights only Empire Strikes Back hits. This is like placing a giant chocolate covered super cherry on top of a stellar sundae of Rogue One’s third act.
You’ll notice I haven’t really mentioned any of the characters yet, which is by far Rogue One’s greatest weakness. This movie is 2 ½ hours long, and we never get past the one character beat each cast member is given. Jyn = abandonment issues. Cassius = conflicted and reluctant rebel, K-2SO = snarky robot. That’s it. Rogue One would have been amazing if I cared at all about the people trying to steal the plans. But it’s telling the only character I felt anything for was K-2SO, because he was at least fun. The writers actively overlook character motivation to show us a new, cool planet these people need to get to. When plot drives a story instead of character, we feel less and less for the people we are supposed to root for; this problem grows and grows until the third act when acts of heroism illicit ZERO payoff from the audience. Darth Vader, as cool as he is, shouldn’t get more applause than the gigantic acts of heroism in act three by our heroes, but because of the poor character building on the writers’ part, we just wait for when Leia or Darth Vader might show up or when spaceships run into each other.
Rogue One funnily reminds me of an 80s action movie. Those movies have lots of cool explosions and one-liners, but the characters are paper thin and fleeting. Except for characters we know of course. Oh man, Rogue One will remind you just how awesome Darth Vader actually is. I’m getting worked up thinking about it now.
Well put, but I wouldn’t call K-2SO “snarky.” If anything, he is very literal, almost to the point of social awkwardness.