Have you seen The Force Awakens?
Have you acknowledged it as the masterpiece it truly is?
Are you ready for Episode VIII already?
Well calm down, it isn't coming out for another year.
In the meantime, however, we've got Rogue One, a Star Wars story taking place before the events of A New Hope.
And it is another awesome Star Wars movie that will keep you excited about Star Wars for a whole nother year.
Rogue One is itself a bit of an odd film to talk about. It's not necessarily a film belonging to a main trilogy, prequel, sequel, or otherwise, but it asserts itself as a film worthy to be discussed in the Star Wars pantheon. It appears to be a spin-off cash grab, but it's so much more than that with an emotional story and a brand new cast of likable characters.
Overall, the story and characters are Rogue One's strongest suit. The story is brand-new and quite original, focusing on the plight of a rag-tag group of characters led by a Death Star engineer's daughter, Jyn Erso, and their mission to retrieve the plans to the Death Star for the Rebellion. These are the very same plans that Leia puts in R2-D2 at the start of A New Hope.
Another interesting quality in the story is how they tell it. We all know that the characters in Rogue One will get to the Death Star. If you haven't seen the main trilogy yet, well, spoilers. Sorry you are part of the 1% of humanity that hasn't. Anyway, knowing this fact, one would think that the tension of the film itself would be lacking. However, the film still remains interesting and unpredictable, making for a tense viewing experience.
Another unique detail the story has is its scale. Never before have we seen a movie with as gigantic a label as Star Wars have a story focused on characters that aren't really tied to any other film. While other stories in the saga take place across the entire galaxy and focus on characters that save the entire galaxy with efforts spanning multiple movies, Rogue One is all about these one-off heroes just trying to make the world's most intense file transfer. And yet the movie feels just as big and important as its kin. This truly is a testament to the film's quality as it makes a seemingly unimportant part of the fight against the Empire and the Dark Side feel just as important. It's a small-scale story that feels just as big as Star Wars films usually feel.
Their names may be hard to remember, and I'll discuss this in a minute, but the characters themselves are memorable and likable enough to carry you through the story. As the story takes place between Episodes III and IV, there are no Jedi characters in the main cast, since most of them are dead at this point. Thus, the Force itself is, except for a choice few in the Rebellion, treated as a sort of myth or legend by most citizens in the galaxy. I feel this is an interesting take on the Star Wars mythos that I feel like hasn't been truly explored, and Rogue One's story comes across as more unique with this original detail.
Rogue One, however, isn't perfect. The overall pacing of the story is a bit slow, especially when compared to its contemporaries, not just in the Saga, but with other films in general. This is what contributes to the difficulty of remembering the character's names. The story's pacing suffers at the hands of admittedly difficult-to-follow dialogue, and thus, character's names are hard to catch amidst the other dialogue that fails to push the plot as hard as it should. Essentially, what you get is a whole lot of buildup for an action-filled finale, however, the finale of the film is absolutely spectacular and well worth all of the buildup. It is definitely the film's strongest point, with edge-of-your-seat action and heartbreaking drama.
The pacing is what makes the characters themselves so valuable. The story takes a while to get going, but, the characters are interesting and likable enough to carry you through. Thus the slower pacing is bearable because you care about the characters enough to see how their story ends. And the story itself has a wonderfully emotional ending.
Rogue One's camera work is brilliant as well. Modern technology really has made the galaxy a wonderful and truly awe-inspiring backdrop for Star Wars movies. The Death Star itself looks more imposing than ever, and the scope and scale provided by the tracking shots of the multiple planets in the galaxy is an absolutely palpable thing.
That leaves one final question: is it as good as or better than The Force Awakens?
Well, no, but then again, it never really needed to be.
Rogue One's entire purpose was to tell a new tale that stood on its own and could tide Star Wars fans over to the next main entry into the sequel trilogy. And with such a small purpose for existence, it really couldn't be better than the game-changing phenomenon that was The Force Awakens. However, it was way, way better than it ever had to be, going above and beyond its limitations and expectations. Rogue One serves a different purpose than The Force Awakens, and, is great in its own right. Both films really have no need to be compared as they are different movies made for different reasons.
Overall, Rogue One is awesome, providing a fresh and new Star Wars story that deserves to be praised as high as other Star Wars movies. The characters are likable, the story is overall great, and the backdrops look gorgeous. If you don't think this film is worth watching, give it a chance. It may be just a filler movie when all is said and done, but it is most definitely better than it had any right to be, really not deserving to be called a filler movie.
Oh, before I forget, quick warning: the text crawl is not in this movie. Again, since its not a main trilogy movie, this isn't a big deal, but if it is to you, don't let your disappointment of this change ruin your perception of the film. It's truly great.
And MAN, am I ever the more excited about Episode VIII!
