Spoilers Rogue One: A Star Wars Story - Grading & Discussion

[Reverend]

Just to give something of a first hand insight into how Lucas himself thought of these things, here's an excerpt from 'The Making of Star Wars' by J.W. Rinzler: -

“I feel that I’m fairly decent at construction, not necessarily plot, but construction,” Lucas says of these changes. “Neither Graffiti nor THX had plots. I’m not really interested in plots. That’s one of the problems I’ve had with this movie—it’s a plotted movie, and I find plots boring because they’re so mechanical. You go from here to there, and once you know what’s going to happen, that’s it. And I just am not enthralled with that kind of action. I’m much more into the scenes and the nuances of what’s going on. I find that fascinating.”

Consider that through all the drafts the plot varied quite wildly, yet certain scenes that he envisioned stuck around even though the context changed. IIRC the two that were always there from the get-go and survived all those iterations more or less intact in terms of imagery were the cantina scene and the space battle at the end. Indeed I think he even began cutting together WWII movie footage together to conceptualise the dogfight as early as 1972, well before the plot was locked down. There's a reason why that whole sequence stands out as exemplary and one of the most iconic in cinema history; He'd spent the best part of half a decade refining it before he'd even shot one frame of film. The images always came first.

If I remember correctly the second trilogy would be part of a production line made by other people that would allow Lucas to concentrate on making "proper" films.

Depends when you're talking about exactly. Lucas seemed to change his mind several times on what his long term plans were. Again, something of a mythos has built up in fandom around Lucas's "original plans" where as I describe above, there ain't so such thing.
There's just a series of ideas that fluctuated from one instance to the next as circumstances changed and new/better ideas came along. Such is the nature of the creative process.

 

[plynch]

Insulting???

Yup, fanboys have found a new low. If you actually think this movie insults you, you've never been insulted in your life. If this is your lowpoint, I congratute you on a near perfect excistence. My God.....

I wrote "almost" insulting. I stand by that, just as a person. That a behemoth machine thinks that we'll buy their tickets and toys, no matter how mediocre the product they put out. And they are, of course, correct.
I am no fanboy. I see things once and move on, generally, and have never read a SW novel other than the original in 1977. And, I have certainly been insulted in my life; just recently in your sarcastic reply, in fact! Be well.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

I wrote "almost" insulting. I stand by that, just as a person. That a behemoth machine thinks that we'll buy their tickets and toys, no matter how mediocre the product they put out. And they are, of course, correct.

How can something be an insult if it IS correct?

 

[davejames]

Same. No story needs to be told. How weird.

To be clear, I said it doesn't feel like a SW story that needed to be told 40 years after the fact, when the story has long ago moved on. Obviously if this had somehow been made as the very first SW movie in 1977 that laid the groundwork for how Luke ultimately destroyed the first Death Star in ANH, then that would be different. And it would feel like a much more urgent and necessary part of the story to see.

But I just don't feel the same need to see this story 40 years later, is all I'm saying. Much like I wouldn't see much point in a big budget movie detailing in precise detail how exactly the Bothans got their hands on information about the Second Death Star, no matter how well executed it was. Because it's 34 years later and that's just not a story I'm really dying to see (and hell, even at the time it would have seemed completely unnecessary).

 

[BeatleJWOL]

It seems like some of the people going into this were expecting the next great Star Wars movie.

It's an Expanded Universe tale. Or, as one might also put it, A Star Wars Story. Is it necessary? Absolutely not. Was it fun as hell? You betcha! However, if you can't agree with one, you're probably not going to agree with the other.

Your loss.

 

[Skywalker]

I don't think a movie about Bothan spies learning about the second Death Star and the Emperor's presence there would be a particularly compelling tale, since the Emperor deliberately allowed them to uncover that information.

Rogue One wasn't just about a team of Rebels stealing the Death Star plans, it was also the moment when the Rebel Alliance finally came together. We saw during the scene with the council how disorganized the Alliance still was at that point. There were various factions pulling in different directions--some sought a political solution, others believed war was the only way, and some even thought they should give up and surrender to the Empire. Sure, Jyn Erso and her team kind of forced their hand, but once they realized the Death Star was real they finally unified and started fighting back. I wish the movie had touched on that side of the story more than it did. The kernel of it was there but they could have done more.

 

[DonIago]

Actually, I could see it being kind of interesting to learn more about how the Emperor "let" the Bothans get the plans. In a way it might be an inverted version of this story, where the Rebels think they've pulled off a coup (doubtless at cost), while the Emperor believes he's just pulled one over on them.

Hell, you could even have some Rebels concerned that the whole thing went too easily.

 

[davejames]

I don't think a movie about Bothan spies learning about the second Death Star and the Emperor's presence there would be a particularly compelling tale, since the Emperor deliberately allowed them to uncover that information.

Rogue One wasn't just about a team of Rebels stealing the Death Star plans, it was also the moment when the Rebel Alliance finally came together. We saw during the scene with the council how disorganized the Alliance still was at that point. There were various factions pulling in different directions--some sought a political solution, others believed war was the only way, and some even thought they should give up and surrender to the Empire. Sure, Jyn Erso and her team kind of forced their hand, but once they realized the Death Star was real they finally unified and started fighting back. I wish the movie had touched on that side of the story more than it did. The kernel of it was there but they could have done more.

The only thing odd about that, is that I've been getting the impression from recent episodes of Rebels that the rebellion was already a pretty strong and cohesive group-- and that series takes place a few years beforehand. So to see them be so disorganized and weak-willed in this movie was a bit strange to me (not to mention that any would actually doubt the capability of the Empire to build a Death Star, after all the massive ships and weapons they've had to go up against in the past).

I can understand council members having certain doubts about the exact way to fight the Empire, but that so many just wanted to surrender and not fight at all seemed like kind of a stretch. Especially at this point in the story, right before the events of ANH.

 

[Reverend]

The only thing odd about that, is that I've been getting the impression from recent episodes of Rebels that the rebellion was already a pretty strong and cohesive group-- and that series takes place a few years beforehand. So to see them be so disorganized and weak-willed in this movie was a bit strange to me (not to mention that any would actually doubt the capability of the Empire to build a Death Star, after all the massive ships and weapons they've had to go up against in the past).

I can understand council members having certain doubts about the exact way to fight the Empire, but that so many just wanted to surrender and not fight at all seemed like kind of a stretch. Especially at this point in the story, right before the events of ANH.

What we've seen on Rebels so far is mostly just one cell gradually grow over the course of about 3 years, with cooperation with another cell only alluded to in passing. The Alliance as we see it in 'Rogue One' & the OT is made up of dozens, if not hundreds of rebel groups of varying types from across the galaxy. All of them integrated into a unified command structure under what can only be characterised as a shadow government in exile.

Also keep in mind a good number, if not most of them are liable to be from former Seperatist worlds, which is going to bring with it all sorts of baggage when dealing with groups from formerly Republic loyalist worlds. Case in point: the 'Rogue One' novelisation implies that Cassian was from a Seperatist world and grew up thinking of Jedi as the enemy.
That alone makes me really look forward to see how they tell his backstory, since his supposed long service for Alliance Intelligence means he may have been recruited Ahsoka, it's founder and chief agent prior to Malachor.

Side note: I've been re-watching TCW recently and am struck by just how many of the Alliance's early connections may have been her doing. Onderon: friends with Saw & his cadre. Mon Cala: knows Akbar & saved the King's life. Kashyyyk: good relations with the Wookiees she has.

 

[BigJake]

I was very impressed. Gave it an A-.

Spoiler: in a little more detail

What I liked most is that Rogue One puts in the foreground the toll the Empire takes on the lives of the people who live under it, or struggle against it. Jyn Erso, the lead -- charismatically portrayed by Felicity Jones -- is one of these people: living on the run from the Empire since childhood, raised a rebel cadre before the cause abandoned her and she abandoned it, the story is essentially the tale of her coming to terms with her past and trying to fulfil her work, to make sure her father's last gesture against the Empire doesn't come to nothing. The people gathered around her are the flotsam and jetsam of rebellion and resistance, people who've traded parts of themselves (in some cases literally) to the pay the price of battling the Emperor; some of them have retained a sense of at least gallows humour about all this (Donnie Yen's Chirrut is one of the most instantly memorable characters ever to appear in a Star Wars movie because of this), others have been largely broken by it (brought out beautifully in Forest Whitaker's portrayal of the paranoid and hollowed-out Saw Gerrera), or remain driven by the need to have the terrible things they've done in the name of the rebellion mean something (which provides a passable excuse for the relatively stock Stoic Hero character Cassian). Everyone is damaged in some degree and looking for some kind of redemption, some way of striking back.

These people, and the tone of the story they inhabit, are considerably different from -- and darker than -- anything we've seen in Star Wars before. I think this lies at the root of the otherwise baffling claims in some quarters that the film lacked "interesting" story, characters or emotion; if you come in expecting the light-hearted, bantering space opera adventure tone of something like A New Hope or The Force Awakens, that's decidedly not what this is. I'm okay with that, because Rogue One is ditching (most of) the light-heartedness in favour of what is essentially a species of relatively grown-up "war movie" style storytelling in Star Wars clothing. it gains more from the trade-off than it loses.

That's not to say everything is perfect. I'm not entirely convinced by the way the hero team coheres by the end of the film, and Cassian in particular does not really hold his own as an interesting protagonist across from Jones' excellent work as Jyn Urso. There are nitpicks to be had with the way the action is handled from time to time (Rogue One really does bring up the eternal questions of why exactly stormtroopers wear armor that apparently is useless), and sequences that don't quite make sense (Saw Gerrera's tentacle moster).

But there's so much more tastiness here: Mikkelsen, Whitaker, Yen, Alan Tudyk as K2SO, a fun and smarmy baddie in Krennic, a badass guest turn by Vader, the digital wizardry used to resurrect Cushing's Grand Moff Tarkin and to give us a glimpse of a young Leia. Sauced with excellent action sequences and clever fan-friendly nods and easter eggs, I found Rogue One to be tremendous fun on the whole.

 

[TREK_GOD_1]

You clearly have no idea how the original movies were developed.

Puh-lease.

Read what I posted. Elements which would ultimately form TESB existed before one frame of ANH was in the can. The only difference are various goal post shifting, identities (which were meant to be important, but not in the what ended up in TESB's final screenplay). The point you completely flew over was the fact the Rogue One story was never meant to be told. There was no intent to tell the story of some group stealing the Death Star plans, hence its mere reference in the crawl. Similar to the story of how the rebels established the Hoth base was only important enough to be mentioned in TESB crawl, but not committed to film.

That is the point. The Star Wars story was not incomplete without what amounted to a line in the crawl.

 

[LJones41]

These people, and the tone of the story they inhabit, are considerably different from -- and darker than -- anything we've seen in Star Wars before.

I don't completely agree. Well, I don't agree at all, to be honest. I'm not saying that I don't appreciate the story told in "ROGUE ONE". I do. But this is not the first movie that has told a very dark tale within the STAR WARS movie franchise.

The argument for most people is "was that worth two hours of my time" - It was fairly light forgettable popcorn entertainment - that's all it aspired to be and all most of the audience need it to be.

This sounds like an opinion. If so, could you phrase it in that manner?

 

[Ithekro]

Puh-lease.

Read what I posted. Elements which would ultimately form TESB existed before one frame of ANH was in the can. The only difference are various goal post shifting, identities (which were meant to be important, but not in the what ended up in TESB's final screenplay). The point you completely flew over was the fact the Rogue One story was never meant to be told. There was no intent to tell the story of some group stealing the Death Star plans, hence its mere reference in the crawl. Similar to the story of how the rebels established the Hoth base was only important enough to be mentioned in TESB crawl, but not committed to film.

That is the point. The Star Wars story was not incomplete without what amounted to a line in the crawl.

And that is entirely besides the point in telling the story. Was it needed to be told? No. Was it an interesting story? Yes.

That is all that is needed for storytelling. Is it an interesting story? It doesn't matter what the story is about. Is it interesting? There have been how many movies about events in history? Some big some small, some that no one really hears about, and some that almost everyone hears about. Everyone should know what happened already and the story was complete long ago. Yet the story is interesting and people will go to see it.

 

[BigJake]

t this is not the first movie that has told a very dark tale within the STAR WARS movie franchise.

A tale that covers "dark" events and a film that actually lands something close to the full emotional content of such events are very different things. The original Battlestar Galactica "told a very dark tale," but seeing someone tackle the full psychological freight of those kinds of events had to wait for Ronald Moore's reimagining. I'd say the difference between Rogue One and prior Star Wars stories (yes, even Empire) is similar.

 

[JoeZhang]

This sounds like an opinion. If so, could you phrase it in that manner?

Of course it's an opinion - on a site for adults not small children, I don't feel the need to spell it out. Raise your game a bit.

 

[Tuskin38]

The only thing odd about that, is that I've been getting the impression from recent episodes of Rebels that the rebellion was already a pretty strong and cohesive group-- and that series takes place a few years beforehand. So to see them be so disorganized and weak-willed in this movie was a bit strange to me (not to mention that any would actually doubt the capability of the Empire to build a Death Star, after all the massive ships and weapons they've had to go up against in the past).

I can understand council members having certain doubts about the exact way to fight the Empire, but that so many just wanted to surrender and not fight at all seemed like kind of a stretch. Especially at this point in the story, right before the events of ANH.

The group you're seeing in Rebels is just one cell out of hundreds or more. While they have connections they don't yet have the unified command structure seen in the movies

 

[Photoman15]

Rogue One is SWs' "Lower Decks". An interesting side-story of the people who make up the bulk of the Enterprise crew (as opposed to the officers that we see and follow every episode).

 

[JD]

Here is some of the backstory behind the usage of Mustafar.
A small excerpt...



Here's Chopper. There was also a mention of a "General Syndulla", which has been confirmed to be Hera rather than her father.

Thanks for posting that. So I wonder if they used the physical Chopper from Rebels Recon? For those who don't know, at the end of each episode of the Rebels behind the scenes webseries Rebels Recon, they have a short skit with a physical Chopper in the LFL offices.

Carrie Fisher is not in Rogue One. Talking about it as "her final performance" is macabre.

Yeah, and even if she was, it still wouldn't be her final performance, we've known since it was first announced that she'll be in EPVIII, that will be her final performance.

They should rewrite it if necessary, or the production should be swallowed by an earthquake.

Disney probably doesn't employ people stupid enough to try that CG stunt for more than a couple of shots.

It's not that bad, and it was a lot more than a couple shots, there were a handful of complete scenes with the CGI recreation of Peter Cushing as Grand Moff Tarkin.

I don't know if we "needed" to see the RO story, but doing it as their first stand alone movie was a really smart idea. It spun off a used minor plot point to the OT, so that was a draw, but at the same time it didn't feature any of the familiar characters in significant roles and the overall plot was not connected to the Skywalker family's story in any significant way. This was Disney's attempt to see if people would come to see a Star Wars movie that wasn't directly connected to the Skywalker Saga, and I think it definitely succeeded. Now that they know people will come just for the Star Wars name, they have the option to take things even farther away from the Skywalker saga if they want to.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

Saw the movie today. I liked it. It feels more like we always pictured Star Wars to be than any Star Wars material released since the original trilogy.

Does this mean we have five or six more ghosts to edit into Return of the Jedi? (Ducks)

 

[JoeZhang]

Thanks for posting that. So I wonder if they used the physical Chopper from Rebels Recon? For those who don't know, at the end of each episode of the Rebels behind the scenes webseries Rebels Recon, they have a short skit with a physical Chopper in the LFL offices.
.

Yes:

StarWars.com: Just from a personal, this-is-awesome perspective, tell us about being on set and operating Chopper.

Matt Martin: It was really surreal. I wasn’t actually there for the purpose of operating a droid. The Rogue One production team asked to have Chop shipped over and we were more than happy to do so. An animated character in a live action movie…and it’s OUR Chopper! Awesome! [Editor’s note: The Chopper droid used in the film belongs to the StarWars.com team, and is featured weekly in Rebels Recon.]

A few weeks later I was sent over to help produce some behind-the-scenes content for StarWars.com and it happened to be when they were shooting in the Yavin set. I saw my buddy Chopper sitting there with all the other droids, as well as some of my friends who were brought onto the production to build and operate the droids. When Chopper was called in for one of the scenes, Lee Towersey on the droid team just handed me Chop’s control and said, “You know how to do this, right?”

You can’t really tell since it’s so brief in the film, but the scene was actually really intense. It was the most challenging droid-driving I’ve ever done. There had to be at least 30 extras running around, as well as a little personnel transport thing, and I had to make sure Chop didn’t crash into any of them or impede their motion. It was very nerve-wracking at first, especially because I was in a position where I couldn’t see very well. Eventually I found my way up onto a gantry and things were a bit easier. I’m pretty sure I never ruined a take, but one time Genevieve O’Reilly [Mon Mothma] accidentally bumped into the droid, she looked around, spotted me holding the control on the gantry and mouthed, “I’m sorry!” I’d expect nothing less from a former senator.

So thanks to Lee and the rest of the crew for allowing me to be a VERY small part of the production without any sort of qualifications. It’ll be one of the highlights of my life, for sure.

http://www.starwars.com/news/the-star-wars-rebels-easter-eggs-and-connections-in-rogue-one