Rogue One is so good it improves the entire trilogy (SPOILERS)

Status
Not open for further replies.
GAF has taught me two things:

1) Fury Road is the greatest movie ever made.

2) Suicide Squad is the worst movie ever made.

Everything else is somewhere in between.

When TPM came out a lot of apologists were claiming that it was only disappointing because the hype was so great. For me Fury Road is proof that the highest of expectations can be met.
Haven't seen Suicide Squad. It looks ok, maybe?
 
I actually find TFA to be better than RO despite it borrowing heavily from ANH. I cared about TFA's characters.
TFA is better since it handles it's characters much better and earns it's emotional moments. Rogue One is straight up star wars porn and TFA was a huge reminder about why people fell in love with the series at it's inception that also critiques the hype train quite a bit, like Rey getting the lightsaber and wrecking Kylo Ren who's never gonna be anywhere near as terrifying as a man who'll force choke you against a ceiling and then slice your ass in half without even blinking while all your friends can do is watch and pray that they'll go less painfully than you did.
 
As we discussed in the spoiler thread, the end of rogue one doesn't connect well to the beginning of a new hope though.

Theres a massive plot hole on why they don't deliver the plans to the rebels as planned, and instead travel to tatooine to find Obi Wan... Getting captured and risking losing the plans tons of people died to get.
 
It's not worse than AOTC.

It definitely is for me. There's no part of it that's worse than the droid factory, but overall? Yeah.
 
Because SPR had a whole movie after the beach head. I've explained it already in spoilers.

I don't see what your point is. The movie doesn't have any good relatable, fleshed out characters, and because of that, I didn't care at all about what happens in the film.

That's a problem with the movie. If they couldn't make the characters compelling, they should have changed to the script, maybe removed some of the characters.
 
fuck the haters. it's a great movie. people bitch just to bitch. It's an echo chamber online where they grab onto dumb shit like "no character development" in an fucking ensemble movie that actually has nice arcs for a ton of characters.

or they bitch about CGI

or they bitch about not enough Vader.

or they bitch about too much Vader

Rogue One is great. It's better on repeat viewings too, just like Force Awakens.

TFS was a kids movie, and in the same category as the Narnia movies.

I do agree with everything you said. RO was amazing and I loved loved Vader.
 
I'm hearing more and more on forgettable characters, and I'm actually pretty surprised. How people don't relate to Jyn is kind of beyond me; the father/child relationship had me feeling for her the whole time. Both the hologram scene and the death of galen were done really well.
 
Ow. Watch the EDGE

I'm hearing more and more on forgettable characters, and I'm actually pretty surprised. How people don't relate to Jyn is kind of beyond me; the father/child relationship had me feeling for her the whole time. Both the hologram scene and the death of galen were done really well.

I don't think the father daughter thing went anywhere. Yeah she wanted him back, but we didn't see them interact much. That one flashback was nice, but for her to carry the movie as a main character, the beginning of it could've shown more between the two. All he does is hug her and tell her to go in a bunker.

Though we don't know much about Rey's parents, she's more relatable because we spend time seeing how she lives on Jakku. Jyn didn't have that written for her.
 
All it did was take stuff you already liked from the trilogy and showed it to you in exactly the way you wanted to see them ("Hey, I liked that character! Hey, I liked that starship!). I don't agree with the article or the reasoning at all. It added nothing and was barebones fanservice. Everything new that it did add was bland and boring.

This is exactly how I feel about TFA.

I think Rogue One is my favorite Star Wars movie now. Although I was never a huge SW fan, and I generally found the parts of the movies that weren't big set-piece battles to be pretty boring. My favorite scene from any of the SW movies before this one was the trench run.
 
I don't see what your point is. The movie doesn't have any good relatable, fleshed out characters, and because of that, I didn't care at all about what happens in the film.

That's a problem with the movie. If they couldn't make the characters compelling, they should have changed to the script, maybe removed some of the characters.

The two movies have dramatically different pacing to begin with, so let's stop comparing apples to oranges. I've given each of the characters motivations in the spoiler post. If the dialog is wooden, it's because that's how real people talk, especially given grave circumstances. Like I've said, there's no manifest destiny for the characters, they're living breath to breath. No one's a jedi, no one is anything but in it for the cause, because that's all they have personally. They live to see the one success that will propel their lives beyond the dreaded oppression of the Empire. It was a
suicide mission to begin with, and it ends as a suicide mission for everyone
.
 
I'm hearing more and more on forgettable characters, and I'm actually pretty surprised. How people don't relate to Jyn is kind of beyond me; the father/child relationship had me feeling for her the whole time. Both the hologram scene and the death of galen were done really well.

Because they don't show it. I have no idea what her relationship with her father was like. The first thing you see of them is the Imperials coming, and him telling her to run away and wait for Forest Whitaker. You never see any small moment where they just spend time together.

Compare it to Luke. You saw his normal life on Tatooine, and there were quiet moments with Owen and Beru, like when they were eating, and Luke complains when he isn't allowed to attend the flight academy. Rogue One had no small moments like that that fleshed out Jyn and Galen's relationship, so there was no reason for the audience to care about it.
 
Because they don't show it. I have no idea what her relationship with her father was like. The first thing you see of them is the Imperials coming, and him telling her to run away and wait for Forest Whitaker. You never see any small moment where they just spend time together.

Compare it to Luke. You saw his normal life on Tatooine, and there were quiet moments with Owen and Beru, like when they were eating, and Luke complains when he isn't allowed to attend the flight academy. Rogue One had no small moments like that that fleshed out Jyn and Galen's relationship, so there was no reason for the audience to care about it.

So you wanted a six hour movie to see how a father and daughter relationship developes? A young girl loses her dad at a young age and spends the rest of her life looking for him, what else did you wanted to see?
 
The two movies have dramatically different pacing to begin with, so let's stop comparing apples to oranges. I've given each of the characters motivations in the spoiler post. If the dialog is wooden, it's because that's how real people talk, especially given grave circumstances. Like I've said, there's no manifest destiny for the characters, they're living breath to breath. No one's a jedi, no one is anything but in it for the cause, because that's all they have personally. They live to see the one success that will propel their lives beyond the dreaded oppression of the Empire. It was a
suicide mission to begin with, and it ends as a suicide mission for everyone
.

Except none of that matters because its not compelling. They weren't able to create good characters that I, and judging from this thread, many other people wanted to root for. What you're basically telling me is why they weren't able to create good characters. If they wanted to go that direction, they should have found another way to make the film compelling. Like imagine if we didn't know whether the heroes would succeed (we do, because that's the plot they chose). We wouldn't know how the mission ends, so wondering if the main characters would win would make the film compelling.

The fact is that neither Rogue One's story nor its characters are compelling, and that's its main problem.
 
Except none of that matters because its not compelling. They weren't able to create good characters that I, and judging from this thread, many other people wanted to root for. What you're basically telling me is why they weren't able to create good characters. If they wanted to go that direction, they should have found another way to make the film compelling. Like imagine if we didn't know whether the heroes would succeed (we do, because that's the plot they chose). We wouldn't know how the mission ends, so wondering if the main characters would win would make the film compelling.

The fact is that neither Rogue One's story nor its characters are compelling, and that's its main problem.

So instead of me flagging my arms like an idiot, what's lacking about the characters specifically? What's missing in their motivation? What would you have liked to see instead?
 
I'm hearing more and more on forgettable characters, and I'm actually pretty surprised. How people don't relate to Jyn is kind of beyond me; the father/child relationship had me feeling for her the whole time. Both the hologram scene and the death of galen were done really well.
Yeah, I'm not saying the characterization was exceptional or anything, but I didn't get the impression that it was somehow sub par compared to other ensemble movies (or hell, other star wars movies). K2 is my favorite star wars droid, and I like Jyn more than Rey...The main characters all have full arcs if you pay attention. I think the movie could have used another 30 minutes in the beginning/middle to flesh things out a bit more, but this critique really strikes me as something built up in an echo chamber as the go to talking point to shit on the movie.

I'm not even a huge star wars fanboy or anything. What's really confusing is how some of the same people gushing over TFA think R1 is a useless pile of shit. I like both movies well enough, but I honestly thought Rogue One is better. Everyone has different opinions I guess.
 
So you wanted a six hour movie to see how a father and daughter relationship developes? A young girl loses her dad at a young age and spends the rest of her life looking for him, what else did you wanted to see?

Or maybe, you know, a short scene or two with showing Galen and Jyn together on the farm before Krennic comes to take him away. Maybe teaching her how to do something. It didn't need to be long. I have many problems with The Force Awakens, but I really like the scene showing Rey's life on Jakku before meeting BB-8. Something like that would strengthen the bond between them, and make the film better.

Jyn's relationship with Saw is the same. I felt nothing when they finally reunited, because the only time you saw the characters together was when Saw lifted the hatch and told her to come with him. They made such a big deal about how he trained her to be a child soldier, so maybe a flashback showing that training would have been nice.

These are both basic storytelling principles. Show, Don't Tell.
 
This opinion is garbage. Rogue was decent, but story was NOT interesting at all. The films purpose was clear, but I feel that they could have been more creative with coming up with a plot for the film. There weren't many characters you could care for because of the lack of development, the minimal dialogue they had, or because the overall flat performances. The standouts for me were some of the actions scenes, the humor provided by the droid, and Vader scenes.

I agree. The characterization was very weak, and the movie didn't feel good to me until the last hour or so. In a movie where we all know the end result...having characters who we care about is paramount. And I think they failed there. Jyn is so so so boring along most of the crew.
 
Because they don't show it. I have no idea what her relationship with her father was like. The first thing you see of them is the Imperials coming, and him telling her to run away and wait for Forest Whitaker. You never see any small moment where they just spend time together.

Compare it to Luke. You saw his normal life on Tatooine, and there were quiet moments with Owen and Beru, like when they were eating, and Luke complains when he isn't allowed to attend the flight academy. Rogue One had no small moments like that that fleshed out Jyn and Galen's relationship, so there was no reason for the audience to care about it.

Her reaction to her father's message alone was enough to show how much he meant to her; if you were unable to relate to the raw emotion of that scene (and Galen's death) then I think that's more on you (which is fine, opinions and all). Them doing father/daughter things wasn't the only way to show she cared for him.
 
So you wanted a six hour movie to see how a father and daughter relationship developes?

Why would it be six hours?

Jyn's relationship with Saw is the same. I felt nothing when they finally reunited, because the only time you saw the characters together was when Saw lifted the hatch and told her to come with him. They made such a big deal about how he trained her to be a child soldier, so maybe a flashback showing that training would have been nice.

SAW: Come, we have a long road ahead of us!
*Jyn is instantly an adult*
 
Or maybe, you know, a short scene or two with showing Galen and Jyn together on the farm before Krennic comes to take him away. Maybe teaching her how to do something. It didn't need to be long. I have many problems with The Force Awakens, but I really like the scene showing Rey's life on Jakku before meeting BB-8. Something like that would strengthen the bond between them, and make the film better.

Jyn's relationship with Saw is the same. I felt nothing when they finally reunited, because the only time you saw the characters together was when Saw lifted the hatch and told her to come with him. They made such a big deal about how he trained her to be a child soldier, so maybe a flashback showing that training would have been nice.

These are both basic storytelling principles. Show, Don't Tell.

You're right, the movie needs some saccharine emotional moments to build character relationships. How about Jyn lost both her father figures in this movie, and it's easy enough for ANYONE to empathize to losing close family without a cuddle contest.

SAW: Come, we have a long road ahead of us!
*Jyn is instantly an adult*

Maybe an 80's montage?
 
Or maybe, you know, a short scene or two with showing Galen and Jyn together on the farm before Krennic comes to take him away. Maybe teaching her how to do something. It didn't need to be long. I have many problems with The Force Awakens, but I really like the scene showing Rey's life on Jakku before meeting BB-8. Something like that would strengthen the bond between them, and make the film better.

Jyn's relationship with Saw is the same. I felt nothing when they finally reunited, because the only time you saw the characters together was when Saw lifted the hatch and told her to come with him. They made such a big deal about how he trained her to be a child soldier, so maybe a flashback showing that training would have been nice.

These are both basic storytelling principles. Show, Don't Tell.

But all the stuff you are talking about was there, she saw how her dad was taken away. Before that they lived a quiet life. All the signs were there at their home before they came for Galen.
 
Saw was crazier than a shithouse rat. Maybe Jyn learned how to do an impression of a statue so he wouldn't notice her.
 
So instead of me flagging my arms like an idiot, what's lacking about the characters specifically? What's missing in their motivation? What would you have liked to see instead?

This is kind of hard to answer, since the main thing I wanted to see was compelling characters, and there are a lot of ways a writer can make characters compelling. I think the movie should have spent more time exploring them.

Take Jyn. We barely see what her relationship with her father and Saw is like. Maybe have a flashback before the Imperials arrive, or maybe instead of starting the movie with their arrival, have some short scenes of Jyn helping Galen around the farm, and him teaching her the ropes. Spend more time with the both of them to make the moment they reunite more compelling. Do the same with Saw, have a couple scenes (maybe a montage) showing him training her to be a child soldier. I think it would improve the scene where she finally meets up with him on Jedha, and the scene where he dies.

Maybe dive a little more into Cassian's backstory, or maybe have a quiet scene with just him and Jyn where they talk about the things they've done. I really liked when he started saying about how he was in the rebellion since he was six years old. Show a bond developing between them, so the hug at the end feels earned.

That's my main problem, not much feels earned. Mads' death felt like it was supposed to be sad, but it wasn't. Same with Saw, we barely saw (haha) any of him before he died. Maybe cut down on the cast if you're getting on running time, and focus on only a few characters, or, build the team bond between those characters if you had a lot of them.
 
lol who needs characterization and development when the strength of a parental relationship should be implied

The Lion King should've started when Mufasa died. Everything about him and Simba before that is useless.

Zuko is a prick. He shouldn't have turned against his father. That stuff about his dad being a sociopath is irrelevant.

To Kill A Mockingbird is a huge waste of time since most of it has to do with Atticus being a single father to Scout in a racist USA.. He's her father. We don't need him doing stuff for her at all.
 
It's crazy to me that star wars fans are complaining about characters not being memorable and having no backstory.

I just don't get it either. Apart from the original trilogy, these were my favorite characters in Star Wars yet, especially after what I found to be a largely unlikable ensemble in TFA.
 
But all the stuff you are talking about was there, she saw how her dad was taken away. Before that they lived a quiet life. All the signs were there at their home before they came for Galen.

Except we didn't see it, and that's the big problem. Seeing Luke with Owen and Beru made a difference. If you cut their scenes out of ANH, sure, you'd be able to figure out that Luke had a connection with his aunt and uncle and lived a quiet life before, but seeing that life makes the audience feel an emotional connection to those characters. It's not the same if you cut it out.
 
This is kind of hard to answer, since the main thing I wanted to see was compelling characters, and there are a lot of ways a writer can make characters compelling. I think the movie should have spent more time exploring them.

Take Jyn. We barely see what her relationship with her father and Saw is like. Maybe have a flashback before the Imperials arrive, or maybe instead of starting the movie with their arrival, have some short scenes of Jyn helping Galen around the farm, and him teaching her the ropes. Spend more time with the both of them to make the moment they reunite more compelling. Do the same with Saw, have a couple scenes (maybe a montage) showing him training her to be a child soldier. I think it would improve the scene where she finally meets up with him on Jedha, and the scene where he dies.

Maybe dive a little more into Cassian's backstory, or maybe have a quiet scene with just him and Jyn where they talk about the things they've done. I really liked when he started saying about how he was in the rebellion since he was six years old. Show a bond developing between them, so the hug at the end feels earned.

That's my main problem, not much feels earned. Mads' death felt like it was supposed to be sad, but it wasn't. Same with Saw, we barely saw (haha) any of him before he died. Maybe cut down on the cast if you're getting on running time, and focus on only a few characters, or, build the team bond between those characters if you had a lot of them.

Jyn's relationship with her father was represented by the cuddle doll
which suggests they lived on the lap of luxury with the Imperials
. Saw
wasn't a soldier, he was a butcher
. We see his effects on Jyn by how closed and afraid of authority she is
{escaping the prison break)
. Cassian already threw his guts out a Jyn, and by the state of the Rebellion in the movie, it wasn't pretty. The ending is just two spent bodies catching up to their minds, there's not supposed to be any more emotional effect than that. Considering all that's happened, and what's about to take place, wouldn't you feel exhausted?
 
Movie had lots of memberberries. Only one that grated on me was them running into funkynose and walrusface. Besides that and CG Tarkin I loved it. Better than 7. Better than rotj. Not as good as anh and esb. Prequels don't exist.

They should make 70's staches a requirement for rogue squadron pilots.
 
Jyn's relationship with her father was represented by the cuddle doll
which suggests they lived on the lap of luxury with the Imperials
. Saw
wasn't a soldier, he was a butcher
. We see his effects on Jyn by how closed and afraid of authority she is
{escaping the prison break)
. Cassian already threw his guts out a Jyn, and by the state of the Rebellion in the movie, it wasn't pretty. The ending is just two spent bodies catching up to their minds, there's not supposed to be any more emotional effect than that. Considering all that's happened, and what's about to take place, wouldn't you feel exhausted?

Why are you tagging spoilers in a spoiler thread?
 
I have to say, I don't entirely understand why so many people say the characters are cardboard cutouts or some such. I thought they did a very good job of characterizing them and make most of them stand out as good characters. Nothing super deep mind you, but Star Wars characters never were.
Kinda seems like people want exposition.
 
lol who needs characterization and development when the strength of a parental relationship should be implied

The Lion King should've started when Mufasa died. Everything about him and Simba before that is useless.

Zuko is a prick. He shouldn't have turned against his father. That stuff about his dad being a sociopath is irrelevant.

To Kill A Mockingbird is a huge waste of time since most of it has to do with Atticus being a single father to Scout in a racist USA.. He's her father. We don't need him doing stuff for her at all.

Nailed it.
 
I still maintain TFA was manipulative garbage. Rogue One had some of those "Remember this?!" moments but managed to feel much more unique IMO. Thought giving the rebels a gray area and actually showing a city under the boot of the Empire was great. Characters were definitely thin and Whitaker was awful but came away much more satisfied here.
 
Or maybe, you know, a short scene or two with showing Galen and Jyn together on the farm before Krennic comes to take him away. Maybe teaching her how to do something. It didn't need to be long. I have many problems with The Force Awakens, but I really like the scene showing Rey's life on Jakku before meeting BB-8. Something like that would strengthen the bond between them, and make the film better.

Jyn's relationship with Saw is the same. I felt nothing when they finally reunited, because the only time you saw the characters together was when Saw lifted the hatch and told her to come with him. They made such a big deal about how he trained her to be a child soldier, so maybe a flashback showing that training would have been nice.

These are both basic storytelling principles. Show, Don't Tell.
There was a scene showing her as a smaller child while her father still worked for the empire and him coming to her and saying "I'll always protect you"
 
I dunno about the article's premise, but I certainly enjoyed R1 far, far more than TFA. It helped that I went in with zero expectations, but the movie was pretty damn fun. The main factor was due to the fact that there was a sense of tension and grand adventure and spectacle. TFA always felt minor league, and the world felt so cramped and compact and its action scenes were all (or nearly all) small scale. R1 is the movie I was hoping TFA would be.

I have to say though, with both movies, I really didn't care for the lead girls.
 
I dunno about the article's premise, but I certainly enjoyed R1 far, far more than TFA. It helped that I went in with zero expectations, but the movie was pretty damn fun. The main factor was due to the fact that there was a sense of tension and grand adventure and spectacle. TFA always felt minor league, and the world felt so cramped and compact and its action scenes were all (or nearly all) small scale. R1 is the movie I was hoping TFA would be.

I have to say though, with both movies, I really didn't care for the lead girls.
Agreed. As for the girls I think Daisy did better with shit material but Felicity was barely noticeable in this.
 
Jyn's relationship with her father was represented by the cuddle doll
which suggests they lived on the lap of luxury with the Imperials
. Saw
wasn't a soldier, he was a butcher
. We see his effects on Jyn by how closed and afraid of authority she is
{escaping the prison break)
. Cassian already threw his guts out a Jyn, and by the state of the Rebellion in the movie, it wasn't pretty. The ending is just two spent bodies catching up to their minds, there's not supposed to be any more emotional effect than that. Considering all that's happened, and what's about to take place, wouldn't you feel exhausted?

The doll only represents that they lived in the lap of luxury, and funnily enough, it's also barely seen, so I guess it does represent her relationship with her father. Also, I think Saw was a soldier; I didn't remember seeing him preparing cuts of meat at any point in the movie, so I'm going to stick with him being a soldier. That detail you mentioned with her backstory and distrust of authority is a good way to show parts of a character, just like having someone interact with disdain to another character.

The problem is, those details are good for giving information and suggesting backstory, not building an emotional connection to the audience, which is what Rogue One fails at. I probably would have accepted and maybe even liked those details in another movie where we didn't know the outcome of the story, but since we already know the Rebels will get the Death Star plans, it makes it so that the characters and their relationships are what drive the audience's investment in the story. I remember hearing before the film came out about how Jyn's relationship with her father was to be the emotional core of the movie, but to build that emotion, you need to see those characters interact. I swear, Jyn and her father aren't even together for 5 minutes in Rogue One. If they wanted to be invested in it, you have to put in effort and SHOW the relationship; show what their life was like before the imperials came into it (After getting the scene with her father and Krennic drinking, I thought they were going to intersperse more flashbacks of her childhood life, which would have fleshed out the relationship and made it better, but no, that was the only one). The film wanted to have these big emotional moments, but didn't want to put in the effort and get the audience invested in the characters. The entire film felt like it wanted to have its cake and eat it too in so many ways (let's make it different, but also throw in tons of OT fanservice whether it makes sense or not; being another one).

There was a scene showing her as a smaller child while her father still worked for the empire and him coming to her and saying "I'll always protect you"

I liked that, and wanted to see more scenes like those ones. I thought they were planning on putting more of them in as the story went on, so that by the time you met Galen, you would have a good picture of their relationship. But it ended up being the only one; more flashbacks like that would have gotten the audience to care more about those characters and whether or not they'd make it out alive.
 
Help me understand why Chirrut and Blaze were needed? I liked them, but as one poster said, they only ever "bounce off" each other. There's very limited interaction amongst all the characters, which is something TFA did mostly well (with Poe being a notable exception - side note: I hope he has a lot more exposure in Episode VIII).

Everyone's personalities weren't on full display, which is so unfortunate. The Star Wars universe is pretty ho-hum without the characters taking center stage, no matter how "iterative" they may be. Luke as the young, whiny farmhand, Ben as the sagacious exile, Han the irreverent smuggler...by themselves, they don't break any new ground in terms of their roles. It's just that they all seem to just "click" whenever they banter, argue, and interact, which is what makes the universe that much more entertaining to me.

Absolutely loved the movie when I saw it in the theater, I just wished that they added more layers beyond the interesting story beats (
like Bodhi reeling in horror at Saw's breathing, Cassian mercilessly killing that dude in the beginning, etc.
) There's a lot the movie gets right, but just like
Chirrut's faith in the force
, it's not enough to save it.
 
So you wanted a six hour movie to see how a father and daughter relationship developes? A young girl loses her dad at a young age and spends the rest of her life looking for him, what else did you wanted to see?
But she wasn't looking for him for the rest of her life. By the time she's found by the Rebels, she assumes he's dead because "it's easier."

The movie is missing a lot of beats to really sell the arcs it's proposing. For one, the video she found should have come back into play. Maybe it was scrambled upon first viewing, her father dies, and then she manages to see the complete video to cement her motivation. Or give her and Bohdi some time to talk, let him describe for her what her father was like to give her something to connect to.

The same goes for the rest of the crew. When Baze begins reciting the prayer after Chirrut's death, was that a conflict or something? Maybe the grief of losing their home caused a rift where he slams his friend's faith, but in the end, he carries it on.

There's nothing about the movie I would call bad by any means. It's a good movie, but the thing that holds it back from greatness are the character beats.
 
Or nitpick fucking every big release of the year because nothing can ever be good enough.

Thank you. This idea that every mainstream movie is garbage gets tiring. I sometimes wonder if some of these folks actually believe this, or if they just echo what others say so they can fit in with all the other "edgy" people.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top Bottom