Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (12/16/16) *SPOILERS*

[jye4ever]

Take a pillow man, that first hour is boooorrrring.

What's boring for you is unicorn rainbow dust for Riddick lol.

 

[TaliBane]

Let's not forget that the pining farmboy killed over 2 million with shot.

A lot of good janitors and cleaning ladies died that day...

Eh, that one's on Mads and his Moondust thumbdrive.

"I'm going to help the Nazis complete an operational nuclear super-bomb, BUT I'll send a message to my daughter about the failsafe I ingeniously built in whilst COMPLETING the project for said Nazis. It didn't occur to me that if I didn't help them in the first place there'd be no need to blow it up."

 

[ZE_501]

[...]

"I'm going to help the Nazis complete an operational nuclear super-bomb, BUT I'll send a message to my daughter about the failsafe I ingeniously built in whilst COMPLETING the project for said Nazis. It didn't occur to me that if I didn't help them in the first place there'd be no need to blow it up."

Star Plot -- since 1977.



Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[The Buffinator]

I was wondering this aspect after roominating on the movie after I saw it. I'll encase it in spoiler tags just in case.

Since we now know that

Spoiler:

the death star was intentionally made with a specific weakness, one which was pretty much un noticed by the Empire during its construction. And in ANH the Rebels attack the DS and find the thermal exhaust port along the trench which we all know blows it up. But we know the exhaust port wasn't the weakness per se, just the means to the end.

Now even then the Empire didn't know that the exhaust port was the critical link to the inherent design weakness. What I wonder is, they had to have been building the second DS, (the one we see in ROTJ) around the time of the first one, the Emprire would still be oblivious to the DESIGN FLAW. I would think that by the time ROTJ rolled around they knew to protect the exhaust port. However, I wonder if by learning to protect the exhaust port, would have had them stumble onto the design weakness? Doesn't seem as if they figured it out because while they didn't use the exhaust port to destroy the second DS, they still blew up the reactor which causes the chain reaction. They just got to in from a different way. Seems like they didn't get the memo, and even in TFA Starkiller base still had some weakness point, as when something got taken out, a cascading chain reaction destroyed it.

Spoiler:

Darth Vader was the only one to survive the original DS's destruction. He was busy trying to reestablish control of his fighter when Luke was firing at the exhaust port, so did he even know that was the ultimate target? Regardless, DS#2's superstructure was incomplete during ROTJ so getting to the main reactor, while still difficult, wasn't as challenging as with the original.

 

[The Buffinator]

I was wondering this aspect after roominating on the movie after I saw it. I'll encase it in spoiler tags just in case.

Since we now know that

Spoiler:

the death star was intentionally made with a specific weakness, one which was pretty much un noticed by the Empire during its construction. And in ANH the Rebels attack the DS and find the thermal exhaust port along the trench which we all know blows it up. But we know the exhaust port wasn't the weakness per se, just the means to the end.

Now even then the Empire didn't know that the exhaust port was the critical link to the inherent design weakness. What I wonder is, they had to have been building the second DS, (the one we see in ROTJ) around the time of the first one, the Emprire would still be oblivious to the DESIGN FLAW. I would think that by the time ROTJ rolled around they knew to protect the exhaust port. However, I wonder if by learning to protect the exhaust port, would have had them stumble onto the design weakness? Doesn't seem as if they figured it out because while they didn't use the exhaust port to destroy the second DS, they still blew up the reactor which causes the chain reaction. They just got to in from a different way. Seems like they didn't get the memo, and even in TFA Starkiller base still had some weakness point, as when something got taken out, a cascading chain reaction destroyed it.

Spoiler:

Darth Vader was the only one to survive the original DS's destruction. He was busy trying to reestablish control of his fighter when Luke was firing at the exhaust port, so did he even know that was the ultimate target? Regardless, DS#2's superstructure was incomplete during ROTJ so getting to the main reactor, while still difficult, wasn't as challenging as with the original.

Spoiler:

I guess it ultimately came down to the Emperor's over-confidence being his weakness, just as Luke said . He leaked the 2nd DS's info so he could set his trap. He should have waited until construction was a bit further along.

 

[TaliBane]

Guys...

1. The title of the thread has "*SPOILERS*" in it (hint: no spoiler tags needed in here.)
2. You're discussing plot points of two movies that are over 30 years old.

 

[jye4ever]

lololololol

 

[ZE_501]

Prolly already posted but RLM's take is dead on.

They make some valid points; but ummm....smug much?

As they touched upon, Star Wars is nothing but tropes all strung together. It's a Catch-22. Fans want Star Wars, but if you replicate it too faithfully, they're pissed. If you deviate, they're pissed. Make new things?

The public keep paying for old things.

The '80s are gone, and ain't none of us going back.

IMO they're overly critical of the action and pacing, and overly focused-on and critical of Tarkin. They occasionally somehow miss their own point when they talk about how the OT is more memorable. Of course it's more memorable.

The best points they make IMO, are those regarding using fewer characters and fleshing them out.

I predict I'm going to get Star Wars fatigue and stop caring as Disney cranks them out. Not enough not to see the films, but you can't sustain romance and anticipation like this.

***I will say this, I agree that the post-modern darkness and ambiguity they injected into the film, was a bold move and I applaud the risk, but my personal inability to place the film due to that darkness and disconnect, aligns with their comment that they could have been more true to the spirit of the originals by creating a caper flick instead of Zero Dark Thirty.

 

[theuzi9mm]

Guys...

1. The title of the thread has "*SPOILERS*" in it (hint: no spoiler tags needed in here.)
2. You're discussing plot points of two movies that are over 30 years old.

I know but with the sudden rise in butt-hurtness even over discussing trailers of movies now it seems, some people are really overreacting to spoiler/discussion. Some people (on other forums I've seen) take it way too extreme, like talking about a movie that's 20yrs old and getting pissed off when a major plot point was discussed. It's tantamount to saying things like Titanic, yeah ship sank, or Ghandi, yeah he dies...or Sixth Sense, he's dead the whole movie....there has to be a statute of limitations because it's just stupid to refrain from speaking on movies that old. I'm not sayng I'm seeing that level of butt-hurtness here, but on other forums I'm on it's pretty rampant, to the point this is the only forum I can discuss movie and TV shows on without the spoiler police....

But while I agree with Khev about it being post opening weekend, I'll still give some stragglers a slight buffer, guess I am in the xmas spirit afterall vs. my usual grinch!

 

[Khev]

For the time being please refrain from posting videos of smug attention seekers. If you want to make a point, just say it yourself.

 

[ZE_501]

Final thoughts on the cognitive dissonance I'm experiencing:

So I don't have kids....but if I did, I couldn't share this with them. I wouldn't want to show them something this dark; I think that's where the film misses.

ANH had a couple of dark moments, notably Owen and Beru's corpses and the destruction of Alderaan, although I don't even remember Alderaan from when I was a little kid in the theatre. ANH was pretty much Flash Gordon.

ESB is commonly seen as super-dark, but it was more like a fairy-tale.

ROTJ was straight-up kid's fare.

The PT are cartoons except for the last act of ROTS when Anakin batters his wife and burns alive (WTF?).

TFA veered into po-mo darkness with Han's death and villagers getting executed, plus genocide(again).

But RO is *bleak*. It's just got a nasty edge.

The heroes eat a blast wave. No one gets out.

As an adult I enjoyed it immensely. Someone here said it was a great sci-fi film. Yes, in the tradition of Frank Herbert. But it's not quite a Star Wars film, no matter how many familiar things are in it.

That's why I don't know where to put it. Great film, wrong tradition.

 

[myc]

They make some valid points; but ummm....smug much?

As they touched upon, Star Wars is nothing but tropes all strung together. It's a Catch-22. Fans want Star Wars, but if you replicate it too faithfully, they're pissed. If you deviate, they're pissed. Make new things?

The public keep paying for old things.

The '80s are gone, and ain't none of us going back.

IMO they're overly critical of the action and pacing, and overly focused-on and critical of Tarkin. They occasionally somehow miss their own point when they talk about how the OT is more memorable. Of course it's more memorable.

The best points they make IMO, are those regarding using fewer characters and fleshing them out.

I predict I'm going to get Star Wars fatigue and stop caring as Disney cranks them out. Not enough not to see the films, but you can't sustain romance and anticipation like this.

***I will say this, I agree that the post-modern darkness and ambiguity they injected into the film, was a bold move and I applaud the risk, but my personal inability to place the film due to that darkness and disconnect, aligns with their comment that they could have been more true to the spirit of the originals by creating a caper flick instead of Zero Dark Thirty.

Those 3 wanna be smart asses ripping things apart that do not need to get ripped apart. Guess, what.. every movie can get ripped apart. If you are a hater you can have your joy with everything. They have some points.. but most of it is just BS from them...

 

[Khev]

how come the guy only had 4 weeks to make the music? what happened?

Last minute reshoots. So we could have gotten a happy ending with Alexandre Desplat's music or the more bleak ending with Michael Giacchino's score. It hasn't been confirmed that all last minute reshoots had to do with the ending but reading snippets from multiple interviews it seems to be that way.

For context John Williams says that he prefers to spend 8-12 weeks scoring a picture but other composers are much faster. Chinatown was released with a last minute replacement score that the composer wrote in 7 days. Hans Zimmer wrote the iconic score for POTC: Curse of the Black Pearl in 2 weeks.

RO doesn't have this instantly memorable theme like Raiders or the SW opening scroll but I specifically remember at several points when ships were zipping around and things were hitting the fan that I went, "this music is awesome!"

 

[Khev]

Those 3 wanna be smart asses ripping things apart that do not need to get ripped apart. Guess, what.. every movie can get ripped apart. If you are a hater you can have your joy with everything. They have some points.. but most of it is just BS from them...

Yep, which is why for the time being I'm not allowing any "crap" from RLM, "40 Things Wrong With...", and all those "hilariously" scathing videos. If those are your thing and you want a laugh then go watch them on YouTube or whatever. Just don't post them here.

 

[ZaCHw117]

No doubt. In the timeline, it should be after his father's death. Maybe the intro can show a little of his childhood, leading up to his father's death, because we need to see what fuels his hatred towards Jedis. Then the bulk of the movie takes place after. I'm with you Zach. Boba needs a movie.

That would be an awesome kick off point as it's right near the beginning of the Clone Wars, someting we didn't get to see much of.

Imagine Clone Wars with RO visuals. Perfect redemption for an era so many fans were eager to see. It could even tie in with why the Empire dropped clones and went with actual humanoids.

What if Boba was hired by the rebels to stop the cloning after the wars? Kamino is his home planet.

 

[Khev]

I didn't think the day would come where someone would make a Star Wars film that I immediately, without reservations, consider a true part of the canon. TFA had its moments but, really, nothing like this.

That's awesome. My daughter and I watched the first 35 minutes of ANH last night and what struck me is that I literally felt like I was watching the continuing story of Rogue One. Everything just fit in to place but with a more somber cloud over the proceedings. I totally could buy that Leia's ship had just left Scarif and that the Vader we had just seen was bearing down on her with relentless ferocity.

His anger at just losing them moments before came across in his tone and violent snapping of Antilles' neck. And after everything that had just happened in RO R2's cargo seemed much, much more precious. When R5 heads toward Luke and R2 is just sitting there I couldn't help but think "nooo, not after all that was done to get those plans, they can't rot on a Sandcrawler!" Gave a whole new dimension to many familiar scenes.

And I found a new tension over Luke being so casual with the droids at his homestead, knowing what the Empire was capable of in their search for the plans. Hell you know that if Tarkin caught word of where they were he would have shown up with the DS and would have just started obliterating all settlements within walking distance of the escape pod crash site, which, the ST's basically did. Every line of dialogue about the plans, spies, etc., just fit totally seamlessly with what Jyn and her team had done just moments before. Really amazing how they managed that.

 

[Khev]

Final thoughts on the cognitive dissonance I'm experiencing:

So I don't have kids....but if I did, I couldn't share this with them. I wouldn't want to show them something this dark; I think that's where the film misses.

ANH had a couple of dark moments, notably Owen and Beru's corpses and the destruction of Alderaan, although I don't even remember Alderaan from when I was a little kid in the theatre. ANH was pretty much Flash Gordon.

ESB is commonly seen as super-dark, but it was more like a fairy-tale.

ROTJ was straight-up kid's fare.

The PT are cartoons except for the last act of ROTS when Anakin batters his wife and burns alive (WTF?).

TFA veered into po-mo darkness with Han's death and villagers getting executed, plus genocide(again).

But RO is *bleak*. It's just got a nasty edge.

The heroes eat a blast wave. No one gets out.

As an adult I enjoyed it immensely. Someone here said it was a great sci-fi film. Yes, in the tradition of Frank Herbert. But it's not quite a Star Wars film, no matter how many familiar things are in it.

That's why I don't know where to put it. Great film, wrong tradition.

Totally fair assessment. I took my 7 year old son and 10 year old daughter and while both my son and I loved it my daughter ranked it last among all 8 films, like you she said it just didn't really feel like a SW movie. And she said that the tension of the final battle caused her literal pain in her stomach. But she still "liked" it, and as I mentioned above when we watched the beginning of ANH afterward she said that "it makes more sense now."

I'm reminded of a famous headline when ESB was released and it was "Star Wars Grows Up." I feel that that has somewhat happened again. ESB made me very uncomfortable in parts when I saw it in the theater as a 6 year old but I only appreciated it more and more over the years and decades and was SO glad that my parents didn't shield me from the darker tone by not allowing me to see it on the big screen.

But your points are still valid, RO *does* fell different, but to me it feels different in a way that I've wanted to see for many, many years. It sounds like it won't always be that way for all films thought. The "Art of Rogue One" book states at the beginning that the "Star Wars Story" films are going to allow various directors to breathe a bit and try new things while the "Saga" films will be more traditional SW. And I love that they're doing that.

 

[a-dev]

That's awesome. My daughter and I watched the first 35 minutes of ANH last night and what struck me is that I literally felt like I was watching the continuing story of Rogue One. Everything just fit in to place but with a more somber cloud over the proceedings. I totally could buy that Leia's ship had just left Scarif and that the Vader we had just seen was bearing down on her with relentless ferocity.

His anger at just losing them moments before came across in his tone and violent snapping of Antilles' neck. And after everything that had just happened in RO R2's cargo seemed much, much more precious. When R5 heads toward Luke and R2 is just sitting there I couldn't help but think "nooo, not after all that was done to get those plans, they can't rot on a Sandcrawler!" Gave a whole new dimension to many familiar scenes.

And I found a new tension over Luke being so casual with the droids at his homestead, knowing what the Empire was capable of in their search for the plans. Hell you know that if Tarkin caught word of where they were he would have shown up with the DS and would have just started obliterating all settlements within walking distance of the escape pod crash site, which, the ST's basically did. Every line of dialogue about the plans, spies, etc., just fit totally seamlessly with what Jyn and her team had done just moments before. Really amazing how they managed that.

For me the only way the PT enhanced the OT was by being so inferior by comparison, but this film enhances them in the way I'd always hoped from the PT - all the stuff you said and probably more besides.

The only thing that's now a little unintentionally funny is Leia trying to deny any knowledge of the stolen plans or having any part in the rebellion. At least Vader doesn't entertain that in the slightest

But your points are still valid, RO *does* fell different, but to me it feels different in a way that I've wanted to see for many, many years. It sounds like it won't always be that way for all films thought. The "Art of Rogue One" book states at the beginning that the "Star Wars Story" films are going to allow various directors to breathe a bit and try new things while the "Saga" films will be more traditional SW. And I love that they're doing that.

Yeah, there's a lot of scope for some more good stuff but equally the potential for more total crap. However, no matter what happens, I feel I've gotten at least one more good Star Wars film here and I don't see how that can be undone.

 

[jye4ever]

That's awesome. My daughter and I watched the first 35 minutes of ANH last night and what struck me is that I literally felt like I was watching the continuing story of Rogue One. Everything just fit in to place but with a more somber cloud over the proceedings. I totally could buy that Leia's ship had just left Scarif and that the Vader we had just seen was bearing down on her with relentless ferocity.

His anger at just losing them moments before came across in his tone and violent snapping of Antilles' neck. And after everything that had just happened in RO R2's cargo seemed much, much more precious. When R5 heads toward Luke and R2 is just sitting there I couldn't help but think "nooo, not after all that was done to get those plans, they can't rot on a Sandcrawler!" Gave a whole new dimension to many familiar scenes.

And I found a new tension over Luke being so casual with the droids at his homestead, knowing what the Empire was capable of in their search for the plans. Hell you know that if Tarkin caught word of where they were he would have shown up with the DS and would have just started obliterating all settlements within walking distance of the escape pod crash site, which, the ST's basically did. Every line of dialogue about the plans, spies, etc., just fit totally seamlessly with what Jyn and her team had done just moments before. Really amazing how they managed that.

Honestly the rebellion needed more smarts, they should've deviced a plan to get Vader on a ship with fake plans rigged to explode.

If that meant sacrificing some rebel lives then oh well, they were already getting slaughtered as it was.

Now, I've been thinking why Vader didn't go nuts on T4 in ANH like he did in RO and I came up with a few reasons.

Going all nuts didn't get him the plans did it, but not for a lack of trying lol, but he was also on his own so he couldn't just take it easy either just standing there, he needed to be aggressive.

Once on the T4 in ANH he had troopers with him which afforded him the opportunity to take a more relaxed approach to murder lol.

 

[Bo Shrek]

I have a young family and don’t get to the theatres that often. When there is a movie that I know I will see, I will not watch/see any trailers, preview’s, reviews images etc. I want to see the movie for the first time……the first time. Many people have months watching trailers to mentally prepare them for what their going to see and just connect the dots to images they are already familiar with. That’s not me. Every detail, every voice, every sound bite is through my first experience. This should not be a surprise I collect Hot Toys so I have “patients” to wait for the movie….

Last night I took my family. I am still digesting this movie. No getting into the detail review of the movie but In the matter of a few hours my OT Trilogy has changed. I can never watch “A New Hope” again the way I had for over 30 years. The OT trilogy no longer exists. We now have a four part movie. Not saying its good or bad, its just now a fact. What I watched last night was new to the SW movie universe in the form of “Stand alone” movies. This will need adjusting too. Many years down the road we will have gotten used to and probably forgotten the ways of “Trilogy SW” movies.

Like “CREED” I felt that this was a story that did not need to be told but knowing that when Disney acquired SW license that they would be telling every story possible so that is something I /we need to get used to.
What I felt watching RO was “Make Money, Make Money, Cash Grab, Cash Grab” which I did not feel with TFA. I also pictured a bunch of Disney executives sitting around a table and asking the question.. “We have this New SW Universe but how do we get the younger audience to watch three very older movies? How can we make them watchable again? Let face it ANH is pretty boring to a new audience”. So to have a New movie that just rolls into ANH was a brilliant idea but a small cost was paid as some of the mystery of ANH beginning sequence is now gone.

I felt that most of the movie was boring from a story POV. I wanted more from the characters. Felicity Jones is not the caliber of Ridley (who was magic on screen). However I am looking to owning this on Blu ray and have a feeling that when many more “Stand Alone” movies are release years down the road and we are adjusted to this new format of SW universe, RO can be looked at and “marvelled” as something magnificent!!