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

[ZE_501]

I think that is a good point. I mean ultimately, most of Star Wars is guilty pleasure, so reviewing these movies on a basis of being a quality movie could be somewhat futile.

I think that between marketing, the internet's weird little worlds, scholarly essays and obsessed fandom, that gets lost. These films are not high art, nor do they need to be. Entertainment can be a forgettable diversion and doesn't *always* need depth.

It's in the best interests of anyone with a financial stake in pop culture properties, to elevate these trivial pursuits and stoke the fires of fandom with pomp and circumstance. If it weren't for the internet I probably wouldn't give Star Wars as much time and thought as I do. It was well in the background of my life for a long time and I expect at some point it will be again.

The ESB might be the one movie that probably is a 'good' movie. It isn't pandering or filled with fan service or dumb action beats. It evolves its characters in complex and unpredictable ways. Their feels like real losses when it happens. The acting is solid. The tone at times feels lighthearted, but there is a current of darkness and dread in the background. The action feels well choreographed, and done in interesting ways.

That's actually a great description of ESB. Kind of a dark fairy tale, especially by the time we get to Dagobah.

Rogue One to me is like an unoriginal war movie. Nothing I haven't seen a dozen times. The problem is the characters are not memorable. So the only thing I am left with is some ships and weapons that look like Star wars. It just is executed so poorly, even if filmed competently and the CGI good.

What stuck with me wasn't the characters, it was the textures, colours and production design. And everything more or less did what it needed to do, which was fine by me.

If it took real chances, or built some strange and driven characters, I would be signing up for it. Without characters, or purpose, or concern or fear, I have no interest in rewatching the movie.

I think it did take a couple of risks, but they were either timed or executed in such a way that we had no deep investment.

Cassian for instance: killing his contact for the greater good was jarring, and established his character and the tone of the film, but we barely knew either of them at that point, so it could only have so much impact.

I also think it was surprising to see *all* of them die. This was a film about Red Shirts. We've seen countless such rebels die in Star Wars, and here they were up close and personal. It's true, I didn't care about them that much, but it's still out of the ordinary for Star Wars. A different script with maybe fewer characters to track, may have had more emotional impact, but we got what we got.

Chances, that is what is needed. Mandalorian started exploring that. But I am worried season 2 will be adding Boba Fett and Tusken Raiders, and we lose the stepping stones of EXPANDING the Universe. Not recycling the same 20 things over and over again.

I agree with you here. I didn't need to see Boba Fett and if I never saw Tatooine again I'd be fine with it:

"Well, if there's a bright center to the universe, you're on the planet that it's farthest from."


What a load of bull****.

It is like in another 5 years we get a new Star Trek movie, and they have Khan as the villain. It is like can we explore other things, or go to a new place? Maybe I am asking too much from corporate popcorn with artifical flavoring, which I agree is probably true as well.

Taking risks by definition means a chance of failure and I think that's part of the reason Lucasfilm and the fandom itself tend to be conservative; and I think I wrote elsewhere on this board that Star Wars isn't a very flexible property. You have Empire vs. Rebellion, Jedi vs. Sith, and you have Scum & Villainy. Stepping too far outside of these eras and tropes tends to divide fandom.

It's a big galaxy but outside of The Great War you have some pretty contentious territory.

 

[ZE_501]

Its true. Somehow Khan has become Kirk's supervillain. If you went by appearance on the show, you'd think that Mudd character was the supervillain.

Great. He'll be played by Joaquin Phoenix in the next reboot.

 

[Wor-Gar]

Great. He'll be played by Joaquin Phoenix in the next reboot.

 

[Khev]

WOW what an improvement on Leia.

 

[rushmore223]

WOW what an improvement on Leia.

Tarkin looks amazing!

If I knew nothing about any of this, and I just watched star wars and Rogue One together for the first time, I'd never know that wasn't Peter Cushing.

Sent from my SM-G960U using Tapatalk

 

[JAWS]

WOW what an improvement on Leia.

This is the type of Special Edition we need

 

[a-dev]

Has Hollywood started using deepfake yet? It does tend to be better than their mo-cap/CGI efforts.

 

[Wor-Gar]

WOW what an improvement on Leia.

That's insane. And scary. The bad things people will do with that tech... and even if no one uses it, there are those who will say bad things and then claim it was deepfaked.

Things will never be the same.

 

[ZE_501]

That's insane. And scary. The bad things people will do with that tech... and even if no one uses it, there are those who will say bad things and then claim it was deepfaked.

Things will never be the same.

The Leia still seemed off on a couple of angles, and I don't recall her being so serene and smile-y in that era.

I imagine posthumous likeness rights and estate management are about to get more complicated up in Hollywood.

 

[Bravomite]

Wow that is scary good, better than the effects used in the movie.

The musical score for Rogue One has really grown on me as well. Especially that reflective bit just before Tarkin gives the order 'to fire when ready'. Looks like I will be preparing my blu-ray player tonight to target Rogue One and play when ready.

 

[chrisstbh]

Dunno if anyone here likes Vinyls but this looks pretty nice

https://mondoshop.com/blogs/news/rogue-one-a-star-wars-story-4xlp-on-sale-info

 

[Khev]

That's really cool!

 

[Dark_Knight_89]

Dunno if anyone here likes Vinyls but this looks pretty nice

https://mondoshop.com/blogs/news/rogue-one-a-star-wars-story-4xlp-on-sale-info

I have an alarm set for 5:55pm UK time on Wednesday so I can hopefully get one of these!

I have quite a few movie soundtrack vinyls from Mondo, the sound quality and production of the sleeves and vinyls themselves is excellent. They also have wonderful artwork. My favourite one I own is this UP score;

 

[Prime Clone]

Cool concept!

 

[Prime Clone]

 

[MeatHookGekko]

Has Hollywood started using deepfake yet? It does tend to be better than their mo-cap/CGI efforts.

Part of the issue is that this is an area of law that is still on shaky ground. But long term, if we are talking the industry, the impact might settle mostly on insurance.

Heath Ledger is an instance. Let's say he was in a different kind of film ( where the plot/narrative in Parnassus didn't have some fantastical elements to provide cover for some soft multiple recastings) but died on the same timeline. That's a huge mess.

The Matrix series, when Gloria Stuart died, they replaced "The Oracle" with Mary Alice and had to write in an explanation. In today's time, maybe they choose to keep the original Oracle around.

Return Of The King, Liv Tyler gained a ton of weight during filming, which was technically a violation of her contract ( i.e. you can't just do something crazy like shave your head or try to climb Everest) , and the storyline had to shift somewhat to basically write out Arwen. That trilogy, the way it was filmed however, was a bit unusual. But the time frame within the actual story and the timeframe IRL of actual filming made it possible to have this problem. This wasn't an issue of how much weight could Tyler gain in a 3 month projected shoot, but over a period much longer. This pretty much ended Tyler, then, as the reigning "It Girl" in Hollywood. It also created enough negative fallout for Bruce Willis, for being cited as the catalyst that triggered Tyler's breakdown, in that it also was partially responsible for tanking his own career. ( He's also a huge POS, so this mess didn't help) In today's time, maybe they just deep fake her a bit.

There is the "uncanny valley" issue. Some stuff moves into human behavior and there are some things that unsettles viewers and you can't really try to manipulate your way around it. For example, the next time you watch an NFL, MLB or NBA game, try to turning off the volume for the entire game. Now you might be able to handle it for a while, but the majority of viewers, it will start to unsettle them a bit. If you know someone is dead but they are on screen in front of you in a current release, then there's no way to rationalize that in the lizard part of your brain.