Rogue One: A Star Wars Story

Experimentation can often lead to powerfully triumphant results that no one expected to occur from the outset, while also leading towards results blowing up entirely in your face. All the effort in the world can’t prepare for those truly daring experiments, so sometimes you have to luck your to the end. That is what Rogue One: A Star Wars Story feels like on the whole. Something that took risks, gambled with a franchise bigger than sliced bread, and flew haphazardly by the seat of its pants towards an end result that is somewhat like an elegantly-crafted fork folded in on itself: beautiful to look at and appreciate, but with an ultimately wrong-ended point.

Rogue One takes place in the days leading up to the events of the original Star Wars film, A New Hope. A ragtag team of rebel spies and commandos band together to locate and steal the plans for the Empire’s newest, and painfully un-focus tested, superweapon: the Death Star. It’s an adventure that will span the underbelly of the Galaxy Far, Far Away and will have our new heroes test the limits of their morality, daring, and willingness to die for a desperate cause.

On the whole, director Gareth Edwards’s entry into the franchise hits all the beats any fan of the franchise wants hit. There are lots of little and large callbacks and connections to the original trilogy and the wider universe, every new concept and idea introduced adds to the franchise tapestry without taking any of it away, and there’s blue milk. Because there should always be blue milk. Sometimes this does become uncomfortable, such as when they begin to puppeteer the computer-generated corpse of Peter Cushing around like a dead rat marionette theater, but on the whole it’s all unobtrusive.

The central cast does its part to bring new dimension to this universe, but not that much depth. While a good sense of each character is gained, there isn’t enough time given to any one character to make them a truly fleshed-out individual. Each one does bring his or her own new concept to the table; like the morally-bankrupt rebel spy, the semi-Force sensitive martial artist, or even the put-upon Imperial middle manager, but not much is done to bring these roles to their full potential. We’re left with archetypes that have faint shadows of individuality.

The climax is therefore left lacking a strong emotional punch when your entire main cast consists of strangers you hardly know. But other than that, the final half of Rogue One, compared the first half’s slow burn, is phenomenal. Epic space battles and heated ground combat that rivals any other kind of combat in the genre. This climax does what it can to bring as much emotional catharsis as possible, but without those strong character connections, it doesn’t do much more than offer a parade of sensory spectacle. It’s fine, it all works within itself, but for what this story was trying to be I expected a lot more from it. The movie wanted me to care about these people and their plight, but it doesn't do all that much to make me connected to them as people.

Of course none of these pieces, for better or worse, work on their own. There’s so much left unexplained and cut off from view that it can do nothing but confuse anyone not at least somewhat familiar with lazer swords and the aforementioned blue milk. As a deep fan of this universe, Rogue One drifts uneasily between disappointment and mild enjoyment for me. I truly wanted to love this movie, but the execution just left a lot to be desired.

Score: C