Star Wars: Rogue One *spoilers from post 1195*

david75

But Vaders in it. There's a family connection too. That's an odd take on it. I for one am glad we'll finally have a film free of Jedi and lightsabers. Vader gets a pass if he goes full on killing machine

Sad Professor

Legacy and moral choice are fundamental themes of Star Wars. Characters living in the shadows of decisions made by their parents and/or the previous generation and struggling to make different choices. While characters don't necessarily have to be biologically related to explore these themes (Rian Johnson, take note!), dramatically it's easier if they are. I certainly I don't want a retread of the Luke/Vader conflict, but based on the trailer I don't think that's the case here.

Tony EH

Doc2311 wrote: »

Watched the trailer a few times. It looks class for sure. Love seeing Vader coming out of the mist looking all business like 😆 favourite shot was the massive statue of a Jedi Knight on its side on the ground.

I saw a lot of comments on YouTube from people hoping this will be better than Force Awakens. I was surprised by this. I really thought it was a great film. Fair enough it plagurised a bit of Episode IV but i still enjoyed it regardless.

I think the fog has lifted from a lot of people's eye regarding 'The Force Awakens'. While it's an ok film, it really leaves an awful lot to be desired.

'Rogue One' looks to be a better picture and has a screenplay based on its own terms, without being a beat for beat repeat of anything before it, so it makes sense that people are hoping/expecting it to be a better film.

Tony EH

Sad Professor wrote: »

Legacy and moral choice are fundamental themes of Star Wars. Characters living in the shadows of decisions made by their parents and/or the previous generation and struggling to make different choices. While characters don't necessarily have to be biologically related to explore these themes (Rian Johnson, take note!), dramatically it's easier if they are. I certainly I don't want a retread of the Luke/Vader conflict, but based on the trailer I don't think that's the case here.

They don't have to be the only themes though. That kind riffing gets really tedious.

Star Wars takes place in a universe where any number of things can happen. Sticking to the same tired cliched formulas will become boring.

I'm quietly confident that 'Rogue One' will be good and will do well, giving Disney some chutzpah to go one and produce more one off films based in the same Star Wars universe.

I can seriously do without the adventures of young Han Solo or teenie bopper Boba Fett though, sod that crap. But there are any number of original stories with original characters that can be concocted using the backdrop of the rebellion against the Empire...any number.

It just takes a bit of balls to do it, instead of hiding behind retreads of already made films. If episode VIII turns out to be a shadowy retelling of 'The Empire Strikes Back', then I'll be shot of the series altogether, just like I was done with the awful Star Trek reboot.

The possibilities are there to make great NEW films. The producers just have to go for it.

david75

You don't hire Rian Johnson to write and direct a retread of empire. 8 is very likely to come under fire for being too different from the Star Wars we know and happen outside all our frames of reference for what we think Star Wars is. People like yourself (and you're in a very large group calling for that) will be delighted I think. It's the hardcore SW fans and maybe joe public casual fans are gonna revolt.

Brief_Lives

someones gonna lose an arm and someone knows finds out who the father is... I speculate, by the way.. Just thinking Episode VII mimicked Episode III.

TerrorFirmer

Tony EH wrote: »

I think the fog has lifted from a lot of people's eye regarding 'The Force Awakens'. While it's an ok film, it really leaves an awful lot to be desired.

'Rogue One' looks to be a better picture and has a screenplay based on its own terms, without being a beat for beat repeat of anything before it, so it makes sense that people are hoping/expecting it to be a better film.

The Force Awakens really was a good film, but it wasn't the film a lot of Star Wars fans were hoping for - but I think there was just a huge amount of collective relief as well that they sailed so high over the bar that Lucas set with his prequels, and that made a solid film a spectacular one. For the first time since 1984, we got a good Star Wars film and that went a long way.

I really liked the first trailer for Rogue One - I absolutely love this new trailer. It appears to be what I wanted TFA to be, even just in simple terms of style, direction and design.

Even the new poster is 10x better than that god-awful, amateur photoshop effort that was the first one. I also think the Russian poster is brilliant as well, some interesting international versions around.

Cantona's Collars

Never copped in the trailer that it was a huge Jedi statue buried in the sand.

Slydice

zerks wrote: »

Never copped in the trailer that it was a huge Jedi statue buried in the sand.

Me either. I was totally focused on the ship and only noticed mountains below it.

Only in a youtube review video later and the reviewer pointing it out that I had a OOOhhhhhh moment

Tony EH

TerrorFirmer wrote: »

The Force Awakens really was a good film, but it wasn't the film a lot of Star Wars fans were hoping for - but I think there was just a huge amount of collective relief as well that they sailed so high over the bar that Lucas set with his prequels, and that made a solid film a spectacular one. For the first time since 1984, we got a good Star Wars film and that went a long way.

Couldn't agree more and that's why I think a lot of people gave the film an automatic pass. But, it has a lot of problems - after 4 viewings, Finn's silliness really grates on me now, more so than when I first saw it and the story is just too similar to 'Star Wars' that I just cannot let it go. It's an ok introduction to the new trilogy, but the next two is where the make-or-break time will be.

TerrorFirmer wrote: »

I really liked the first trailer for Rogue One - I absolutely love this new trailer. It appears to be what I wanted TFA to be, even just in simple terms of style, direction and design.

I've liked both, but as I said earlier, some of those lines are cringy - at best (yeh, I know the originals had some duffers too, but that doesn't excuse anything), "Rebellions are built on hope"... :rolleyes:. But, context is everything. That line may work in the actual film. However, the design is spot on, absolutely! It looks like a Star Wars film. I really do have high hopes for it. Higher than Ep VIII to be honest. It looks like the Star Wars film my generation has been waiting for.

TerrorFirmer wrote: »

Even the new poster is 10x better than that god-awful, amateur photoshop effort that was the first one. I also think the Russian poster is brilliant as well, some interesting international versions around.

Again, I find myself in complete agreement.

Unearthly

Have a big concern over the director. Godzilla and Monsters were awful. Trailer looks good though

JustTheOne

Forest whittakers few lines worry me. Very cheesy Hollywood reliable.

Apart from that looks great.

david75

Tony EH wrote: »

Couldn't agree more and that's why I think a lot of people gave the film an automatic pass. But, it has a lot of problems - after 4 viewings, Finn's silliness really grates on me now, more so than when I first saw it and the story is just too similar to 'Star Wars' that I just cannot let it go. It's an ok introduction to the new trilogy, but the next two is where the make-or-break time will be.



I've liked both, but as I said earlier, some of those lines are cringy - at best (yeh, I know the originals had some duffers too, but that doesn't excuse anything), "Rebellions are built on hope"... :rolleyes:. But, context is everything. That line may work in the actual film. However, the design is spot on, absolutely! It looks like a Star Wars film. I really do have high hopes for it. Higher than Ep VIII to be honest. It looks like the Star Wars film my generation has been waiting for.



Again, I find myself in complete agreement.

There's more Star Wars iconography in the latest rogue one trailer than there is in all 3 trailers for force awakens combined. So id say it's depending on nostalgia in its own way as Force awakens did in its own ways. Not a bad thing but it's only avoiding being fully accused of depending on 'Star Wars' by not using identifiable Star Wars music.

david75

You liked the trailer you'll love this. 6 minute supercut trailer from all the trailers an from the sizzle reel shown at celebration. This is epic

https://youtu.be/D26gCL4CpKE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D26gCL4CpKE

Tony EH

david75 wrote: »

There's more Star Wars iconography in the latest rogue one trailer than there is in all 3 trailers for force awakens combined. So id say it's depending on nostalgia in its own way as Force awakens did in its own ways.

Well, that's because it's set in the same time period as the original 'Star Wars'. So, it's certainly not unreasonable to expect the designs to be the same. The exact same. 'Rogue One' literally ends where 'Star Wars' begins. It makes perfect sense.

'The Force Awakens', however, takes place decades after and rehashes largely the same designs, from TIE fighters, X Wings and even the Death Star (plus exploitable weakness), despite the fact that the First Order is a different entity than that of the Empire.

The clone element of 'The Force Awakens' comes across as simply cowardly. Afraid to take its own steps for fear of losing a few quid. Sure, a couple of decades isn't a crazy amount of time, but putting some effort into creating a new design landscape rather than simply painting a few TIE fighters black/white and rehashing the Death Star wouldn't have gone amiss.

david75

Yeah but did anyone like any of the design language used in any of the prequels? Nobody did. It all looked crap from the battle droids to the ships to the costumes. All made worse by the CG it was rendered in.

It's also.a huge story beat people seem to have missed. The resistance exists on a shoestring and is a project lead by Leia to find Luke. It doesn't have resources nor the full support of the republic, only support in name. So old ships falling apart and old gear. You see when he gets caught Poe looking around the Star destroyer hangar amazed at what the first order have and seeing first hand what they're up against. This is all explained in some making of doco but sure using the same design language from the original trilogy was definitely a concious decision. Had it all been new and different would it have mattered at all? I think you'd hear the complaint be 'it didn't look like starwars'.

It needed to evoke Star Wars as the first big reboot. It would have been insane if them if they had chosen otherwise. Same is happening here in this one.

david75

My mate saw the trailer and saw the Jedi statue straight away in the sand. His take away from it 'another desert planet? Seriously?'

Tony EH

david75 wrote: »

Yeah but did anyone like any of the design language used in any of the prequels? Nobody did. It all looked crap from the battle droids to the ships to the costumes. All made worse by the CG it was rendered in.

But, at least, there were efforts to design new material. Don't get me wrong, they were largely forgettable and some were downright awful, like that super shiny silver thing and I agree the CG was an incredible weak point (like it is in a few instances in 'The Force Awakens', it has to be said). But, episode VII is just a lick of paint. It was a bit disappointing, especially for a series that's rightly proud of its designs.

david75 wrote: »

It's also.a huge story beat people seem to have missed. The resistance exists on a shoestring and is a project lead by Leia to find Luke. It doesn't have resources nor the full support of the republic, only support in name. So old ships falling apart and old gear.

That kind of bugs me about 'The Force Awakens' as well, I have to say. This whole "resistance" business. What the hell are they "resisting"? Leia and her crew won the fight against the Empire. They were the ascendant power in the galaxy. They weren't on a shoestring budget. If anything, it should have been the First Order that were the resistance against the new galactic Republic. But, I get the feeling that the producers may have felt that that would have been too "complex" for the audience and simply retreated back to the original template from 1977 but just changed the R word slightly.

Funny enough, Red Letter Media did a Plinkett thing for 'The Force Awakens' and Mike Stoklasa outlined a much better plot synopsis for ep VII, that made far more sense that the one we got. It involves the Republic building the new Death Star thingy to guard against and future fledgling enemy and the Resistance, in the form of the First Order getting control of it. That alone makes for a more sensible scenario right there.

david75 wrote: »

You see when he gets caught Poe looking around the Star destroyer hangar amazed at what the first order have and seeing first hand what they're up against. This is all explained in some making of doco but sure using the same design language from the original trilogy was definitely a concious decision. Had it all been new and different would it have mattered at all? I think you'd hear the complaint be 'it didn't look like starwars'.

Again though, I have to ask, what the hell were the Republic doing while the First Order was building this massive amount of gear? Including nouveaux Death Star? Nobody noticed that?

A bit of "new and different" would have been good no? You probably would have had people complaining about it "not looking like Star Wars", but did it have to be almost exactly the same?

Anyway, we'll see what they do next. They have their audience (IMO that was never in any question), so they have licence to take a few real chances in the next couple of episodes. I think Disney's bigger worries should be how people are going to react to their Han Solo film. I think there's a real possibility that fans will react badly to that.

Burgo

Tony EH wrote: »

Couldn't agree more and that's why I think a lot of people gave the film an automatic pass. But, it has a lot of problems - after 4 viewings, Finn's silliness really grates on me now, more so than when I first saw it and the story is just too similar to 'Star Wars' that I just cannot let it go. It's an ok introduction to the new trilogy, but the next two is where the make-or-break time will be.

Yeah watched it again with my boy again, and finn in particular really grated on me. The comedy just seems so shoved down your throat.
It was a very conservative film, but it payed off for Disney playing it safe a million times over. But I do hope they take a few chances with the next two.
It really doesn't hold up well on multiple viewings.

I've liked both, but as I said earlier, some of those lines are cringy - at best (yeh, I know the originals had some duffers too, but that doesn't excuse anything), "Rebellions are built on hope"... :rolleyes:. But, context is everything. That line may work in the actual film. However, the design is spot on, absolutely! It looks like a Star Wars film. I really do have high hopes for it. Higher than Ep VIII to be honest. It looks like the Star Wars film my generation has been waiting for.

Yeah Jyns dialogue in particular from the trailers in incredibly cringeworthy.
Hopefully it actually is better in film than in trailer.

Roar

Kylo Ren reacts to the latest trailer

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9pEHQhIlyDw

david75

Tony EH wrote: »

david75 wrote: »

Yeah but did anyone like any of the design language used in any of the prequels? Nobody did. It all looked crap from the battle droids to the ships to the costumes. All made worse by the CG it was rendered in.

But, at least, there were efforts to design new material. Don't get me wrong, they were largely forgettable and some were downright awful, like that super shiny silver thing and I agree the CG was an incredible weak point (like it is in a few instances in 'The Force Awakens', it has to be said). But, episode VII is just a lick of paint. It was a bit disappointing, especially for a series that's rightly proud of its designs.

david75 wrote: »

It's also.a huge story beat people seem to have missed. The resistance exists on a shoestring and is a project lead by Leia to find Luke. It doesn't have resources nor the full support of the republic, only support in name. So old ships falling apart and old gear.

That kind of bugs me about 'The Force Awakens' as well, I have to say. This whole "resistance" business. What the hell are they "resisting"? Leia and her crew won the fight against the Empire. They were the ascendant power in the galaxy. They weren't on a shoestring budget. If anything, it should have been the First Order that were the resistance against the new galactic Republic. But, I get the feeling that the producers may have felt that that would have been too "complex" for the audience and simply retreated back to the original template from 1977 but just changed the R word slightly.

Funny enough, Red Letter Media did a Plinkett thing for 'The Force Awakens' and Mike Stoklasa outlined a much better plot synopsis for ep VII, that made far more sense that the one we got. It involves the Republic building the new Death Star thingy to guard against and future fledgling enemy and the Resistance, in the form of the First Order getting control of it. That alone makes for a more sensible scenario right there.

david75 wrote: »

You see when he gets caught Poe looking around the Star destroyer hangar amazed at what the first order have and seeing first hand what they're up against. This is all explained in some making of doco but sure using the same design language from the original trilogy was definitely a concious decision. Had it all been new and different would it have mattered at all? I think you'd hear the complaint be 'it didn't look like starwars'.

Again though, I have to ask, what the hell were the Republic doing while the First Order was building this massive amount of gear? Including nouveaux Death Star? Nobody noticed that?

A bit of "new and different" would have been good no? You probably would have had people complaining about it "not looking like Star Wars", but did it have to be almost exactly the same?

Anyway, we'll see what they do next. They have their audience (IMO that was never in any question), so they have licence to take a few real chances in the next couple of episodes. I think Disney's bigger worries should be how people are going to react to their Han Solo film. I think there's a real possibility that fans will react badly to that.

You're gonna see all of this fleshed out in 8. Theres loads of backstory in the new books about it and it is that there's a peace accord between the republic and first order. Leia knows they're lying and arming up and building starkiller base. She gets accused of being hysterical and is constructively ran out of the republic as a rabble rouser. But HSE has the intel and it's true. She also knows Ben is leading the first order and that's why she's desperate to find Luke. You're gonna see a lot of political exposition in 8 or so the theories go.

Cantona's Collars

The Force Awakens is on Sky atm,only noticed now that Rey has a handmade doll dressed in the original X-Wing pilot colours.It's on a shelf beside where she marks off the days in her hut.

Tony EH

david75 wrote: »

You're gonna see all of this fleshed out in 8. Theres loads of backstory in the new books about it and it is that there's a peace accord between the republic and first order. Leia knows they're lying and arming up and building starkiller base. She gets accused of being hysterical and is constructively ran out of the republic as a rabble rouser. But HSE has the intel and it's true. She also knows Ben is leading the first order and that's why she's desperate to find Luke. You're gonna see a lot of political exposition in 8 or so the theories go.

It would want to be fleshed out in VIII, as you say, because none of that was in VII - which in my mind is a terrible omission and would have gone some way to explaining exactly what each side was about. Instead, we got Rebellion lite and Empire lite. Having it in a book is no good. It needs to be on the screen. 90% of the audience don't and won't read the books. A huge % don't read any book at all.

That political background inclusion may have happened if 'The Force Awakens' wasn't just a retelling of George Lucas' 1976 script, with a few changes here and there. I get the feeling though, that Disney were eager to shy away from the politics as some people constantly go on about trade disputes in the prequels.

If what you're saying is correct David, then that back story is welcome. But it should have been in VII. As it stands, we have no idea why Leia is doing what she's doing. We have no idea what the First Order is about, or what it wants. Even in 1977's 'Star Wars', the political situation was made clear in a few lines in the Death Star. We knew both sides were fighting to bring their version of control to the galaxy. In 'The Force Awakens', we get none of that. It feels like Leia and her Rebels are still just fighting for the LOLs and that the First Order are beavering away on a super weapon and nobody really minded, until they blew up a few planets full of people nobody knew or cared about, because they only saw them as they got blown up.

Jan_de_Bakker

Nice trailers, visually this looks fantastic, Vader - blink and you miss him!

david75

Tony EH wrote: »

It would want to be fleshed out in VIII, as you say, because none of that was in VII - which in my mind is a terrible omission and would have gone some way to explaining exactly what each side was about. Instead, we got Rebellion lite and Empire lite. Having it in a book is no good. It needs to be on the screen. 90% of the audience don't and won't read the books. A huge % don't read any book at all.

That political background inclusion may have happened if 'The Force Awakens' wasn't just a retelling of George Lucas' 1976 script, with a few changes here and there. I get the feeling though, that Disney were eager to shy away from the politics as some people constantly go on about trade disputes in the prequels.

If what you're saying is correct David, then that back story is welcome. But it should have been in VII. As it stands, we have no idea why Leia is doing what she's doing. We have no idea what the First Order is about, or what it wants. Even in 1977's 'Star Wars', the political situation was made clear in a few lines in the Death Star. We knew both sides were fighting to bring their version of control to the galaxy. In 'The Force Awakens', we get none of that. It feels like Leia and her Rebels are still just fighting for the LOLs and that the First Order are beavering away on a super weapon and nobody really minded, until they blew up a few planets full of people nobody knew or cared about, because they only saw them as they got blown up.

Do you not see why it wasn't though? The prequels were bogged down in politics and trade disputes and taxation. They were never gonna put even a touch of that in FA. They actually shot scenes of Leia sending an envoy to beg the chancellor of the new republic for help as they as proof the first order had a new super weapon but it was cut out. They're the ones you see standing on the balcony as the starkillers blast fills their sky. It just didn't fit.

You will see more political exposition in 8 and a lot of it. They have to find a balance though so it's not overbearing or boring.

david75

Listening to a podcast and an interview with a guy called Anthony bresnikan from EW who has been covering R1 since day one and hes interviewed Kathleen Kennedy and Gareth Edwards and others both on and off the record and he's saying the film had huge problems as it had no emotion and that's why Tony Gilroy was brought in and the reshoots happened. Gareth is an amazing visual director but apparently not an actors director at all.


put that report side by side with the cheesy / OTT dialogue we've seen thus far and yeah it's cause to worry.

Wedwood

I think they got TFA just right. They didnt bog the audience down with exposition politics, they just went straight for what people wanted - Tie Fighters, X Wings, Millennium Falcon, Han Solo and simple story about good guys v bad guys.

TFA gives enough hints about how the First Order came into being, You dont need the first hour of the movie taken up explaining how the previous 30 years unfolded. You get what you need to know - Luke made a bags of his Jedi school and the Empire (sorry First Order) want their Empire back.

Same goes for Rogue One - no politics, just a good adventure story. I'm hoping this is Star Wars' answer to Where Eagles Dare !!!

david75

Wedwood wrote: »

I think they got TFA just right. They didnt bog the audience down with exposition politics, they just went straight for what people wanted - Tie Fighters, X Wings, Millennium Falcon, Han Solo and simple story about good guys v bad guys.

TFA gives enough hints about how the First Order came into being, You dont need the first hour of the movie taken up explaining how the previous 30 years unfolded. You get what you need to know - Luke made a bags of his Jedi school and the Empire (sorry First Order) want their Empire back.

Same goes for Rogue One - no politics, just a good adventure story. I'm hoping this is Star Wars' answer to Where Eagles Dare !!!

Couldn't agree more. They pulled off the impossible catching that lightning in a bottle again. It had the Star Wars magic. And even further you can watch force awakens never having seen the original trilogy and still love it. A great many people had that exact experience.

Tony EH

david75 wrote: »

Do you not see why it wasn't though? The prequels were bogged down in politics and trade disputes and taxation. They were never gonna put even a touch of that in FA.

Yes, that's what I said

Tony EH wrote: »

I get the feeling though, that Disney were eager to shy away from the politics as some people constantly go on about trade disputes in the prequels.

However, the political situation could easily have been summed up in a few scenes in 'The Force Awakens' quite easily, like it was in 'Star Wars'. It's not difficult and would have fleshed out the scenario nicely, without the need to wait around for the next film to understand what the hell is going on.

david75 wrote: »

They actually shot scenes of Leia sending an envoy to beg the chancellor of the new republic for help as they as proof the first order had a new super weapon but it was cut out. They're the ones you see standing on the balcony as the starkillers blast fills their sky. It just didn't fit.

Then that was a bad cut to make and directly leading to the why the fuck should I care about these people as they get blown to pieces from a hyper space laser.

SnakePlissken

Tony EH wrote: »

Yes, that's what I said



However, the political situation could easily have been summed up in a few scenes in 'The Force Awakens' quite easily, like it was in 'Star Wars'. It's not difficult and would have fleshed out the scenario nicely, without the need to wait around for the next film to understand what the hell is going on.



Then that was a bad cut to make and directly leading to the why the fuck should I care about these people as they get blown to pieces from a hyper space laser.

The Force Awakens has grossed over 2 billion.. But I'm sure the film-makers will be devastated that their cut wasn't to your standards

As for Rogue One, though in my opinion this latest trailer is a vast improvement on the first, I still can't quite get over my dislike for the director's past output, there's some striking shots on display and the production design certainly looks well considered, I just hope there's some emotion and genuine characterisations to pull it all together.