Rewind Back to 2016: “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story”

This month for the Examiner, not only will I be checking out the upcoming movie, “The Mandalorian and Grogu” (which also marks the first time the franchise is on the big screen since 2019), I will also be checking out the three seasons of “The Mandalorian” for the first time for the next few editions! So, since I am already on the topic of the “Star Wars” franchise, I wanted to revisit “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story” for its upcoming 10th anniversary.

“Rogue One” marks the first anthology “Star Wars” film and also serves as a prequel to the iconic 1977 film. Not only did the film gross $1 billion worldwide, it has also received Oscar nominations for Best Sound Mixing and Best Visual Effects, and also spawned a Disney Plus prequel series, “Andor,” for two seasons.

Former scientist Galen Erso lives on a farm with his wife and young daughter, Jyn. His peaceful existence comes crashing down when the evil Orson Krennic takes him away from his beloved family.

Many years later, Galen becomes the Empire’s lead engineer for the most powerful weapon in the galaxy, the Death Star. Knowing that her father holds the key to its destruction, Jyn joins forces with a spy and other resistance fighters to steal the space station’s plans for the Rebel Alliance.

“Rogue One” is a gritty, visually stunning war film that is also one of the best films in the franchise (especially in recent years). This “Star Wars” anthology film has a completely darker tone compared to some of the other films, a final act that’s really incredible and a greater seamless connection to “A New Hope.” Many have also considered “Rogue One” as being the strongest entry of the Disney era (which I do agree 100%).

Even though it’s really rare for a “Star Wars” film to have a darker, somewhat grittier tone, yet the filmmakers really pulled it off. “Rogue One” provides a mature war-like perspective within the “Star Wars” universe. While this entry is a significant departure from the lighter tone of the Skywalker Saga, it does an excellent job adding more emotional depth to the franchise.

One thing I really enjoyed with this anthology film is that the film expands the “Star Wars” universe with a more “lived in” aesthetic that feels true to the original trilogy while also showing new locations. The film also gives a deeper exploration of the Rebel

Alliance as a fractured, sometimes desperate militant group rather than a force.

Now, while most of the visual effects that are featured in this entry look amazing, the only mixed to negative thing I am really thinking of is the CGI recreation of a couple human characters - Tarkin and Princess Leia. Granted the characters are pivotal to the story of “A New Hope” and this film, but at the time, the technology just wasn’t quite capable of recreating characters like today.

Before wrapping up my thoughts of this film, I also have to give a huge shout out to the film’s final act and the iconic Vader hallway scene that is probably some of the best moments in the franchise’s history. The third act (the Battle of Scarif) is intense and emotional as we see the characters sacrificing everything to make sure the plans get to their destination- even if it means sacrificing themselves.

And the Darth Vader hallway scene where Vader takes down a bunch of Rebel soldiers is honestly the biggest stand-out sequence of this entry. In this sequence, we’re able to see the iconic character at his full potential, transforming him from a brooding villain into a heart-stopping terror.

“Rogue One: A Star Wars Story” is widely regarded as a gritty, successful standalone war film that bridges the gap to “A New Hope”, praised for its cinematography, darker tone, and stunning visuals. While lauded for its epic finale, some critics found some of the character development somewhat rushed and the digital resurrection of characters controversial. “Rogue One” is also frequently cited as one of the best Disney-era ‘Star Wars” films, with many praising its emotional, sacrificial ending. 

MPA: Rated PG-13 for extended sequences of sci-fi violence and action   (133 minutes)

Initial release date: December 16, 2016

Streaming services: Disney Plus/ various PVOD platforms

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=frdj1zb9sMY

• Gareth Edwards and his creative team discovered some old film canisters while rummaging around the Lucasfilm warehouses. When he asked what they were, an employee said they were old Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope (1977) footage. The discovery led to the inclusion of unused Episode IV material featuring Red Leader and Gold Leader in this movie.

• R2-D2 and C-3PO have a brief cameo, making Anthony Daniels the only actor to appear in every movie. (He appears as another character in Solo: A Star Wars Story (2018)).

• The studio had only two choices to play Chirrut: Donnie Yen and Jet Li. Yen was approached first because of his salary of $4 million against Li's $10 million. To gauge his interest and as secondary plan, director Gareth Edwards also offered him the other role of Baze. Yen expressed interest in playing Chirrut but was hesitant in accepting it, because it required him to be away in London for five months. However, it was his young son's love of the Star Wars films and comics that wore down his reluctance, and it was his idea to make his character blind.

• The rebel base at Yavin IV features several full-sized cardboard cutouts of X-Wings and Y-Wing fighters, using the same technique of filling out the hangar as in the original Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope (1977).

• Jyn's father, Galen, is modeled after J. Robert Oppenheimer, the father of the atomic bomb. Both men share the same guilt factor of becoming an agent of death for building a weapon of mass destruction.

• Gareth Edwards instructed the art department to only use elements that would have been available in 1977 to get the movie to look contemporary to Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope (1977). The flight control animations, for example, had to be kept as simple as possible, resisting the urge to make them too 'flashy'.

• This film is based on the opening crawl ("It is a period of civil war. Rebel spaceships....") from Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope (1977).

• When Vader is first seen, he is in a Bacta tank like the one that Luke uses in Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980) after being wounded by the Wampa. This is a nod to his (Vader's) history in the extended universe, where it's known that he repeatedly spends extended periods of time in a Bacta tank in hopes that it will repair the damage done to his lungs from the lava on Mustafar, as he despises having to rely on the mask to breathe.