Another year, another Star Wars movie. This is something to be expected every year for decades to come, most likely. Disney's four billion dollar acquisition of Lucasfilm seems to be one of the biggest coups in the history of the entertainment industry and will be the gift that keeps on giving for the foreseeable future. Disney CEO Robert Iger pulled off purchases of Pixar and Marvel at prices that now look like robberies. Last year's The Force Awakens has already surpassed five billion dollars in just merchandise, not accounting for the film's massive gross. Making FOUR billion dollars look like chump change after one movie is monumental. Financially speaking, Star Wars is probably the single most profitable entity in all of film and that won't change anytime soon. However, drowning in wads of cash hasn't exactly propelled the franchise forward creatively. The space opera's "new" direction still draws upon fervorous nosetalgia from its loyal fan base to draw in new fans. The Force Awakens is in many ways a carbon copy of the original Star Wars, and Rogue One's plot circles back to the times leading up the the film that started it all. The prequel ties up loose ends and introduces a disposable cast of renegades who are barely fleshed out and very poorly realized.
Rogue One is a visually stunning movie that dwarfs the CGI heavy, messy look of George Lucas' disastrous prequel trilogy in every way. It stacks up a ways below the franchise's original films, but is more than a notch above the trilogy that nearly emasculated one of cinema's most iconic villains by portraying him as a whiny, useless dweeb with some of the worst lines ever written. Gone are the days of Hayden Christiansen's cringe worthy interpretation of what Darth Vader was in his formative years, but characters are still the major issue here. Rogue One follows Jyn Erso, played by Felicity Jones, as she and a team of fellow rebels go on a suicide mission to steal the plans to the Death Star, which her estranged father designed. She is flanked by Riz Ahmed, Diego Luna, and Donnie Yen as the scrappy group of under-developed characters attempting the daring mission, and succeeding as we all know. The beauty of prequels is that we already know how it all plays out, so the least they could do is craft a compelling narrative and take risks, maybe even put an interesting spin on past events. Rogue One does that, stretching a simple concept into a decent script that deserves a movie and only adds to the Star Wars lore in a positive way. However, this movie could have been much better, and probably should have been.
Every single one of these characters is so poorly realized that caring for them becomes difficult. We as audience members are supposed to really feel their pain and joy, to relate to their struggle, or at the very least find them compelling. This isn't the case, as limited back stories and non-existent chemistry between all of the leads prevents the audience from truly latching onto anyone. These characters are unfortunately all forgettable and the movie almost feels this way as well. If not for the entertaining and suitably over the top performance by Ben Mendelsohn as an Imperial general/admiral/villain guy, or the brief but glorious screentime of Darth Vader, this movie would truly have no human connection to it's audience. Awesome effects and some well designed action set pieces are where Rogue One really excels. It feels like a real war movie that shows the nastiness and ugliness of war and what it brings out of people, even the "good guys". Its darker tone and commitment to self seriousness actually work in making Rogue One really feel like a high stakes drama at times with real consequences for our heroes, only our heroes aren't nearly interesting enough to make it captivating.
The best character in the history of the saga is relegated to cameo duty in what could have been another starring act. Darth Vader is perhaps the most versatile character that Star Wars has in its treasure trove of narrative paths and opportunities, as long as James Earl Jones' hauntingly awesome voice is available to echo across pop culture. A masked character who has been played by numerous actors over the decades should age well and be used as much as possible given the ease at which he can be incorporated without sacrificing narrative continuity. Even Peter Cushing's less iconic Grand Moff Tarken was thrown into the film using motion capture and CGI to compensate for the fact that the actor died over twenty years ago. Rogue One sort of fluffed the little things and blew chances to be much better. The film's ending is near perfect but that can't make up for the characters' lack of development and ability to coax empathy out of the audience.
C+