Saw Rogue One. I was pleased. For most of the movie, it feels like we're getting a Lower Decks look into the Star Wars universe. I appreciate this because it's nice to have a different perspective into an established world. While I'd agree with arguments that much of the heroic cast is fairly sketched-in, I do think there's enough of a start there for you to feel good about rooting for them, especially since they're pointedly not the people that make it into the history books--they're ordinary people who struggle to cling onto fragments of shattered lives while balancing daily survival against doing the right thing, often without any reliable guidance or support from someone in a position of authority. No one of them is going to go down as a classic character, but collectively I think it's a respectable representation of the beleaguered footslogger who helps make history without getting any of the glory for it. Their adversary is also completely appropriate: one of those ambitious gray mediocrities that scurry after dictators begging for scraps--the Eichmanns of the galaxy, only too happy to get force-choked by Vader if only it should mean they retain control over their own tiny scrap of turf. (Forest Whitaker, on the other hand, just breathes crazy, but he's one of those dudes who'd be impressive just reading from a dictionary.) Of course, the real danger is just malevolent architecture as always (justified here, for once: hey, the Empire doesn't want people accessing these files casually!)
So I was happy to see something new come out of a familiar property. This is maybe why the obligatory space battle is the least satisfying part of the film. But the director has an eye for composition, and it was often a rewarding film to look at even when (or especially when) nothing much was going on kinetically. I'd say the music also didn't rely on the past themes pretty much at all (barring end credits), but I may simply not remember any of the musical cues Giacchino used in The Force Awakens.
It was fun. It earned its ending.
CGI Peter Cushing was probably a mistake, though. The effectiveness of this really varies, as it's more or less convincing in different shots, but on the whole I think it constitutes a distraction that was perfectly avoidable. Would it really have been an unforgivable offense to just cast someone living in the same role? I'm pretty sure they also do this with some of the X-wing pilots at the end (duping the A New Hope Death Star assault crew), but it's harder to tell since things are moving faster there. (No Denis Lawson, though.)
First Star Wars movie without Wilhelm Scream?
No Bothans died to bring us this movie.
