If you adored Star Wars: The Force Awakens, you'll probably love this not necessarily a compliment

Rating: 5/10 (27 December 2016)

Watching the trailers, I got the sense of Rogue One gearing up as a grittier, darker film. After the endless " massive space battle clash" feel of much of the rest of the series, I was hoping for a smaller, character intimate project about espionage. Perhaps a work about Bothans being the CIA, MI6 or Special Forces equivalent within the Rebel Alliance. Yep, the odd battle scene, but mostly these scenes as strictly character and story driven, rather than by plot and action.
Well, what were we delivered ? Sadly, you guessed it again, mostly plot and action. More massive space battles (more space dogfights than any Star Wars movie to date, incidentally); more explosions; more pace, over slow build up.
Beneath the surface in Rogue One, there's yet again more of the key issue that plagued Star Wars 7: characters and events, rather than being introduced and explored with respect and feeling, "appear" from nowhere. People thrown like driftwood - from plotted scene to plotted scene. We're supposed to instantly and intensely care them, and their fate. Well, I'm sorry, but if I can't get a rounded sense their histories and context, I can't suddenly force myself magically to care much in the end as to their outcome. Note that a large part of why the best film in the saga – the Empire Strikes Back – is best is because it takes a long, bonding, intimate stretch -examining Luke's fledgling sense of identity and purpose learned from Yoda, and Han and Leia's burgeoning relationship.
Rogue One's at least marginally better than TFA on one character front, but only by a whisker. Jyn Erso gets some nominal backstory/history, and has to work hard at her progress in the film (unlike the credibility stretching "Mary Sue" exploits and appearance of Rey in the TFA). However, aside from Jyn, who else gets a look in? Take for example Donny Yen's blind Force sensitive character, whom I was initially fascinated by. Where did his power originate? Who might he have trained under? How do his abilities tie with the Jedi exactly? But the filmmakers didn't seem to care two sticks about exploring this kind of territory. He ends up finally, as might be expected, as little more than cannon fodder for yet another large scale Empire-Rebel battle.
As said, building a person driven story is not helped if the film insists on jumping location to location, at a breakneck pace – Rogue One revels in this. Just when you're beginning to work out where you are, and what might be going on – bang, they move again! Note it's very telling the filmmakers decided to add captions at the bottom of the screen, that describe which place and planet you are now on. These were never present in the previous episodes - you need them to have a faint stab at where you are next! To justify a five out of ten rating - there are things to appreciate here. The cinematography, special effects and 3D detailing are mostly excellent - probably the best of the saga to date (the only exceptions being the facial recreations of Grand Moff Tarkin and Leia: see below). I was also impressed with the narrative decision that all the major Rebel characters are dead by the end – bold, but gives the story at least something of an attempt at a kind of sad dignity (although as I've said, given how little characters are fleshed out, it's not nearly as sad as you'd hope it might be).
There's also frankly an incredible scene – one of the best of the saga. Vader, in Vader costume, goes into full on Sith mode towards the end, in a way we've only imagined for the last 40 years. It's a truly stunning moment – that sadly only lasts a minute or two.
This again makes the point again about meaningful and memorable characters. Vader - the most memorable character of all in the entire saga - could have done with being in the film a lot more than the three or four minutes present. Tarkin (and Peter Cushing) being recreated digitally, eclipsed Vader's screen time, by some distance. Was he memorable? Yes, but sadly not necessarily for the right reasons. I don't know whether if I had not seen the original Star Wars: A New Hope, whether I would have noticed the digital recreation or not. If you've seen him though in the prior film, you'll see the difference between the digital and the real Cushing. The effect wasn't stunning to me: it's creepy and unsettling, and distracts away from the film. Ditto the young Princess Leia digital recreation.
So why all this plot based, digital action obsessed filmmaking taking place in a saga that once mixed action and character so beautifully? Perhaps because you get the sense that, under the Mouse House, their primary concern is displaying as many new locations and characters as they can squeeze in, in order to sell more toys and merchandise.
It's interesting to me David Fincher – who would be my first choice by a long shot with this kind of movie, if allowed to work without creative interference from Disney - originally declined Star Wars 7 when offered it. My guess now as to why he declined is because he was wisely afraid of exactly what has happened - the franchise being dominated by the Mouse suits, and their intent on lowering Star Wars to the lowest common denominator.
My overall comment then: what a waste of creative and narrative potential - just like Episode 7. For the love of Pete, Disney – tone it down in future: please. Please. We don't need recycled space spectacle every time: we don't need endless action and jump cutting. Stop treating us like we have the attention span of a goldfish, and actually write a quality story - over constant visual effects and space battles filler.