Star Wars does World War II

Rating: 8/10 (15 December 2016)

Star Wars Roue One. Warning, this review contains spoilers.
It would seem that Disney are looking to release a new Star Wars film every Christmas - maybe alternating between the main storyline and standalone films. Personally, a new Star Wars film every year is fine with me.
I guess the story of obtaining the Death Star plans is a pretty obvious story to tell, but I hope in future that the standalone movies aren't tied quite so closely into the main storyline - the opening scene of A New Hope would be the next scene following the closing scene of Rogue One. From a continuity point of view that's fine, but it does remove almost all the suspense from the story. And Star Wars is a vast universe - there are plenty of stories to be told.
Because we know that no one is getting out alive, it does make for a darker film than any in the original trilogy - darker even than Empire Strikes Back. That's not necessarily a bad thing - it's certainly possible to tell a dark, character driven story and do it well. However, this isn't a character driven story, it's an action film. But hey, this is Star Wars, so that's hardly surprising :)
They could have chosen to make a Cold War style spy thriller, but that doesn't give enough opportunity for dogfighting between X-Wings and TIE fighters, so they have made a war movie instead. In one scene it looks like the Rebel fighters have raided a surplus shop for American GI helmets, and they could easily be a squad of Nick Fury's Howling Commandos in the landing barge approaching the Normandy beaches.
Now, this might sound like I didn't really enjoy it, but that's not the case at all, I had a great time. Yes, it's an out and out action war film, but it's still Star Wars and it's still fun. The dogfighting scenes and the space battles in general are well done and we all like the space battles in Star Wars :) And the digital work for Tarkin and Leia is very good.
It's a fast-paced action film and we all know the ending, but it's done with Star Wars style and it works. But if Disney is going to tell a different Star Wars story every 2nd year, they are going to have to explore new territory.