Much better than The Force Awakens.

Rating: 8/10 (2 January 2017)

Mild Spoilers!
First off, I was very disappointed with The Force Awakens. I mean very very disappointed. Other than the fact that its plot is an obvious rip off of A New Hope, the nonchalant destruction of the bigger badder Death Star (Starkiller Base) is what especially killed it for me. I was so completely disappointed with The Force Awakens that I held off watching Rogue One. The fact that this movie is also centered around a Death Star (albeit the original) further made me unsure about seeing this movie.
In the end I did see it and was not disappointed. In fact, It might be the best overall Star Wars movie in my opinion. In a New Hope, we knew that people had died to get the Death Star plans. Although a scant detail, it added weight to the Death Star's ultimate demise. We also saw the effort princess Leia and the others went through to get the information to the rebel base and the near impossible shot Luke needed to take to make it all work. In Rogue One we actually got to see all the bloodshed needed to get those plans. As a result A New Hope looks better but The Force Awakens looks even stupider. That ten second meeting where they figure out how to completely destroy Starkiller Base with some explosives, shortly after learning about its existence, feels almost insulting. Whereas Luke's miraculous shot is all the more fulfilling.
Because Rogue One is a prequel mostly absent of the usual main characters, the characters did not have the usual plot armor. As such there are a lot of character deaths which adds a certain realism to this movie. This felt like an actual war. The visuals were all very nice and there were no glaring plot holes that I noticed or couldn't readily accept. Dark Vader's scenes where all great. We even got Imperial Walkers which I love for some weird reason!
The humor was mostly great. I'd say the probability that you'll also find the humor to be great is very high. There was plenty of action of course. Perhaps more then any other film, and the end ties in nicely with the beginning of a New Hope. And I just love those wacky white helmets!
A great movie overall. I definitely recommend it.