Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016)

[von Boom]

As the one person on Earth disappointed in The Force Awakens I don't know why I remain hopeful about this one, but here we are.
I think I might be a Bizarro-Star Wars fan: instead of going around saying "as long as George Lucas isn't involved it will be good" like all the other SW fans, I'm thinking "as long as JJ Abrams is nowhere near it it might actually have some emotional gravy-tass or an identity of its own."

Lightsabre-drop!

[I, Cosh]

From that trailer I have learned that it is impossible to have any Star Wars film without a central father-child relationship. Disappointing.

[Satanist]

Vader had better appear 5 minutes from the end and fuck them all up. That's all I want from him.

Quite looking forward to this.

Young Han Solo, not so much.

[dweezil2]

Speculative spoiler ahead:

I've got a feeling that Jyn Erso's [spoiler]Dad deliberately creates the inbuilt flaw in the Death Star that leads to its eventual destruction.[/spoiler]

[Spikes]

As the one person on Earth disappointed in The Force Awakens I don't know why I remain hopeful about this one, but here we are.

I like the look of those Black Stormtroopers. They look cool. 
Not as cool as a Sandtrooper, but then nowt is cooler than a Sandtrooper.



The rest? I'll imagine I'll find that it's a load of shite....

[Frank]

.
Star Wars 8* should mean fun larks that appeal to small kids and their middle aged dads, but because fantasy films have to make a billion quid, they've also got to embrace the portentousness and excess enervated millennials expect.

You can treat Star Wars with the same dramatic tone as contemporary event movies like Transformers or Batman v Superman, but that's as meaningless as lacquering the stormtroopers blue, red, and green, like the Daleks in the Dr Who film.

Hopefully Netflix/Amazon/whatever will start stealing franchises from cinematic release in the way they're hoovering up niche telly formats, and Star Wars can stop worrying about catering for audiences who don't really like Star Wars.


* Eighth films in series include Hallowe'en Resurrection (the web-cam one with Busta Rhymes), Jason Takes Manhattan, one of those Sherlock Holmes films where he's in WWII, and a Tarzan film that's set in the desert instead of the jungle. There are now more films in the Star Wars series than there were Police Academy movies

[SIP]

I trust love star wars, have done since the day I first saw it, and I'm really looking forward to this.

[Goaty]

You're welcome

[Tiplodocus]

From that trailer I have learned that it is impossible to have any Star Wars film without a central father-child relationship. Disappointing.

Wait? What? You'rYou're disappointed that it doesn't  have a theme that is consistent with the other movies? I liked the way that they brought this relationship up front and centre (I.e. not kept as a twist).

[Michael Knight]

Professor Bear mate you not alone i was disappointed with 'The Force Awakens' too. I did feel a bit of a heretic saying this at the time though. We seem to be in minority on this 

[NapalmKev]

Professor Bear mate you not alone i was disappointed with 'The Force Awakens' too. I did feel a bit of a heretic saying this at the time though. We seem to be in minority on this 

I'm not a big fan of The Force Awakens (as I've said before). I don't hate the film, it has its moments; but I stand by my assertion that The Phantom Menace (for all of its faults) is a better Star Wars film!

Jar Jar Binks can Fuck Off, though!

Cheers

[SIP]

Hmmmmm, the phantom menace. I think that's as bad as a star wars film gets. Qui gonn and sidious  (maul at a push) being it's only real redeeming features. Force awakens has many problems, but nowhere near as many as the turgid phantom menace.

[IAMTHESYSTEM]

There's a a give away line in the trailer about how 'hope' makes '10 men feel like a hundred' which is a clever way of getting round how a handful of armed insurgents could out fight a numerically superior enemy, none of whom, despite being trained soldiers can hit a barn door from point blank range. Complete bollocks of course but I'm looking forward to this much more than I did The Force Awakens.

[TordelBack]

Hmmmmm, the phantom menace. I think that's as bad as a star wars film gets. Qui gonn and sidious  (maul at a push) being it's only real redeeming features. Force awakens has many problems, but nowhere near as many as the turgid phantom menace.

There can't be many folk who will defend Phantom Menace to the same degree I am prepared to, but Force Awakens' problems are far milder and quite different to those of that earlier problem child.  My own issues with TFA all stem from its concept as a post-RotJ film (hardly the fault of the film), a major shift in direction late in pre-production or maybe during production, and from what was obviously a particularly savage editing process employed to keep it lean and straightforward.  As a result too much was taken out, and there are annoying gaps in viewer information and character motivation, and a general feel of events taking place in a small, rather simple universe (desert planet, alien-packed bar, secret base, planet-sized superlaser, X-Wings and TIE fighters.. . sigh), which contrasts with the sprawling wonder-filled galaxy we should be seeing. 

What is actually on the screen is fine, especially the likeable characters and solid performances, it's what isn't there that disappoints.
   
I feel the same way about seeing AT-ATs and Death Star so prominently featured in the Rogue One promos (seen it all before - hell, I've personally piloted nearly all the vehicles for whole weeks of my life, and I've stolen the Death Star plans, even met its numerous conflicted designers, half a dozen separate times..), but at least with Rogue One, nostalgia is really the point of the thing: I want novelty from the Sequels, not so bothered getting it in Dark Forces III.

[Professor Bear]

I hated the The Phantom menace when I first saw it and repeat performances haven't really made me love it much more, but I have come to see that it tries in a way that The Force Awakens never does, and for all its callbacks and references to the OT, it never relies on reflected glory and nostalgia to the extent that TFA does.
With hindsight, there is plenty to see there that Lucas has never been given credit for, and TPM tries new things and brings more into the universe it inhabits than it takes away.
For all its faults, it is a sprawling and sumptuous fantasy whose greatest failing wasn't what was onscreen, it was that its audience could never accept that it wasn't the Star Wars they had in their heads.