
Fans will likely thrill at the climax, which cuts between Jyn's ticking clock mission and a raging space conflict above. The stakes are high, the tone grim, and the chances of survival are very low. We're repeatedly embedded with characters in lethal battles, ranging from the streets of an Empire-occupied city to the heights of space, alight with gunfire and alive with zipping spaceships.
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Still, I admire the darker tone Edwards strikes with the "Star Wars" series most conventional war movie. And her turn from apathetic loner ("I've never had the luxury of political opinion!") to the Alliance's bravest rebel ("Rebellions are built on hope!") feels unearned, not exhilarating. Oft stern and smirking, Jyn is a bit of a bore. And while Jyn is a physically and mentally "strong female character," she's not a complex or compelling one. But a handful of lines apiece and occasional heroics is not enough to define these characters or deeply engage audience empathy. It helps that Edwards has a cast stacked with charisma, including the wide-eyed Ahmed as a defected Empire pilot, the sultry Diego Luna as Alliance tough guy Cassian Andor, Alan Tudyk voicing the snarky robot K-2SO, Wen Jiang as a gruff gunslinger, and iconic martial artist Donnie Yen as a blind samurai, who believes deeply in the Force. Instead, you're entreated to enjoy the ride that rockets from one far flung planet and earnest hero to another, hastily setting up heroes we're meant to care for deeply, despite little character development. "Rogue One" doesn't want you looking too closely at the plot, unloading its points in messy exposition dumps across Alliances roundtables, edged with steely commanders. But hey, look! Robots and aliens and space battles! Oh, my! One might wonder why Pappa Erso didn't just send that McGuffin file along with the messenger (an underused Riz Ahmed) sent to tell the rebels such a file exists. Weitz and Gilroy keep the story small, focusing on a single directive: recover Jyn's father to discover the Death Star weakness. The story fits snugly into the existing "Star Wars" franchise, and long time fans will thrill at the ways director Gareth Edwards and screenwriters Chris Weitz and Tony Gilroy lace "Rogue One" into "A New Hope" through costumes, set design, and recurring characters (some more smoothly employed than others). RELATED: Mark Hamill Gets Honest About Rogue One, Han Solo Anthology Films When a message goes out that suggests he's built a purposeful flaw into the proposed planet-killing weapon, Jyn and a motley crew of rebels and rogues set off to steal the plans before a power-hungry Imperial military leader (Ben Mendelsohn, all delicious sneers and space capes) can employ the Death Star.
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Ever wonder how the Alliance got the plans that told them how to destroy the Death Star? Well, what once seemed like a convenient plot device has now been retconned into Episode 3.5, "Rogue One: A Star Wars Story."įelicity Jones stars as scrappy survivor Jyn Erso, whose father ( "Doctor Strange"s Mads Mikkelsen) is an Empire weapons designer, but a Rebel at heart.
