Gave this another spin last night. Just a wonderful, wonderful movie.
I’ll second everything Rodney said, except to say that I’ve come to the conclusion that Tarkin looks like crap. He looks a bit waxy, and his face moves way to much. Peter Cushing was more stone faced in his portrayal. Seems like something they literally could’ve just dialed down a little.
Still, far from enough to ruin the movie and it gets an A
I have a theory that the biggest issue with this weird CGI facial animation comes down to the smooth way a CGI movement is animated versus the twitchy way muscles really move. I think this is also one reason why an animatronic puppet can more easily appear lifelike than CGI - the mechanical servos that control the puppet are often a better approximation of muscles than smooth motion gradients.