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Anyone else dislike Rogue One? I feel like the only person.

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Sure the Vader scene was cool, the pilots were nice, and it tied in nicely to the original Star Wars at the end; but other than that it just isn’t a very good movie in my not so humble opinion.

You’ll laugh! You’ll cry! You’ll kiss three bucks goodbye!

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If the pilots aren’t nice in any film I will more than likely dislike that movie! Airplane rules!

Have a look around the many Rogue One threads & recently in the ‘Unpopular Opinion’ thread on here… and you’ll find there are a number of others that also dislike Rogue One - though they have probably explained what it is that they disliked about it… 😉
 

A little patience goes a long way on this old-school Rebel base. If you are having issues finding what you are looking for, these will be of some help…

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… and take your time to look around this site before posting - to get a feel for this place. Don’t just lazily make yet another thread asking for projects.

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Rogue One remains my favorite Disney SW film and the one I rewatch the most, but I agree it’s certainly overrated to some extent. Objectively it wouldn’t say it’s the absolute best of the modern films, much less the greatest thing to come out of the saga after the OT. Most of the characters are underdeveloped and the pacing of the first half is all over the place. The CGI resurrection/de-aging of actors remains divisive in hindsight.

However I’ve always welcomed the smaller details and nuances of each movie that make me like them as a whole. What I liked about RO is that it felt interconnected with the wider galaxy. Classical aliens appeared (they were almost nowhere to be seen in the sequels), relevant characters like Mon and Bail played small parts, it acknowledged the prequels, there were direct ties to Rebels, a character from Clone Wars jumped to live action, etc, yet at the same time the new additions, like the Death Troopers or U-Wings, for some reason felt more memorable to me compared with the sequels aesthetic. The grey-vs-grey morality was a welcome change of pace (I also liked TLJ’s approach in this). Most of the time the visuals are majestic. The space battle of Scarif is definitely the best in the Disney era. And it made me appreciate a whole lot more of the events in ANH in hindsight.

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It’s alright I guess. It’s not that great, though. The characters are super boring and the premise of the movie itself is problematic. I mean, we start where we do in ANH because the story before ANH isn’t important or interesting. Plus, the Death Star plans on their own aren’t really an interesting story, especially in the format of a big action blockbuster with a big fight at the end.

I watched it three times in the movie theater, but I think only because I loved seeing the OT aesthetic on the big screen and not just on the TV. I can no longer say I watched it since, because I watched it again back in 2019 (my friends wanted to). But other than that, I haven’t.

Reading R + L ≠ J theories

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I only watch the Battle of Scarif. I find the rest too dull to sit through.

I think the problem is the dull characters. Each has an interesting backstory that should make for an interesting character but watching them interact they all looked so bored. Cassian says he’s been in this fight since he was 6 but we don’t learn why. What motivates him to push further and further towards grey morality, in essence becoming as bad as the Empire to fight the Empire? That should be interesting but it’s never explored.

Same for the “Gun Guy” and the “Force Guy” (yes, I’ve forgotten their names). They say in passing they once thought similarly but have since drifted in beliefs. What motivated that and how will they reconcile? Never explored, instead they just offer Jyn weird advice.

Or how about the Pilot? The Pilot is just a walking plot device. He has no characterization other than knowing Imperial stuff. We never learn why he defected or what he believes in, he is just with Galen for whatever reason and knows the tech stuff.

As a result, I prefer watching the first half of TROS over R1. Yeah, the story is terrible but there’s something fun about the ST’s characters. I’d watch them together in any scenario. I can’t say the same about R1 unfortunately. I’m supposed to feel something for these characters when they’re systematically killed off, but the only death I cared about was the droid.

Maul- A Star Wars Story

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In many ways, I think that Rogue One is similar to Revenge of the Sith. Both movies have a messy beginning and middle, which is partially salvaged by a strong third act that leaves people with a more positive impression leaving the movie. I don’t mind the characters being underdeveloped, though I think a little more screen time of them working together as a team would have helped me care about them more and view them as a group (a la The Dirty Dozen).

My main issues with Rogue One are that I don’t like how the Death Star’s exhaust port flaw was made into a deliberate, significant act of sabotage rather than just a small oversight in construction. I also think that the ending doesn’t line up with the beginning of ANH since Vader literally sees the Tantive IV fleeing from the battle with his own eyes, but in ANH, Vader never mentions that, and Leia acts like she has plausible deniability.

But we can’t turn back. Fear is their greatest defense. I doubt if the actual security there is any greater than it was on Aquilae or Sullust. And what there is is most likely directed towards a large-scale assault.

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This probably isn’t the thread for this - since this is a thread mostly for people that don’t like the movie finding other people that don’t like the movie - but I absolutely LOVE Rogue One. It nailed the Star Wars aesthetic and feel for me.

It’s the first one, since the original movie, that gave me the true feeling of the underdogs going on a hopeless, suicide mission, for something greater than themselves. I don’t think it undermines Star Wars in any way, Luke’s miraculous, heroic shot is still that. If anything, it makes Rogue One resonate even more, given that all the effort that went down to steal the plans payed off.

I loved every character (even if Chirrut and especially Baze are quite underdeveloped) and I thought the movie had the best humor in a SW movie since TESB. It was a fantastic and joyful experience for me, and I especially love how harmless it is. Don’t like it, move along, like it, alright! I also love that the movie had the balls to make the entire cast die at the end, fulfilling their selfless goal of bringing people hope to fight another day against tyranny. That’s literally what Star Wars is all about, and Rogue One nails it.

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WookieeWarrior77 said:

Sure the Vader scene was cool, the pilots were nice, and it tied in nicely to the original Star Wars at the end; but other than that it just isn’t a very good movie in my not so humble opinion.

I do agree: since day one I don’t like this movie. Let’s say I tolerate it now because of a few qualities (it looks great, I’m a big fan of Giacchino’s score, and a few sequences actually are pretty good). One of my main issues is it doesn’t tie that nicely to the original SW. When I watched both movies back to back, ANH felt inconsistent with R1 in many ways… I have the same problem with the PT, however at least ROTS ends some 20 years before ANH starts, so my mind can adjust the inconsistencies with the time gap. With R1, the 5 minutes gap don’t explain why Vader is suddenly so weak and got memory issues… I don’ dig at all the plot about some engineer who input a defect on purpose into the DS, it kinda ruins everything we see in ANH (it removes the symbolic of the Dragon to become something which allegedly makes sense, exactly what people usually are mad with the PT for but they mostly gave a pass to R1 here for some reasons I still don’t get). Also, R1 is a war movie with some myth used as a background for no real value, so even in tone it doesn’t align well with the main Saga.

In the end, I really hated it when I first saw it. Now it take it as it is: a boring war movie with incredible visuals, high standard scenery and a thrilling last half hour. Which qualifies it as one of the best of the Disney (bad) batch 😄

(my Disney ranking would be: TLJ > R1 > Solo > TROS > TFA)

So long 🙌

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For me it is the best Disney era film, but it’s not like the bar is super high.

I really want to know how the film went before the reshoots. Sure, maybe it wasn’t working, but there is plenty of evidence to suggest the original script provided much better characterisation for at least Jyn and Bodhi. Also, the Saw Gerrera scenes from the reshoots are really messy. After they leave Jedha, the film gets much better and the finale is pretty great.

I agree, however, that making the reactor shaft an inside job was a bad call.

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How can you not like it when it’s dark a gritty and Darth Vader gets out his red lightsaber.

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OutboundFlight said:

I think the problem is the dull characters. Each has an interesting backstory that should make for an interesting character but watching them interact they all looked so bored. Cassian says he’s been in this fight since he was 6 but we don’t learn why. What motivates him to push further and further towards grey morality, in essence becoming as bad as the Empire to fight the Empire? That should be interesting but it’s never explored.

Maybe this is why I don’t get all the hate for Rogue One… I feel this way about every movie. Movies are too short, I find, to really get attached to the characters or explore them fully. Obviously, some movies do this better than others, but I always need to spend more than 2 hours with characters to really feel an emotional bond. Even still, I felt just as connected to the Rogue One characters as I did to characters from other good movies, so I feel like it worked well for what it was trying to do.

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Rogue One is boring, that’s all. It’s not a poorly made film or anything, but the characters are just faces. They have one unique trait and that’s it, no growth, no real personality.

Use the Force, Joh Yowza.

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Still, Rogue One is by far the best Star Wars film produced under Disney so far. TFA and subsequent garbage set the bar extremely low.

真実

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Not to start an argument but at least TFA and the “subsequent garbage” had characters that grew and you came to care about, and were more than faces with a single trait.

Use the Force, Joh Yowza.

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I still preferred the Rogue One cast over the Sequels cast. I wanted to spend more time with the Rogue One characters, and was disappointed that I couldn’t because I thought they had a lot of potential as a group. Whereas with the exception of Finn, none of the Sequel characters interested me, and we all know what they did to Finn.

But we can’t turn back. Fear is their greatest defense. I doubt if the actual security there is any greater than it was on Aquilae or Sullust. And what there is is most likely directed towards a large-scale assault.

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I didn’t like it. I had an exchange about this with some folks here on one of the RO threads a while back. I think the actual premise is okay, but the film lines up poorly with ANH, the ‘reactor as deliberate sabotage’ thing doesn’t make sense to me, and the fan service is lame. I do understand why people dig it, but it’s not for me.

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Time to rip the bandaid and admit I never officially finished this movie. To be totally honest my friend and I walked out of the theater before the Vader scene, which after viewing online I was glad to miss, if I stayed that scene would have just annoyed me, I’m not the craziest for fan service. I totally understand why people love it so much I just don’t connect with it, felt like Star Tours but not fun, or a video game I couldn’t play.

“The ability to destroy a planet is insignificant next to the power of the Force.” - DV

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Hoop28 said:

Not to start an argument but at least TFA and the “subsequent garbage” had characters that grew and you came to care about, and were more than faces with a single trait.

To each their own, I guess. I never came to care about the ST characters and found them bland and unconvincing (aside from Han in TFA, but he’s not from the ST). I cared much more about the Rogue One characters by the end of the movie, and that was without any major character development or really fleshing them out. I think the difference was in the story. I found the RO characters believable because I found the story believable. I didn’t find the ST characters believable because the story was awful from beginning to end.

But this shows you how subjective this really is. It depends on your expectations and on what you look for.

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I like the film.
I still find all the characters quite interesting. But I wanted to see more of them like Saw Gererra. Jyn Erso, the Guardians of the Whills.

The Vader scene at the end is too prequel styled for my liking, that is the only place i would deduct points. before that he was very much in the style of OT Vader.

Still isn’t the gritty war film they intended to make. Too much fanservice as well. Pretty safe in terms of the story and direction, the only thing that is novel is what happens at the the end to Jyn and Cassian.

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Hoop28 said:

Not to start an argument but at least TFA and the “subsequent garbage” had characters that grew and you came to care about, and were more than faces with a single trait.

Characters that grew? Rey was a Mary Sue from the beginning and grew into an even bigger one. Then they ruined Finn, which was pretty much the only remotely interesting character in TFA. Not to mention they ruined all OT characters.

R1 is not really supposed to have much character growth anyway, since it is set over a very short period of time.

Hoop28 said:

and you came to care about, and were more than faces with a single trait.

I came to care about them? Sorry but I did not. On the other hand, I did at least slightly care about the lead characters in R1.

真実

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I’ve kinda said since 2016 that you could combine Cassian and Jyn into one character and the movie would be a lot better for it, but I also sort of think you could combine Baze (gun guy for OutboundFlight) too.

Jyn is only really there for the plot, because her father built the Death Star. Cassian is more of an active protagonist than her, but Baze is the only character with a real arc.

You could probably combine Saw Gerrera and Chirrut (force guy for OutboundFlight) too, making the story more focused. The daughter of an Imperial scientist is taken in by a religious guy who’s an early rebel after her parents are killed. They part ways as she grows into adult, and she loses faith in the Force as she wanders through the Empire. They reunite after the Rebellion gains intel on the Death Star and her father goes missing. Over the course of the movie, she regains her faith in the Force and leads the charge on Scarif.

Reading R + L ≠ J theories

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Chase Adams said:

Anyone else like Rogue One? I feel like the only person.

I love it - probably the best Star Wars film since Empire for me, and I can happily sit back, re-watch and still enjoy it any time.

 

Though I’d still love to see the version of the film before the re-shoots - or even the many discarded & unused / alternative scenes…
 

A little patience goes a long way on this old-school Rebel base. If you are having issues finding what you are looking for, these will be of some help…

Welcome to the OriginalTrilogy.com | Introduce yourself in here | Useful info within : About : Help : Site Rules : Fan Project Rules : Announcements
How do I do this?’ on the OriginalTrilogy.com; some info & answers + FAQs - includes info on how to search for projects and threads on the OT•com

A Project Index for Star Wars Preservations (Harmy’s Despecialized & 4K77/80/83 etc) : A Project Index for Star Wars Fan Edits (adywan & Hal 9000 etc)

… and take your time to look around this site before posting - to get a feel for this place. Don’t just lazily make yet another thread asking for projects.