As I have said before, I like to see the schedule of films coming out and I’ll circle the ones I highly anticipate. Usually, there about 4 per year that I get excited for and this was one of them. However, being that Rogue 1 isn’t part of the original story, I was a little less excited for this as I was for Episode 7 last year. Spinoff of the original tend to suck (Scorpion King, This is 40, X-Men Wolverine films are awful, and those god awful American Pie straight to DVD films) so I was slightly hesitant. I also read that this is the first Star Wars film that John Williams wasn’t doing the score for. John Williams is as integral to these films (Indiana Jones, Star Wars, Jaws, the list goes on) as pepperoni is to pizza.
The story takes place after Episode 3, Revenge of the Sith, when Hayden Christiansen thankfully slides into the lava after Obi-Wan slices his legs off. I wish Obi-Wan used the force to give Hayden better acting lessons. Felicity Jones plays Jyn Erso, whose father (Madds Mikelsen) was the architect behind the Death Star. Young Jyn is hidden for years by Saw Gerrara (Forrest Whittaker) as the Imperials have been looking for her to ensure her father’s cooperation in the completion of the Death Star. Jyn is freed by the Rebellion and thus begins her mission to steal the plans for the Death Star.
The new characters are instantly likable and you feel something for them all. K2SO is the robot who embraces the newest comedic role. You’ll see a bunch of familiar faces from previous films, even some restored by CGI as their younger selves from Star Wars. Some characters may take you a second to recall but when you do, a smile will cross your face. And of course, Darth Vader makes several appearances in the film. And without spoiling anything, his final scene is bad-assery at its finest. One of my complaints are they take you to several planets/moons all over the galaxy but you won’t need to remember them later on. I wish they showed you the Emperor in some capacity but no luck. This film flows beautifully while weaving a fantastic tale. It’s almost sad as we know the fate for most of these characters being that we’ve seen the 7 previous films. Director Gareth Edwards ensures it ends with a flawless segue for Star Wars, Episode 4.
People ask me how I rank this amongst the other films but I really need to see this again to take it in. I’m still processing everything but rest assured, it’s damn good. If I were to give an early ranking, I put it after Empire and before 7. Here’s the way I rank them as of now. 4, 6, 5, 3.5, 7, 3 (really good, people just hate the shit out of the 2nd trilogy), 2 (the last 1/3 is really good), 1 (an egregious piece of shit).
Kevin Gootee 