Rogue One – A Star Wars Story: Blu-ray Review
The Movie:
Former scientist Galen Erso (Mads Mikkelsen) lives on a farm with his wife and young daughter Jyn (Felicity Jones). His peaceful existence comes crashing down when the evil Orson Krennic (Ben Mendelsohn) takes him away from his beloved family. Many years later, Galen is now the Empire’s lead engineer for the most powerful weapon in the galaxy, the Death Star. Knowing that her father holds the key to its destruction, a vengeful Jyn joins forces with a spy and other resistance fighters to steal the space station’s plans for the Rebel Alliance.
Whenever studios start to change things around and try to add elements to an already fantastic franchise (the prequels aren’t THAT bad okay) it gets me a bit worried. So when I heard that they were doing a standalone film that wasn’t a part of the usual Saga movies my first thought was “How are they going to get people to believe in these characters that have no Jedi background?”. The answer was simple: Have the film connect right into the much beloved Episode IV. With movies like these that have various directors involved it’s a bit of a gamble as to what kind of aesthetic you’re going to get but much to my surprise it managed to have the same feel as the original trilogy. The story was a fantastic companion piece and will fit in perfectly with various story elements if people decide to do a Star Wars marathon. While watching this film I couldn’t help but keep going back to Kevin Smith’s Clerks where they make it a point to bring up the contracted workers that helped build the Death Star and I feel like they definitely borrowed from that idea and expanded on it greatly and made it all feel so natural in the Star Wars Universe. The action scenes were damn near perfect and instead of it feeling like a space opera it felt a whole lot more like a war film. It was a nice change from what I was used to and it gave the film a way more grounded feel. The only thing that kind of bothered me a bit was the CG faces for two particular character in the film. I know that those characters were pretty essential to the story but as impressive as it looked it just made it seem like I was looking at video game characters. Even with that I thought having the two characters there was a great touch. If this is more or less what to expect with future standalone Star Wars movies then I have complete faith in what they have in store for the fans. 9/10
Special Features:
A Rogue Idea – A feature that goes a bit into detail on how the story came about and how it was pitched.
Jyn: The Rebel – A nice character profile piece on Jyn and how she differs from other females in the Star Wars Universe.
Cassian: The Spy – Much like the previous feature except focusing on the father of Jyn Erso.
K-2SO: The Droid – A look at Alan Tudyk’s robot character and how much he is not like C-3PO.
Baze & Chirrut: Guardians of the Whills – Actors Donnie Yen and Wen Jiang discuss getting their parts in the film and they talk about their experiences while filming.
Bodhi & Saw: The Pilot & The Revolutionary – This feature looks at Riz Ahmed and Forest Whitaker‘s characters and they discuss certain scenes within the film and how they feel about being a part of the Star Wars Universe.
The Empire – A look at Galen Erso, Orson Krennic, Grand Moff Tarkin, and Darth Vader and what their characters meant to the overall story.
Visions of Hope: The Look of Rogue One – An awesome look at how everyone involved made it a point to make it seem as close as possible to the original trilogy.
The Princess & The Governor – This focuses on digitally recreating 2 key characters.
Epilogue: The Story Continues – Photos from the premiere with fans talking about the franchise and the film itself.
Rogue Connections – A really cool feature that digs into easter eggs, connections, cameos and more.
