Okay, I’m feeling refreshed and ready to get back to Star Wars content. Certainly doesn’t hurt that Rogue One–sometimes known as Rogue One; A Star Wars Story which is where the name of 2024: A Star Wars Event came from–is pretty good! It’s the Captain America: The Winter Soldier of the franchise in that it’s more of a spy thriller than the rest of the movies. I summarize it as a very 21st century movie, but lemme actually do the summary before I explain why.
Years ago, Jyn Erso (Ms. Felicity Jones, who I had to keep reminding myself didn’t voice Shadowheart in Baldur’s Gate 3) watched her father, Galen Erso (Mads Mikkelsen) get forcibly conscripted by Director Orson Krennic (Ben Mendelsohn) into helping the Empire build the (first) Death Star. With her dad abducted and her mom dead, she was raised by radical revolutionist Saw Gerrera (Forest Whitaker), who I’ve been led to believe first appeared in Star Wars: The Clone Wars, not to be confused with Star Wars: Clone Wars. Anyway, she gets picked up by Cassian Andor (Diego Luna) and the Rebellion because Saw Gerrera–you have to say his full name–has taken an Imperial turncoat pilot named Bodhi Rook (Riz Ahmed) who says he has information on the Empire’s latest super weapon, along with a message from Galen himself. Jyn reluctantly works with Cassian, and K-2SO (Alan Tudyk) is also there and a goddamned delight. The band teams up with Force sensitive Chirrut Îmwe (Donnie Yen) and his husband bodyguard Baze Malbus (Wei Jiang) while getting to Saw Gerrera, who shares Galen’s message with Jyn, saying that he included a fatal flaw in the Death Star’s construction. But Krennic and a very CG Grand Moff Tarkin want to stop this before it becomes a problem, so they use a fraction of the Death Star’s power to blow up part of Jedha, the moon where our main characters are. Everyone except Saw Gerrera makes it off, and after some discussion they head to Eadu to rescue Galen. Or to kill Galen, as Cassian has been secretly ordered. But he can’t bring himself to do it right as Rebel fighters attack the Imperial base, accidentally killing Galen. With no direct knowledge of how to stop the Death Star, Jyn passionately demands the Rebellion head to the Imperial databank on Scarif and retrieve the plans. But the Rebel leaders aren’t all convinced, leading Jyn, Cassian, and the rest to sneak off to do it themselves, calling their band Rogue One. Stealth and guerilla tactics work for a bit, but Krennic soon realizes exactly what the Rebels are looking for. Luckily for Jyn and the rest, word of the attack on Scarif has emboldened the Rebellion leaders to go and back them up. But K-2SO sacrifices himself so Jyn and Cassian can get the physical plans, which hits the audience with a sudden realization: we’ve never seen these characters before. Sure, this is a prequel to a movie made in 1977, but they’re not getting out of this alive. Sure enough, Chirrut manages to help Bodhi send a message to the Rebellion about the plans right before the two die, with Baze following his totally married spouse best friend shortly after. But Jyn manages to beat Krennic and send the Death Star plans to the Rebellion right as the Death Star shows up and blows up the Imperial bases; nuke the site from orbit, it’s the only way to be sure, except, you know, they failed to stop the rebels. Jyn and Cassian spend a moment of mutual respect and/or primal attraction before they die, Krennic eats shit, and the Rebels have the plans! Too bad Darth Vader is on site to try and get them back. But at the last minute they’re handed off to a very familiar ship run by a CG very familiar princess from Alderaan, which makes Leia’s lie to Vader in Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope that she’s on a diplomatic mission extra funny since he literally saw her ship blast off.
Rogue One does what it’s meant to do very well, showing the lengths that the Rebels will go to in order to stop the Empire. I said it’s a very 21st century movie because I feel like with the 24-hour news cycle and just about everyone having access to the internet and social media, we’re much more aware now of what’s going on in the world moment by moment compared to, say, 1977. America’s misdeeds in the Vietnam War are retold by historians while the actions of Ukraine and Russia, or Israel and Gaza, or the Battle of Aleppo–which was ongoing when the movie came out and I have tied to this movie in my memories–are documented and posted for everyone to see. The Rebels are the good guys compared to the Empire because they’re fighting for freedom, but they’ll get blood on their hands to ensure freedom wins. The first time we see Cassian, he kills an informant when they’re being chased by stormtroopers. Was it because the guy physically couldn’t climb away to escape so he was saving him from being captured, or did he do it to save himself and prevent any information he had from getting into the hands of the Empire? Can’t it be both?
You have all these disingenuous takes on the Rebellion actually being the bad guys: “By blowing up the second Death Star while it was under construction, they killed a bunch of potentially unaligned workers.” “The medal sequence in A New Hope was inspired by Nazi propaganda Triumph of the Will so that’s code they’re the actual villains.” “I’m edgy and like the Empire so blah blah blah.” But the Rebellion didn’t win by asking the Empire to please stop being evil; they fought and died to take down the Emperor, and then fought and died as the Resistance to take down the Emperor again. Most Star Wars movies show a small band of heroes fighting back, and Rogue One did all that in one movie.
Honestly I’m surprised a project that most likely started because nerds kept asking, “How could the Death Star accidentally have such a major fatal flaw?” turned out to be good.
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