Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016)
Save the Rebellion. Save the dream.
- Props / Costumes.
- Two main battles feel large in scale (think Endor/Hoth battles from the originals in terms of scale).
- Space Battle!
- Characters end up feeling like a D&D campaign of adventurers - and that's cool in my book.
- Very short cameos of characters from the original trilogy that don't impact the story much at all.
- Jokes.
- Single short scene of Vader that makes him look like an actual boss.
- No opening scroll reading.
- Variations of the music.
- "Bow" staff.
- No real Jedi action.
- Not a massive amount of character development outside of the main.
- Surprising under-use of a character from the trailers feels a bit sad.
Opinion
Is it the best movie ever? I wouldn't go that far, but it's still a fun watch. Feels arguably the closest to having "Wars" belong in the title, and the multi-tiered final battle is pretty dang awesome. Jokes are abound, some of which are puns. It's also interesting to see a Star Wars movie without any Jedi action in it - something I've admittedly been drawn to the franchise because off. This would probably be a decent starting place for anyone who wants to skip the prequel series, and feels much more attached to things as a whole over those.