Rogue One: A Newer Hope

You know going in how it must end, yet you went. Even if you know little about the canon, you know people died to get the plans to the princess. So how do you open your heart to characters that will die? That remains the potential and problem of classical tragedy.

It reminds me of Oedipus or Agamemnon, Greek myths turned into stage play tragedy, some of the oldest in theater and writing. The audience were familiar already with the stories, but the play turned them from a faceless footnote into a cathartic character. The irony of knowing that Oedipus is doomed from the beginning, yet he continues to push for truth to save the people he rules over makes him the proud and pitiable hero.

Rogue One follows a group of new characters who discover and steal the Death Star plans and ultimately die so the Rebellion can live. Even one unfamiliar with Star Wars knows going in that these people are not in New Hope and that many died to get Princess Leia the plans for the Death Star, so the ending is not structured as a big surprise but as the fulfillment of a greater purpose they have come to understand. They know their own inevitable demise yet continue because they have found a new purpose worth dying for- the Rebellion and freedom.

The characters are stereotypes we have come to expect from this universe, yet feel fresh because they fit the greater universe Star Wars has created in our minds. The final battle feels like a play on all the Vietnam movies that played out in the 70’s, and the character stereotypes feel taken from the Japanese samurai films that inspired Lucas and Star Wars in the first place. I don’t mind archetypes as long as they use them in a clever and appropriate manner, and here, it works as the high tragedy leading into a greater hero’s journey plot. They each have endearing moments that make them and by extension, the universe, feel more grounded and alive. They treat death in a serious manner, making the eventual self-sacrifice a choice, showing the growth they underwent.

The beginning feels rushed and scattered, trying to introduce too many characters and places too quickly, and makes me wish they had kept the crawl just so the beginning felt more focused. Although the young Jyn seeing her parents’ sacrifice made her character more engaged and understandable than Rey from Force Awakens. They can be seen as similar, yet Jyn stands as the more developed and moving of the two currently. The bounty hunter feels like a simple and brilliant take on Han Solo if he didn’t have Chewie or Leia to temper his brutal efficiency. And the villain, the officer commissioning the Stardust project, fills the role of earnestly conniving Imperial trying to brute force the universe perfectly.

The movie shows what you can do with intelligence and risk with a franchise as beloved as Star Wars. They took the time to learn the universe and find an enigma worth exploring and create a fitting story to answer that mystery. They took another form of the epic, the doomed hero, and archetypes that fit both the form and this universe, and let the characters naturally develop into the pivotal pawns of the fated franchise. 


--Rozlynd