ROGUE ONE (2016)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *metaphysical, psychological*

I'm glad I didn't review ROGUE ONE when I saw it in the theaters. At that time, when the stand-alone film came out in between the first and second parts of the "Rei Trilogy," I was rather underwhelmed. None of the characters really grabbed me, and I didn't see the point of making a film about the events that led up to A NEW HOPE. Yet now, thanks to Walt Disney having mismanaged the STAR WARS franchise so badly, I can make an argument that ROGUE ONE is the last real STAR WARS film.

Though I mildly enjoyed FORCE AWAKENS, in my review I noted that J.J. Abrams did not "possess the talent evinced by the Lucas of 1977 for synthesizing great action-scenes from Classic Hollywood: the western’s saloon-confrontation, the pirate film’s yardarm-flights, the war film’s airborne strafing-runs." At the time I reviewed LAST JEDI  and RISE OF SKYWALKER in the same month, I believed that JEDI's badness might have been partly the result of poor scheduling, while RISE had some positive aspects that made it the strongest of the trilogy. Unfortunately, though I've had little experience of the various SW shows on streaming services, it sounds like JEDI became the new model for the franchise's sociopolitical engagement. 

The idea behind ROGUE, however, began in 2003, pitched by one of the Lucasfilm visual FX guys. Whatever changes the idea went through as it was scripted by other raconteurs roughly from 2014 to 2016, it seems to have hewed to the approach of George Lucas. That means that although some sociopolitical content was present, the story emphasized dazzling action and a sense of wonder at the mysteries of the universe-- including those of the human mind, as exemplified by the powers of the Jedi.

In keeping with A NEW HOPE, the Jedi are in total eclipse at the time of ROGUE, and the Empire has most of the galaxy locked down, aside from the scattered forces of the Rebel Alliance. The major heroes and villains of HOPE play only marginal roles here, for ROGUE is about the sacrifice of rebels who made the later triumphs possible.

Jyn Erso (Felicity Jones) is a child when the Empire, in the person of the villainous Krennic, abducts her father Galen to work on the Death Star after killing Jyn's mother. For fifteen years Jyn has to grow up in hiding with the help of raffish rebel Saw (Forest Whitaker), but he, functioning as a surrogate father, willfully separates himself from her to avoid exposing her identity as Galen's daughter. Jyn is eventually picked up by the Empire even though the Stormtroopers don't know her identity. However, two agents of the Alliance, Cassian Andor (Diego Luna) and the droid K-2SO (Alan Tudyk) learn Jyn's identity and liberate her. Because Jyn can help the Alliance's plan to free the imprisoned Galen, she's more or less drafted into the rebel movement.

During the assorted battles and spycraft-endeavors that make up the action of ROGUE, the main psychological arc is the contrast between Cassian, who has been fighting as a rebel since childhood, and Jyn, who has sought to steer clear of political involvement because it cost her so much. This master trope of ROGUE is not quite elaborate enough to bestow good mythicity upon the movie as a hole, but it does keep the events of the film from being nothing more than a recitation of plot-points. Humorous counterpoint is provided by Chirrut (Donnie Yen), who is a skilled blind swordsman who believes in the Force though he possesses no literal mind-powers. The three of them are not resonant enough to come anywhere close to the mythic status of Luke, Leia and Han, but they comport themselves well enough.

Director Gareth Edwards, purportedly a STAR WARS fan, shows all the wonder-working ability that Abrams lacked. I was particularly taken with several outer-space spectacles, both with and without battling starships, that would be foreign to more plebeian directors. Edwards also structures the fast-paced narrative much in the style of Original Lucas, but without neglecting some ethical reflections. 

Unfortunately, two years later Disney came out with a second stand-alone SW movie, Ron Howard's SOLO, which helped put an end to George Lucas's filmmaking legacy.