Its last 10 minutes are spectacular and dark, with a final flourish that should give any “Star Wars” fan goose bumps - and a new hope that the next main installment will be this good.The annual SXSW conference kicks off today in Austin, Texas, bringing together the worlds of technology, music, film, and gaming in a nine-day carnival of breakfast tacos and panel presentations. didn’t put more of a premium on snappy one-liners.īut by the time its credits rolled, I was ready to forgive “Rogue One” any imperfections.
#STAR WARS A ROGUE ONE RUNNING TIME SERIES#
Given that they get so many other details about this series right, I’m surprised director Gareth Edwards & Co. But there’s a missed opportunity for banter, especially between Jyn and Cassian. Voiced by Alan Tudyk, he’s more withering than C-3PO, and, ultimately, just as human. Co-writers Chris Weitz and Tony Gilroy leave most of the funny to K-2SO, a towering black Imperial droid who’s been reprogrammed by the rebels. If there’s a weak spot in “Rogue One,” it’s wit. (This is a space opera, at its roots I demand a little swashbuckling.) Donnie Yen and Wen Jiang are standouts as, respectively, a blind Jedi samurai and his machine-gunner accomplice, while Riz Ahmed (“The Night Of”) is a former Imperial pilot who’s had his mind scrambled by a truth-sucking alien parasite. Jyn joins up with a band of rebels headed by the spy Cassian Andor (Diego Luna), who is disappointingly un-swashbuckling. Ben Mendelsohn in “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.” ©Lucasfilm LFL 2016. Its main agent is her dad’s boss, Director Krennic (Ben Mendelsohn), whose dedication to mass murder is only slightly undermined by his silly white cape (one of many sartorial nods to the overly flowy “Star Wars” wardrobe of yore). Abandoned in childhood to the care of a radical extremist (Forest Whitaker, in amazing cybergarb) who ultimately also gave her up, Jyn’s as disaffected as a Bernie Sanders voter until she gets a look at the Empire’s capacity for sheer evil. Reluctant rebel Jyn Erso (Jones) is the daughter of a scientist (Mads Mikkelsen), once part of the Rebellion, who’s now a key architect on a planet-annihilating weapon the Empire is building. The action (and it’s nearly all action) takes place shortly before the events of 1977’s “Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope,” centering on a rebel mission to steal Death Star blueprints that reveal its fatal flaw (a longstanding joke among “Star Wars” fans, finally given a rationale). Another old villain is ingeniously resurrected via CGI, while a third character makes a cameo with the help of a digital makeover. “Rogue One” has a few heavy-hitting throwbacks up its sleeve: Darth Vader (voiced by James Earl Jones) shows up in brief, but satisfying, sequences, the last of which left me brushing away tears of giddy nerd joy. Despite being merely “A Star Wars Story,” which makes it sound flimsy and fan-fictiony, this is a worthy entry in the franchise, from its formidable heroine (Felicity Jones) to its canny blend of innovation and nostalgia, of human-scale drama and judicious special effects. Much like last year’s “The Force Awakens,” it rights so many wrongs perpetrated by that loathsome trio of films from the late ’90s/early aughts. “Rogue One” is definitive proof: “Star Wars” is back, baby.