Which is worse? The Star Wars prequel trilogy or the sequel trilogy?

[John Dule]

In retrospect I should have stuck with my first instinct. Rogue One convinced me that TFA was not just a one-off failure, and I haven’t seen another Star Wars movie in theaters since then. I’ve come to agree with Dale that TFA had zero potential, that it was just as bad as TLJ, and that every harbinger of  the disaster to come was present and apparent in 2015. My only regret is not being more vocal about it at the time.

I actually liked Rogue One. It has a clear thematic through line that actually respects the existing canon and provides a very fitting tonal bridge between the prequel and original trilogies (the former ending in tragedy, the latter providing hope, while Rogue One shows the sacrifices needed to bring back hope to a hopeless galaxy). That and Andor (which examines the same theme in even more depth by showing how hard it is to actually start a rebellion and how broken the people who do it must be) are the only valuable things Disney has brough to Star Ward, though of course it doesn't make up for all the trash.

The Darth Vader fanservice scenes were corny and annoying, but they were a very minor part of the movie all considered (and I love that Andor just doesn't bring up any major character and is content telling its own story).

Ok, we disagree there. I detest Rogue One and I think it's worse than TFA. The fan service isn't just limited to Darth Vader; it includes the absolutely cringe-inducing C-3PO and R2-D2 cameo, as well as the terrible CGI'd Leia and Tarkin (both of which looked so fake they could've been in the Clone Wars animated series). The dialogue was terrible-- hearing "I am the force and the force is with me" 50,000 times made me want to put an ice pick through my eardrum. That is the type of faux-philosophical nonsense that writers put in as filler dialogue until they can come back and think of something more profound.

The characters were all dull. Jyn looked bored and had no interest in being present (her line "Let's just get this over with" summarizes that entire performance), and the rest of the cast was uncharismatic. The locations were also stupid, and they felt like the writers were just throwing in "cool" locations without paying any attention to the tone of the scene (why was the tragic final battle set on space Tahiti?). None of the locations were memorable, nor did they feel like they had unique cultures-- especially when compared to those in the Prequels.

Moreover, I never understood the desire of (adult) Star Wars fans to make a "gritty war drama" out of their favorite franchise. We are talking about a series with little green men and laser swords, but some of these neckbeards treat it like it should be Saving Private Ryan. Rogue One would've worked a lot better as a heist film about how the Death Star plans were stolen, featuring some kind of intrigue, disguises, and intricate planning. It did not work whatsoever as a war movie.

[Antonio the Sixth]

Only because they are more boring than episodes 7, 8, and 9.

I genuinely do not understand how a thinking, feeling human being could ever possibly come to this conclusion.

It could make sense for Episode 2 at least.

Okay, yeah, I'll grant you an argument for TLJ being less boring than AotC (not that it makes it better, of course). The other two though? Just no.

[Alben Barkley]

Sequels, not even close.

I can't believe I'm saying that by the way. 2015 me would be absolutely shocked.

[Thank you for being a friend...]

I barely remember either really.  All of the Star Wars things I like are in the original 3 - together as one movie, it's one of the most imaginative and epic of motion pictures.... how can you really top it?

[ProudModerate2]

The sequel trilogy was worse, and it's not even close.

Side note: I did like the "Live-action film ... Rogue One, A Star Wars Story.  And the other one wasn't too bad either ... Solo: A Star Wars Story.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

In retrospect I should have stuck with my first instinct. Rogue One convinced me that TFA was not just a one-off failure, and I haven’t seen another Star Wars movie in theaters since then. I’ve come to agree with Dale that TFA had zero potential, that it was just as bad as TLJ, and that every harbinger of  the disaster to come was present and apparent in 2015. My only regret is not being more vocal about it at the time.

I actually liked Rogue One. It has a clear thematic through line that actually respects the existing canon and provides a very fitting tonal bridge between the prequel and original trilogies (the former ending in tragedy, the latter providing hope, while Rogue One shows the sacrifices needed to bring back hope to a hopeless galaxy). That and Andor (which examines the same theme in even more depth by showing how hard it is to actually start a rebellion and how broken the people who do it must be) are the only valuable things Disney has brough to Star Ward, though of course it doesn't make up for all the trash.

The Darth Vader fanservice scenes were corny and annoying, but they were a very minor part of the movie all considered (and I love that Andor just doesn't bring up any major character and is content telling its own story).

The Darth Vader light saber sequence was awesome. One of the best parts of the movie. If you want to complain about such a thing than the cameo at the end would be it.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Sequels, not even close.

I can't believe I'm saying that by the way. 2015 me would be absolutely shocked.

You were actually expecting the sequels to be good?

[John Dule]

In retrospect I should have stuck with my first instinct. Rogue One convinced me that TFA was not just a one-off failure, and I haven’t seen another Star Wars movie in theaters since then. I’ve come to agree with Dale that TFA had zero potential, that it was just as bad as TLJ, and that every harbinger of  the disaster to come was present and apparent in 2015. My only regret is not being more vocal about it at the time.

I actually liked Rogue One. It has a clear thematic through line that actually respects the existing canon and provides a very fitting tonal bridge between the prequel and original trilogies (the former ending in tragedy, the latter providing hope, while Rogue One shows the sacrifices needed to bring back hope to a hopeless galaxy). That and Andor (which examines the same theme in even more depth by showing how hard it is to actually start a rebellion and how broken the people who do it must be) are the only valuable things Disney has brough to Star Ward, though of course it doesn't make up for all the trash.

The Darth Vader fanservice scenes were corny and annoying, but they were a very minor part of the movie all considered (and I love that Andor just doesn't bring up any major character and is content telling its own story).

The Darth Vader light saber sequence was awesome. One of the best parts of the movie. If you want to complain about such a thing than the cameo at the end would be it.

No, it was idiotic. It was a pointless sequence and I will never forget how disgusted I was by the collective nerd orgasm in that theater.

[Meclazine for Israel]

The Empire Strikes Back is the best movie of the entire series. So that side is better.

The Jaja Binks movie is just a joke.

I like the 30 mins leading up to the Star Wars film where it shows Darth Vader being made.

[Samof94]

Only because they are more boring than episodes 7, 8, and 9.

I genuinely do not understand how a thinking, feeling human being could ever possibly come to this conclusion.

It could make sense for Episode 2 at least.

A lot of that film is just so boring to be honest. Padme showing skin is one of the few "not boring" things about it.

[MABA 2020]

The prequels are frustrating to me because I think those films have real potential buried under all the terrible writing and directing choices. George Lucas works best as an idea man and the prequels have great ideas, just awful execution. If the originals are supposed to be a classic adventure story, I can imagine a version of the prequels being a classic Greek of Shakespearean tragedy. That being said people these days mistake good intentions for these films being underrated, thats wrong. It doesn't matter if Lucas was trying to make something interesting, he failed.

Well, whether something is interesting or not is going to be in the eye of the beholder. I find most of the prequels extremely interesting: even the parts that are weaker on a technical level have always an intriguing character moment or a worldbuilding detail that keeps me invested. The only exception are some of the action sequences like the pod race in TPM or the final battle in AotC that drag on too long, but those are very much the exception to me. Even the cringe dialog is cringe in an iconic way (and actually makes sense when you stop to think about it - like, is it a surprise someone who grew up as a slave on a desert planet has negative associations with sand?). I don't think TPM and AotC are "so bad they're good" because I think they're generally just decent movies, but even the stuff that's bad about them is usually bad in an enjoyable way.

Of course it's subjective up to a point. I keep trying to think of specific examples of why you're wrong and the prequels are just as terrible as the sequels, but I realise that haven't actually watched them in at least 10 years and every point I go to make just comes from other peoples criticism of those movies. So I'll have to rewatch them, I remember all the terrible dialogue and I'm sure the plots are full of logical holes and isn't TPM basically pointless to the rest of the trilogy?

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

In retrospect I should have stuck with my first instinct. Rogue One convinced me that TFA was not just a one-off failure, and I haven’t seen another Star Wars movie in theaters since then. I’ve come to agree with Dale that TFA had zero potential, that it was just as bad as TLJ, and that every harbinger of  the disaster to come was present and apparent in 2015. My only regret is not being more vocal about it at the time.

I actually liked Rogue One. It has a clear thematic through line that actually respects the existing canon and provides a very fitting tonal bridge between the prequel and original trilogies (the former ending in tragedy, the latter providing hope, while Rogue One shows the sacrifices needed to bring back hope to a hopeless galaxy). That and Andor (which examines the same theme in even more depth by showing how hard it is to actually start a rebellion and how broken the people who do it must be) are the only valuable things Disney has brough to Star Ward, though of course it doesn't make up for all the trash.

The Darth Vader fanservice scenes were corny and annoying, but they were a very minor part of the movie all considered (and I love that Andor just doesn't bring up any major character and is content telling its own story).

The Darth Vader light saber sequence was awesome. One of the best parts of the movie. If you want to complain about such a thing than the cameo at the end would be it.

No, it was idiotic. It was a pointless sequence and I will never forget how disgusted I was by the collective nerd orgasm in that theater.

Meh, you're in the minority on this. I actually agree with you on your criticisms of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but Rogue One had much better set up action sequences than that, as well as the Star Wars sequel trilogy to put it mildly.

Also cool about Rogue One is how it actually fixed lots of plot holes and explained inconsistencies. My favorite touch is how in A New Hope the rebel squadrons were supposed to be Red and Blue Squadron, but they couldn't get a blue squadron to work with 70s technology as it clashed with the blue screen, so it was changed to Gold Squadron. So in Rogue One Blue Squadron does appear but is destroyed and only Red and Gold remain.

[Antonio the Sixth]

Ok, we disagree there. I detest Rogue One and I think it's worse than TFA. The fan service isn't just limited to Darth Vader; it includes the absolutely cringe-inducing C-3PO and R2-D2 cameo, as well as the terrible CGI'd Leia and Tarkin (both of which looked so fake they could've been in the Clone Wars animated series).

I agree the CGI Leia and Tarkin were... jarring, and that's an unfortunate reality that the technology at the time was just not there yet to make them feel just right (I recently saw the latest Indiana Jones and whatever you can say about that movie, de-aged Harrison Ford is infinitely more believable). But I wouldn't call them fanservice, since they both had to be there for important narrative and thematic reason. Tarkin is the guy we see running the Death Star in ANH, so giving him no role in a movie centered about it would be bizarre. And given how the events of Rogue One feed directly into the beginning of ANH, having that connection with Leia at the end is important and meaningful. It shows that the main heroes of the original saga were only able to achieve their victory because of the sacrifice of the many that came before, which I think is a valuable idea for Star Wars to explore (if you disagree on that, fair enough)

The dialogue was terrible-- hearing "I am the force and the force is with me" 50,000 times made me want to put an ice pick through my eardrum. That is the type of faux-philosophical nonsense that writers put in as filler dialogue until they can come back and think of something more profound.

That's literally a religious mantra. The point is not for it to come off as philosophically ~deep~ to the audience, but to show it's spiritually meaningful to the character. Personally I thought it was genius to finally show us the Force actually as an actual religion practiced by someone who believes in it without direct evidence, rather than just a superpower. I'm not surprised you don't find the idea as interesting as I do, but at least understand that that's the purpose.

The characters were all dull. Jyn looked bored and had no interest in being present (her line "Let's just get this over with" summarizes that entire performance), and the rest of the cast was uncharismatic. The locations were also stupid, and they felt like the writers were just throwing in "cool" locations without paying any attention to the tone of the scene (why was the tragic final battle set on space Tahiti?). None of the locations were memorable, nor did they feel like they had unique cultures-- especially when compared to those in the Prequels.

I agree Jyn wasn't a particularly interesting protagonist. I love Chirrut and Baze personally and I think their interactions do a lot to give the story a personality, but I'll concede they're not the larger-than-life figures we're used to from the 6 core movies. And yeah, I'll also give you that the locations don't stand out as much (though I do find some of the visuals memorable and there is a sense of scale to things that you just don't see in the sequel trilogy). Personally I think the story and themes are interesting enough to carry the movie even with this weakness.

Moreover, I never understood the desire of (adult) Star Wars fans to make a "gritty war drama" out of their favorite franchise. We are talking about a series with little green men and laser swords, but some of these neckbeards treat it like it should be Saving Private Ryan. Rogue One would've worked a lot better as a heist film about how the Death Star plans were stolen, featuring some kind of intrigue, disguises, and intricate planning. It did not work whatsoever as a war movie.

I'm sure these people exist but I don't think that's a fair characterization of Rogue One's appeal at all (at least not to me). The point isn't to be gritty for the sake of being gritty - this isn't some Zack Snyder bullsh*t we're dealing with here. I don't see Rogue One trying hard to be cynical and jaded - on the contrary, the whole theme is the length at which people will go to bring back hope in the darkest of times. To me, that's as Star Wars a theme as it gets. Sure, it's a silly story about weird looking aliens, but it's also a space opera that's purposefully dealing with high emotional drama and political stakes. It's a story about individual choices sealing the fate of the universe for good and for ill. If you're a fellow fan of the prequels, how can you possibly argue that Star Wars should never be dark? Personally, I find RotS way darker than Rogue One (sure, fewer named characters die, but it's still a complete downer endings where the good guys see everything they've fought hard to protect corrupted and destroyed from within). It's not really about tone to me, it's about whether you meaningfully contribute to the grand narrative of liberty's death and rebirth. And I think Rogue One and Andor add a lot to this narrative.

[Antonio the Sixth]

Of course it's subjective up to a point. I keep trying to think of specific examples of why you're wrong and the prequels are just as terrible as the sequels, but I realise that haven't actually watched them in at least 10 years and every point I go to make just comes from other peoples criticism of those movies. So I'll have to rewatch them, I remember all the terrible dialogue and I'm sure the plots are full of logical holes and isn't TPM basically pointless to the rest of the trilogy?

Please do rewatch them and actually try to give them a fair shake. I beg you to forget all the sh*t you've heard from angry internet reviewers. These people are basically Gen X losers who watched the original trilogy as kids and couldn't understand why watching the prequels as adults didn't somehow recapture that childlike awe for them, so they just made up lies or applied ridiculous double standards to justify their irrational hatreds. TPM and AotC are flawed but largely enjoyable movies, and RotS is a genuine masterpiece. If you actually look at these movies from a fresh perspective they absolutely hold up.

Also if you really want an internet review, there's one that actually goes deep:

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

I actually think this is very difficult to answer

The prequels are frustrating to me because I think those films have real potential buried under all the terrible writing and directing choices. George Lucas works best as an idea man and the prequels have great ideas, just awful execution. If the originals are supposed to be a classic adventure story, I can imagine a version of the prequels being a classic Greek of Shakespearean tragedy. That being said people these days mistake good intentions for these films being underrated, thats wrong. It doesn't matter if Lucas was trying to make something interesting, he failed.

The sequels are just a mess, not a coherent trilogy at all since they played it safe with the first one, got backlash for that so took some risks with second one, got backlash for that so tried to take it back for the third one and just made a mess. It isn't even really a trilogy as there was no consistent vision, they're three individual films declining in quality as they go on. That being said they are better made than the prequels, despite being completely hollow.

The only thing I can say for sure is the Rise of Skywalker is the worst SW movie hands down no contest. The other two may be better than the prequels, I'm not sure.

The bolded is exactly what does matter. It's what makes the difference between art (bad art, at least until Revenge of the Sith gets over some of the execution issues, but art) and prolefeed. An actual meal, no matter how poorly made, is manifestly better for you than a plaster cast of a beautiful three-course dinner.

[Mr. Smith]

Of course it's subjective up to a point. I keep trying to think of specific examples of why you're wrong and the prequels are just as terrible as the sequels, but I realise that haven't actually watched them in at least 10 years and every point I go to make just comes from other peoples criticism of those movies. So I'll have to rewatch them, I remember all the terrible dialogue and I'm sure the plots are full of logical holes and isn't TPM basically pointless to the rest of the trilogy?

Please do rewatch them and actually try to give them a fair shake. I beg you to forget all the sh*t you've heard from angry internet reviewers. These people are basically Gen X losers who watched the original trilogy as kids and couldn't understand why watching the prequels as adults didn't somehow recapture that childlike awe for them, so they just made up lies or applied ridiculous double standards to justify their irrational hatreds. TPM and AotC are flawed but largely enjoyable movies, and RotS is a genuine masterpiece. If you actually look at these movies from a fresh perspective they absolutely hold up.

Also if you really want an internet review, there's one that actually goes deep:

And isn't this exactly what's going to happen to "The Sequels" once there's another trilogy down the road?

Sorry, but AotC was a garbage movie with a few blips of intrigue at best, and Phantom Menace was totally hit-and-miss.

[vitoNova]

Rogue One is the greatest Star Wars film of all time.

[John Dule]

Ok, we disagree there. I detest Rogue One and I think it's worse than TFA. The fan service isn't just limited to Darth Vader; it includes the absolutely cringe-inducing C-3PO and R2-D2 cameo, as well as the terrible CGI'd Leia and Tarkin (both of which looked so fake they could've been in the Clone Wars animated series).

I agree the CGI Leia and Tarkin were... jarring, and that's an unfortunate reality that the technology at the time was just not there yet to make them feel just right (I recently saw the latest Indiana Jones and whatever you can say about that movie, de-aged Harrison Ford is infinitely more believable). But I wouldn't call them fanservice, since they both had to be there for important narrative and thematic reason. Tarkin is the guy we see running the Death Star in ANH, so giving him no role in a movie centered about it would be bizarre. And given how the events of Rogue One feed directly into the beginning of ANH, having that connection with Leia at the end is important and meaningful. It shows that the main heroes of the original saga were only able to achieve their victory because of the sacrifice of the many that came before, which I think is a valuable idea for Star Wars to explore (if you disagree on that, fair enough)

Nah, there were very easy ways to write around including Leia and Tarkin in the film on-screen. Tarkin could have been referenced in passing by his imperial subordinates, which would have made his presence feel more ominous and looming. Including Leia also made no sense at all. Why was she on the ship at the scene of the battle? She claims at the beginning of A New Hope that she's on a diplomatic mission, as if she has some kind of plausible deniability. How does this make sense when Vader and his forces saw her ship fleeing the battle with their own eyes? Including her in that way creates more plot holes, not less.

That's literally a religious mantra. The point is not for it to come off as philosophically ~deep~ to the audience, but to show it's spiritually meaningful to the character. Personally I thought it was genius to finally show us the Force actually as an actual religion practiced by someone who believes in it without direct evidence, rather than just a superpower. I'm not surprised you don't find the idea as interesting as I do, but at least understand that that's the purpose.

Oh, come on, man. Honestly. I've enjoyed portrayals of fictional (and real-life!) religions in dozens of books, movies, and TV shows. I don't mind the portrayal of the force as a religion-- I actually like the idea of trying to explore its cultural and spiritual significance within the Star Wars universe. What I am criticizing is the redundant and circular dialogue used to achieve the writer's goal. It is lazy writing that does nothing to peel back any layers of this belief system or its tenets. It's just bumper-sticker philosophy that sounds like it was written by AI.

I agree Jyn wasn't a particularly interesting protagonist. I love Chirrut and Baze personally and I think their interactions do a lot to give the story a personality, but I'll concede they're not the larger-than-life figures we're used to from the 6 core movies. And yeah, I'll also give you that the locations don't stand out as much (though I do find some of the visuals memorable and there is a sense of scale to things that you just don't see in the sequel trilogy). Personally I think the story and themes are interesting enough to carry the movie even with this weakness.

I don't remember a single specific interaction between those two characters. All I remember is thinking that their inclusion was clearly geared towards getting Star Wars more accepted by Chinese audiences. Nothing wrong with including Asians in Star Wars, but since those characters were so pointless I couldn't help but think their inclusion was motivated by the recent data on TFA's underwhelming performance in the Chinese film market. And, of course, they weren't funny and their banter felt tonally inconsistent.

None of the other side characters are interesting, and their decisions make no sense. I especially recall the moment when Forrest Whitaker's character refuses to leave the exploding planet because he's "done running." He decides to stay behind and sacrifice himself to an incoming nuclear blast for no reason, gaining nothing whatsoever in the process. Why is he staying behind? To stand up to that planetwide inferno? There is no point (aside from the fact that Whitaker was probably expensive to have on-set and they needed a way to write him off).

I'm sure these people exist but I don't think that's a fair characterization of Rogue One's appeal at all (at least not to me). The point isn't to be gritty for the sake of being gritty - this isn't some Zack Snyder bullsh*t we're dealing with here. I don't see Rogue One trying hard to be cynical and jaded - on the contrary, the whole theme is the length at which people will go to bring back hope in the darkest of times. To me, that's as Star Wars a theme as it gets. Sure, it's a silly story about weird looking aliens, but it's also a space opera that's purposefully dealing with high emotional drama and political stakes. It's a story about individual choices sealing the fate of the universe for good and for ill. If you're a fellow fan of the prequels, how can you possibly argue that Star Wars should never be dark? Personally, I find RotS way darker than Rogue One (sure, fewer named characters die, but it's still a complete downer endings where the good guys see everything they've fought hard to protect corrupted and destroyed from within). It's not really about tone to me, it's about whether you meaningfully contribute to the grand narrative of liberty's death and rebirth. And I think Rogue One and Andor add a lot to this narrative.

I should clarify: I'm not a fan of the prequels. Those films are terrible. Their one saving grace is that they had a consistent artistic vision behind them in the form of one individual, so they are at least coherent from the most general narrative perspective possible. Other than that, they are abject failures in almost every conceivable way (this still makes them many orders of magnitude better than the sequels, for the record).

That said, I don't mind Star Wars taking on a darker tone. But Rogue One is needlessly bleak in almost every respect. The main characters are dour automatons, the film's color scheme is composed of drab grays and blues, and almost every character seems consumed by a sense of impending doom. This might work in a movie like Black Hawk Down, but is it really what we want out of Star Wars? The Empire Strikes Back is proof that you can make a film that includes life, love, humor, wit, and empathetic character moments and still end on a gut-wrenching and dark twist. The Rebels from the OT were fighting against overwhelming odds, but they still felt like happy warriors with a bit of pluck. In contrast, the characters in Rogue One feel like ISIS fighters. There's just no spectrum of the human experience at all in that film, which is probably why nobody remembers or cares about those characters today.

[John Dule]

Rogue One is the greatest Star Wars fan film of all time.

[Antonio the Sixth]

And isn't this exactly what's going to happen to "The Sequels" once there's another trilogy down the road?

I mean, probably? I'm aware the Sequel trilogy has its fans, and like, good for them. If they see something valuable in these movies that I don't, I'm genuinely happy for them. But I'm not gonna tolerate bad-faith criticism by entitled manchildren masquerading as professional reviewers. You can like what you like and hate what you hate - just don't make sh*t up to attack movies you happen to dislike.

Sorry, but AotC was a garbage movie with a few blips of intrigue at best, and Phantom Menace was totally hit-and-miss.

Nah, there were very easy ways to write around including Leia and Tarkin in the film on-screen. Tarkin could have been referenced in passing by his imperial subordinates, which would have made his presence feel more ominous and looming. Including Leia also made no sense at all. Why was she on the ship at the scene of the battle? She claims at the beginning of A New Hope that she's on a diplomatic mission, as if she has some kind of plausible deniability. How does this make sense when Vader and his forces saw her ship fleeing the battle with their own eyes? Including her in that way creates more plot holes, not less.

Meh, tbh I just don't care much about the whole "plot holes" discourse. Sure if the whole core premise of the movie is incoherent that would obviously be a problem, but the stuff cite as "plot holes" in Star Wars are extremely minor examples (I also disagree with BRTD in this regard, I think ANH stands just fine on its own and didn't need any "fixing") and this is no exception. You can chalk it up to Leia making up brazen lies just as a way to buy herself some time, or that she assumed shed manage to evade Vader's tracking and could pretend to be a different Alderaan ship that just got mixed up with the one that fled. Plenty of "plot holes" can be plugged up with a bit of imagination. Or we could just roll with it anyway.

From a thematic standpoint (which is what I care about - plot is just an excuse for the themes to play out as far as I'm concerned) it was crucial to connect the events of Rogue One to the start of ANH. The point is that what we saw in the original trilogy was the culmination of a longstanding struggle. The ending of Rogue One drives that point across perfectly, and there's no real substitute for it that preserves the meaning.

Oh, come on, man. Honestly. I've enjoyed portrayals of fictional (and real-life!) religions in dozens of books, movies, and TV shows. I don't mind the portrayal of the force as a religion-- I actually like the idea of trying to explore its cultural and spiritual significance within the Star Wars universe. What I am criticizing is the redundant and circular dialogue used to achieve the writer's goal. It is lazy writing that does nothing to peel back any layers of this belief system or its tenets. It's just bumper-sticker philosophy that sounds like it was written by AI.

Okay, fair enough. If you think that's a trite portrayal and you wanted more depth, that's totally fair - I myself would have loved to see more. But real-world religions do build rituals out of intense repetition of a simple phrase with the purpose of attaining a greater spiritual awareness. This is a real thing, not something the movie made up as a lazy parody. So I can totally buy a follower of the Jedi religion being into this kind of practice as well. I agree it's not that deep, but I personally found it a fascinating glimpse

I don't remember a single specific interaction between those two characters. All I remember is thinking that their inclusion was clearly geared towards getting Star Wars more accepted by Chinese audiences. Nothing wrong with including Asians in Star Wars, but since those characters were so pointless I couldn't help but think their inclusion was motivated by the recent data on TFA's underwhelming performance in the Chinese film market. And, of course, they weren't funny and their banter felt tonally inconsistent.

I thought their dynamic felt genuine and compelling, personally. I agree there's nothing as memorable to it as you'd find in the many relationships of the 6 core movies, but that's a high freaking bar to set! I think they worked fine at being the archetypes they were supposed to be, and sometimes that's all I need if I buy into the broader goal of the move. If that's not enough for you that's fair of course.

None of the other side characters are interesting, and their decisions make no sense. I especially recall the moment when Forrest Whitaker's character refuses to leave the exploding planet because he's "done running." He decides to stay behind and sacrifice himself to an incoming nuclear blast for no reason, gaining nothing whatsoever in the process. Why is he staying behind? To stand up to that planetwide inferno? There is no point (aside from the fact that Whitaker was probably expensive to have on-set and they needed a way to write him off).

I agree this isn't justified enough in the movie, and the actual scene is goofy as hell, but the in-universe reason is that this guy is basically the rebellion's Darth Vader - an extremist who stopped at nothing to achieve his goals - and he's been fighting for so long to gain so little that it makes sense he'd just give up. What's left for a fanatic to do when they've lost faith in their cause? Just waiting to die seems like a plausible answer. I agree the execution is goofy as hell, though. The movie really needed to give us a proper introduction to Saw before we got to this point.

I should clarify: I'm not a fan of the prequels. Those films are terrible. Their one saving grace is that they had a consistent artistic vision behind them in the form of one individual, so they are at least coherent from the most general narrative perspective possible. Other than that, they are abject failures in almost every conceivable way (this still makes them many orders of magnitude better than the sequels, for the record).

Ah, I see. That's disappointing. I guess my quest to find a genuine fellow prequels appreciator continues on... I know these movies are far from perfect of course, but I genuinely think they're compelling pieces of art that deserve to be appreciated on their own merits rather than merely being positively compared to Disney's abominations.

That said, I don't mind Star Wars taking on a darker tone. But Rogue One is needlessly bleak in almost every respect. The main characters are dour automatons, the film's color scheme is composed of drab grays and blues, and almost every character seems consumed by a sense of impending doom. This might work in a movie like Black Hawk Down, but is it really what we want out of Star Wars? The Empire Strikes Back is proof that you can make a film that includes life, love, humor, wit, and empathetic character moments and still end on a gut-wrenching and dark twist. The Rebels from the OT were fighting against overwhelming odds, but they still felt like happy warriors with a bit of pluck. In contrast, the characters in Rogue One feel like ISIS fighters. There's just no spectrum of the human experience at all in that film, which is probably why nobody remembers or cares about those characters today.

I think we are largely in agreement that Rogue One's characterization pales in comparison to that of the originals. I'd be hard pressed to disagree with that. I mean, George Lucas gave us some of the most iconic characters in modern cinema history, so it anything short of that would suffer the comparison. Given that inevitable reality, I think the movie's choice was to deliberately go with somewhat blander characters in order to hammer in the point that you don't need to be a larger-than-life hero to make a positive difference for the world. Jyn has to be a little Special of course, because this is still Disney, but even she is basically just someone who's had a sh**t life and is trying her best to survive until she finds a cause worth dying for. Andor... well, he's getting his own show now but let's just say his journey to becoming a rebel is a deeply meaningful one that goes in depth about the nature of political radicalization. The others are just random people caught in the mix who decide they want to do the right thing. Again, nothing groundbreaking, but I like the overall picture it paints.

As for the bleakness, I don't really see it? Like, I know I'm an anomaly but personally I find ESB a bit of an unsatisfying watch? Nothing is really achieved by the end aside from the heroes having Learned Valuable Lessons. Sure, those lessons are very compelling, but that still leaves me feeling a bit empty. The heroes fail at everything and end up further from their goals than they started. This would have been great as a first half of a movie, but as the whole thing it does strike me as a bit... well, bleak. In Rogue One, the characters embrace their mission in full knowledge of the risks involved because they think it's worth it. Sure, it's sad (and I don't disagree that a bit more levity in the movie could have helped tonally) but it still feels narratively satisfying. The Rebellion is now in a stronger position than it ever was before. I guess maybe I just don't mind the "ISIS fighter" mindset quite as much as you do - I am actually interested in what drives people to be willing to die for a cause, and while that's not the most fun topic, I think it can be inspiring in its own way.

[quesaisje]

My most vivid memories of the sequel trilogy are of (1) Luke Skywalker drinking blue milk on an island covered in CGI space puffins and (2) Carrie Fisher getting vented into space and turning into Mary Poppins.

[Antonio the Sixth]

Rogue One is the greatest Star Wars fan film of all time.

I can agree with that actually. Frankly anything with the Star Wars label that wasn't made by George Lucas is best understood as fanfiction. I just think Rogue One is good fanfiction, while the sequel trilogy is sh*t tier fanfiction.

[Devout Centrist]

Sometimes I wish I could back in time and convince Hollywood execs to let Lucas direct the Flash Gordon adaptation.

[Antonio the Sixth]

My most vivid memories of the sequel trilogy are of (1) Luke Skywalker drinking blue milk on an island covered in CGI space puffins and (2) Carrie Fisher getting vented into space and turning into Mary Poppins.

You know, it actually makes a lot of sense that all of your memories from the sequels are from TLJ. TLJ is the only movie of the three that had something resembling a creative vision behind it (albeit a terribly misguided one) while the other two were entirely derivative, soulless pandering.

[John Dule]

Nah, there were very easy ways to write around including Leia and Tarkin in the film on-screen. Tarkin could have been referenced in passing by his imperial subordinates, which would have made his presence feel more ominous and looming. Including Leia also made no sense at all. Why was she on the ship at the scene of the battle? She claims at the beginning of A New Hope that she's on a diplomatic mission, as if she has some kind of plausible deniability. How does this make sense when Vader and his forces saw her ship fleeing the battle with their own eyes? Including her in that way creates more plot holes, not less.

Meh, tbh I just don't care much about the whole "plot holes" discourse. Sure if the whole core premise of the movie is incoherent that would obviously be a problem, but the stuff cite as "plot holes" in Star Wars are extremely minor examples (I also disagree with BRTD in this regard, I think ANH stands just fine on its own and didn't need any "fixing") and this is no exception. You can chalk it up to Leia making up brazen lies just as a way to buy herself some time, or that she assumed shed manage to evade Vader's tracking and could pretend to be a different Alderaan ship that just got mixed up with the one that fled. Plenty of "plot holes" can be plugged up with a bit of imagination. Or we could just roll with it anyway.

I have definitely been accused of taking plot holes too seriously in the past, but with stuff like this the error is so blatant that it is only attributable to the stupidity or laziness of the writer. If just one of the thirty freaking people in Disney's writers room had watched A New Hope prior to birthing this festering monstrosity of a script, they could've easily avoided this obvious mistake. And at the very least, you have to concede that Leia (and Tarkin, and C-3PO, and R2-D2) did not need to be there in order for the plot to make sense, which was my original point. Rather, they were clumsily shoehorned in for the sake of inducing nerd orgasms. The level of disgust I felt upon seeing Carrie Fisher's CGI'd face was only matched during my viewing of Cannibal Holocaust.

From a thematic standpoint (which is what I care about - plot is just an excuse for the themes to play out as far as I'm concerned) it was crucial to connect the events of Rogue One to the start of ANH. The point is that what we saw in the original trilogy was the culmination of a longstanding struggle. The ending of Rogue One drives that point across perfectly, and there's no real substitute for it that preserves the meaning.

You can connect the films chronologically and thematically without literally having one movie conclude mere minutes before the next one begins, and telegraphing that fact without a hint of subtlety. It's the same dumb thing that Revenge of the Sith did: end the film by moving all the characters into the exact positions they need to be to set up the next movie, assuming that the audience is too stupid to understand how the intervening events play out.  Such things will inevitably reek of a low estimation of the viewer's intelligence, as well as blatant pandering and fan service.

Okay, fair enough. If you think that's a trite portrayal and you wanted more depth, that's totally fair - I myself would have loved to see more. But real-world religions do build rituals out of intense repetition of a simple phrase with the purpose of attaining a greater spiritual awareness. This is a real thing, not something the movie made up as a lazy parody. So I can totally buy a follower of the Jedi religion being into this kind of practice as well. I agree it's not that deep, but I personally found it a fascinating glimpse

I think it's the equivalent of a Christian character engaging with their faith by doing nothing aside from saying "What would Jesus do?" over and over again.

I agree this isn't justified enough in the movie, and the actual scene is goofy as hell, but the in-universe reason is that this guy is basically the rebellion's Darth Vader - an extremist who stopped at nothing to achieve his goals - and he's been fighting for so long to gain so little that it makes sense he'd just give up. What's left for a fanatic to do when they've lost faith in their cause? Just waiting to die seems like a plausible answer. I agree the execution is goofy as hell, though. The movie really needed to give us a proper introduction to Saw before we got to this point.

If he'd actually lost faith in the efficacy or righteousness of the Rebellion, that might've been interesting. The way it's played out in the movie makes it seem like he is literally just too lazy and tired to keep going though, lol.

Ah, I see. That's disappointing. I guess my quest to find a genuine fellow prequels appreciator continues on... I know these movies are far from perfect of course, but I genuinely think they're compelling pieces of art that deserve to be appreciated on their own merits rather than merely being positively compared to Disney's abominations.

The Prequels are arguably more frustrating because they take an extremely compelling story and tell it in the most boneheaded way possible. I do still appreciate the aspects that work (Ewan McGregor, the Emperor, and some genuinely decent sequences mostly in Revenge of the Sith), but I rarely revisit those movies and I think it's pretty insane to consider them successful at all from a storytelling perspective. I'll always defend them to the death as better than the Sequels, but that is an abysmally low bar.

I'd probably give The Phantom Menace a 2/10, Attack of the Clones a 3 or 4, and Revenge of the Sith a 5 or 6. It depends on how forgiving/nostalgic I feel at the time. Every Disney Wars film gets a zero though.

I think we are largely in agreement that Rogue One's characterization pales in comparison to that of the originals. I'd be hard pressed to disagree with that. I mean, George Lucas gave us some of the most iconic characters in modern cinema history, so it anything short of that would suffer the comparison. Given that inevitable reality, I think the movie's choice was to deliberately go with somewhat blander characters in order to hammer in the point that you don't need to be a larger-than-life hero to make a positive difference for the world. Jyn has to be a little Special of course, because this is still Disney, but even she is basically just someone who's had a sh**t life and is trying her best to survive until she finds a cause worth dying for. Andor... well, he's getting his own show now but let's just say his journey to becoming a rebel is a deeply meaningful one that goes in depth about the nature of political radicalization. The others are just random people caught in the mix who decide they want to do the right thing. Again, nothing groundbreaking, but I like the overall picture it paints.

Surely this is giving the hacks at Disney too much credit. When you have bored-looking actors delivering emotionless dialogue while playing indistinguishable characters with paint-by-numbers backstories and motivations, it is time to employ Occam's Razor. What is more likely-- that Disney deliberately wrote their heroes in an uninteresting and bland way so as to subtly pay homage to the heroism of the ordinary soldier, or that they are just bad at their jobs? I get the argument you're making here, but movies like Blade Runner 2049 have managed to explore the theme of the "unexceptional" hero while also making their protagonist a unique and compelling figure in his own right. Just because your character isn't a Jedi or a lightsaber-savant doesn't mean they can't also have some motivation beyond "This is a Rebellion isn't it? I rebel."

As for the bleakness, I don't really see it? Like, I know I'm an anomaly but personally I find ESB a bit of an unsatisfying watch? Nothing is really achieved by the end aside from the heroes having Learned Valuable Lessons. Sure, those lessons are very compelling, but that still leaves me feeling a bit empty. The heroes fail at everything and end up further from their goals than they started. This would have been great as a first half of a movie, but as the whole thing it does strike me as a bit... well, bleak. In Rogue One, the characters embrace their mission in full knowledge of the risks involved because they think it's worth it. Sure, it's sad (and I don't disagree that a bit more levity in the movie could have helped tonally) but it still feels narratively satisfying. The Rebellion is now in a stronger position than it ever was before. I guess maybe I just don't mind the "ISIS fighter" mindset quite as much as you do - I am actually interested in what drives people to be willing to die for a cause, and while that's not the most fun topic, I think it can be inspiring in its own way.

Well, now we're back at the Man of Steel problem that you alluded to: Is this franchise really the proper venue in which to invite ISIS comparisons? I have to answer no-- just as Superman was not the proper venue to draw upon 9/11 imagery. While there is certainly some thematic elasticity in any franchise (Batman in particular handled the transition from cartoonish hijinks to gruesome gothic nightmare very well), there is a limit on what a viewer can take seriously in a film series that involves laser swords, silly purple aliens in hats, and adult men in Halloween costumes. If Gareth Edwards or the eunuchs in Disney's brainstorming chambers want to make a movie about what it means to die for a cause, they should have the confidence to do so without packaging their message in the most recognizable family-friendly media brand of all time.

Star Wars fans, especially the ones who were children in the 1980s and are now adults, might find dark and gritty depictions of child murder, mass genocide, terrorism, torture, and suicide appropriate for the franchise given the sensibilities they've grown into. This is why Star Wars fanfics always include such tonally inappropriate elements, and it's why I called Rogue One a fan film. But if you want a story about Superman committing mass murder, you should write for The Boys-- and if you want your sci-fi to confront the realities of conflict and morally grey dilemmas, you should write for Star Trek.

I'm not even going to comment on your remark about Empire, a movie in which more thought was put into individual lines of dialogue than was put into the entire production of Rogue One.