This is not a secret ISIS plan. There really are Star Wars spoilers below the jump.
(Of course, that's just what ISIS would say, isn't it?)
I'm sure that its flaws will be more obvious on repeated viewings, but at first glance Rogue One is the best film since Empire. It manages to achieve this in spite of sharing a glaring flaw with the last movie, to whit, a main character who is almost completely without personality or interest. Indeed, except that one is a proto-Jedi and the other apparently not, they seem to be exactly the same character. Both young women orphaned by the conflict; both have extraordinary fighting abilities (this last one without even an appeal to latent ability with the Force as an excuse); both claim to want nothing more than to be left alone, but secretly long for reunion with their fathers. The fate of the universe hangs on each, and both are recognized by all as the moral pillars of the story, somehow, in spite of their lack of accomplishments or contributions to the war before they showed up five minutes ago. Both are sufficiently empty of personality to allow, I suppose, the widest possible range of viewers to see themselves in the character as a kind of wish-fulfillment.
That major flaw aside, it's really quite a good movie. The best thing about it is its willingness to do something that hasn't been done since the very first Star Wars, when Han shot Greedo without warning or apology. It accepts that a resistance movement depends on spies, on assassins, and on a high degree of sacrifice. There is only one magic sword in this movie, and the black knight has exclusive access to it.
The moral maturity shown by most of the characters in the film gives Rogue One more depth than in most of the others in the series. There is something much more interesting going on here than Good Guys versus Bad Guys. It's definitely worth two hours if you're a fan of Star Wars. If you aren't, of course, you won't like it. It is very much a Star Wars movie.
I've hashed the over and over with my friends, and I have come to the conclusion that while it may not be strictly better (beat for beat) than Empire, it is a more important movie to the story of the trilogy than any other movie (by virtue of the fact that it cleans up SO many plot holes in A New Hope; which I will get into more below), and that makes it the best Star Wars movie of all.
ReplyDeletePlot hole repair. Nostalgia has kept us from overly examining A New Hope in the manner that we examined the widely panned prequel trilogy. I recognize that now, as having gone back and rewatching it recently revealed all the sins we've decried in the prequels. Bad/wooden acting, awkward dialog, an over-reliance on special effects, a simplistic plot, etc. And plot holes there are. Clearly, advanced remote communications are in existance, and yet the rebels require the manual transfer of the Death Star plans to a droid and thence to Kenobi (who is to take them to Alderaan). Why? Why doesn't Leia transmit them? Rogue One explains this. Why does an exhaust port allow a single fighter-borne weapon to destroy a moon sized battle station? Rogue One covers this as well. Why does Luke get assigned to Red 5? Rogue One explains that one too.
And this movie covers those holes while faithfully sticking to the look of a New Hope. People have terrible 70's hair-dos and moustaches. The equipment we see on screen looks like it could have come off the set in the 70s. I give a lot of credit to the director for that choice. It would have been pretty easy to go with a more modern aesthetic, but I think the movie is stronger for not having done so.
More below
As for the main character's "inexplicable combat expertise", that's actually covered by the film as well, but you'd have to be quick to notice it. Saw Gerrera (the Forest Whitaker character) was leader of a Resistance cell, an extremely violent one at that. And she fought with them until she was in her teens, being left only when other Resistance members started questioning who she really was. So she knows guns and explosives. And honestly, a lot of the questioning of Rey's combat ability in The Force Awakens was kind of stupid as well. It's established early on that she's skilled with melee weapons as she easily beats up several would be attackers with her staff. Given her clear Force aptitude, it's not that strange. And furthermore, at the point where she is fighting Kylo Ren, she is losing that fight consistently (against a VERY wounded opponent, I would add) right up until she calls upon the Force. So to say it's "unexplained" is perhaps a misjudgment of the situation?
ReplyDeleteAnd as for the moral center on what is clearly the protagonist (since when is that odd?), it's not even all that true in Rogue One. First off, I applaud Disney for a couple of extremely braves choices for this film. Not the least of which is the marketability destroying decision to kill off the entire team (hey, this thing SAID it had spoilers), but also to show that the Rebellion is not unambiguously "good". The choice to have Cassian (aka "French Resistance guy") shoot his contact in the back, rather than risk his capture is another. His orders from the head of Rebel Intelligence to straight up murder Galen, and his general underhandedness all were bold choices not seen since back when Han actually shot first. Which, if you remember, even Lucas considered a "mistake".
And best of all, while he is somewhat conflicted about the things he's done, he lectures Jyn about fighting for a greater cause rather than avoiding it. If she's the moral center and he makes her realize she's been hiding rather than fighting, what does that say about her "moral centralness" in the film? She's an ambiguous character, like many of the others in this film, who actually grow rather than simply be established as "the good guy" who always does the right thing. Han Solo is the closest we get to a morally ambiguous character prior to Rogue One, and even he only spends one movie as slightly ambiguous (and even then, Lucas tried to whitewash him into a "better" person with the Special Editions). This is the first movie to acknowledge that an armed Rebellion must commit immoral actions if they are to win their fight. And I applaud that decision. This idea of "clean hands" is one of the greatest disservices I think popular media has ever given us.
I saw Rogue One last night and I'm not sure what I think.
ReplyDeleteThe original Star Wars was space fantasy. You have an untested young knight, a good princess captured by a black knight and held in a nearly-impregnable castle, a bold rescue that tests the knight's mettle, and an investment in faith.
I'm not sure portraying the moral ambiguities of war make the story or universe any better; Star Wars was never intended to be a realistic portrayal. Han shooting first was to establish him as an anti-hero, in contrast especially to the idealistic young knight and his mentor, and really most of the Rebels, for that matter. Now the whole Rebellion is Han Solo.
My feeling is that, if I had wanted to watch a realistic war movie, I would have have stayed home and watched one on DVD.
And I'm not sure the last 20 years of movies have really portrayed the good guys as pristine. Batman, 24, Justified, Blue Bloods, Sons of Anarchy, Suicide Squad, X-Men, Hurt Locker, Apocalypse Now, Full Metal Jacket, the anti-hero / morally compromised hero has become a standard form of hero in our stories. Is there to be no more room for the idealistic young knight in our storytelling?
So what makes the Rebellion any better than the Empire? Yes, in the greater arc of the movies the Rebellion is about maintaining the Republic, which presumably is a more moral form of government than the Empire. If the ends can justify the means, then at least there is that justification.
But we don't see or hear about that in this movie. If this is the first Star Wars movie someone sees, why should they cheer for the Rebels? What is the difference between the Rebellion and Empire? That's not at all clear in this movie, and without that clarity it's difficult to care whether the Rebels win or not.
That said, Diego Luna's character, Cassian Andor, is one of three characters who mitigate my criticism of the movie. He certainly gets his hands dirty, but he does believe in the greater good, has a conscience, and articulates that. I would have preferred him as the hero of the tale.
ReplyDeleteDonny Yen's Chirrut Imwe is the second. He is as close as the Rebels get to a Jedi in this film.
Mads Mikkelson's Galen Erso is the third.
These characters might save the movie for me, though it still left me with a "Why am I cheering for the Rebels again?" feeling. Any of these three would have been a better focus for the movie.
I'm not averse to a morally problematic hero, but I am averse to a hero I don't care about, which is what Disney seems to want to give me. And if immoral acts must be committed, I want the movie to tell me why in the grander scheme they were necessary.
A few nits to pick. The nearly impregnable fortress. In point of order, it's pretty clear that not only did the Imperials let the Millennium Falcon onboard, let them rescue the Princess, they also let them escape in order to track them to the Rebel base. The only failure in the plan was their inability to recognize that their "impregnable" battle station had a glaring and fatal weakness baked in.
ReplyDeleteAlso, while there is room for the gallant white knight, I take issue with the idea that we're inundated with morally ambiguous good guys. Yes, counter examples do exist. But most of them either turn over their ambiguity by the end of the film, are intended to show that the larger culture they're part of is evil (e.g. your example of Full Metal Jacket), or are actively bad people being used to further "good purposes" (that in many cases are the direct fault of the people who sent these bad guys to go clean it up in the first place). What made Unforgiven a magnificent modern Western is that it is not a tale of redemption of a bad man, but a man living the best he can in an imperfect world. William Bonney doesn't end the movie having turned over a new leaf. Indeed, he ends the film as a gunfighter once more. But what's truly amazing to me about the choice to show the "seedy side" of the Rebellion is that it came under the direction of Disney. Not generally known for their pushing "morally ambiguous heroes".
And also, I've seen the case made that the Republic probably deserved to fall, based upon what we saw in the prequels. A sclerotic Senate could not even bring itself to condemn a hostile invasion of one of its own members, instead so mired in bureaucracy that a committee had to be drawn up to determine if an invasion had even taken place. And the vaunted Jedi council was little better. An unelected oligarchy, they clearly had a mandate from the Republic to mete out lethal justice with no regard to due process because we're told "they're the good guys". Hardly an enlightened organization. Heck, they attempted to assassinate the Chancellor (yes, we know he was a Sith, but literally none of his actions were illegal or in violation of what the Senate voted in favor of). Look at that in context. Imagine that during a war that the US is winning, Federal Marshals bust into the President's office, attempt to arrest him for... well, no actual violations of law, and one of them unilaterally declares the President to be "to dangerous to let live" and attempts to kill him. Would you think that reasonable, measured, or indeed in any way "good"?
Now personally, I thought French Resistance guy was pretty good. Yeah, he had done some terrible things, but he had the moral compass to know they were pretty terrible. And that is a far step above most "conflicted" heroes we end up seeing. He attempts to play off the fact that he was prepared to murder Galen, but you can see it eats at him. And when it appears that the Rebellion, in their fear, will simply fold rather than try to stop the Death Star, he takes action, mostly based on the idea that if the Rebellion fails now that all of the terrible things he has done were not for a greater good, but for a lie.
ReplyDeleteChirrut I could have done without. Oh, the actor was fine, and it did add pathos to the film, but ultimately it would have been at least a little nice to see a Star Wars film where Force wielders were not required to save the day. I mean, literally any character, given proper development, could have filled that role. But did we have to have one of the genetic elite (or religious chosen ones if you prefer) solve the problem? That's a minor quibble though, and not a complaint I'd make outside of a "in a perfect film" discussion.
Why are you cheering for the Rebels? Because at the end of the day, they ARE the good guys. Yes, they're not saints with firearms, but neither is any other group of soldiers ever. I served with good soldiers, but I also served with bad ones. The men who fought at Valley Forge were heroes, but we don't need to see them as stainless paladins in order to appreciate their heroism. In fact, I think it is to our detriment to try. It distances us (as mere mortals) from them. They were men, just like us, in hard times doing what they saw as necessary. And their example is all the more remarkable for it. After all, if the Knights of the Round table are all sinless giants among men, how could we ever emulate them? But if they're just men like you or me, then it tells us we can also perform great deeds if the need arises. And I prefer that sort of hero to the flawless demigod kind.
Mike, to go back to your second comment, I've been thinking about this for a bit:
ReplyDeleteThis is the first movie to acknowledge that an armed Rebellion must commit immoral actions if they are to win their fight. And I applaud that decision. This idea of "clean hands" is one of the greatest disservices I think popular media has ever given us.
I don't think I agree. They can't win without making some extremely hard decisions, decisions which could be argued either way, but I don't believe there is an imperative to act immorally to win.
Take the order to kill Galen. Cassian goes all the way to having him in his cross-hairs but doesn't pull the trigger. Cassian's decision here was hard: It was a lawful order, Galen is serving in the Imperial military (or at least I took it that way) so he's a legitimate target, and it might impede the Empire's use of the Death Star. On the other hand, Cassian has a reason to believe that Galen is really on their side and has done them a great favor by designing a fatal flaw into the weapon and then risking his life to get that information to the Rebels. Bringing him back to the Rebels alive might be a much greater service.
One could argue that either decision would be immoral, but I would disagree. Cassian's moral responsibility is to do the math and make the best decision he can in the situation he finds himself. In that sense, either decision would be moral as long as he has done the math and it's the best decision he can make.
What I want to see in a movie is that the hero does the math. If I disagree with the decision, that's okay. Good people can disagree about what the best decision is.
Can I pick nits with your nitpicking?
ReplyDeleteThe nearly impregnable fortress. In point of order, it's pretty clear that not only did the Imperials let the Millennium Falcon onboard, let them rescue the Princess, they also let them escape in order to track them to the Rebel base.
Sure, but the heroes don't know that, so their actions are still as heroic as if they had gone into a truly "nearly impregnable fortress."
I take issue with the idea that we're inundated with morally ambiguous good guys. Yes, counter examples do exist. But most of them either turn over their ambiguity by the end of the film, are intended to show that the larger culture they're part of is evil (e.g. your example of Full Metal Jacket), or are actively bad people being used to further "good purposes" (that in many cases are the direct fault of the people who sent these bad guys to go clean it up in the first place)
I don't think those things detract from them being morally ambiguous heroes. The Suicide Squad are still the heroes of the film, even if they are bad guys being used by, well, other bad guys, to stop worse bad guys. Joker is still the hero of Full Metal Jacket, and we don't want to see him die; he's doing the best he can in the situation he's in, and we want to see him live even if the film disagrees with why he's there. Pretty much every police procedural I have watched in the last 15 years has its cops breaking the law to bring bad guys to justice. In Justified, there are episodes where the hero is no better than the villains and where he is pursuing the villains not as a matter of justice but as a matter of personal vengeance.
How many action films or series have been made in the last 15 years where the hero doesn't break the law to win?
Why are you cheering for the Rebels? Because at the end of the day, they ARE the good guys.
ReplyDeleteI agree with that whole paragraph, but in this movie it is not made clear that they are the good guys. Throw in the hard choices, don't make the hero spotless, but at some point you have to make it clear that there's a good reason behind it all. If the moral equivalents of two drug gangs are killing each other, all I'm going to root for are casualties.
It's established early on that she's skilled with melee weapons as she easily beats up several would be attackers with her staff.
ReplyDeleteWhat you're taking as the explanation is exactly what I think needs explaining. :)
What you're taking as the explanation is exactly what I think needs explaining. :)
ReplyDeleteWhy? Do we need to see why Han is so good with a blaster? Do we need to see how Poe Dameron got to be such a good pilot? Not at all. It is established that they are skilled by demonstration, and that's all we need. We infer training, practice, and study because that is what those things take to master. I see it as no different with Rey.
They can't win without making some extremely hard decisions, decisions which could be argued either way, but I don't believe there is an imperative to act immorally to win.
ReplyDeleteThere's no imperative to act immorally. But the practicalities of the situation may force them to act in ways that would otherwise be immoral. It is immoral to kill another man. Up until he is trying to kill you. It is immoral to shoot someone who trusts you in the back. Up until he is going to be captured and has information that could lead to the destruction of the Rebellion. My point is that all this is pretty whitewashed in all the other Star Wars films. "Hard decisions" mostly involve self-sacrifice in all the other films. Which is laudable to be sure, but is a child's view of war.
Let me try to explain what I mean. If you could, by risking your own life, save a city from destruction, that would be a hard decision. But there's no ethical risk involved. Now what if you have to decide to utterly destroy a city to end a war? Now there's a moral dimension that the former decision doesn't even approach. Harry Truman had to make one of history's toughest calls (and he made the right one, in my opinion). But that's a much harder decision (from an ethical standpoint) than self-sacrifice is. It's that ethical calculus that I feel has been missing prior to this. It's a war movie, not a fairy tale.
And to be clear, there's nothing wrong with fairy tales. They have a place in entertainment, and I still enjoy a well told one. But it was refreshing to see what is essentially a war story (Star WARS, after all) told as such. Not that they all need to be. It's like why I enjoyed Captain America: Winter Soldier as much as I did. Because while it was still a superhero movie, it was also a spy movie. And Ant Man was essentially a heist movie. And so on. It's nice to see them reaching out a little more.
I agree with the way you've framed it there. I think the element of ethical risk makes the movie better, as long as we know the good guys have done the math and done their best to act morally.
ReplyDeleteI would like to point out, however, that even Captain America approaches being an anti-hero in Winter Soldier. He's fighting German cops out of loyalty to a friend; he's certainly breaking the law. He's stopping one injustice, but committing many more in the process. The movie gods really are not going to let us have idealistic heroes anymore.
Just on Rogue One as a Star Wars movie, Star Wars for me was defined by the first movie. It's fantasy. It's a medieval tale told in the language of science fiction. That's what I loved about Star Wars. The further the movies deviate from that, the less I care for them.
ReplyDeleteWant a science fiction war movie? Make Starship Troopers a series. But that would be hard; Star Wars already has a huge fan base, so they're shoehorning everything into it because it's easy money. The story no longer flows, though. For me, Star Wars is broken. I didn't see episode 3 and I almost didn't see this one or the previous one. It was only peer pressure that finally did me in and sent me to the theater for these last two.
There's no contradiction, by the way, between fantasy and war stories. Read Glen Cook's The Chronicles of the Black Company series. It's pure fantasy: wizards and warriors, swords and sorcery. But Cook was a corpsman for a Marine Recon unit in Vietnam and this is a dark, gritty tale about a mercenary company selling their swords to the highest bidder. It is all about war and the kinds of men who make a career out of it. Some of them just happen to call down spells instead of calling in artillery.
Hm. Maybe I was thinking of Civil War, not Winter Soldier so much.
ReplyDeleteDo we need to see why Han is so good with a blaster? Do we need to see how Poe Dameron got to be such a good pilot? Not at all. It is established that they are skilled by demonstration, and that's all we need.
ReplyDeleteWhen I see someone of approximately 90 pounds taking on several professional thugs and beating them all soundly, and all of them at once, I'd like an explanation to make that plausible. "The Force" is fine in a Jedi, but not in an untrained person who is simply "Force Sensitive." Everyone kept saying how strong the Force was with Luke, but he couldn't win a bar brawl (barely survived being present at it, in fact); he couldn't use a lightsaber to stop a drone from blasting his leg, not without some initial training.
It's that 'Mary Sue' aspect of being exceptionally good at everything, from karate to engineering, in spite of being quite young. It's an annoying weakness in the storytelling.
Okay, finally saw it and my feeling coming out was that it wasn't that good- I think mostly on what Grim ID'ed as the unsympathetic nature of the main character. Also, the tactics were awful, especially in the final battle. good grief, can we get a little cover fire from the guy with the squad blaster when the monk walks out to get the switch please? And then Squad Blaster guy (I don't think I remembered any names after the movie) walks around not bothering to seek cover anymore and is cocking his squad blaster? WTF? And it seemed like almost every guy on the 'Dirty Dozen' team waited then attacked individually so as to die a heroic death, instead of anyone showing some leadership and getting guys to work as a team. I thought of Patton's line about winning not being dying for your country but making the other poor bastard die for his. You can add to this that if they used up so many ships in the attack of the gate, what were they going to have left for the death star attack? Speaking of which, the gate seemed to be a field interrupter to provide an opening in the gate (this seemed quite clear when they showed the closing of the gate). Then when they want to get through, they attack the gate seeking to destroy it. So the planetary shield was powered from a floating satellite?!?!?!?! The small moon of Endor had a shield too, but it was powered from the ground.
ReplyDeleteAnother thing that really irked me was that the "Rebellion" was for some strange reason debating the use of force. How can you be a rebellion without having resorted to use of force? Why are they having a discussion they surely must have had and come to the conclusion to use force long ago? No sense to that at all.
"Clearly, advanced remote communications are in existence, and yet the rebels require the manual transfer of the Death Star plans to a droid and thence to Kenobi (who is to take them to Alderaan). Why? Why doesn't Leia transmit them? Rogue One explains this."
Does it? it shows what happened, but other than showing that time was scarce (which New Hope showed as well), what did it explain? I can think of reasons - large volumes take time to transfer, possible problems of interference or disruption of transmission could mean incomplete data, interception and disclosure of bases, etc.
"Why does an exhaust port allow a single fighter-borne weapon to destroy a moon sized battle station? Rogue One covers this as well." Yes, good.
"Why does Luke get assigned to Red 5? Rogue One explains that one too." Oh! I caught the reference to Red 5, but missed that connection- can you enlighten me please?
”The equipment we see on screen looks like it could have come off the set in the 70s.” Yes, it was way too identifiable. Like the pilots goggles which since he never once wore them, seemed to be pointless. Also, they’ve come to rely too much on very thinly disguised earthly characters- the Buddhist monk, the samurai, the French resistance guy, the assault team when geared up looked like a VN era army unit- this was one of the big problems with the prequels. Yes the originals had it too, but it was a little more layered over, which helps a great deal.
” he lectures Jyn about fighting for a greater cause rather than avoiding it. If she's the moral center and he makes her realize she's been hiding rather than fighting, what does that say about her "moral centralness" in the film?... This idea of "clean hands" is one of the greatest disservices I think popular media has ever given us.”
This to me was probably the best aspect of the movie.
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ReplyDeleteTom, I had to agree to a large extent with you comment about the standardization of the anti-hero. It seemed like the books my son was getting in reading lists for his English classes were loaded with anti-hero type plots, I actually asked the teacher at back to school night- ‘if all they get are anti-heroes, and never heroic plots, how can they understand the anti part of the anti-hero?’.
”The men who fought at Valley Forge were heroes, but we don't need to see them as stainless paladins in order to appreciate their heroism. In fact, I think it is to our detriment to try. It distances us (as mere mortals) from them. They were men, just like us, in hard times doing what they saw as necessary. And their example is all the more remarkable for it.”
This is an excellent point. I think flawed heroes’ are excellent- I think of Odysseus, or pretty much all the old testament prophets and heroes. They are not, however anti-heroes. That is something different. They are flawed, but somehow still greater than us common men. Relatable but also exemplary.
”How many action films or series have been made in the last 15 years where the hero doesn't break the law to win?”
I don’t care so much about them breaking the law necessarily, but are they still virtuous? The cop shows where they break the law to get things done I find particularly bothersome.
""Hard decisions" mostly involve self-sacrifice in all the other films. Which is laudable to be sure, but is a child's view of war." And that’s where the entire battle part of the movie went, one by one having men rather foolishly sacrifice themselves supposedly in some noble way, but often it wasn’t really doing anyone any favors. It merely showed how poorly trained and disjointed they were. There was no sense of ‘team’ other than the overwrought relationship of the monk to the samurai (sorry, clueless on their names). This was a seriously important missing element in my opinion.
”It's that 'Mary Sue' aspect of being exceptionally good at everything, from karate to engineering, in spite of being quite young. It's an annoying weakness in the storytelling.”
Or it’s that they recycled the new feminist hero(ine) typology from the last film (and about every other action flick with a female lead), which we all know is silly. Watching some of the clips of Leia being shown because of Carrie Fisher’s passing, I realized that female leads used to be able to be both tough and feminine, able to keep up with the men, but not by being one of the men, and attractive instead of a dirty faced girl in guys clothes. Women used to be women. I liked it better that way.
One more thought jumped into my head about this- I was glad that we've gotten back to movies with adult heroes instead of children as heroes. Not that there isn't a place for it, but it seems at times as if popular culture has been trying to convince kids for while now that the adults are all morons and they need to save the earth...
ReplyDeleteWhen I see someone of approximately 90 pounds taking on several professional thugs and beating them all soundly, and all of them at once, I'd like an explanation to make that plausible.
ReplyDeleteSeveral was two, she was armed, they were not, and I don't see that as such an extraordinary feat as to require justification. But your mileage may vary. I simply took it as "she has trained with melee weapons at some point in her past as part of surviving as a scavenger on a harsh world". /shrug
Also, the tactics were awful
It is the curse of the informed. I cringe when I watch Vazquez lead the other Colonial Marines into a breach situation when she's the squad's heavy support weapon in Aliens. Every (and I do mean every) hacking scene in a film or TV show makes me want to slap the taste out of a writer's mouth. My "favorite" example is this (please watch it, it will make you feel my pain a little) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u8qgehH3kEQ
In that little scene, you'll see "hacking" (which apparently is identifiable by the opening of tons of windows on one's screen...) and then two "experts" typing away using the exact same keyboard. And I feel the need to point out, this was played seriously on the show (and not as a "haha, look how goofy we are"). Anyone with even a PASSING knowledge of typing (not computers, just typing) could immediately identify how stupid this is. And not only did the writers leave it in, the actors didn't stop and say "come on... are you SERIOUS?" Because this is what Hollywood thinks hacking looks like.
Sorry, pet peeve.
[RE: Death Star plans] it shows what happened, but other than showing that time was scarce (which New Hope showed as well), what did it explain?
Literally, the one spoiler that it seems most people didn't consider a spoiler (and yet was THE big spoiler for me), is that New Hope happens minutes after the plans are stolen. We see the Tantive IV escape the battle with Vader in pursuit. They barely got the plans off of the Rebel flagship at all. And the plans are described as being huge and needing specialized equipment to transmit. Equipment that the Tantive IV (being a small blockade runner) won't have. R2 doesn't have the plans in his memory, he's literally a rolling lock box containing the stored plans. It's not that transmitting the plans to the Rebel Alliance is inconvenient, difficult, risky, or any other explaination. They literally cannot. They have neither the time, nor the equipment to do so.
Oh! I caught the reference to Red 5, but missed that connection- can you enlighten me please?
It was a tiny little nit to pick, but in New Hope, they stick Luke into Red Squadron in Red 5. A lot of folks wondered where the previous Red 5 was. We watch him die over the Imperial planet in Rogue One. Did they need to do that? Couldn't we just have assumed that? Sure, it was unnecessary, but it was a nice little bone to throw to the hardcore grognards.
This to me was probably the best aspect of the movie.
And frankly, this is why I love discussions in the Hall. Tom and I disagreed on this completely, but you agreed with me that this is one of the best aspects. Tom's not wrong, it's completely subjective. But we all saw the same film and all came to different conclusions about it.
I was glad that we've gotten back to movies with adult heroes instead of children as heroes.
This was the first Star Wars film to acknowledge that there was another audience than just kids. It spoke to those of us who grew up with the original Trilogy who are no longer children and don't want to be treated like children anymore. Which may be why I enjoyed it so much.