Rogue One Discussion !!!SPOILERS!!!

[Manchu]

Yes - the orcs were definitely a paper tiger. That's an important part of the theme of LotR. Sauron's troops were of extremely poor quality, compared to the warriors of the Free Peoples. But there were tremendous numbers of them and the Free Peoples were disunified and demoralized. The armies of Sauron looked overwhelmingly powerful, regardless of their actual capacity, because his strategy hinged on the courage of men failing in the face of apparently hopeless odds. The whole book is about finding the hope and courage to resist anyway, which was nicely captured by Jackson's movies. Part of that success was making the orcs - and especially the uruk hai - seem fearsome, even considering the audience never doubted that the heroes would come through and win the day.

[ErikB]

I thought the stormtroopers fought reasonably well in Rogue One.  They had a decent fight against that ambush on Jedda and they gave as good as they got in the final fight.  All those rebels got shot or blown up.  Looked reasonably even to me.

[tomcat51]

I thought the stormtroopers fought reasonably well in Rogue One.  They had a decent fight against that ambush on Jedda and they gave as good as they got in the final fight.  All those rebels got shot or blown up.  Looked reasonably even to me.

They walked headlong into that ambush/chokepoint on Jedha.

[pocoloco]

And what was with that tank that could only fire on vertical axis?

I think the inspiration for that tank comes from the flat bed version of Alvis Stormer. So it was meant not to be a main battle tank, just an armed cargo hauler.

[Erny]

When Cassian kills the informant at the beginning, I was really impressed: that scene says "this film is going to tackle some tough realities about war and rebellion."

I think he was killed for overly hammy acting.

Good film, not enough to make up for axing Clone wars or putting out Starwars rebels and the force awakens but at least Disney have done something good with their purchase now. How future films are as good.

[Dezmond]

I think the inspiration for that tank comes from the flat bed version of Alvis Stormer. So it was meant not to be a main battle tank, just an armed cargo hauler.

A grav tank that could strafe in directions other than the one it is facing might not need horizontal traverse on its guns.

And Lego calls it an Imperial Assault Hovertank



That the prop has tracks is clearly just a production oversight :-)

[Vanvlak]

A very late first watching yesterday night with the wife.
I loved it!

The Rebels and other cameos in particular, K2SO, the U-Wing gunner, the first appearance of the AT-ATs, the AT-ST (one of my favourites), the transport and the Hammerhead Corvette - hope they make these for X-Wing.
I missed seeing Chopper and the Ghost, so I'll have to see it again of course.

It was darker than I expected - I always felt it had a Seven Samurai feel (no prizes for guessing why!) to it and expected many of the characters to die, but not all of Rogue 1.
The greater callousness of the rebels and the disagreement on Yavin eliminated what I felt was a slight degree of blandness to the rebels' character in previous films. And one scene I found particularly dark was K2SO digging into the memory of a twin robot nonchalantly.

The aesthetics - it looked like the 70s tuned up - the hairstyles and moustaches were spot on!

[von Lucky]

A very late first watching yesterday night with the wife.
I loved it!

Pfft, wife and I only managed it today. I loved it too (she thought it was a little long, but a great ending). And the cameos were hilarious (Fares Fares!).

[Mick_in_Switzerland]

Here is an interesting video which speculates about the original script for Rogue One
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xGzCGRKEPKQ