Star Wars Rogue One MASSIVE SPOILERS BY BERKUT

[Syt]

Finished Catalyst. It's not the best story ever, but it provides a decent amount of backstory, from the original idea of the Death Star during the Clone Wars, its construction efforts, to the rivalry between Krennic , Tarkin, and Mas Amedda. Main focus is Krennic's trying to get Galen Erso to participate in the project. Erso is portrayed as an ivory tower scientist - he cares only about his research into kyber crystals as energy source and while he rejects taking part in the war effort he is slowly goaded into working on what he thinks is a civilian energy project, not looking too closely at where his resources/crystals are coming from.

His wife is meddlesome in that she mistrusts Krennic and the Empire and - after being shown the devastation the Empire causes on some worlds, and the disappearance of old friends - wakes up her husband. The main conflict is between her and Krennic, and you can see why he has her shot at the start of the movie.

The politicking between Tarkin and Krennic is interesting - both are manipulators behind the scenes, but they have different motivations. Krennyk is in this for rank, money, and power. Tarkin is in it for the ideology and thinks Krennyk is too unreliable to be trusted with running something as vital as the Death Star after its completion.

[Berkut]

Finished Catalyst. It's not the best story ever, but it provides a decent amount of backstory, from the original idea of the Death Star during the Clone Wars, its construction efforts, to the rivalry between Krennic , Tarkin, and Mas Amedda. Main focus is Krennic's trying to get Galen Erso to participate in the project. Erso is portrayed as an ivory tower scientist - he cares only about his research into kyber crystals as energy source and while he rejects taking part in the war effort he is slowly goaded into working on what he thinks is a civilian energy project, not looking too closely at where his resources/crystals are coming from.

His wife is meddlesome in that she mistrusts Krennic and the Empire and - after being shown the devastation the Empire causes on some worlds, and the disappearance of old friends - wakes up her husband. The main conflict is between her and Krennic, and you can see why he has her shot at the start of the movie.

The politicking between Tarkin and Krennic is interesting - both are manipulators behind the scenes, but they have different motivations. Krennyk is in this for rank, money, and power. Tarkin is in it for the ideology and thinks Krennyk is too unreliable to be trusted with running something as vital as the Death Star after its completion.

That sounds like it ought to be a pretty damn good story, actually...

Just not executed well?

My (limited) experience with Star Wars canon books has been that the writers I've seen have just been terrible, so I gave up on reading them very quickly.

[Syt]

I listened to it as audio book. The Star Wars audio books make use of music, sound effects etc. which usually alleviates the quality somewhat. Luceno previously wrote for the Expanded Universe.

I'm not saying it's bad, just very by the numbers. There were no big surprises (except maybe how the Geonosians were used as labor force). It has some nice action sequences, though. Part of the rather predictable plot may be because the determined end point, i.e. the start of the movie. It's interesting in showing the transition from Republic to Empire, and some of Death Star background for sure. I'll be checking out Tarkin (the novel) next.

The Star Wars Rebels winter premiere in January will feature Saw Gerrera and the crew of the Ghost traveling to Geonosis, so that might be interesting.

EDIT: As to other new canon novels - I enjoy some of them a fair bit. Aftermath 1 & 2 have an excellent story covering the, well, Aftermath of Ep. VI. It focuses on new characters with some original trilogy characters playing smaller parts. The Republic is struggling to establish control while the Empire is fractured and withdrawing faster than the Republic can fill the vacuum. It's laying some basic groundwork for Ep. VII, and intercuts with short vignettes from different spots around the galaxy to give a bit of a panorama of what's happening on various planets. The biggest drawback is the style of writing - short, breathless sentences in present tense. More like you would tell a story verbally than how you would write it. Haven't checked the audio versions; they might work much better. If you can get over that, the story is pretty good IMHO.

I also enjoyed Fallen Stars. Two kids from a backwater planet - a girl from the original, pastoral settlers, and a boy from the second wave of merchants and craftsmen. They dream of joining the Imperial Navy. They excel in their classes, but because they're very close, the Empire sabotages them to split them up and sow animosity between them. The girl later stays with the Empire and tries to rationalize the things she sees, like the destruction of Alderaan. She becomes increasingly disillusioned in the Empire, but still tries to see the good in it, and she feels bound by her oath.The boy (later her lover) eventually deserts, and after hooking up with smugglers eventually joins the Rebels. In between they visit their old home now and then whichs shows how the Empire transforms its society and exploits its resources. I thought the book made a pretty decent attempt at looking at why good people would serve the Empire till the very end.

[celedhring]

So, third viewing today 

Modest clapping when the princess showed up.

[The Brain]

Finally saw it. Thanks to Berkut I knew what would happen. I liked the robot.

[Eddie Teach]

They prefer "droid".

[crazy canuck]

I thought it was well done.  A couple of minor edit issues though.  In the opening scenes the ship flies over her but she gets to the house first.  Later in the move, on the landing pad with her dad, she almost gets blown off but he doesn't move.  I liked how they tied the end of the movie into the beginning of episode 4.

[Fate]

Loved the movie. But what the fuck with the CGI. It's not ready for prime time. It works with non-human characters or semi-humans like Smeagol. But not yet for real humans. They should have done the CGI of Tarkin and Leia via distorted holograms.

[Syt]

What a lovely universe.



Also, the Darth Vader scene in 16 bit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=biYMDphGTcg

[Josquius]

A thought I had when watching .  The rebels really need more aliens.  Underline the evil racist empire angle. I guess the problem is it damages their relatabilty and opens the door to cg abominations.

That said I thought the CG Cushing was very well done. My mother thought so too.

[Tonitrus]

Also, the Darth Vader scene in 16 bit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=biYMDphGTcg

At risk of seeming a rebel (hah), I thought there was quite a bit of pandering to the audience/fanboys in the Vader "storming a ship and kicking ass with the force" scene.  Especially as it greatly contrasts with the opening scene from ANH, where Vader does absolutely no fighting, and lets the stormtroopers do the "vulgar" work of fighting lowly "rebels/normals".  Just as I thought the spinning-Yoda-of-death scenes from the prequels were, while cool to watch, really quite silly.

[Berkut]

I can't say I agree that they two are comparable.

Yoda and a martial artist was stupid, because it makes no sense.

Vader willing to go in an kill people makes perfect sense, both from what we know of his temperament, and from the tactical situation he was presented with when time was of an essence.

[MadImmortalMan]

I heard that the movie was originally shot with Vader personally murdering most of the R1 characters, but it was thought too brutal and that was why they did the reshoot.

[garbon]

At risk of seeming a rebel (hah), I thought there was quite a bit of pandering to the audience/fanboys in the Vader "storming a ship and kicking ass with the force" scene. 

I agree that it did seem a bit cheesy. Not saying it should have been cut, but I could have done without it.

[garbon]

I heard that the movie was originally shot with Vader personally murdering most of the R1 characters, but it was thought too brutal and that was why they did the reshoot.

Just re-watched the teaser trailer. What a different movie it was about!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wji-BZ0oCwg