Great. A New Hope just became a 4 hour movie for me.

In case any of you were somehow able to resist the urge to immediately pop in Ep. IV after returning from the theater, go watch it now. The whole movie has a much greater sense of urgency and danger. It was like I was watching it for the first time.

We have:

A smuggler/troublemaker named Jyn (with a pistol!)

A heavy weapons guy in half armor with a heavy repeating blaster and a grudge against the Empire

a Force Sensitive armed with a durasteel staff

a mechanic/gadget guy

an older, bearded African-American in a command/support role

A big, beefy brawler (but he's a droid instead of an Aqualish)

And they are all fighting to stop some new Imperial weapons project run by a new high ranking Imperial officer

This movie is Imperial Assault to the core

We have:

A smuggler/troublemaker named Jyn (with a pistol!)

A heavy weapons guy in half armor with a heavy repeating blaster and a grudge against the Empire

a Force Sensitive armed with a durasteel staff

a mechanic/gadget guy

an older, bearded African-American in a command/support role

A big, beefy brawler (but he's a droid instead of an Aqualish)

And they are all fighting to stop some new Imperial weapons project run by a new high ranking Imperial officer

This movie is Imperial Assault to the core

Hopefully there will be a Rogue One box for Imperial Assault.

That it was Imperial Assault definitely occurred to me. I mean the group is basically your typical RPG party composition, right?

We have:

A smuggler/troublemaker named Jyn (with a pistol!)

A heavy weapons guy in half armor with a heavy repeating blaster and a grudge against the Empire

a Force Sensitive armed with a durasteel staff

a mechanic/gadget guy

an older, bearded African-American in a command/support role

A big, beefy brawler (but he's a droid instead of an Aqualish)

And they are all fighting to stop some new Imperial weapons project run by a new high ranking Imperial officer

This movie is Imperial Assault to the core

Hopefully there will be a Rogue One box for Imperial Assault.

I'd be utterly shocked if there isn't, but I wouldn't be surprised if they're a set of allies and skirmish characters rather than heroes.

I'd love to be wrong on that though.

Plus, IIRC there's nothing to suggest Bail even knows Ahsoka is there?

Read the novel Ahsoka.

Plus, IIRC there's nothing to suggest Bail even knows Ahsoka is there?

Read the novel Ahsoka.

Fair enough.

Plus, IIRC there's nothing to suggest Bail even knows Ahsoka is there?

Read the novel Ahsoka.

Fair enough.

Plus the Clone Wars TV series.

We have:

A smuggler/troublemaker named Jyn (with a pistol!)

A heavy weapons guy in half armor with a heavy repeating blaster and a grudge against the Empire

a Force Sensitive armed with a durasteel staff

a mechanic/gadget guy

an older, bearded African-American in a command/support role

A big, beefy brawler (but he's a droid instead of an Aqualish)

And they are all fighting to stop some new Imperial weapons project run by a new high ranking Imperial officer

This movie is Imperial Assault to the core

Hopefully there will be a Rogue One box for Imperial Assault.

We are totally looking forward to playing this and would LOVE a R1 expansion.

There were 200+ TIE FIGHTERS between the SD's, the Ground Base, AND The Death Star.... The space-battle was cheesy. I didn't like it at all.

I feel like I'm going to have to watch it again in order to get a good idea of exactly what I thought about this one. It didn't actually draw me in right away like TFA did. It didn't feel instantly magical. Maybe that was partially due to them eschewing an opening crawl (which I actually guessed beforehand). Before seeing it, I had this feeling that Jyn would be the one character I hated. But it turns out that early in the movie, I hated almost everyone, but Jyn least of all. I didn't like many of the opening or transition shots either. Everything felt dark and muddy and difficult to distinguish. I was feeling a seed of resentment start to grow.

But then we got K-2S0. He was fun, and he kept me invested a bit.

As the movie went on, I found myself very slowly getting to know the characters, and turning to like them more and more. And I am actually very glad that they had to work for my affection, that I didn't like many of them to start off. It made the ending of the movie, and I suppose the entire arc of it in general, feel very organic for me. By the end I truly was thoroughly invested. And as K began to get overwhelmed by Stormtroopers, I could feel the ending I knew was coming beginning to actualize.

Bottom line, I did enjoy this movie. I really got a sense for what the director was going for, he wanted to show a very grim reality in a world where we tend to be presented with everything through a lens of whimsey and magical fun. And I think he did a very good job of that.

There were 200+ TIE FIGHTERS between the SD's, the Ground Base, AND The Death Star.... The space-battle was cheesy. I didn't like it at all.

Do you even Star Wars bro?

The other good point of the movie is that it makes Episode IV better. The weak point of the Death star is now not based on a construction "error", which was a bit ridiculous in the original movie.

Well, not really. It explains why the Death Star vaporized the moment torpedoes detonated, but Erso had nothing to do with the exhaust port.

I like it. The idea that the secondary exhaust port is an intentional design flaw is IMO silly, glad the movie restrained itself.

You know, in my own head I always kinda imagined that the reason the Death Star blows up so spectacularly isn't so much due to the torpedo, but the fact that it destroyed something important just as they were charging up all that energy. Like, it would have just been severely damaged and crippled if they had fired that shot when it wasn't charging to shoot. I actually wrote an alternate universe X-Wing minis campaign based on that idea.

There were 200+ TIE FIGHTERS between the SD's, the Ground Base, AND The Death Star.... The space-battle was cheesy. I didn't like it at all.

Do you even Star Wars bro?

Yes, but this was supposed to be the grim, war-time, "a lot of rebels died to get us these plans," war-film Star Wars needed... ground battles delivered, space-battle was an idealistic rock-video.

Surprised nobody has said this yet but I'm pretty sure there was a very small nod to Kyle Katarn in R1, or at least a nod to the Jedi Knight games. During/right before the start of the ground assault on Scarif they jump to 2 stormtroopers idly chatting and the convo they had (something about the T15 being outdated/obsolete), I feel like was almost entirely ripped from some stormtrooper dialog in Jedi Knight 2: Jedi Outcast. Need to go back and play that game again to see if it is the exact same lines. Used to love sneaking up on stormies in that game and hearing the random things they'd say.

So... Rebels is too "kiddy" because no one dies and Disney.. Rogue One, complete pyrric victory, and it still isn't good enough? Sheesh.

I enjoyed it, it was pretty much exactly what I expected it to be. I really appreciate that most of the fan service-y call backs were more subtle and clever than in TFA(for example, the guys in Saw's hideout playing the holo-chess game, with wooden pieces and dice) or otherwise fit in better. The way they handled Red and Gold leader was neat, CGI Tarkin and Leia less so, I don't feel like those effects are going to age well with the rest of the movie. Apparently there was a Wedge callout that I missed? Was it somewhere during the battle? After Red and Gold leader checked in I figured they'd do something similar with him so I was a bit disappointed.

Both Vader scenes were cool, for different reasons. Saddest death scene was K2. I thought for sure Chirut was going to actually use the force to flip the switch. Krennic's "Who are you?" at the top of the tower felt a bit awkward, but I guess he did get a good look at Jyn on Eduu? I can't remember. As much as I feel the CGI didn't work I liked the interplay between Krennic and Tarkin.

Now I'm not sure General Syndulla is Hera.
Isn't she a naval captain now? It would make more sense, considering her position, than army captain, which is quite a few steps lower (naval captain would be army colonel). And if she's in a naval rank "path", she would become an admiral not a general.

Don't try to make the Star Wars ranking system make sense. It never ends well.

I guess

The leader of Blue Squadron was a general, and don't forget Lando and Han were also both generals, so yeah.

Do you guys think Blue Squadron is a squadron that works closely with rebel command and that's why they weren't at the battle of Yavin? The leader of the squadron was walking with Mon Mothma, and seemed close to her, in a bodyguard type sense, I felt.

Other Generals: Anakin, Obi-Wan, all the Jedi really.

The ranking isn't that unfathomable. To quote Yoda, you must unlearn what you have learned. Factor in that navy and army are not seperate entities. Generals command fighter squads.

So what I have learned from Star Wars ranking:

Commander will lead a mission or be put in charge if one in the field.

Generals draw up battle plans, in addition to commanding in the field.

Admirals coordinate and lead several starships at a time.

Everything else seems pretty standard from captains down.

Other Generals: Anakin, Obi-Wan, all the Jedi really.

The ranking isn't that unfathomable. To quote Yoda, you must unlearn what you have learned. Factor in that navy and army are not seperate entities. Generals command fighter squads.

So what I have learned from Star Wars ranking:

Commander will lead a mission or be put in charge if one in the field.

Generals draw up battle plans, in addition to commanding in the field.

Admirals coordinate and lead several starships at a time.

Everything else seems pretty standard from captains down.

Jar-Jar was also a General.

a Bombad General to be exact.

Do you guys think Blue Squadron is a squadron that works closely with rebel command and that's why they weren't at the battle of Yavin? The leader of the squadron was walking with Mon Mothma, and seemed close to her, in a bodyguard type sense, I felt.

They likely werent there as they got wiped out. They tried to get in under the shield closing, and those that didn't either bounced off or crashed.

Yep, most likely all dead.

Anyone else felt like watching Platoon at some points. I even spotted one rebel with 3 cigarettes on his helmet! And Whitaker was in both movies too!

.spoil

Do you guys think Blue Squadron is a squadron that works closely with rebel command and that's why they weren't at the battle of Yavin? The leader of the squadron was walking with Mon Mothma, and seemed close to her, in a bodyguard type sense, I felt.

Blue Squadron wasn't at Yavin because the color blue wasn't showing up on their bluescreen shoots. It's why R2D2 looked black in all the X-Wing scenes. If you read the 1977 novelization of Star Wars, Luke was actually Blue Squadron in the original script.

Having Blue Squadron in this movie was another nod to the original film, albeit a more subtle one.