CAPSULE: Rogue One - A Star Wars Story (2016, Dir. Gareth Edwards)

Oh, Star Wars. As much as I enjoy tilting a critical mind at you and your big franchise buddies, I'm tired. I feel like I'm shouting into the void. We've grown old together. We've shared good times (and bad times) and we've revisited them probably more often than any other film committed to celluloid. But I think I've gotten older, and I like to think more sophisticated in my outlook - if not sophisticated, then at least more demanding.

I rock up. I enjoy, even. But I think we've got different priorities. I recognise you're trying. I know you've tried to tap into the darkness that all your grown up devotees so desperately want you embrace. And you're getting there. But, you know, there's more to entertainment than hard-edged action. You've still got to put in a little groundwork if you're going to want me to get involved.

It's not me; it's you.

I don't want to sound like I'm totally down on us, but if you're going to introduce me to new characters, they need to have a reason to do what they are doing. Just knowing they need to get some plans to the Death Star is not enough. You've got to stop acting as if your characters are cognisant of the Star Wars canon.

Just telling me this rag tag crew that you're putting in front of me is hardcore space grift doesn't work unless they actually act like it (and Felicity Jones does not act like it, nor does Diego Luna for that matter).

And, you know, you need to give them a plan. "We're going to steal the plans" is not a plan. "Just try giving them the pass code to get through the shield cos it might work" is not a plan. "Go pull the master switch" is not a plan. "Oh shit that small band of rebel rebels has broken away so we should send the whole fleet to hang around outside a shield we can't get through" is not a plan.

You've got to stop throwing away characters once they've served their narrative-pushing purpose (Did Mads really have to leave when he did? Would Forest in hardened dissident mode really have just said, that's it from me?). There's so much richness in your mythology. You can use it for more than window dressing.

But, credit where credit's due, when you dress up, you dress up well. That final act, once you got where you wanted to get, as silly as it is, as preposterously nonsensical as the rebel actions were, it certainly was pretty.

I'd like to say that throwing third act spectacle at us isn't going to cut it. But it kinda did.

Just know you are better than this.

And let poor Peter be ffs.

★★★☆

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