This is the spoiler free version of this review.
For the spoiler filled post movie discussion, click here!
Let's start with the basics. This movie is pretty awesome. I've seen it multiple times now (with different groups of people) and I've walked away satisfied every time. So the tl;dr version of this post is go see it, it's a great movie.
Now for some meat (and potatoes, I'll throw in some potatoes. Who wants to read a post with no side dish? Don't you just hate how some places charge you extra for those? If I'm paying $40 for my main course shouldn't I at least get a side salad or some sort of starch to go with it?).
The acting was solid all around. I was very pleased with our leading character, Felicity Jones. She did a good job of exuding feeling onto the audience. Alan Tudyk was obviously amazing, as he always is, and Ben Mendelsohn played a solid villain. The whole cast felt like a good fit, and there were only a few cases were the actor took me out of the movie a bit (see the spoilerized post for details).
He did angry psycho really well [2]
The plot and writing was spot on too. I really enjoyed watching everything unfold, and although this was a super direct prequel to A New Hope, I was constantly surprised. Very refreshing to see a prequel achieve that level of excitement for me.
The action and CGI were glorious. I really felt some strong pangs during some of the more epic shots (as I believe was intended). And all the battles felt very raw and real, definitely lending to the assertion that this is a war movie.
Imperial walkers assaulting ground troops: exactly as terrifying as it was supposed to be [3]
Now to some things I didn't like. I would have liked more character development during the movie. The characters were strong, don't get me wrong, but they didn't really evolve much through the movie. They were pretty much all set. Some relationships worked, and I enjoyed that interaction, but any kind of growth was fairly skimpy. The plot took home the gold for this film, and while it was tremendous, it left me wanting more character development.
I didn't really experience this, but after having it pointed out to me getting feedback from less news-obsessed viewers, the beginning was apparently quite confusing. Lots of character introduction, and the timeline might not be immediately apparent. I won't go into detail here (spoiler free FTW) but suffice it to say that my fellow movie viewers were scratching their heads a bit trying to keep people and places straight early on.
I also have a very specific complaint that I can't go into here (too spoilery) so I leave that to your imagination. But honestly from what I've seen online and heard from friends I think it bothered me more than most people.
So, definitely go see it if you're a star wars fan (tons of amazing easter eggs). And if you're not, this is actually a really solid movie on its own. The only problem is that the movie assumes you have a sound understanding (and memory) of A New Hope. If you don't, then you'll probably be fairly lost during pieces of the movie and most of the set pieces, characters, and plot will fall flat. If you're a newbie and want to enjoy this, make sure you watch Episode IV first.
Tell me what you thought in the comments!
Until next time,
Ryan
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