After the reboot of Star Wars last December, Lucasfilm is back with a new Star Wars saga with a spin-off titled Rogue One: A Star Wars Story. The first trailer for the movie just arrived and by the look of it, we can see it’s totally different than what JJ Abrams directed Episode VII looked like. Rogue One, a spin-off is one of the several standalone movies that was lined up when the reboots were announced and will take a look at the Star Wars universe and its characters.
This movie is said to take place just before the events of the original film. The trailer kicks in when Felicity Jones who plays Jyn Erso in the movie is brought in front of a young Mon Mothma, being charged with forgery of imperial documents, stolen property, aggravated assault and resisting arrest. Mothma says, “On your own from the age of 15, reckless, aggressive, and undisciplined.”
“This is a rebellion, isn’t it?” questions Jones. “I rebel.”
Felicity Jones then along with a band of members is sent to steal plans for the Death Star before it can be used to enforce the Emperor’s rule. These are the same plans, it appears, that Princess Leia stored in the memory banks of R2-D2 back in 1977.
Rogue One is a Star Wars anthology film, moving away from the story of Luke Skywalker and his family. Directed by Gareth Edwards known for his work on Godzilla and Monsters, others in the cast include Diego Luna, Donnie Yen, Forest Whitaker, Mads Mikkelsen, Jiang Wen and Ben Mendelsohn.
The trailer packs a lot of nostalgia from the first Star War trilogy as it features shots of the iconic Death Star, the Star Destroyers, ATATs shooting at soldiers on the ground, but there is no sight of Darth Vader who is set to be seen in the film. With Rogue One, Star Wars is moving into the expanded cinematic universe, something Disney has mastered with Marvel and will want to expand it to this lucrative franchise.
Disney CEO, Bob Iger at the recent quarterly earnings call in February said, “Filming of Rogue One is virtually completed and we absolutely love what we’ve seen so far. This is the first of a set of planned stand-alone stories and we’re already in preproduction on our next one, for release in May of 2018.”
Star Wars will be an annual event as Rogue One is slated for release on 16 December this year, followed by Rian Johnson’s Episode VIII year later, a Han Solo spin-off film coming in 2018, and then Episode IX which will see an end to the Skywalker saga in 2019.
That’s not all. Another anthology film is scheduled for 2020, but neither a title nor character on which it will be based has been officially announced. But according to rumour mills, these anthologies could be centred on everyone, from Boba Fett to Obi-Wan Kenobi.
