Rogue One: A Star Wars Story took over like a storm this week. Character reveals, Darth Vader returns, and more clarification on those “scary” reshoots.
By Mike Audette // Thanks to Anthony Breznican over at Entertainment Weekly, Rogue One was all over the news this week. There were character name reveals, the transition of a Clone Wars character from the small screen to the silver screen, details about Darth Vader’s involvement in the film, and more information on the reshoots that had everyone in a tizzy.
Rogue One Character names
First up was the reveal of the characters and their names. Jyn Erso (Felicity Jones) has already been known since the first teaser trailer that came out a few months back, however we finally now have official confirmation on the rest of the Rebel crew as well as the big bad for the film. The Rebel group, tasked with stealing the plans to the Death Star, include: Captain Cassian Andor (Diego Luna), Chirrut Imwe (Donnie Yen), Baze Malbus (Jiang Wen), Bohdi Rook (Riz Ahmed), K-2SO (Alan Tudyk as mo-cap), Galen Erso (Mads Mikkelsen), and the huge shock of the day, Saw Gerrera (Forest Whitaker)!
The main antagonist is named Orson Krennic played by Ben Mendelsohn. His title within the Empire is that of Director. Director of what? Your guess is as good as mine. Krennic and his squad of deathtroopers will be out for blood in Rogue One trying to prevent our group of Rebels from getting away with the Death Star plans. Krennic is notably described as being “hot-headed and unpredictable as compared to Tarkin’s ice-cold and streamlined approach. It’ll be interesting to see how he reacts on-screen as he tries to unravel the relationship between Vader and the Emperor.
Vader Returns in Rogue One
Speaking of Vader, he will indeed play a role in the film, after all. James Earl Jones will be back to voice him, as if there was any other option. According to Lucasfilm President Kathleen Kennedy, Rogue One has to make careful use of Vader.
“He will be in the movie sparingly. But at a key, strategic moment, he’s going to loom large.”
What sort of moment will that be? One can surmise it has something to do with Director Krennic. A little more info on Vader’s reputation: the Rebels are barely aware of who he is. Even those within the Empire aren’t quite sure who he is or what he is capable of. I am hugely interested to see more about Krennic and what happens between him, Vader, the Emperor, and the Rebels throughout the film.
Rogue One Reshoot Redux
There was also another story from Breznican to clarify on the reshoots that are taking place this summer. In an effort to just get down to the nitty-gritty of the situation, he pointedly asked: “Why?” According to his sources inside of Lucasfilm, the reshoots were previously planned to be a part of the filming schedule. The purpose of this extra filming would be to add more weight to its emotion and action sequences. Gareth Edwards commented that:
“I mean it was always part of the plan to do re-shoots. We always knew we were coming back somewhere to do stuff. We just didn’t know what it would be until we started sculpting the film in the edit.”
All of the things that require additional filming are based on preexisting scenes, to add more character development. Nothing like the unclaimed rumors that nearly 40% of the film needed to be redone. If that was the case, Rogue One would not be releasing in December at all. Kennedy also went on to say that the tone of the film isn’t being altered from a straightforward “war” style film. Following the reshoots, which are supposed to wrap up before Celebration Europe, editing will take place in August, and then the score and sound effects then added in in September. This schedule is actually earlier than The Force Awakens editing and scoring last year.
Saw Gerrera joins Rogue One
Wrapping up with probably the biggest piece to come out of all the Rogue One coverage was that Forest Whitaker’s previously mysterious character is none other than Onderonian rebel Saw Gerrera from season five of The Clone Wars. Saw fought along side his sister Steela, Ahsoka Tano, and Anakin Skywalker during the Clone Wars to overthrow the Separatists’ rule of Onderon. Twenty years later, he’s still playing the role of a freedom fighter. Just for who exactly, we’ll have to find out.
Saw has slowly been getting referenced in other canon sources recently. Therefore, his reveal of being involved in Rogue One shouldn’t have been as shocking as it actually was. He was mentioned by Agent Kallus in an episode of Rebels this past season. Also, he got a mention from Ransolm Casterfo in Claudia Gray’s novel Bloodline. Saw is being described as a “battle hardened veteran who leads a group of Rebel extremists,” according to Kennedy. This group of extremists are known as the “Partisans” as said by Casterfo in Bloodline.
Seeing this sort of continuity in Star Wars canon is nothing but incredible. Getting a character created by George Lucas for an animated television show into a full-length, live-action film speaks nothing but volumes on the type of work that is going on within Lucasfilm. If that doesn’t get you excited for the future of Star Wars, I don’t know what else will.