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This is not a review.
[This post contains spoilers for Star Wars: Rogue One. Do not click the cut if you haven’t watched the film and are sensitive to spoilers.]
I saw Rogue One last week and I'm still dealing with the emotional fallout.
Actually, before I get into this: If you think the film was terrible, want to pick apart plot points, lecture me about how the story isn't deep or meaningful, argue that a having female lead is a pointless gesture in the direction of political correctness, tell me I’m not a “real” fan, or claim that casting a significant proportion of characters of colour is tokenism or that representation doesn’t matter, I have a request. Please, hold your tongue. This post is not for you.
Because the film drew me in completely. Not just because it was, in many ways, the Star Wars film I always wanted. The Force Awakens was good, centering the female lead, providing a nuanced character of colour, connecting beautifully with the characters in the original films (Episodes IV-VI). Rogue One does those things too but I got involved with this story on the level I used to when I was a kid and I'd lose myself completely in a narrative, to the point where I'd have visceral nightmares about it (as I am with Rogue One). This story felt true.
I don't talk much about it but as a child I spent long periods (months to years) separated from my parents, for reasons I don't actually fully understand even now (and don't want to ask about because what would be the point: the past is past and I have no wish to revisit pain). I was with my relatives who loved me in their reserved way (see: Saw Guerrera). I left home at 16 (willingly, which is where I diverge from Jyn).
The way she reacted to her experiences struck a deep chord in me. The (misguided?) idolatry of the absent father. The resentment and anger directed at the world at large, for wrongs and suffering that seemed destined never to abate. The determination to survive because in spite of this, life is worth clinging to. My story is not identical to hers - hers is amplified to maximum agony - but I found her uncannily relatable. I loved her. And I loved Cassian and K-2SO and Baze and Chirrut and Bodhi. And I was devastated that everyone died. It was the right ending for the story but to watch them, and particularly Jyn, end that way...well, I'm crying even typing about it.
On a less soul-searing note, it was also a great pleasure to watch Diego Luna and Donnie Yen, both men with identifiable and heavy accents, in speaking roles with lots of dialogue, and where the accent is just there. It’s not cause for mockery or even remarked upon at all. There’s no reason for everyone to speak with an American or British accent in a space opera that spans the galaxy. Or at least, none that don’t come across as colonialist. One day, I hope to watch - with my dad - a Hollywood film that features a Filipino actor speaking with a strong accent. (I know, I know, moon on a stick. The closest I’ve ever heard is Tia Carrere’s voicing of Nani in “Lilo & Stitch”.)
Also, Donnie Yen gets to be funny, in a Hollywood film that both showcases his martial arts ability and isn’t a screwball comedy. I grew up watching a lot of kung fu - mostly from behind the sofa because technically I wasn’t allowed - because my dad loved it. If you haven’t watched Once Upon a Time in China II or Iron Monkey, I challenge you to do so and not end up both delighted by the humour and gobsmacked by the physicality of Donnie Yen (and Jet Li).
So anyway, watching Rogue One was a significant and moving experience for me. I don’t expect everyone will agree with me, but I hope this conveys, to an extent, why the casting choices and script were so important to persons with marginalised identities.
And now I need to go and sob into a cup of herb tea again because, well, I loved them, and they all died.
[This post contains spoilers for Star Wars: Rogue One. Do not click the cut if you haven’t watched the film and are sensitive to spoilers.]
I saw Rogue One last week and I'm still dealing with the emotional fallout.
Actually, before I get into this: If you think the film was terrible, want to pick apart plot points, lecture me about how the story isn't deep or meaningful, argue that a having female lead is a pointless gesture in the direction of political correctness, tell me I’m not a “real” fan, or claim that casting a significant proportion of characters of colour is tokenism or that representation doesn’t matter, I have a request. Please, hold your tongue. This post is not for you.
Because the film drew me in completely. Not just because it was, in many ways, the Star Wars film I always wanted. The Force Awakens was good, centering the female lead, providing a nuanced character of colour, connecting beautifully with the characters in the original films (Episodes IV-VI). Rogue One does those things too but I got involved with this story on the level I used to when I was a kid and I'd lose myself completely in a narrative, to the point where I'd have visceral nightmares about it (as I am with Rogue One). This story felt true.
I don't talk much about it but as a child I spent long periods (months to years) separated from my parents, for reasons I don't actually fully understand even now (and don't want to ask about because what would be the point: the past is past and I have no wish to revisit pain). I was with my relatives who loved me in their reserved way (see: Saw Guerrera). I left home at 16 (willingly, which is where I diverge from Jyn).
The way she reacted to her experiences struck a deep chord in me. The (misguided?) idolatry of the absent father. The resentment and anger directed at the world at large, for wrongs and suffering that seemed destined never to abate. The determination to survive because in spite of this, life is worth clinging to. My story is not identical to hers - hers is amplified to maximum agony - but I found her uncannily relatable. I loved her. And I loved Cassian and K-2SO and Baze and Chirrut and Bodhi. And I was devastated that everyone died. It was the right ending for the story but to watch them, and particularly Jyn, end that way...well, I'm crying even typing about it.
On a less soul-searing note, it was also a great pleasure to watch Diego Luna and Donnie Yen, both men with identifiable and heavy accents, in speaking roles with lots of dialogue, and where the accent is just there. It’s not cause for mockery or even remarked upon at all. There’s no reason for everyone to speak with an American or British accent in a space opera that spans the galaxy. Or at least, none that don’t come across as colonialist. One day, I hope to watch - with my dad - a Hollywood film that features a Filipino actor speaking with a strong accent. (I know, I know, moon on a stick. The closest I’ve ever heard is Tia Carrere’s voicing of Nani in “Lilo & Stitch”.)
Also, Donnie Yen gets to be funny, in a Hollywood film that both showcases his martial arts ability and isn’t a screwball comedy. I grew up watching a lot of kung fu - mostly from behind the sofa because technically I wasn’t allowed - because my dad loved it. If you haven’t watched Once Upon a Time in China II or Iron Monkey, I challenge you to do so and not end up both delighted by the humour and gobsmacked by the physicality of Donnie Yen (and Jet Li).
So anyway, watching Rogue One was a significant and moving experience for me. I don’t expect everyone will agree with me, but I hope this conveys, to an extent, why the casting choices and script were so important to persons with marginalised identities.
And now I need to go and sob into a cup of herb tea again because, well, I loved them, and they all died.
From:
no subject
I love them all, they are my darling babies, the movie was EXACTLY RIGHT, but that doesn't mean I don't endlessly entertain myself imagining them miraculously surviving* and changing the whole course of the original trilogy by a combination of common sense, yelling and sheer stupid "there is no way that should have worked" Force intervention.
*I dunno. The Doctor did it. The Heart of Gold passed too close to their reality. Q had a Moment. It's Batman's fault. Whatevs.
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And I adored that line, I had already fallen in a little in love with Chirrut but that line was just so full of personality and I fell the rest of the way in love with him there.
(I mean, I fell in love with all the main cast. That's why I was crying my damn face off at the end, for all that I would've been furious if they hadn't allowed such a fierce, awful, beautiful ending. But yes. I also entertain the "what IF" thoughts because I loved them all and this movie was the most real, truest Star Wars movie I've ever seen and I WANT ALL MY DARLINGS TO HAVE MORE ADVENTURES. >_>)
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In fairness, that protestation carries a bit less force coming from someone we've seen take down about eight stormtroopers with a stick, and who later hits a TIE fighter from several hundred metres away with a single shot.
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Yes, but the bag won't make any difference to any of that either, so the point remains, really. Which is "this is stupidly pointless on all levels".
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*wibbles* If only. I couldn't even do that immediately after the film, all my circuits were occupied with processing grief.
And lo, there was a flurry of crossover fic plotbabies, and they were good.
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I mostly handwave the mechanism. It's not real, it's just for my own enjoyment.
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I found it very moving.
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I'm with recessional - lots of people out there are imagining what-ifs where they miraculously made it out and continued to have hijinks (or just.. lived, in a new place, and made the best of it; I haven't personally seen this but I want it badly) and.
Yes, please.
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(....why do I not have icons.)
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... FORCE HUSBANDS. \o/ )
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And thanks for the link. If I can find one thing I like, I can usually find more by tagsurfing or finding fans... so that helps a lot!)
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Thank you again. It's a beautiful fic and I'm still thinking about it off and on.
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I wanted them to get away so badly, and it was literally not until the mushroom cloud was just about to envelope them that I realised Yes, this IS the Star Wars film where the Millenium Falcon isn't going to sweep in to save them and I just sat there with the tears pouring out of my eyes.
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It's funny, I didn't think of Donnie Yen as having an especially heavy accent. (I was actually struck by how American his accent was, since I didn't know at the time that he spent time in the US as a kid.) He definitely does have a Cantonese speaker's accent, and I did love the range of accents and the fact that they were totally unremarked upon. It was almost like real life! :O
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I am glad that it was a movie that felt true to you as well. <3
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But regardless, I enjoyed it immensely (and I was very fond of K-2SO :-) )
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K-2SO is the best sarcastic robot.
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And yes, lots of good what-ifs are possible, when you have the Force. (Donnie Yen is awesome.)
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I am wallowing in the what-ifs. They are a comfort.
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