I wanted to title this "Rogue One and classical tragedies, but I realized that title was not spoiler safe at all. And If I haven't spoiled the film for you yet then here is my official SPOILER WARNING! Ok so now as that is out of the way... everyone dies. Which is awesome. I have heard several upset people who have mentioned their frustration with that chosen ending. But It is what will make this movie not only stand out in the ever expanding Star Wars cinema universe, but quite possibly help is stand the test of time. When speaking classically, that is examining the stories of the Greek and Roman foundations there are two divides of story, that is comedy (which generally ends in a wedding) and tragedy. Where the hero dies. Here we are given tragedy.
So Why is tragedy so important. One reason is; it creates this ensemble heist in space story, fall in line with the more traditional Star Wars cannon that of a by the book "Heroes Journey." The rest of star wars follow the Heroes Journey so directly it is almost like Joseph Campbell. This is the framework of an effective type of story which when I think of it I think of "The Odyssey" "Lord of the Rings" and "A New Hope." When I think of ensemble heist stories, I think of stories, like "Leverage" the TV show, "Oceans Eleven" or if we want to make the ensemble heist story to take place in space then "Guardians of the Galaxy." By making this ensemble heist film turn into a tragedy it is more closely linked to the classical tragedies and the hero journey elements, which it does possess, to shine out a little more and link more closely to the Star Wars cannon while still doing something clearly different.
The second reason why it being a tragedy is so important is because american escapism rarely has tragedy in it. Think about it, how many stories can you think of when the hero looses or dies, versus the other way around. I am not saying it is wrong for the hero to win, not at all, but when you want to make a movie stand out, giving audiences something different certainly accomplishes that.
Third, This adds so much more meaning to the adventures in "A New Hope" It does more than helping to bridge the gap between Episode III and Episode IV, it add context and sacrifice, telling a story that would have influenced the motivations of Princess Leia, The Rebel Alliance, and even Luke Skywalker.
Moving beyond the ending. It was awesome to see some official Darth Vader fight scenes where he takes people down like a boss, as well as more of the origins of the Death Star. In order to make this movie and to keep the visuals of the characters consistent with a movies made years ago they did some serious CGI. I was impressed with most of it. Even Though a computer rendered version of young Carrie Fisher was exciting, I could tell, as well as a few others. I still think that is was an impressive display of the progress of CGI technology.
Overall I really enjoyed this film, and would be ok to see more films come out of the Star Wars franchise. Disney has done some impressive things with the Marvel Cinematic Universe, I think they could really add more universe to the Star Wars Galaxy and do a good job with it too.
