Review: Rogue One (Spoilers!)

So I am not going to review this movie “normally” because well, I had an unusual reaction to the movie. So I am not going to stray from spoilers per say.  Fair warning.

I spent 99% of the movie feeling like I was watching an RPG group run a campaign module:

• You had the one character with a really elaborate backstory that the GM used as plot-bitch to make the rest of the characters move along. She also may have been the player who never actually looked at her skill sheet and was always surprised that she could do something beyond hold a blaster…
• You had the min-maxer (MM) who took “blind” and then offset it with a religious boost giving them a weird and insane skill set.
• You have the MM’s SO who is only kinda into the game and so ends up feeling a bit ancillary to the MM with pretty much one useful skill and the occasional snide comment (who is also kind of min-max’ed but in an only slightly-less broken way of “one skill waaaaay to high and otherwise probably useless”).
• You had the guy who wanted a little of everything and to accomplish it took a couple of good skills AND a dependent/side-kick. Like many of these builds, I cared more about the side-kick than the PC.
• There were three available NPC’s and the GM made the team pick one: the pilot, the scientist, or the rebel. I would be curious how the game would have turned out if they had picked the scientist instead of the pilot….
• You had the big-bad guy the GM used before but liked a little too much to let you get away from.

It wasn’t until the very end of the movie when I realized they weren’t going to get a miraculous escape (yup, I went in pretty much expecting Deus ex Machina ending) that I realized this wasn’t the typical RPG team. It might be a Hell on Earth group who goes in with their backup character already spec’ed ’cause they should expect to die. Horribly.

I do stand by my previous review of the characters though. And if you’ve already seen the movie, go watch it again – either the writers are playing too many RPG’s or they are getting caught by some stereotypes and they should be aware of them.

Otherwise, it was a well-written module and the players characters were fun to watch.