In the last few weeks, there's been a ton of chatter about ROGUE ONE: A STAR WARS STORY. The standalone film, which is being directed by Gareth Edwards (GODZILLA), has been said to be undergoing extensive reshoots. Depending on who you speak to, it's either run-of-the-mill tweaks and pick-ups, or a major overhaul of practically the entire film. The rumor stems from the idea that the suits over at LucasFilm/Disney saw a rough cut of the film and were none too pleased with the direction Edwards took things in.
Well, there's been a lot of spin in both directions. Entertainment Weekly even came out to try and help calm the anxiety fans have been feeling about the reshoots- which are said to be lengthy, costly, and involve a shifting of the film's tone and the development of its characters.
We reached out to a reliable source of ours, who works at the very Pinewood Studios stages where these reshoots are taking place, to see if they could separate facts from spin. Our source has been plenty reliable in the past, since they work at Pinewood- which is the epicenter of so many the industry's blockbusters. So they're right there in the thick of it.
"I've just asked my mate who has been doing work on Rogue One, and that rumour about them reshooting almost half of the movie is true, apparently."
To be clear, our source is stating that ROGUE ONE, which opens in six months, is currently undergoing a reshoot that covers nearly half of the movie.
This is not par for the course. This is not run of the mill. This is huge, and it means that LucasFilm wants some drastic changes.
If you'll recall, GODZILLA got an interesting reception. The film was lauded for its visuals, and for the fleeting moments when the anticipated monster mayhem took place, but was raked over the coals for the somewhat boring, flat depiction of its characters- which actually ate up the bulk of the film's running time. Could ROGUE ONE have turned out the same way? The whispers claim that the film's action sequences aren't being touched or tweaked, which leads one to believe that the issues with the ROGUE ONE mirror the issues from GODZILLA: Strong visuals, great action, solid look and feel, but characters and dramatic beats that don't exactly hit the right notes.
With so much riding on ROGUE ONE, which will be the first ever live-action cinematic expansion of the STAR WARS universe, coming off of the insane success of STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS, it makes sense that the studio would be worried about the characters. Let's face it, without endearing characters the STAR WARS films would fall flat like so many sci-fi sagas before and after A NEW HOPE came out in 1977. Even the Prequel Trilogy was plagued by the complaint that the characters were one-dimensional and that the drama was uninspiring and uninteresting. THE FORCE AWAKENS changed all that, and LucasFilm will be damned if ROGUE ONE brings us back there.
