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Welcome to The SciFi Podcast, a wretched hive of scum and villainy a bi-weekly podcast focused on in-depth discussion of all things Science Fiction. The SciFi Podcast features four hosts—Mattroid, Brain, Solo, and Station!—and frequent guests. Each episode we look at a science fiction theme or franchise and take the discussion where no show has gone before.
This episode is another LIVE! recording (sorry about the sound flubs!), where your lovable band of podcasting misfits gleefully discuss the highly anticipated, eagerly awaited, very first Star Wars anthology movie, Rogue One. The second half of the episode is a spoiler-heavy discussion, but if you’ve not yet seen the movie, you can still get a full, spoiler-free review in the first part of the show.
Did you love it? Hate it? Somewhere in the middle? Let us know!
Theme music courtesy of TMMC, which features Matt on guitar, and I Hear Sirens, featuring Matt on bass and Liz on keyboard. Hear more of I Hear Sirens ethereal, instrumental, post-rock at BandCamp. Podcast production and artwork by Mattroid and SpaceWolf.
New TSFP drinking game: take a drink whenever you hear the words “force” or “hope.”
🙂
no one would be able to stand by the time the credits rolled.
Good point.
Some spoiler stuff to add to discussion:
The pacing felt off in a few areas of the film for me and these were moments that felt very “off” with regard to the film. The first, and most glaring, was the performance of Forrest Whittaker. His character seemed to be in a different film entirely, and not just from the performance level- in was very obvious that he shared no studio time with the rest of the actors, that he was filmed separate from everyone else, and that nothing he did ever seemed to match with the rest of the film. It felt like his scenes were directed by someone else entirely, shot with a different crew, and had different lighting- this was especially true in the scene he “shares” with Jyn. They are never lit the same, they’re both “off” when responding to one another, and the shot moves back and forth regardless of acting choices made by one or the other of them. It may have saved a few dollars but it ultimately hurt the scenes in which they performed…
And while I agree that Leia looked awful in the film, I have to entirely disagree with the same assessment of Tarkin… maybe it’s because, like Spacewolf, I’m far more accustomed to Peter Cushing in other films and have seen him with different lighting- but this was a very nuanced job on the cgi. It felt like Peter Cushing was brought back to life for me… something that made me cry and feel giddy as a fan. I know they did something different with this performance, also… that the face wasn’t entirely CGI since they used real eyes and a real performer in the “make-up” for Cushing.
A fellow Cushing fan shared with me that he thought they had the voice totally wrong and it sounded like a good impersonation, but still an impersonation. It lacked his softer tones.
But I think it worked. I think it worked much better than a hologram would have or having someone else deliver orders- I think that it allows Tarkin to be the villain that he is and for Krenik(sp?) to be the weasel that he is.
Some solid points made here, and after seeing it again I have softened a bit on the Tarkin stuff, but I still can’t fully get behind it. I love the idea of him, bringing him in, maybe even making him out to be Snoke…I just don’t love what they did.
But you’re right about Whittaker. OUCH.
i liked tarkin in the movie but hated the leia thing. it just didn’t work.
The Leia thing didn’t work, rest her sweet soul.