Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (Pre-release)

[astroboy]

Well, to be fair the incident you've cited from TFA happened the way that it did because they were attempting to steal the Falcon and were being chased and fired upon by TIEs, and at first they had no capability of fighting back until Finn figured out the turret. So rather than make a run for it straight up (as Rey instinctively did) Finn suggests that in order to hamper the TIEs' ability to track and engage them at close range, they ought to fly low and confuse their sensors by (presumeably) flying in between other objects to make it more difficult to get a line of sight and/or a lock on them until they could either fire back or lose their tail altogether.

There's a scene in the first transformers movie where Mr. Army tells Spike to take the allspark to an abandoned tower in the middle of the city. If he can get to the top of the tower a helicopter will extract him.

The thing is, they were standing in a secret underground army facility in the middle of the dessert.

When you think about the "plan", there was no reason to do any of it except that a populated city is far more interesting for a destructive fight scene than the dessert.

And that is why Finn told Rey to stay close to the ground. It's why JJ can't do "space" in space movies.

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[Jaitea]

Perhaps,....but if the Falcon left the planet with the TIE's following,....we would have probably had a closer re-run of the escape from the Death Star in SW

George always liked to show us something different & the Falcon skimming close to the surface of a planet was something we have never seen her do,....so what JJ & co chose to do is very fitting to what the boss would have done

J

 

[Wolfsburg]

I think the rub is the larger Imperial class SD's.

That's it exactly. Like I said, it doesn't bother me a great deal but I always thought it made sense that something as large as an ISD wasn't capable of atmospheric flight. Although perhaps never canon, I do hate to see these (albeit assumed) limitations being pushed aside willy nilly as they made things seem a little more real and it opens the question of why we never saw it employed before. For example, why didn't the ISDs just hover over Echo base, past the shield, and bombard it that way?

Now something that does bug me quite a bit is how TFA handled hyperspace and what can be done with it. That's a topic for another discussion though. Lol!

 

[astroboy]

Perhaps,....but if the Falcon left the planet with the TIE's following,....we would have probably had a closer re-run of the escape from the Death Star in SW

George always liked to show us something different & the Falcon skimming close to the surface of a planet was something we have never seen her do,....so what JJ & co chose to do is very fitting to what the boss would have done

J

Are you suggesting that JJ was trying to tell his own story and differentiate this film from A new hope?

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[Jaitea]

Well I understand what happened & why it happened,...& the negative effect it had on some movie-goers who couldn't....but if they would have short-cutted the surface chase & the TIEs were shot down in space,....well that would have been another negative added to the list

We have had space battles & chases in every film,.....we have never seen X-Wings or the Falcon like this before,.....

"We want something new!!",....."We want things just the same!!, how dare they give us something new!!"

J

 

[Bryancd]

The Falcon and TIE pursuit on Jakku was one of the best sequences in the film.

 

[CessnaDriver]

Big ships in the air is not a deal breaker, I am griping. I grew up on the original trilogy and those big ships stayed in space.
I prefer they stay in orbit because to me, it makes more sense that they stay up there and I think it lends a little credibility to
all the fantastic.
We would not see a large navy vessel today cruising through Death Valley. Star Wars bases much of it's military action
on WWII for instance despite all the hyper advanced technologies. It also forces you have to show ground presence with
different more appropriate tech, AT-ATs like in Empire.
Luke in the cut scenes gazing up at the battle with his macros, looking up into orbit seeing the ships battling in space.
He was getting a peek into that big universe out there with those kind of fantastic things, calling him to adventure,
it was never going to come hoverin' over Mos Eisely.
I think it helped to separate the worlds a bit too, so when a character goes from a planetary environmennt to
space, it's more of an event. You're going to see different things you can't in the other.

Make some sense? Fine to disagree, but that's sort of my view on it. Yes it's Star Wars and they have magic tech
I get it, but I think for crafting these different worlds it's better to have them not overlap. In the OT when you went
to the next envronment it was so different and a new chapter opened up.

Sure we see a lot of flicks with big mofo ships in the atmosphere and I don't care generally,
Again, going back to the original trilogy it was sort of established for me... you would not see big ships doing that in Star Wars.
Again, it's a gripe, visually yes it's stunning, I know why they want to do it, to show that massive presence
of the Empire brought right down to the ground, it shows the monumental challenge of what the good guys are going up against.

 

[PantheraGem]

The Falcon and TIE pursuit on Jakku was one of the best sequences in the film.

I'm not a fan of TFA in the least, however I enjoyed that sequence very much!

 

[The Wook]

Big ships in the air is not a deal breaker, I am griping. I grew up on the original trilogy and those big ships stayed in space.
I prefer they stay in orbit because to me, it makes more sense that they stay up there and I think it lends a little credibility to
all the fantastic.
We would not see a large navy vessel today cruising through Death Valley. Star Wars bases much of it's military action
on WWII for instance despite all the hyper advanced technologies. It also forces you have to show ground presence with
different more appropriate tech, AT-ATs like in Empire.
Luke in the cut scenes gazing up at the battle with his macros, looking up into orbit seeing the ships battling in space.
He was getting a peek into that big universe out there with those kind of fantastic things, calling him to adventure,
it was never going to come hoverin' over Mos Eisely.
I think it helped to separate the worlds a bit too, so when a character goes from a planetary environmennt to
space, it's more of an event. You're going to see different things you can't in the other.

Make some sense? Fine to disagree, but that's sort of my view on it. Yes it's Star Wars and they have magic tech
I get it, but I think for crafting these different worlds it's better to have them not overlap. In the OT when you went
to the next envronment it was so different and a new chapter opened up.

Sure we see a lot of flicks with big mofo ships in the atmosphere and I don't care generally,
Again, going back to the original trilogy it was sort of established for me... you would not see big ships doing that in Star Wars.
Again, it's a gripe, visually yes it's stunning, I know why they want to do it, to show that massive presence
of the Empire brought right down to the ground, it shows the monumental challenge of what the good guys are going up against.

My thoughts exactly. Great post. Especially great is the part I've highlighted in blue.

The Wook

 

[wuchi01]

Beyond the high brow pseudo intellectual space talk, aren't those ISDs just clean?
Must have just come off the yards, having seen no opposition.
Were they actual models, cgi or both?
Anyone know? Beautiful details.

 

[karmajay]

That's it exactly. Like I said, it doesn't bother me a great deal but I always thought it made sense that something as large as an ISD wasn't capable of atmospheric flight. Although perhaps never canon, I do hate to see these (albeit assumed) limitations being pushed aside willy nilly as they made things seem a little more real and it opens the question of why we never saw it employed before. For example, why didn't the ISDs just hover over Echo base, past the shield, and bombard it that way?

Er, if I remember correctly large ships could not get through due to the shield generator. Once the shield generator was destroyed Vader is told "You can start your landing" so it seems those ships COULD come down in the OT.

 

[JD]

Er, if I remember correctly large ships could not get through due to the shield generator. Once the shield generator was destroyed Vader is told "You can start your landing" so it seems those ships COULD come down in the OT.

AT-ATs came down in dropships.

 

[DaddyfromNaboo]

Er, if I remember correctly large ships could not get through due to the shield generator. Once the shield generator was destroyed Vader is told "You can start your landing" so it seems those ships COULD come down in the OT.

I´d say that with "landing" he meant deploying ground troops. Although I did wonder why they did not use TIE fighters to cover their ground troops. Maybe they just overestimated the balancing skills of their behemoth walking attacking machines ...

 

[Strongbow]

Well, to point out the obvious, there were TIEs chasing the MF in the atmosphere of Bespin. I fail to see this as an issue at all.

That's something that bugged me in TFA and now again in Rogue One... X-Wings in atmosphere. In the OT we didn't have this - on Hoth, the Rebels had to use Snow Speeders and the Imperial Army used no air combat. I'm sure there could be a tremendous amount of reasons that could be created why X-Wings or TIE Fighters were not used... but, the most basic reasoning was that they were not made or meant for atmospheric flight. (This would also mean that the Death Star trenches did not have gravity or atmosphere... which, isn't real clear).

I'd guess that in TFA, JJ and crew wanted to keep it to simple and basic - and basics means X-Wings and TIE Fighters, so that's what we got - TIEs and X-Wings zipping around on planets like they were flight capable despite little to suggest they're aerodynamically capable. Yeah - we can concoct different reasons for them having flight ability, but that doesn't change that they did not do this in the OT.

But, now that I do think about it - there was a brief TIE vs Falcon bit on Bespin. With Cloud City so high and protected, I'm not sure if that applies... but, it does show an exception to this - and both the Falcon and the TIEs seem unlikely candidates for lift (AT-AT's had dropships to deploy them).

It seems repulsors are the reason this is possible - but, the maneuverability just seems crazy. I liked it better when Star Wars kept the starships in space.

Which brings us to Rogue One with more TIE and X-Wings flying around in non-space... and a Star Destroyer looking like it was hovering in the atmosphere. Which sets up a whole 'nother set of questions - mostly, why didn't they do this at the beginning of ANH? ....and how much power would that take?

It's not like this going to hurt my fun with any of it.

 

[Darth Lars]

In the original ANH, we see [X-wings] zipping from Yavin 4 into space - basically powering their way through the atmosphere and gravity (not unlike the Shuttle on her boosters). The SE changed that a bit and added some basic movement - but, even that was more akin to some very basic repulsor like and not so much actual flight.

What kind of craft delivered the fireworks on Endor during the victory celebration?
I would say that those flew in atmosphere - not just hugging the ground, taking off or doing a "controlled descent" like NASA's Space Shuttle.
In my memory those were X-wings, but I might be mistaken.

 

[Jaitea]

AT-ATs came down in dropships.

Outside the area protected by the shields

J

 

[Bryancd]

What kind of craft delivered the fireworks on Endor during the victory celebration?
I would say that those flew in atmosphere - not just hugging the ground, taking off or doing a "controlled descent" like NASA's Space Shuttle.
In my memory those were X-wings, but I might be mistaken.

I think it was both X-wings and Y-wings.

 

[Jaitea]

Er, if I remember correctly large ships could not get through due to the shield generator. Once the shield generator was destroyed Vader is told "You can start your landing" so it seems those ships COULD come down in the OT.

I´d say that with "landing" he meant deploying ground troops. Although I did wonder why they did not use TIE fighters to cover their ground troops. Maybe they just overestimated the balancing skills of their behemoth walking attacking machines ...

It's likely like the Gungan shield generator,.....craft cant fly through the shield because of their repulsers,....energy bombardments & shots cant get through either,....but something walking connected to the ground can

J

 

[Bryancd]

It's likely like the Gungan shield generator,.....craft cant fly through the shield because of their repulsers,....energy bombardments & shots cant get through either,....but something walking connected to the ground can

J

The Imperial officer mentions the shield could withstand any bombardmant so walking in was the only option.

 

[Jaitea]

Big ships in the air is not a deal breaker, I am griping. I grew up on the original trilogy and those big ships stayed in space.
I prefer they stay in orbit because to me, it makes more sense that they stay up there and I think it lends a little credibility to
all the fantastic.
We would not see a large navy vessel today cruising through Death Valley. Star Wars bases much of it's military action
on WWII for instance despite all the hyper advanced technologies. It also forces you have to show ground presence with
different more appropriate tech, AT-ATs like in Empire.
Luke in the cut scenes gazing up at the battle with his macros, looking up into orbit seeing the ships battling in space.
He was getting a peek into that big universe out there with those kind of fantastic things, calling him to adventure,
it was never going to come hoverin' over Mos Eisely.
I think it helped to separate the worlds a bit too, so when a character goes from a planetary environmennt to
space, it's more of an event. You're going to see different things you can't in the other.

Make some sense? Fine to disagree, but that's sort of my view on it. Yes it's Star Wars and they have magic tech
I get it, but I think for crafting these different worlds it's better to have them not overlap. In the OT when you went
to the next envronment it was so different and a new chapter opened up.

Sure we see a lot of flicks with big mofo ships in the atmosphere and I don't care generally,
Again, going back to the original trilogy it was sort of established for me... you would not see big ships doing that in Star Wars.
Again, it's a gripe, visually yes it's stunning, I know why they want to do it, to show that massive presence
of the Empire brought right down to the ground, it shows the monumental challenge of what the good guys are going up against.

But has any of the OT's stories ever called for a Star Destroyer to come into orbit?

The Devastator caught up with the Blockade Runner & captured it,....then headed back to the DS

Echo Base was protected by an energy field

Besides,...each Star Wars film pushes for more & more fresh visuals,....but seeing a Star Destroyer in atmosphere in the R1 trailer doesn't make me say 'how come they didn't do that before?'

J

- - - Updated - - -

The Imperial officer mentions the shield could withstand any bombardmant so walking in was the only option.

Yes I know,....but I was trying to explain why walking in works

J