Christmas came a few days early forStar Wars fanswith the release ofRogue One: A Star Wars Story, an action-packed tale that some are calling the bestStar Warsmovie since the original, 1977’sA New Hope. The movie is already a bona fide critical and commercial hit, with $318 million domestically and $555.4 million worldwide from a $200 million budget, after just over one week in theaters. Today we have an extensive new video that breaks down all of the deleted scenes and rejected concepts that had surfaced before the film hit theaters. If you still haven’t seenRogue Oneyet, there will be massive SPOILERS below, so read on at your own risk.
This new 14-minute video comes fromMr. Sunday Movies, who begins this video by breaking down the story’s origins. The plot first came fromJohn Knoll, the chief creative officer at ILM who worked on theStar Warsprequels. The original idea was culled from theopening crawlofA New Hope, which reveals that Rebel spies had managed to steal plans to the Death Star. His seven-page treatment was entitledDestroyer of Worlds, which included character bios. He even cut together a sizzle reel of films for inspiration, which included footage fromA Hunt From Red Octoberand the firstMission: Impossiblemovie, with the focus ofRogue Onesaid to be militaristic and self-contained.
John Knoll’s original pitch was also said to be “super low-budget,” which likely meant that his story didn’t include the digital recreation ofPeter Cushing’sGrand Moff Tarkin, despite the actor passing away 22 years ago. It was also his idea to recycle some sets fromStar Wars: The Force Awakens, although that didn’t happen, but there was a creature who was supposed to appear inThe Force Awakens, but ended up being used forRogue One. This video also breaks down the original team of Rebel soldiers, only two of which actually made it onto the big screen.
Jyn Erso(Felicity Jones) and the reprogrammed Imperial droid K-2SO (Alan Tudyk) were the only members of the original Rebel team, concocted byJohn Knoll, that made it all the way through development into the finished film. Other included Lunnic and Senna, Dray Nevis, Ria Tello and Jaris Kestrel, although the spelling for each of those character names has not been confirmed. Lunnic and Senna ended up being reconfigured as Chirrut Imwe (Donnie Yen) and Baze Malbus (Wen Jiang), who have already become fan favorites in the days following the theatrical release.
This video also reveals that it was directorGareth Edwards' idea to make Jyn Erso the centerpiece of the story, with earlier drafts giving Jyn Erso a younger brother, and a mother who was a Jedi warrior.Rogue One: A Star Wars Storyalso originally featured more story elements regarding the Jedi warriors becoming extinct, but those were all discarded at some point. There are a lot more new details forRogue Onediscussed in this video, which you can check out below.
