What scenes would you change and how?

I like your alternate ending, even as I love the ending R1 gave us.

 

Change the end so it matches the start of ANH perfectly:

No passed disc, as its supposed to be beamed to the Tantive IV.

I can live with the Vader rampage stuff, so keep that.

Have the plans beamed to the Tantive IV, not a physical disc.

Tantive IV should not be in range of the battle or the Rebel Flagship, have it orbiting Scariff seperately so Darth Vader doesn't see it, which avoids the 'consular ship' story clash in ANH.

 

I liked R1, but, for me, they could have left out the scene with the space octopus (in Saw's hide out) and the scene in which they bumped into Dr Evazan and Ponda Baba.

 

I would of started the movie with the flashback...and THEN Along time ago........ then a crawl to catch us up in the last 15 years since Saw found Jen. I would COMPLETELY remove the mind creature of Saw's that messed with Bohdi.....wasn't that necessary to the story. Also, have less switching back and forth between Scariff battle, space battle and plans retrieval.....it felt like it was switching back and forth every 15-20 seconds.
These are the only changes I would make.

 

The problem with the disc is a problem with ANH, because you can see Leia putting the disc into R2D2, and I believe it is referenced later as well.

 

It could be made to fit into ANH simply by having the plans beamed and downloaded into a Tantive IV computer and then onto a disc. Once its on the disc, the main computer records would be erased to match the "The Death Star plans are not in the main computer" line. Then Leia would put the plans into R2.

 

1) Echoing Drall15me's original comment, I think Saw could have had a bigger role. His part in the story didn't feel to me like it needed to be him... the same function could have been achieved just as effectively with an entirely new and unknown character.

2) In one rare instance, I would have indulged George Lucas's burning desire for Space Politics CSPAN for just a few moments. Unless you're a diehard fan, some of the plot around Saw being an "extremist" and the debate over whether to attack Scarif was lacking context. It would help if there were a bit more info or dialogue that would frame those issues and where the movie stands in the timeline more clearly for non-diehard fans or total newcomers to the franchise.

3) Probably would change the final scenes on the beach with Chirrut and Baze... I find it implausible that two people who so easily and efficiently dispatch large groups of imperial troops at a time (multiple times in the film no less) have trouble with a small number of Krennic's Death Troopers.

4) I also would have had at least one of the Rogue One crew make it out alive. Its appreciable and believable as it is. I guess that the ending is, in many ways, such an inevitability that for me it would have been an unexpected twist for someone to actually make it out alive. (One of the things I look forward to in behind the scenes features is if there is any explanation of the different story versions proposed for R1 and why different endings were scrapped for the one in the theatrical cut).

 

Here are a few things I would change:

1-Add the opening crawl.

2-Add some of the OT and PT familiar background aliens or some of the new TFA ones so that the movies might flow together in a better way. RO was awesome but it still feels like an almost human filled universe contrary to the wonderful alien filled galaxy created by Lucas. His aliens were the inhabitants from the galaxt far far away and not just a little nod for fans.

3-Remove the whole assassination thing. Call me old fashioned, but I loved it back in the day OT days when the good guys were exactly that GOOD GUYS and that made them different from the bad guys who would do anything to get what they wanted no matter how evil it was. Seeing the Rebels send a guy to flat out murder Krennic was a bit of a shock as this is something I would never think I'd see Mon Mothma approving. She was a senator, a diplomat that fought for peace and all of a sudden she's staging a hit on a dude? That's messed up.

 

Add Jar Jar to the Jedah destruction scene and let us actually see him bite the dust . It would be fantastic if some director had the guts to make him die onscreen.

 

That would create a great disturbance in the Force as millions of fans would instantly cry out in sheer happiness and relief!

 

But was she even aware of that? The Rebel Alliance still seemed to be quite a disjointed bunch in "Rogue One" and its Intelligence appeared to make up their own orders instead of listening to the leadership.

Additionally, didn't you mean Galen Erso instead of Krennic? Even if you did this mistake, Mon Mothma and Bail Organa didn't want Erso dead. They wanted him alive so that he could have confessed in front of the Imperial Senate about the Death Star.

 

Yes my friend you are correct on my Krennic/Galen Erso mistake. My Amanin brain failed me there. But yeah, even if Mon Mothma didn't know about some other rebel leader being the one to order the hit it still is kind of meessed up. I mean, sure chalk it up to me being old fashioned and my mind still seeing things pure like in the OT days when I was a kid but I'm pretty sure that in those days, the good guys never would have resorted to that. I could never see Jan Doodona, General Madine or Admiral Ackbar ordering a hit on an innocent man just because they thought he was dangerous. It's one thing to try to take out Hitler like they tried to do with Palpatine in ROTJ but it's completely another to go to try to kill the guy who builds the engines for the Star Destroyers just cause other guys think he's bad.

 

he he...
What if this RO ending changed your point of view?
You believed until now that Leia was frightened in front of Vader, when she says "this is a diplomatic ship".
But in fact she is a true Rebel. According now to RO ending, she knows Vader was there, she knows what he just has done, and at this very momen, she is not scared in front of him in the ANH opening: she boldly lies to him. She knows she lies. And she knows HE knows she lies, because he saw the Tantive escape.
But since she is a Royal Princess from Alderaan, and since she actually belongs to the Diplomatic Council, Vader just cannot slap her in her face

The plans were actually beamed from Scariff's tower to the Profundity, the Admiral Raddus's MC-75 flagship. There, they were stored on the disc passed to the Tantive 4, who escaped.
Later when Vader asks "where are the plans that have been beamed to you" (or something like that, uh! don't blame me ) "you" means "the whole Rebel Alliance" ; it is not intended just for the Tantive.

Does all of it make sense?





However, I miss some aliens in the cast. Okay, we know the Rebel Aliiance is a human affair (see the final shot in ANH)...
On the other hand, feel something disturbing with Chirrut and Baze characters. It is absolutely not related to the actors: Donnie Yen and Jiang Wen perfectly fit their role and there is no debate. It actually concerns the characters, mainly Chirrut and that asian-judo cliche.
So my little change would have been to replace the warrior-monk and his friend by two aliens. I would have loved Moroff the Gigoran as the rough heavy killer and... why not, a Twi'lek, or a Chiss... or a Muun ... as the Force spiritual guy.





Ah, and to improve the timeline continuity, Dr Evazan and Ponda Baba should have been met on Wobani in the labour camp : that would match with them being criminals.
But in fact, their appearance in the movie is just fan service, nothing important is due to them. So, in terms of fan service, I would have preferred to let Evazan and Baba to Tatooine, and endeavoured to reshoot this:

featuring Orson Krennic

 

1. Opening crawl. The fact that it ended with the circle wipe followed by Blue credits is a bigger mystery of why no crawl at all. Which brings me to..........

2. Scene ending/starting wipes. It's not SW without wipes.

3. Lone survivor. Maybe a badly damaged Bohdi Rook makes it off. But he's out of the fight due to injury.

4. I really am sick and tired of the Empire being an all white all male all british officer affair. So the Empire hires smart blue guys but not smart blacks or asians? Enough.

5. Fewer planets. 3/4 tops. Jyn could of bin rescued on a ship.

6. The Rebel fleet out numbers the Imperial fleet? What the Force! I would of loved 2 finally c a Victory class SD.

That's all 4 now!

 

More aliens.

There should have been more Aliens. It seemed extremely human centric. There were a few with the rebels but not many.

Nor was there any utilization of slaves or conscripts that we see in other stories.

 

I'm surprised of the "needs more aliens" vibe?

We had many aliens with Saw. The mind control alien. Possibly the first non force telepathic creature is Disney Canon? The door gunner alien. The Rebel alien fighting on Scarif & nu color Calamarians Raddus & his white officers.

 

None of them mattered.

The aliens with Saw were purposely dehumanizing. The were off putting and unnatural. Meaning they wanted you to suspect them of being evil. Which they seemed pretty much nasty dudes but they were enemies of the enemy.

The tentacle creature was a torture device to showcase why rebel hardline splinter group are not necessarily "good" guys.

The rest were set dressing they were cool but deliver few lines, had little interaction with the actual plot. Sure the new Akbar admiral was cool but ended up sitting in his chair doing pretty much the only thing his species can do.

Why not have the door gunner be one of the 7?