Hey Jo, Where You Goin' With That Gun in Your Hand

Perfect Dark

2000

Nintendo 64 + Expansion Pak

**********

Pros: Gameplay, Graphics, Music, Multiplayer

Cons: Some Wasted Weapons, Flaw in Blurred Vision Effect, No Library

       After the success of GoldenEye 007, Martin Hollis’ team followed up with Perfect Dark.  Operating on the same engine as the 1997 classic, it was hard to screw up.  This game mostly keeps what worked while adding enough improvements to succeed as a sequel.  

       The controls are mostly the same, with the most notable exception of a secondary weapon function that can be conveniently activated by holding B.  There’s also an option to uninvert the Y-Axis.  That’s a nice separation of Church and State despite the divine morality’s demanding that Y-Axises be inverted. Graphics are a notable improvement.  The visuals are more shadowy and atmospheric with some slight dynamic lighting.  The lights that display glare (which actually enhances the atmosphere) can be shot out, making the area darker.  Crude flakes that fly from bullet holes are replaced with sparks, which are more compatible with the graphical limitations.  I usually don’t like the bullet spark cliché, but here it works.  Bullet-proof glass even has its own unique non-penetrated bullet hole effect.  The violence is also improved.  In addition to blood stains on the character we have copious amounts of remarkably well-textured blood stains spread out on the walls behind NPC’s.  Reinforcing the carnage are some small gib-polygons and a nice head jerk for headshots.  Explosions now lack visible fragments;  it looks less impressive, but makes more sense considering the lack of shrapnel damage anyway.  The game now features full voice acting thanks to the improved memory.  An Expansion Pak is required for the game unless you want to limit it to 2-player deathmatch or certain other basic side features.

        The multiplayer adds options of co-op and counter-op campaign modes, but the real feature of course is in deathmatch, featured under the Combat Simulator menu.  Almost everything all the strengths of GoldenEye’smultiplayer are present with a few improvements.  Bots of various types and difficulty can be added or even played against alone.  The most notable boon is the higher quality of the maps.  In the first game the only really great ones are The Library, The Temple, and the The Complex, and maybe (I know this is an unpopular take) The Caves.  Most of the others were rehashed Campaign maps.  Perfect Dark features over 10 new maps, and practically all of them are worth playing on.  It also includes Complex and Temple, but drops the ball on Library in favor of Facility.  I’ve said this before but I’ve always found Facility to be an overrated map; it’s too linear to be a good multiplayer board.  What’s worse is that I would count the Library as the best classic map.  

       Another good thing in the multiplayer is the ability to customize weapon sets, which is good because I was always annoyed by the weapon intersectionality GoldenEye’s multiplayer.  You also get to choose which song plays during the match and save customized player files with control preferences.  There was supposed to be a feature that allowed you to use the Game Boy Camera to superimpose your face onto players, but this was scrapped after Columbine.  The new ability to dual wield in multiplayer is also much appreciated.  Unfortunately, I don't think you can use Classic Weapons in multiplayer.  In this game you can now run off edges, and it's a neat strategic twist that you can knock an opponent into an abyss and have it count against him instead of for you.

       In an interesting innovation, the game allows the player to explore the Carrington Institute on foot to enjoy training features in various rooms.  This allows one to familiarize oneself with devices, and a weapons range allows you to unlock a few Classic guns.  Various cool cheats include Perfect Darkness as well as some classics, but many of these don’t even require time limits so they’re gimmes.  Paintball Mode has been demoted to an option.  There is some humor in the form of a piece of cheese hidden in every level.

      The music, composed by David Clynick, Grant Kirkhope, and Graeme Norgate is one of my favorites in video game history.  Whereas GoldenEye’s mostly limited itself to interpretations of the Bond theme, this score features a varied original soundtrack full of melody and ambience.  It mixes techno, metal, and classical elements for a great cyberpunk feel.

       There are some weaknesses in addition to the Library’s not making the cut.  Despite the expanded options in the list-based menu, its format is not nearly as convenient as GoldenEye’s GUI.  One frustration is the limitation of the blur effect, which occurs when you are punched or hit with a tranquilizer.  It would have been a great feature for multiplayer, but it’s hardwired to lessen over time and endures after a respawn, which is just cheap.  It also happens on the Disarm feature of Unarmed, which is too much.  Also some of the weapons (MagSec-4, RC-P120) are not utilized well in campaign mode, and others are completely wasted in Mulitplayer (Laptop Gun, RC-P120, Farsight XR-20) due to ill-advised secondary functions.  The Bonus Boards are mostly recycled maps.  An inconsequential “flaw” is that it lacks the airtight board design that prevents out-of-bounds exploration, a detail that has both frustrated and impressed speed-runners about GoldenEye.     

       The plot is relatively interesting.  You are Joanna Dark (Eveline Fischer), an agent in a paramilitary organization run by eccentric businessman Daniel Carrington (Chris Sutherland).  He sends you to rescue a mole in the Carrington Institutes rival company dataDyne.  Ultimately this unravels a plot in which dataDyne’s CEO Cassandra De Vries (Louise Tilston) is in league with a warlike race of aliens called the Skedar, who are secretly planning to destroy the earth.  Carrington knows about this thanks to his contact with a benevolent species of aliens called the Maians, who have been at war with the Skedar for years.  I find it odd that the Maians are Greys since that seems to go against years of real-life alien lore that makes it clear they’re kinda assholes.  It’s an interesting enough plot to warn of spoilers in the campaign recap.  It’s also one of the games I’d like to see an adaptation of.

       Despite some flaws, Perfect Dark is exactly what a video game sequel should be, and it’s a must have for any fan of the first game.  Sadly, Nintendo fans have been denied any port since Microsoft bought Rare and squandered the franchise’s potential.  The less that’s said about Perfect Dark: Zero the better, but XBLA port of Perfect Dark is near flawless.  Its only real difference is improved graphics with a few awkward redesigns like that of the Maians and Mr. Blonde.

MATT. DAMON.

BOARD RECAP (SPOILERS)

Here is a rundown of the Campaign Mode.  The story is divided into Missions, but the gameplay is divided into individual boards.  An interesting oversight is that you get a different weapons/tool set in each board, and this can get annoying at times.

1. dataDyne Central: Defection

After being dropped off by a hovercraft at the datDyne’s central headquarters (which goes unnoticed despite a secretary’s seeing the flyby), you are tasked with shooting your way through the place in order to rescue the mysterious Dr. Carroll, a defector implied to be in danger of a mind wipe.  At this point it’s hard to ignore that you’re basically massacring a whole bunch of guards whose only apparent crime was picking the wrong company to provide security for.  Of course you’re not allowed to kill Cassandra despite her culpability.  One also wonders why she doesn’t simply call the cops and have Carrington & Co. arrested.  I know she’s got something to hide, but it’s not like Carrington’s explanation would fly.  

The place is named the Lucerne Tower, which is what I thought of instad of milk when the Buick Lucerne came out.  Then again I live in Purity country.

2. dataDyne Central: Investigation

After accessing the secret elevator at ground level, you explore the classified labs underground.  More shooting and killing occurs until you find Dr. Carroll (Chris Seavor), only to discover that he is in fact a robot whose advance AI enabled him to grow a conscience.

3. dataDyne Central: Extraction

Essentially you have fight your way up the first map in the opposite direction.  This time there’s a lights-out (you have NV goggles), and there are tons of barricades set up.  This might be tricky considering that Dr. Carroll will often hover in front of you without cover while annoying asking you if you know what you’re doing.  In harder modes you have to deal with a dataDyne attack hovercopter that shoots at you until you take cover.  It’s actually pretty thrilling to play cat-and-mouse with it.  You finally face Cassandra and her butch brigade (after the game forces you to stand in front of them without cover).  The closing cutscene reveals her mysterious co-conspirator Mr. Blonde (Duncan Botwood).

4. Carrington Villa: Hostage One

Apparently Carrington has stupidly brought Dr. Carroll to his villa with no security and guess what.  Now he’s being held hostage by dataDyne.  CI’s plan involves endangering a negotiator while obviously dropping you off in a big dropship.  After rescuing the negotiator from execution, you must reactivate Carrington’s wind turbine (he hates birds), and rescue him.  You have the option of destroying every bottle in his absurdly large wine cellar, prompting him to quip.

5. Chicago: Stealth

While Carrington is now safe, dataDyne has made off with Dr. Carroll and has now reprogrammed him.  Carrington’s hunch is that they have a backup of his AI in a safe at one of their front companies.  Ontologically, I would argue he’s dead, and you’re rescuing a second copy of him.  You pick up a package that has been dropped off separately for some reason, contend with a pointlessly aggressive droid, and encounter a sassy pimp in a limo before you enter the G5 building.

6. G5 Building: Reconnaissance 

You send a camspy into a “soundproof” (despite the open tunnel allowing the device access) room in which Cassandra, Mr. Blonde, and NSA Director Trent Easton (Sutherland) discuss their plans.  Mr. Blonde harangues Cassandra for not predicting that the self-aware AI (the game get a points for correctly using the term “sapient”) would form a conscience, and Cassandra asserts “no one could have predicted that” (except maybe every sci-fi writer ever).  Mr. Blonde reveals that as evil as he is he cares about his men by complaining that his team will have to take it to "the core" themselves, because Caroll apparently needed a personality to move.  He calls Trent out on failing to talk the president into loaning dD the “Pelagic II,” musing that the latter overestimated his influence over the world leader.  Easton responds with a blatant Distinction without Difference Fallacy after saying “no” as if his whole mouth was filled with peanut butter.  You then recover Dr. Carroll’s back-up file.   

7. Area 51: Infiltration

You just completed the Chicago Mission only to get an urgent message from Carrington informing you that a “friend” needs an emergency rescue.  At this point Jo discovers aliens are involved.  You must rescue a Grey before he is dissected.  I’ve never understood the Alien Vivisection trope.  Aside from its being needlessly evil, it’s also provoking an advance race into interstellar war.  Once again Jo has to kill a whole bunch of people whose culpability in this is vague.  This time it’s US Military personnel! 

The board has a lot of long-to-mid-range shooting so it’s odd that the only available weapons are a MagSec-4 (which is worthless at long-range) and a scopeless Falcon 2.  It isn’t until you get inside when you get a Dragon.  It’s also the only board that features a MagSec despite its being a fun close-range weapon. 

Higher difficulties make you contend with a drone fighter, which is pretty thrilling. 

8. Area 51: Rescue

You finally meet the actual CI spy Jonathan (Steve Malpass) when he shoots a guard for you without alerting the ones just down the hallway.  He and Jo banter and flag each other, and Jonathon quips that he could alert more guards if Jo likes (as if he didn’t just shoot a .357 right there).  He then informs you of a weak spot in the wall that accesses the lab area.  Of course he doesn’t just tell you where the spot is, he just puts a barely noticeable X on it while you have to search this massive area with the help of X-Ray glasses.  Thanks, Jonathon, it’s not like we’re on the clock here (actually there is no time limit until you actually enter the lab room the alien is about to be operated upon).  He provides you with a hovering crate bomb to blow the wall up.  You will fail the mission if it goes off prematurely but if you blow up the wall with a secondary-mode Dragon you will unfail it.  You then disguise yourself to enter the lab area.  This board has a very good, ominous soundtrack.  

9. Area 51: Escape

You rescue the alien just in the nick of time, but the doctor activates nerve gas in the room accidentally killing himself easily while giving you an extremely minor cough.  After that non-threat, you contact Jonathan and wake up the alien, a jivey fellow named Elvis (Malpass).  When you make it to his ship, he suddenly realizes that it can only seat two people.  Apparently attempting to cram three in is out of the question, so you have to make it out on a speeder bike.

10. Air Base: Espionage

Now you have to go out and rescue the president from the plan to clone him.  Before the mission, Carrington tells you not to kill the Air Force security (not like all those guys at Area 51 got that kind of benefit of the doubt) while announcing that the NSA agents are fair game under that massive assumption that they have all consented to Easton’s alien conspiracy.  Entering through the front door will trigger the weapons scan, so you just enter through an unlocked side door in the same room right in front of people without arousing suspicion.  You then deactivate security and sneak onto a remarkably ugly futuristic Air Force One. 

It interesting to note that this Air Force base has got to be the most luxurious military base I’ve ever seen.  The entire place is built in high-polished granite and designed in an attractively monolithic style.  Apparently this is a problem with the Air Force. Your tax money at work, people.

11. Air Force One: Antiterrorism

After the plane takes off, Trent gives the President (Botwood) a last chance before he orders his men to take over.  You fight your way to the President’s office and show him the G5 recording of the conspiracy, which is apparently enough for him to entrust his safety to you.  Unfortunately, an unknown alien ship docks with Air Force One and you can’t blow up the umbilical.  Elvis, in his own ship, can’t shoot it because his lasers jam, so, being the proficient problem-solver he is, decides to crash his ship into the other ship, sending everyone tumbling into the Arctic mountains.

12. Crash Site: Confrontation

Despite Air Force One’s being smashed into giant chunks spread miles apart, every important character somehow survives.  Jo even wakes up after apparently having been flung from the plane.  By the time she does, the bad guys have already regrouped and captured the president.  Jo must fight various Mr. Blondes, kill the clone president (who was foolishly positioned over an opening in a cave) and rescue the real one.  Afterwards Mr. Blonde reveals himself to be a Skedar in disguise before killing Easton. 

13. Pelagic II: Exploration

It’s revealed that the Pelagic II is a unique deep-sea research vessel that is necessary for some sort of plan dataDyne has.  Unable to get permission from the president the bad guys essentially decide they’re going take it over, since that’s how it work in this game.  Well, Jo and Elvis take it back over.  Before embarking in the submersible, they scuttle the ship.  Elvis second-guesses the decision to demolish this expensive government property, but Jo brushes it off because she just likes to blow shit up.

14. Deep Sea: Nullify Threat

In a surprisingly alien setting for the Goldeneye engine, we find ourselves on a crashed ancient alien ship at the bottom of the ocean.  Apparently the bad guys have used Dr. Carroll to activate its superweapon and destroy earth.  Jo reinserts the unaltered AI into him and Carroll tells her to leave before he sacrifices himself to destroy the craft. The opening cutscene is wonderfully ominous and makes good use of Dutch angles.

15. Carrington Institute: Defense

Jo and Carrington prepare to celebrate by introducing the President officially to the Maians, but dataDyne and the Skedar invade the Institute.  Jo must rescue various hostages and blow up a Skedar ship.  She succeeds in getting everyone to safety, but is captured by the Skedar.  This is a frustrating board for reasons I go into under RC-P120.

16. Attack Ship: Covert Assault

Jo wakes up in a holding cell on a Skedar warship with Cassandra, who reveals that she was used by these aliens.  She sacrifices herself as a diversion, allowing Jo to commandeer the vessel with the help of Elvis and a few Maian soldiers. 

17. Skedar Ruins: Battle Shrine
Elvis drops off Jo on the Skedar homeworld to finish it.  The final boss battle involves killing the chief Skedar, who looks like a big hash monster, by blowing up a big marijuana leaf behind him.  So far the only board I have yet to beat on Agent.

BONUS: Mr. Blonde’s Revenge

You get to play as Mr. Blonde as he infiltrates The Lucerne Tower and kidnaps Cassandra

BONUS: Maian SOS

You play as Elvis as he makes a last ditch effort to temporarily escape capture long enough to destroy your ship and send an SOS to the Carrington Institute.  Apparently a highly unliked and unsatisfactory board.

BONUS: WAR!

You play as a Maian soldier mopping up Skedar after Jo’s final mission.  You must kill three Skedar king clones.

WEAPONS

UNARMED

Secondary Function: Disarm

Lacks the humorous quality of the slap, but adds a twist in that punching someone blurs his vision until he’s punched enough to die.  Unfortunately this feature is transferred onto the disarm function (which steals his weapon), which makes it a little too cheap.

FALCON 2

IRL: Colt Double Eagle

8/800 Pistol Rounds

Secondary Function: Pistol Whip

Penetration: Low

Dual Wield: Yes

A simple workhorse handgun: accurate and effective.  It can also be equipped with a Hollywood Silencer or scope.  The latter is quite effective for long range.  It features an integral laser sight despite Jo’s HUD sights; you’d think all that would do is give away one’s position.  I’m not sure why a video game about the future would feature an unsuccessful 90’s handgun design that was discontinued by the time said game was in production.  Perfect Dark Zero features the Falcon 1, based on the Glock 17.  It’s one of the few guns in that game without an oddly truncated magazine, but in-universe it seems like a baffling downgrade.          

MAGSEC 4

IRL: Beretta Auto 9 (allegedly)

9/800 Pistol Rounds

Secondary Function: 3-Round Burst

Penetration: Low

Dual Wield: Yes

It looks great and makes an awesome sound, but its bark is worse than its bite.  Unlike its real-life counterpart, which holds 20 rounds, it only holds 9 rounds (this team has apparently never heard of high-capacity pistol mags), which is especially short for 3-round bursts.   Even though it’s suggested to have a magnetic acceleration system for the bullets, which would suggest greater penetration and accuracy, it doesn’t shoot through anything and you can’t hit anything at more than ten feet.  And to add insult to injury, it’s got a scope!  It’s sometimes described as the Klobb of the game for its blatant inaccuracy, but even that’s unfair.  It’s an effective and fun close-range weapon in multiplayer (especially dual-wielded), and it’s fun to watch people occasionally fly back 20 ft when you shoot them in single-player.  It would be nice if it had high penetration.  Unfortunately, it’s only available in one campaign board.  It’s one that emphasizes long-range sniping, and the only guns available to you are this and a scopeless Falcon 2 until you get a Dragon indoors.       

DY357

IRL: Colt Python

6/200 Magnum Rounds

Secondary Function: Pistol Whip

Penetration: High

Dual Wield: Yes

A solid magnum revolver.  Good stopping power and penetration.  Trent Easton owns a gold-plated one with a tiger-striped grip (DY357-LX) that’s the game’s equivalent to the Golden Gun.

PHOENIX

8/800 Pistol Rounds

Secondary Function: Explosive Shells

Penetration: Low

Dual Wield: Yes

A Maian handgun.  Despite the oddly alien method of loading ammunition orbs into a membrane, it has a very Terran 8-round magazine.  Typical pistol in primary mode, but the secondary mode is a neat high-explosive feature, like miniature grenades with the trajectories of bullets.  This takes up the same amount of ammo as the primary mode, which strikes me as wasteful and impractical.  Then again, the Maians are an older race than we are and they probably understand some things we don’t.  

MAULER

20/800 Pistol Rounds

Secondary Function: Charge-Up Shot

Penetration: Low

Dual Wield: Yes

A Skedar gun.  Despite its alien appearance, it has a slide and a ribbed magazine.  The instruction manual claims that it will fire as fast as you can pull the trigger, but it has a set firing rate when you hold the Z button, and you can’t bump-fire it like the other pistols.  Dual-wielded, it makes a nice sound while firing alternately, but the game always wants the two guns to fire simultaneously.  Secondary mode makes the gun charge up while eating a few extra rounds.  Holding the trigger will make the gun fire normally afterwards.  It’s a surprisingly effective feature in multiplayer, since a single charged shot will kill an unshielded opponent.

CMP150

IRL: Steyr TMP

32/800 Pistol Rounds

Secondary Function: Follow Lock-On

Penetration: Low

Dual Wield: Yes

dataDyne’s primary submachine gun.  The bad news is that it’s the weakest SMG in the game, at least until you unlock the DMC, ZZG and the KLO1313.  The good news is that it’s still a pretty good gun.  Has a high rate of fire.  The game designers must have mistaken the TMP’s thick barrel for some kind of integral suppressor, so the gun makes a distinctive silenced sound.  The secondary mode basically has the gun aim for you.  When you hold down the aim button and rollover your targets, the gun will assign a number for each and then shoot at them in order.  It shoots each target with perfect accuracy and automatically moves on to the next the instant he dies.  It looks cool, but it requires no skill.

CYCLONE

50/800 Pistol Rounds

Secondary Function: Magazine Discharge

Penetration: Low

Dual Wield: Yes

A futuristic SMG with a cool report and a nice blue muzzle flash.  The instruction manual describes it as inaccurate, but this only really applies to the secondary mode, which sprays the whole magazine automatically.  It’s an effective submachine gun, but is unfortunately only available on one single player level.  The bulbous shape of the gun would make it hard to conceal and handle in real life, but Secret Service Agents seem to be able to hide it in their form-fitting suits seamlessly.

CALLISTO NTG

32/800 Pistol Rounds

Secondary Function: High-Impact Shells

Penetration: Low (Primary Fire)/High (Secondary Fire)

Dual Wield: No

A Maian submachine gun.  In primary fire, its cyclic rate is highly inconsistent, and game engine’s rate of fire/distance to object lag is even worse in this gun than any other.  The secondary mode greatly reduces the rate of fire while allowing the bullets to fire through objects.  Disappointingly, it’s the only automatic weapon in the game with penetration.   Dual Wield would have been appreciated. 

LAPTOP GUN

50/800 Pistol Rounds

Secondary Function: Deploy as Sentry Gun

Penetration: Low

Dual Wield: No

The Carrington Institute’s covert SMG which folds into a laptop.  It’s modeled after one of CI’s popular laptop models, making it more effective as a covert weapon than its real-life counterparts.  Unlike most SMG’s in the game it has burst fire (tapping the trigger automatically lets off three rounds rather than one).  It makes a cool sci-fi sound effect when fired.  Its secondary function is to magically turn into a Gatling gun turret which shoots at enemies with 100% accuracy.  This would be a fun multiplayer feature if it didn’t know the difference between friend and foe.  As it is, it’s a bit of a gamebreaker for multiplayer.   

RC-P120

120/800 Pistol Rounds

Secondary Function: Cloaking Device

Penetration: Low

Dual Wield: No

The most frustrating gun in the game.  As a follow-up to the RC-P90, it’s disappointing.  It doesn’t look as cool, it doesn’t make that awesome sound, and it has no penetration.  It has an excellent magazine, but that’s all its got going for it.  It’s hard to ruin a decent SMG with a 120 round mag, but they manage to do it. 

     This gun is wasted in a way that’s hard to do by accident.  It’s like they decided to just f--k with gamers.  It’s only in one level and that level is set up so that you can’t possibly have any fun with it.  You don’t get it until well into the level, and the enemies have a strong shield which offsets the advantages of this gun.  As soon as you get the damn thing, you’re immediately summoned to defuse a bomb, and the quick run from point A to point B shooting whomever you happen to come across along the way is the only time you get to use it in campaign mode.

      Oh, well.  At least we get to have fun with it in multiplayer, right?  Well, not unless you want to complicate the match with a cloaking device, because for some asinine reason that’s the secondary function.  Not that you’d want to use it.  The controls for the CD are awkward and it eats up bullets like crazy (it’s powered by the bullets, which makes no sense).    

DRAGON 

30/400 Rifle Rounds

Secondary Function: Proximity Self-Destruct

Penetration: Low

Dual Wield: No

This big, fat ugly gun is a solid assault rifle, although it fires in Rapid Fire instead of Burst Fire.  Secondary Fire is turning it into a proximity mine and throwing it away.  This has potential for fun surprises in multiplayer.

K7 AVENGER

IRL: Steyr ACR (?)

25/400 Rifle Rounds

Penetration: Low

Secondary Function: Threat Detector

Dual Wield: No

An effective assault rifle with a satisfying report and a neat look.  The instruction manual makes a gross understatement by saying that its 25-round magazine is “perhaps” too small.  It’s also not divisible by three, which makes little sense for a burst-fire gun.  Still, the gun is good for mid-range sniping if you use controlled bursts, and full automatic is useful for point-blank confrontations.  If not for the short magazine, I might call it the best standalone AR in the game.  The secondary fire is a threat detector for mines and other hazards, which is useful but almost defeats the purpose of hiding mines in multiplayer.

AR34

IRL: FAMAS

30/400 Rifle Rounds

Secondary Function: Run while Zoomed

Dual Wield: No

A solid, accurate AR from the Carrington Institute.  As a follow-up to the AR33, it’s disappointing because of its lack of penetration (it also doesn’t make the intimidating noise and muzzle flash of its predecessor). 

SUPERDRAGON

30/400 Rifle Rounds, 6/40 Grenade Rounds

Secondary Function: Grenade Launcher

Penetration: Low

Dual Wield: No

Arguably the best gun in the game.  Primary mode is the same as the Dragon’s and the transition to secondary is easy and quick.  The grenade launcher shoots medium-sized grenades (out of the same barrel as the rifle somehow) at an impressive rate.  Great for both campaign and multiplayer, but not in enough of the former.

CI 2010 SNIPER RIFLE

IRL: Walther WA 2000

8/400 Rifle Rounds

Secondary Function: Crouch

Penetration: Low

Dual Wield: No

Same functionality as the sniper rifle from the last game except you have the option of improving accuracy by crouching while zoomed.

FARSIGHT XR-20

8/100 Energy Orbs

Secondary Function: Target Locator

Penetration: Very High

Dual Wield: No

A rail gun with an adjustable X-Ray scope that allows you to reach out and touch someone anywhere on the map.  What ruins the gun is the Target Locator, which automatically adjusts aim and zoom so that your target is always in your sight.  This makes a gun that would otherwise be great in multiplayer become absurd and unfair. 

REAPER

200/800 Reaper Rounds

Secondary Function: Grinder

Penetration: Low

Dual Wield: No

An alien machine gun that spins bladed barrels while spraying a lot of rounds in a general direction.  Fun to use. The Grinder is simply spinning the barrels without firing, which can cut enemies.  The rate of fire takes a second or two to get up to speed unless you try a trick.  Switch to Grinder mode, get grinding and hold down on the B button to switch back to “Reapage” without taking your finger off the trigger.  The Reaper will continue to spin at top speed without firing.  Then, simply release the trigger and press it again quickly.

SHOTGUN

9/100 Shotgun Shells

Secondary Function: Double Blast

Penetration: Low

Dual Wield: No

A big, ugly shotgun with the same functionality as the one from GoldenEye except with a pumping animation and a nonsensical double shot function.

K12 DEVASTATOR

8/40 Grenade Rounds

Secondary Function: Wall Hugger

Dual Wield: No

A grenade launcher with a slower rate of fire than the SuperDragon, but fires larger grenades at a greater range and with a straighter trajectory.  The secondary mode causes the grenades to stick to a wall momentarily before falling to the ground and detonating.

ROCKET LAUNCHER

1/3 Rockets

Secondary Function: Heat-Seeker

Dual Wield: No

Same functionality as the classic rocket launcher except with a heat-seeking secondary function.  The heat-seeker moves more slowly and has a black smoke trail; it’s surprisingly fun to try to evade it.  

SLAYER

1/3 Rockets

Secondary Function: Fly-by-Wire

A neat-looking Skedar rocket launcher.  Secondary mode is a remote-controlled camera function.  The in-game manual speculates this was only done for shits and giggles while ironically musing that the player would be above that.

LASER

Infinite

Secondary Function: Short-Range Stream

Dual Wield: No

Combines the functions of the laser gun and watch laser from GoldenEye

CROSSBOW

5/69

Secondary Function: Instant Kill

Dual Wield: No

A stun weapon used for stealth on the Air Force base level.

GRENADE

12

Secondary Function: Proximity Pinball

Dual Wield: No

Typical grenade in primary mode, but the secondary mode has a lot of fun possibilities in multiplayer and actually makes the weapon relevant.

N-BOMB

12

Secondary Function: Proximity Detonation

Dual Wield: No

Primary Mode is Impact Detonation.  Lets out a black sphere that kills anyone in the radius (or blurs a player’s vision if not in it long enough).  Considering the color of the sphere, I don’t think the name is an accidental joke.

MINES

1/10

Secondary: Threat Detector (Timed and Proximity) Detonator (Remote)

Dual Wield: No

Pretty much the same from GoldenEye, except their conspicuous design lacks the insidious quality of the original.

COMBAT KNIFE

12

Secondary Function: Poison Throw

Dual Wield: Yes

Combines the functions of both knives in GoldenEye with the secondary function needlessly adding a poison/stun effect.

TRANQUILIZER

8/200

Secondary Function: Lethal Injection

Dual Wield: No

A neat little ranged weapon that blurs your opponents vision (causing wandering in NPCs). The Lethal Injection only works in contact range.

PSYCHOSIS GUN

Basically the tranquilizer except it causes NPCs to attack each other.  Only available in one bonus level.

CAMSPY

8

A remote controlled drone that acts as a camera/tranquilizer/bomb depending on the variant.

CLASSIC WEAPON: PP9i

GoldenEye: PP7

IRL: Walther PPK

7/800 Pistol Rounds

CLASSIC WEAPON: CC13

GoldenEye: DD44 Dostovei

IRL: TT33 Tokarev (with Tokagypt grips)

8/800 Pistol Rounds

CLASSIC WEAPON: KLO1313

GoldenEye: Klobb

IRL: Sa vz. 61 Skorpion

20/800 Pistol Rounds

CLASSIC WEAPON: DMC

Goldeneye: D5K Deutsche

IRL: Heckler & Koch MP5K

30/800 Pistol Rounds

CLASSIC WEAPON: ZZT (9mm)

GoldenEye: ZMG (9mm)

IRL: IMI Micro Uzi

32/800 Pistol Rounds

CLASSIC WEAPON: RC-P45

GoldenEye: RC-P90

IRL: FN P90

80/800 Pistol rounds

CLASSIC WEAPON: KF7 SPECIAL

GoldenEye: KF7 Soviet

IRL: AKS-74

30/400 Rifle Rounds

CLASSIC WEAPON: AR53

GoldenEye: AR33 Assault Rifle

IRL: M16

30/400 Rifle Rounds

QUOTES

CASSANDRA: You won't shoot me, you foolish child.

[Jo knocks her out]

NPC: [getting killed by Jo] Ah, you bitch!

CARRINGTON: [after Jo shoots every last bottle in his wine cellar] Act your age, Joanna.

EASTON: We have a contingency plan ready to go, and we will move as soon as the presidential entourage arrives at the air base.  All I need from the president is a tissue sample.

CASSANDRA: Hah!  Assuming you don't get any interference.  If Carrington has pieced together enough of this, he will have called for reinforcements.

EASTON: There will be no outside help from Mr. Carrington.  The technology you gave us is installed in Nevada and fully operational.  We can intercept any craft they use.  

MR. BLONDE: Then the devices we gave you are working correctly?  Good.  Because we believe that anything which does not work correctly should be destroyed.  Consider that as you follow your backup plans.

[Spy footage reveals alien captured in Area 51]

JO: Oh my G-d.

CARRINGTON: Here is our friend.  He appears to be physically unhurt, though he hasn't regained consciousness yet.  By the look of it, the surgeons are almost done with their preliminary tests and will begin dissection soon.

JO: But who was-?

CARRINGTON: Any questions? No? Good.  Away you go to the hangar.

JO: Agent Dark: Mission Log: 1028 Hours.  Against my better judgment, I'm about to enter Area 51. 

JONATHAN: Agent Dark, over here.

JO: There you are.  I was beginning to wonder if...

[Jonathan shoots guard she mistook for him]  

JONATHAN: If what?

JO: If you'd been discovered yet.  And frankly if this is how you work, I'm amazed you lasted more than five minutes.

JONATHAN: I was tidying up one of your loose ends.

JO: My loose ends?

JONATHAN: I'm sorry, I didn't realize you wanted him to shoot you.  I can call in some more guards if you like.

JO: Okay, okay, forget about it.  I'm going to let the Institute know we've made contact.

JONATHAN: The problem you have is that there is not way to sneak into the research section.  The only way available to you is a weak section in the on the wall I've marked on the room beyondthe stores.  It can be destroyed with explosives. 

JO: Doesn't sound like a problem to me.  Where are these explosives?

JONATHAN: In that crate: [activates a hover feature on the crate] 

JO: Cute.  Very cute.

JONATHAN: By they way, stores are crawling with guards.  It may go against your nature, but try sneaking through rather than blasting everything.

JO: Certainly.  Any other pearls of wisdom?

JONATHAN: That crate...

JO: Yes?

JONATHAN: It really doesn't like being shot.

JO: Great.  Now if I can just fight the urge to report him to base security...

MR. BLONDE: You have failed, Easton.  You are a flawed device, and we need you no longer.

EASTON: [pulling gun] Just try it, you Scandinavian freak!

JO: Dr. Caroll, are you in control again?  Can you stop the program?

DR. CAROLL: Yes, I'm back again, my dear.  But the program has run far too long for me to prevent it from completing.  There is only one way out now.  

JO: What do you mean?

DR. CAROLL: When the program has run, I will have control of a vastly powerful weapon.  It cannot be allowed to exist.  So I must destroy the Cetan and, unfortunately, myself along with it.  I'm sorry Joanna.  There is not other way and no time to discuss this.  Go now.  Avoid the Skedar and you will have time to escape.  It has been an honor to work with you.  Goodbye, Joanna Dark.

Going Boonta

Mad Max: Fury Road

2015

D: George Miller

**********

Pros: Visuals, Worldbuilding, Simple & Effective Narrative, Action

Cons: No Mel Gibson, One Boring Stretch, A Couple Tacky Visuals

[I'm sorry for the small font size on a section of this review.  For some reason Blogger randomly changed the size of this section and refuses let me fix it]

         Usually when an aging creator revisits the genre/franchise that made him popular, the results are less than stellar, whether it be George Lucas with Star Wars, Ridley Scott with Prometheus, Brad Bird with Incredibles 2, or even Ben Stiller with Zoolander 2.  George Miller’s Mad Max: Fury Road, stands as a triumphant exception to this rule, along with (surprisingly) M. Night Shyamalan’s Split.  One explanation is that no one was particularly clamoring for the latter two.  Outside pressure can compel a filmmaker to follow-up on success even if he doesn’t have it left in him.  Assurances that it’s only taking so long because they’re making sure they get it right should be a warning that they’ve got nothing.  In retrospect it’s not surprising that these projects are so forced.  But today we’re talking about the opposite.

       Mad Max lacks the restraints of other franchises because it can be read not as a single continuity but as in-universe lore.  In the post-apocalyptic future, every developing civilization has its own version of the Mad Max legend.  The first movie is his potential origin story, while the others are different versions of the same myth.  This is why it makes sense for Fury Road to recast Tom Hardy in lieu of Mel Gibson and replace a dead son with a dead daughter.  Still, Gibson’s absence seems to be a bow to cancel culture that goes against the movie’s theme of redemption.  The world building simply demonstrates the earnestness and passion that went into this movie.  In contrast to “Transformers,” you could tell this world is Miller’s baby, something he cared about and took seriously.

         The cast is solid.  Max stays true to his archetype, an apathetic loner who comes through for the movie’s true protagonist, Imperator Furiosa (Charlize Theron).  Furiosa is a complex antiheroine.  Once she was a victim of the antagonist in her youth, she rose through his ranks to become a brutal enforcer until inspired by conscience to rebel against him.   The theme of competition between members of the War Boys cult is underscored by Nux’s (Nicholas Hoult) tension with Slit (Josh Helman).  The villain, Immortan Joe (Hugh Keays-Byrne from the first movie) believes he’s helping society rebuild, but allows his ego to corrupt him.  He presents himself as a god, and attempts to run a eugenics program with his own seed.  His arrogance blinds him to his own inadequacy as a sire.  The conflict begins when Furiosa attempts to free his concubines, whom he cares for in a twisted way in spite his abuse of them.  Like Vader in Empire Strikes Back, he mobilizes his own army, as well as those of his allies, in the name of “a family matter.”  The concubines themselves (Rosie Huntington-Wilteley, Riley Keough, Zoe Kravitz, Abbey Lee, Courtney Eaton) show surprising diversity of personality, and I find it refreshing that the most heavily pregnant one is the strongest terms of development, in defiance of the "pregnant idiot" stereotype.  

        This has earned the movie praise as a feminist work without going overboard.  In fact that’s probably why the movie got its well-deserved Best Picture nomination.  Still, there are some unfortunate undertones as a result.  The heroic group of women called the Vuvalini (Megan Gale, Melissa Jaffer, Melita Jurisic, Gillian Jones, Joy Smithers, Antoinette Kellermann, Christina Koch) are vaguely misandrist. They distrust Max and Nux until Furiosa assures them they are “reliable” (not a term with good ideological history).  These aren’t blatant enough to ruin the movie, however.  Regardless of intent, a scene in which Joe orders an unborn baby ripped from his dying concubine’s belly by the Organic Mechanic (Angus Sampson) has little political significance since the child was unviable and lack of medical technology in this world would make the issue moot.  Besides, practically all pro-lifers prioritize the life of the mother.  2015 is a watershed year in our culture since it marks the beginning of the end of the Left’s earnest interest in artistic quality; it was the year it praised Fury Road, but it also the year The Force Awakens came out.  And we all know where that led to…

        In an age of convoluted plot lines, Fury Road’s narrative is refreshingly simple.  It’s a great example of minimalistic storytelling done right.  Characters have complex motivations that are hinted at onscreen without distracting the viewer, and the movie does a great job of following the show-don’t-tell rule.  A wealth of worldbuilding is shown through visuals without exposition.  The different cultures represented by the Citadel, Buzzards, etc. are displayed by their behavior, dress, and vehicle design.  Rituals are obviously important in the cult-like society of the Citadel, and this theme was previously most obvious in Beyond Thunderdome.  Slang is well-developed in this world, though I’m surprised I didn’t hear this word.  I like the touch of OO-blood’s being refered to as “High Octane,” considering it’s the universal donor.  Even the title of “Bullet Farmer” makes sense as gunpowder is made using fertilizer.  I wish The Interceptor played a bigger role, but its this not the first time its getting downplayed happened in this series.  I highly recommend The Art of Mad Max: Fury Road as a supplement to this movie; it really helps one appreciate the thought that went into this movie while not being a crutch for its plot.  There is a slight cheat in the worldbuilding in that people play much faster and looser with resources like gas and bullets.  Contrast this with Lord Humungus' waging war over oil and only loadng single magnum bullets for special occasions.        The visuals are excellent, with great costume, production design by name and cinematography by Jenny Beavan, Colin Gibson/Lisa Thompson, and John Seale.  The effects are primarily real stunts (using Olympic athletes and Cirque du Soleil performers), with CGI only used sparingly and to good effect.  One exception is a tacky 3D gimmick at the end of the final crash.  The emphasis on practical effects is refreshing here, since many aging directors are enamored with the novelty and convenience of CGI, seeing only the difficulty in the practical effects many found so compelling in their old works.  Camera tricks add a healthy amount of camp that’s appropriate to the movie’s setting.  The sequence that violates the visual brilliance is the nighttime scene, which is an absurdly blatant example of using a blue color filter to shoot day-for-night (and yet everyone acts like it’s good!).  It's also the one boring part of the movie, it drags on a while, and the apparently awesome offscreen defeat of the Bullet Farmer (Richard Carter) by Max doesn’t help.  The Bullet Farmer also has a remarkably silly scene with a jarringly off-model choice of music that takes you out of the movie.  Junkie XL provides an energetic score, and the movie stars iOTA as a crazed bard for the Citadel. 

      Mad Max: Fury Road is a must-see, and it took me awhile to allow The VVitch to dethrone it as my favorite film of 2015.  Not only does it do justice to its franchise, I’d say it’s its best entry, which would usually be heresy in reference to a sequel that came out 30 years after a trilogy.      

      

Films as Fanfiction

Rogue One: A Star Wars Story

2016

D: Gareth Edwards

**********

Pros: Directing, Cinematography, Action, Effects, Tone

Cons: Unnecessary, Bland Heroine, Some Logical Flaws

     I love Star Wars so obviously I would love to see expansions of this universe.  There was hope that Disney would take advantage of this literal galaxy of potential, but unfortunately decided to rehash the Original Trilogy.  Even the standalones were very closely related to existing arcs.  Like Solo, this plot was an answer to a question already answered, but it was still rather enjoyable. 

    In this case we’re revisiting the stealing of the Death Star plans.  It’s not necessary to know this, and besides I’d rather see a movie about the liberation of the X-Wings from Incom.  What’s strange is that they felt the need to rationalize it by claiming that the Death Star’s weakness was a “plothole.”  First off, it’s not.  Designs have weaknesses and tradeoffs, and this humorous article actually explains the exhaust port better than the movie does  In fact, neither the Imperials nor the Rebels in ANH knew of a specific phantom weak spot (thus making much of this movie’s plot irrelevant); they were acting on the common sense assumption that it had something to take advantage of.  I don’t even remember this being a problem at all until people conveniently started selling it as the most ridiculous thing ever in time for this movie’s release.  It’s like the movie nitpick version of an SJW issue.  It’s not unbelievable that the Death Star had a weakness.  What’s ridiculous is that a known rogue scientist purposely sabotaged the process without anyone noticing.

      The scientist in question is Galen Erso (Mads Mikkelsen), who sent a secret message through an defecting Imperial transport driver named Bodhi (Riz Ahmed) to Rebel partisan Saw Gerrera (Forest Whitaker).  Getting wind of this, the Rebel Alliance sends agent Cassian Andor (Diego Luna) and reprogrammed Imperial Enforcer droid K2-SO (Alan Tudyk) to retrieve Galen’s daughter Jyn (Felicity Jones) due to her connection with Saw.  Along the way they pick up a blind Force monk named Chirrut Imwe (Donnie Yen) and his friend Baze Malbus (Jiang Wen). The circumstances turn Jyn into a sort of “chosen one” aesthetically, if not logistically.  This ends up adulterating the selling point of this movie: normal rebels without the benefit of Plot Armor fighting the Empire in the dirt.  While all the protagonists do die (it would have been more impactful if some of them had survived), they seem to do so right when their usefulness to the plot is fulfilled.  It doesn’t help that Jyn is a remarkably flat, weak character, constantly needing to be goaded until the climax.  For all the accusations of sexism leveled at the fanboys, people don’t give Felicity Jones nearly enough crap for her bland performance in a movie with otherwise good acting.  Credit where it’s due, though: she does a great impression of a kid looking out of a minivan window during a boring road trip when the good guys are flying from an exploding city.  

         This problem is reinforced when Galen’s message turns out to be directed toward Jyn.  Instead of simply telling the Rebels what the weakness is, he babbles on about his love for her but does little to provide her any information.  He just assumes she’ll go to the Planet of Scarif and download the plans recognizing that the file name is his pet name for her.  This speech is also interspersed with shots of the Death Star’s destruction of the city on Jedha.  This would have been a great opportunity to finally see the horror of the battle station from the POV of the people it’s killing.

        The best character is the villain, Director Orson Krennic (Ben Mendelsohn, in a bigger star-making role than Jones).  His personal obsession with Galen turns out to be his and the Death Star’s undoing.  He spends the movie attempting to repair his mistake before his superiors finally have enough of him.  I usually find plots about protagonits' owing dangerous people money to be hackneyed and tedious, but the desperate villain trope has everything appealing about this without making us sympathize with the character to much.  In the process he gets in a political struggle with Grand Moff Tarkin (Guy Henry, with CGI).  He’s my second favorite Star Wars bad guy, and the movie would have been better if they had scrapped the heroes’ arcs and simply focused on him as a villain protagonist.  After all, all we need to know about the Rebels here is that they’re normal people fighting the good fight. 

        Still, two characters the movie who could have been developed further were Bodhi and K2.  Bodhi’s arc as a defecting Imperial, along with the mistrust he faces, could have been a good story.  He might have formed a connection with K2, who would struggle as result of his own redemption being programmed rather than chosen.  Droids are an interesting case in Star Wars: they’re clearly conscious, sapient beings, but they’re also limited by their programming.  They have the awareness to appreciate their lack of genuine free will, and they develop copes.  K2-SO’s is excessive snark and defiance on minor orders.  He’s one of the more amusing characters in the film.          

        The movie is quite enjoyable for all its flaws, which illustrates the importance of a consistent tone and good directing.  There is one stretch where it drags down, largely because of two disordered scenes.  The first is the attack on Eadu, the Imperial weapons facility Galen is working on.  It seems unnecessary, and then we get to the blatant fanservice of the Mustafar scene with Darth Vader (Spencer Wilding, voiced by an incredibly exhausted-sounding James Earl Jones).  The latter is fun to watch.  Vader’s palace is cool, and he’s refreshingly in-character, expressing his lack of enthusiasm for the Death Star and frustration with Imperial power politics.  Unfortunately, he drops a terrible pun while choking Krennic (using the word “choke” as if unaware “aspirations” is already a pretty good stealth pun).  The scene would have made a lot more sense if: 

1)    It had taken place before the Battle of Eadu, with the mention of it deleted

2)    It had no mention of the meeting’s being Vader’s idea (Krennic had a point: Vader was wasting his time and endangering his counterintel op)

In this case Krennic, desperate to gain power back from Tarkin, reaches out to Vader in order to get an ally in this feud.  This backfires because Vader takes the leak just as seriously as Tarkin does.  With Vader on his butt, Krennic now takes the problem seriously and travels to Eadu to confront Galen.  This would have also made the Eadu scene seem less tediously pointless.  More importantly, the Mustafar scene wrecks an excellent reveal for Vader later in the movie.  It should have been deleted or edited so that we never actually see him.

       Eventually the Rebels mount an assault on the Planet Scarif to retrieve the Death Star plans.  The heroes sneak off using the new call sign “Rogue,” which seems a lot like an orphaned payoff.  The resultant battle is the best thing to happen in Star Wars since Return of the Jedi.  In addition to specificity and strategy that makes it one of the more well-thought-out of the space battles in the series, it’s also where the special effects shine.  It looked  100% convincing in ways most MCU battles are not. Rogue One ends up succeeding more in its goals of being a Star Warswar movie with the extras in the Battle of Scarif.   It also features the best scene in the movie…

       The Hallway Scene is one of my litmus tests to identify people who feel the need to feign sophistication and those who can actually appreciate and enjoy things.  The former apparently promote a false dichotomy between Turning Your Brain Off and Turning Your Heart Off.  Here we finally get to see how frightening Darth Vader (Daniel Naprous) is to a regular person.  Imagine fighting for the Rebellion always knowing about Vader, always hoping you never cross his path, and then one day you get unlucky.  Imagine this being your first sight of Vader as an audience member. He and the Force are effectively foreshadowed throughout the movie, and then at the finale you see this…thing.  The movie leaves with this cliffhangar knowing this the series’ prime villain.  If not for the Mustafar scene, this would supplant A New Hope as the beginner movie for the series.  But some people won’t stop dismissing this effective climax as “fanservice” or “something out of a horror movie.”  They often denounce it as too dark, not understanding the significance of a bunch of ordinary people standing up to the Galaxy’s biggest walking nightmare and holding him off just long enough to save the day.  

These guys >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>MCU superheroes

       One of the dumber takes on this scene is that it finally demonstrates how evil Vader is.  Sure, he might be playing with those guys a little too much, but it’s not like fighting enemy soldiers in a battle is as evil as murdering children, sand people, complicity with the Death Star, etc.  In fact, he probably spared some stormtroopers’ lives by doing this.  I could answer Vader’s absence in the battle at the beginning of ANH by claiming that Vader had spent enough time in the bridge conducting the chase of the Tantive IV that we wasn’t as fresh.  

       The movie should have cut to credits as Vader was looking after the fleeing ship (the music even builds up to a perfect segue to the Star Wars theme here), but instead we had an unnecessary scene in which Leia (Ingvild Deila) is given the plans.  When asked what they are, she cheesily turns her back on the guy and says “hope” to no one in particular.  The scene itself is worse than CGI on Leia’s face.  The CGI facework is a little off, but I’ve never minded that as much as when the entire battle scene looks like a Pixar movie.  Also, Leia is sufficiently hyped earlier in the movie when Bail Organa (Jimmy Smits) says “I’d trust her with my life.”

       Where fanservice is concerned, the movie has its cringe moments.  The presence of contemporary ships like X-Wings, Star Destroyers, etc. are fine, but some of it is forced.  In the first scene Galen is apparently posing as a moisture farmer on Planet Seattle.  We even have a gratuitous shot of bottle of blue milk in which it is the focal point of the entire image.  Now I’m sure there’s some forced rationalization for those vaporators, but I can’t imagine any justification that can’t be simply explained as water filters.  There’s also a cringe-inducing cameo from Dr. Evazan (Michael Smiley) and Ponda Baba.  However, the movie does combine nostalgia with creativity by adding the U-Wing.  While it’s admittedly designed to sell merchandise, it’s an example of how that’s not always a bad thing.  Not only does it look good, it also serves a thoughtful, practical purpose that’s essential to the plot.  Much better than the redecos of the Sequel Trilogy.  Saw Gerrera is also an import from The Clone Wars, though I don’t see what was ever so interesting about him.  

       The movie isn’t terribly political, despite the assertions of the writers.  It’s an interesting phenomenon in which the Left is so convinced of its own righteousness, as well as the evil of its opponents, it comes full circle.  Instead of hitting you over the head with their own opinions, they simply produce a straightforward black-and-white action movie because they now can’t even tell the difference.  That’s probably why the BP for 2018 went to a blandly safe movie about the Civil Rights Era.  In fact, the only thing really divisive here is the one heroic character seemingly named after an overrated tyrannical communist, and even that’s qualified by observations that he’s an extremist who alienates the Alliance.  Still one can’t help but think upon hearing standard lines about standing up to evil that the writers are completely thinking about resisting Trump.  The irony is that, despite not being remotely enthusiastic about Trump’s nomination, I have my own bad take about the movie that’s in his favor:

1)    Krennic is Hillary.  Corrupt, megalomaniacal official whose carelessness is responsible for intelligence leaks.  The difference is that, unlike the Democratic Party, the Empire was actually willing to hold him accountable.  Also liked fancy white dresses.

2)    Battle of Eadu is Benghazi

3)    The Rogues are the Trump movement, mobilizing under someone who up to this point had no connection to the Alliance/GOP, with some help from fringe elements (Saw)

4)     The decision to invade Scarif was the nomination of Trump, after which many in the GOP sat out the election while the establishment decided to reluctantly throw in with the Trump Train.

On the other hand this ignores that the Trump movement was acting against the Republican Party during the Primary.

         Rogue One, despite nitpicks, is a very enjoyable movie with a solid cast.  Gareth Edwards succeeded in making a more down-to-earth spinoff of this space opera, with cinematographer Greig Fraser’s contributing to the grit.  Michael Giacchino’s score sounds distinctive while fitting the franchise, but one song sounds suspicious.  Action is engaging with the exception of one tacked-on adult fear moment in which a child is endangered during a gunfight on Jedha (only to be blown up offscreen afterward!).  Rogue One's greatest strength is earnestness.  It takes the franchise seriously and treats it with love, not looking down on it as a “silly space movie for kids.”  That’s why it ultimately works.