Rogue One: A Star Wars Story Review

My film review is on the movie Rogue One: A Star Wars Story using the Mako Mori test. The Mako Mori test is based on a character from the science-fiction movie, Pacific Rim. This test evaluates three things in a movie. First, the movie must have at least one female character. Second, the character must get her own narrative. And third, that narrative can’t be about supporting a man’s story. There is also the Bechdel test which focuses on needing two women who have at least one conversation that’s not about a man. These test are vital to movie culture for a couple reasons. First, the Bechdel and Mako Mori tests give movie directors a push to have a more diverse plot. This way we aren’t just seeing the same old recycled plot over and over again. Second, it shows that directors actually care about what light movies put women in. A movie being able to pass the Mako Mori test or the Bechdel test shows cultural progressiveness and shows that women can be more than something on earth for the sake of men. And third, the tests give moviegoers a higher standard for female actors, besides just being a wife who comforts her husband or other shallow and stereotypical female roles. The movie is centered on Jyn Erso (played by Felicity Jones), a woman who had her mother and father torn from her as a child. The Imperial forces, led by Director Orson Krennic, kill Jyn’s mother and takes her father with them to become an engineer for the Imperial force. She runs away before they get to her and gets taken in by Rebel extremist, Saw Gerrera (played by Forest Whitaker), who makes her into a great warrior. Fast forward many years later, she is now an adult. She joins the rebel alliance with the hope that she can find her father Galen Erso (played by Mads Mikkelsen). How does Star Wars, a famous $4 billion franchise—one that has spawned a Jedi religion followed by over 390,000 people— have relevance to a test that was inspired by a sub-par science-fiction movie? In this particular movie, Jyn Erso has detailed narrative arc that eventually leads us to the motive of the movie. She is the main character and while her story is about finding her long lost father, her narrative arc doesn’t lean on or support her father’s story. If anything, her father’s story is supporting her story. He makes this key to the destruction of the death star so that he can help defeat the Imperial Empire, but also so that he might one day see his daughter again and make the world a better place for her. To recap, the Mako Mori test needs one female character, which is accommodated to. One female character must get her own narrative arc, which is in a nutshell the plot of the movie. And finally, that narrative arc doesn’t support a man’s story, which is accommodated to. A new test that I would make would need a total of three things. The test is only applicable to superhero movies. First, it must have a female character. Second, that female character must have her own narrative arc. And third, the character can’t be a lover who is only there for the man’s needs or can’t be a sidekick. A movie that would pass this test would be Wonder Woman. She gets her own narrative arc and is there to save the world, instead of being Batman and Superman’s sidekick in the 2016 film Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. I believe this is important criteria because women aren’t represented as strong characters in superhero movies. When they are seldom cast a superhero, they are cast as in a small role where they are there to occasionally assist the protagonist.