Disclaimer: This post largely revolves around the recently released movie Star Wars: Rogue One. It has spoilers, so if you haven’t seen the movie you may not want to read this.

Last night, I decided to go see Star Wars: Rogue One. I had a bit of an adventure getting there, involving me driving to the wrong theater after finding the most perfectly timed available parking spot in my life, driving in a rush to the actual theater I bought a ticket for, and getting lost in a stairwell. Fortunately, movies run 19 trailers at the start these days, so I was able to reach my assigned seat before opening credits.

Star Wars has always represented adventure to me. Self-actualization. Morality. Friendship. Perseverance. It carried an almost innocent interpretation of good and evil. I didn’t actually watch the original trilogy until I was in my early 20’s, but I read a few of the Expanded Universe books growing up, and really enjoyed the video games set in the universe.

The Force Awakens was able to capture a lot of what I felt a child must have felt when seeing A New Hope for the first time. There’s this uplifting sense of adventure. An idea that the protagonist could rise to greatness and save the world and everyone they care about. They just had to believe in themselves.

Rogue One is the first Star Wars movie that didn’t leave me with that feeling. If anything, I walked away from the theater feeling a morose sense of contemplation.

Don’t get me wrong. The movie was really good. The action was top notch. The story, also. Cinematography, the musical score, and everything involved with its presentation blew away all the expectations I had. I think where I stumble is that the movie was too good at accomplishing its message.

Heroism comes at a great cost.

Throughout the course of the movie, you start to develop a rapport with a largely relatable and likable cast. After the third act stage is set, the characters are emboldened with a sense of inspiration that will swell the chest of any viewer paying attention. You truly feel that David can defeat Goliath. That there is hope.

I think one of the most positive aspects of the original trilogy is that the main cast is presented with the same opportunity to hope against tyranny. The main difference is that they are rewarded by victory and the promise of a new chapter.

The members aboard the Rogue One only get one of those luxuries.

That difference has startling implications for me. It really struck a chord. I was anticipating a more serious tone. One free of the Skywalker family. Of the Force. Of Jedi and Sith. I wasn’t exactly anticipating Saving Private Ryan in space.

As you watch these characters commit daring acts of heroism in the name of hope and the cause for good, there’s a sense of inspiration that is dashed somewhat as they each make the ultimate sacrifice. I imagine how a kid must have felt walking out of Return of the Jedi, seeing Luke Skywalker overcome the obstacles in his way and the Rebellion claim victory over the Empire. Anything is possible, right?

Compare that to a kid walking out of Rogue One, and the message behind heroism is selfless where the former is selfish. A viewer identifies with Han, Luke, and Leia because they see parts of themselves in these characters. They are charismatic. You want to root for them. And when the original trilogy’s arc concludes that reflection is rewarded with a sense that if you can relate to the hero that you subsequently then relate to the result of the story’s arc.

The difference between Return of the Jedi and Rogue One is stark and jarring to any viewer used to the hero winning the day and living to tell the tale.

It’s easy to want to be the hero when you see them having these daring adventures, beat the bad guy, and celebrate at the end. Not so much when the hero dies for the cause. What does a viewer identify with that? There is no celebration at the end of Rogue One. By virtue of the original trilogy’s place in the timeline, the movie had to be zero sum in some ways. But it casts a dark shadow over the plucky adventures of a whiny kid, a smuggler, and a princess.

Characters died in the original trilogy. But Ob-Wan was not really absorbed by the audience by the time he became one with the Force. You weren’t rooting for him. He was a guide. Soldiers died during the aerial battles and ground warfare, but seldom did any of them have names. They were there to present action and tension for the cast of characters you actually care about. That fate could happen to them. This is dangerous stuff that they’re doing.

Rogue One doesn’t offer much padding to the realities of war and what selfless sacrifice for a cause really means. There’s no pat on the back payoff.

If Jyn Erso is the character the viewer puts themselves in the shoes of and is the viewfinder for the world you’re being shown, is there not a moment where the connection you feel with character severs when it’s made clear that the general sense of heroism and excitement one normally feels at the end of an action movie?

If you, even subconsciously, deviate from aligning yourself with the character and values of the hero, is there a hero within you? Would you make such a sacrifice? Or would you be like the Rebel Alliance leaders who wanted to surrender, choosing to live a life under Imperial rule over dying for what, by all measures, looked like an impossible task?

The concept of what you would die for and what you would live with underscores almost every moment in Rogue One. It makes real the power wielded by the Empire and the insanity of the Rebel Alliance’s hope.

At the beginning of A New Hope, R2’s message and schematics are a simple plot device to kick off the story. After seeing Rogue One, the contents of that droid’s memory banks represent a lot more.

There’s no going back now. Star Wars has been made a darker, grittier, and more tragic place with the release of Rogue One. There’s still a sense of a large world, of adventure, of morality, and the battle of good and evil. But there’s no glossing over the deaths on the side of the good guys. That innocence and streamlining is gone.

Before now, all of the Star Wars movies have had either a positive or inconclusive ending. But the characters in Rogue One all have a beginning, middle, and end. No celebration, no medals. Only peace made with knowing up until your dying breath you fought not for yourself and not for fame, but for a cause greater than yourself.

In fact, outside of the Death Star’s schematics being sent out, no one knows by exactly how small a margin was found. But again, these characters weren’t doing it for a reward, or even an ending. They died to continue the hope that there could be an ending. It’s not glamorous, and it carries a different message than the traditional presentation of a hero.

The threat of death has always been there in these movies, but it has not come to collect in the way it did in Rogue One before.

I wouldn’t imagine kids would jump around pretending to be Jyn Erso in the same way they fantasized about being Luke Skywalker. It’s easy to want to be the hero that lives and is regarded by everyone as a hero. It’s a touch more difficult to want to assume the role of a hero that dies to move the yard stick in a noted, but understated way. But aren’t they both heroes?

The moment you detail the differences through that viewpoint, I think the real message of the movie becomes clear.

Again, maybe I’m just overanalyzing, but… Rogue One has changed Star Wars and my perception of its world for me. I’m glad it did.