Jump to content

Michael Giacchino's Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016) - 2022 Expanded Edition now available


mrbellamy

Recommended Posts

;)

 

I only know because he's always quite forthcoming about his Wigan upbringing in interviews, seems quite proud of it. I remember him talking fondly about it on the Paul O'Grady Show years ago. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

That recycled chord progression in The Imperial Suite from the inGen theme in Jurassic World is really irritating. There is sadly very little originality to anything in most Giacchino scores -- they all seem to blend together into a generic mess.

 

And he took John's comments about Star Wars allowing for a "mustache twirling villain" type theme for the baddies a bit too literally, IMHO.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

6 hours ago, MikeH said:

After listening to this album all day I'm now listening to the full Battle Over Coruscant cue from ROTS and had some thoughts.  I've always had a feeling that JW's ability to create these sorts of chaotic action cues and have them not sound like random crap comes from his jazz background.  Amid all the flourishes and changes, there's still an internal logic in structure and feel, almost like a jazz improvisation.  Perhaps that's why it can be easy to differentiate between a true JW action cue and pastiche. Any thoughts? 

 

6 hours ago, crumbs said:

Not going to find many disagreements there. It's a huge factor I reckon.

 

His mastery of the entire orchestra is unchallenged. Every time you hear a pastiche it becomes quickly apparent that they just can't work out how to balance the ingredients like JW can (and record it so it doesn't sound like a muddy mess).

 

You guys nailed it. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Saw the film last night agree the "fifth theme" is not for that Saw whatever character (Forest Whitaker).  There is a bit of similar orchestration applied to him twice, but not a melody.

 

I DID however pick up a different fifth theme, it was like a bouncy rhythmic action melody.  I'll try ot listen today to see if its on the OST.

 

And it makes sense that Chirrut's Theme is called the "Guardians of the Whils Suite", because when we first meet that character, another character mentions that he is a Guardian of the Whils.  I don't know why BloodBoal said the Whils weren't mentioned at all in the movie... maybe he saw the film dubbed into another language and they messed it up?

Anyway, I think the theme was only used twice, though, both times to emphasize his "mystical" site.  Someone said it got turned into an action variation later, but I didn't pick up on it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Just now, Jay said:

And it makes sense that Chirrut's Theme is called the "Guardians of the Whils Suite", because when we first meet that character, another character mentions that he is a Guardian of the Whils.  I don't know why BloodBoal said the Whils weren't mentioned at all in the movie... maybe he saw the film dubbed into another language and they messed it up?

 

Nah. I probably just either missed the line of dialogue when they mentioned them or simply forgot about it. But they're not mentioned much, right?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

7 minutes ago, BloodBoal said:

 

Nah. I probably just either missed the line of dialogue when they mentioned them or simply forgot about it. But they're not mentioned much, right?

 

Yea, after Chirrut's introduction the Whils are never mentioned again

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I didn't think Amazon broke release dates like that.  Not that I'm complaining!  Maybe it was because I ordered it so many months ahead of time

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Oh and I think someone here asked:

 

The End Credits were done in the traditional Star Wars style. Opened with the same 1977 End Credits beginning like all 7 films, and that segued into the Jyn concert arrangement, then the Imperial concert arrangement, then I forget what else, but eventually it ended with the usual 1977 End Credits ending. But oddly after that's final note, a new sustained note was added for some reason. 

 

So basically I think we have all the end credits music on the CD, except for the straight-out-of-ANH opening and closing pieces.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

12 minutes ago, Jay said:

I didn't think Amazon broke release dates like that.  Not that I'm complaining!  Maybe it was because I ordered it so many months ahead of time

 

I think that they ship it at a specific time in order to ensure that it gets to you on the Friday release date.  Anything earlier is good luck with the post office - lots of extra hands working this time of year, etc.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, BloodBoal said:

If some label were to release a Giacchino compilation album, there would only be 3 tracks on it!

 

01. The Good Guys Theme

02. The Bad Guys Theme

03. Emotional Piano Theme

 

Hahaha. Lol! I´m a big Giacchino fan, but you are right!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

44 minutes ago, crocodile said:

Seriously guys, did you seriously expect Giacchino would suddenly write like John Williams because it's Star Wars? He never did that before and never will.

 

That's the problem: it's not even good without the Williams baggage (plus, composers like David Shire, Bruce Broughton, Gordon, and so on wouldn't have any problems emulating JW without falling even remotely as flat on their ass). I realize the broken-record level of annoyance because the criticisms of Giacchino's compositional abilities remain basically the same over the years but then it's a new Star Wars movie, so there you have it.

 

My beef with this recent stuff is more that i genuinly think he was a better writer 10-15 years before. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

15 minutes ago, BloodBoal said:

Hehehe... I'm listening to the OST on Spotify, and I just noticed a detail they added on the player. They may have actually done that before for other SW titles, but it's the first time I ever saw that:

 

 

 

That's brilliant!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

If Giacchino indeed had been "writing this score his whole life" and this is the best he has to offer (time constraints aside)...........well.................thanks for playing!  Next contestant, please!

 

Just posted 1st customer review on Amazon. Here it is:

 

Serviceable but ultimately forgettable and disappointing new Star Wars score...

 

Upfront Summary:   Serviceable score with a few bright moments.  Utterly forgettable and irrelevant as a whole.  Fails to rise to the high bar set by John Williams with past Star Wars scores.  Probably will be a disappointment for most John Williams & Star Wars music fans if they were expecting a Star Wars score with fresh, catchy new themes, complex orchestrations and well-referenced old themes.  Muddy, hollow-sounding OST recording can be distracting at times.    

 

So many problems with this score, both standalone and especially as used in the film itself.  Too many to list track-by-track at this point, so this review will be more general about the score as an OST and in the film.

 

As an OST, some of the score sounds "Star Wars-esque", and the new themes such as Jyn's theme and the new Imperial motif are serviceable (at best).  However, most tracks feel woefully lacking in the complexity that we've been so spoiled with in John Williams' Star Wars scores and end up feeling like the music is tripping over itself, trying its best to emulate John Williams' style.  It doesn't help that the recording itself seems rather poor, hollow and washed out at times.

 

IMO, the music as used in the film was a mess 70+ percent of the time.  Too overbearing and loud much of the time, especially with forced crescendos and "mickey-mousing" just about every action cue whenever a character dodged, jumped, hit or shot someone.  Old Star Wars themes were shoehorned in at some awkward places and used in unfitting or just blatant fan-servicing ways.    There were a few times when original trilogy themes were referenced well and sounded nice, but most of the time, it sounded awkward and forced.  In the film, the OT themes were oftentimes used in heavy-handed and inappropriate ways.

 

My concern with the score began with the terrible film title reveal music (starting at 3:36 of the 2nd track, "A Long Ride Ahead") ---- how do you mess that up so badly?  It was very cringeworthy and set the tone for the rest of the film. There are just too many problems with the score to really break down the issues scene by scene, but overall, the score was possibly the main thing weighing the movie down from greatness.  So many scenes begged either a different musical tone to them or required less (or more subtle) music.  Giacchino just doesn't seem to understand subtlety and restraint with this score (and maybe he just lacks the ability to do so?).  A key scene near the end (beginning of the "Hope" track) was amazing but was held back by the accompanying music, which was just a pale imitation of John Williams' style from Episode III's track "Anakin's Dark Deeds" --- just a woefully lacking and distracting imitation.

 

From this work, it's clear that Giacchino shouldn't be given the "keys to the kingdom" once John Williams hands off the baton permanently and shouldn't be considered the go-to guy for future Star Wars movies .  Others need a shot at rising to Williams' greatness because Giacchino clearly failed to do so here.  Sure, he had only 4 weeks to write the score, but I don't think more time would have solved the many issues plaguing this score, because many issues are just inherent to his own style and limitations as a composer.  Alexandre Desplat was originally the person set to score this work ---- to think what might have been with a different composer at the helm.

 

As it stands, this score will serve as a distraction every single time that I watch Rogue One and this OST is one that I likely won't revisit very often.  As a life-long Star Wars music fan, with the music from these films being my favorite film music of all time, this is a terribly disappointing conclusion to reach and painful review to write.  Thank goodness John Williams is currently scoring Episode VIII.....

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I put my whole review of the film/score up in the Rogue One spoiler space thread here:

 

 

But I'll paste my thoughts on the score in this thread too:

 

17 minutes ago, Disco Stu said:

The Score

I’ve gotta say, throughout the film and while sitting through the end credits music, I was thinking to myself, “This score is pathetic.”  Frankly, I don’t think Giacchino is cut out for Star Wars.  His scores are best when they’re fun, fluffy, and frivolous.  This is why he excels at animated/children’s films and when the films skew older, like Star Trek, they’re much lighter and more ironic in tone than Star Wars.  He doesn’t have the talent for incorporating and developing leitmotifs or the orchestral skill of writing engaging and uplifting underscore.  He lacks earnestness.

The score felt clumsy and amateurish.  Frankly, a huge disappointment after the far superior Star Trek Beyond score.  His incorporation of existing Williams themes was especially clumsy.  The new themes made almost no impression and when they did it was to make me laugh at how bad they were (lookin’ at you, new “Imperial” theme).

Again, these were my first impressions upon seeing the movie.  After listening to the OST this morning, I will say my opinion has been rehabilitated somewhat.  I still hate his Imperial theme. The Jyn and Rebellion themes are ok, I guess, but nothing amazing.  By far the best of his new themes is the “Guardians of the Whills” stuff.  It’s probably why I like the Jedha part of the score so much.

In some ways this was an impossible task.  This film is a direct tie-in to one of the greatest films ever made that had the greatest score ever written.  The way I put it to my wife was, “Imagine if a composer was tasked with writing a prequel to Mozart’s Magic Flute or something.”  It was just never going to measure up.  BUT. The rushed nature of Giacchino’s score is felt with every ill-thought out note.  I would kill to hear what Desplat’s score would’ve been.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

5 minutes ago, publicist said:

My beef with this recent stuff is more that i genuinly think he was a better writer 10-15 years before. 

 

Maybe he just lost that initial passion he had at the early stages of his carreer, when he had something to prove. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'm starting to look through this thread and I just have to put this out there:

 

People who think Jyn's Theme is superior to Giacchino's Yorktown theme from Star Trek Beyond, are you on bath salts? WTF

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Quintus said:

Some of his militaristic pre battle music in the Bahamas scenes reminded me of his early MOH writing. Don't some of you guys go nuts for that stuff? 

I think there was a lot of the moH sound in this film. I cant see why people dont hear it.

 

The score is not bad. Nobody will write like williams. And desplat score would have been equally alienated from the williams sound. Probably he wouldnt even have quoted WIlliams themes.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'm glad you like it.

 

Giacchino's work has always been quite shallow. And I'm a fan!  But the depth required for a Star Wars score, he just doesn't have.

 

Like, there are many composers whose work I really enjoy that are just not cut out for Star Wars. I now know for sure that Giacchino is one.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

9 minutes ago, leeallen01 said:

Shoot me by all means, but I really really like what I'm hearing. 

 

He really knows his Star Wars scores as well. Things like the great little Hoth battle reference at 0:30 in 'AT- ACT Assault.'

 

I know people will reply with things saying I'm an idiot for thinking it's great, but I care not. I am a fan of Giacchino, and I really like his style and this score.

 

We've all got our own opinions and tastes!  Glad to hear that it satisfies you and some others on here.  Through all of our praises and criticisms, we'll all learn more about the score and how fans of JW interpret it differently

 

Funny how on Amazon, there are already very brief reviewers to the rescue to try to boost the star rating (that started at 2 stars with my 1st review).  They claim "I love it!  Don't believe the 1st reviewer!  It's awesome!" and then don't list any reasons why, LOL.  Already up to 4 stars.....

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think had he not had three other scores this year (and another on the way) he might have done better than he did. That being said, I quite like this score (I saved listening to it until I saw the film) but it's definitely his weakest this year.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The below review comes from somebody very little acquainted with Giacchino and who only really knows him from the LOST Season 2 opening music (which was great) and the Star Trek Beyond score (which was not so great):

 

 

I think the score was quite good. Well, the first half anyway; the second half became a bit too dreary and "epic" for me. And even on top of that, there were some moments where I thought to myself, "Eh? Really Giacchino???" 

 

Like, for example, the round-off of the Force theme in "Trust Goes Both Ways" (~0:50). What happened? Did Giacchino's finger slip on his keyboard or something? It sounds dreadful, and it's a wonder how that B-natural managed to get past quality control!

 

Also, I can't help but chuckle at Jay's annoyance with the ending of "A Long Ride Ahead". It does seem to come out of the blue, as if somebody suddenly inserted a score from an animated children's movie. However, it would definitely sound better if the orchestra sounded a bit fuller! The horns in particular sound weak.

 

However, despite those complaints, I found the score enjoyable enough. There are some great moments to be found throughout (e.g. from 1:07 of "AT-ACT Assault" - I'm a sucker for that kind of thing!). Also, I don't mind so much the Imperial music. In fact it has a welcome "campy"  air about it. I don't know if that was Gia's intention or not but...well, I like it!

 

Is Gia the new Williams? That's an easy answer: No, because there can never be another Williams. 

 

So could Gia take over Williams' position in the SW franchise? Based on what I've heard from the soundtrack, while there's lots of fun and creative stuff in there, it lacks the flow and depth of a score like TFA (and even the fun and creative stuff is not as good as a track like "The Falcon"). I'm thinking especially about the suites in both scores; something like "The Jedi Steps & Finale" sounds much more cohesive than any of the suites from Rogue One (probably the best is Jyn Erso & Hope Suite, but frankly I almost fell asleep listening to that). HOWEVER I admire Gia's creative spirit, and what seems to me like somebody trying out new quirks and ideas, especially in the action material, which can sometimes work and sometimes fall flat on its face. There's a certain tongue-in-cheek spontaneity in his music that I admire. So, on that side of things, he may well end up writing SW scores in the future...yet his composing style is also a bit lazy and shabby. 

 

Besides, I feel like, after Williams is gone, SW pastiches won't do it. There will have to be a revamp in SW's sound world (for better or worse). So I'm not sure that simply "sounding like a Williams score" will cut it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

If Gia had been the composer from the beginning and had a normal timeframe to create the score rather than a last minute replacement, I'n certain the score and its theme would have been much better

Link to comment
Share on other sites

4 minutes ago, Disco Stu said:

 

Zootopia?

 

I preferred Zootopia, TBH.

 

3 minutes ago, peter.anschutz said:

Strange (and disappointing) they didn't include the full end credits suite on the OST.  That would've been the highlight of the whole album.

 

Indeed. They should have included it, but Giacchino OSTs haven't included a full end credits suite at all this year.

 

2 minutes ago, dfenton85 said:

If Gia had been the composer from the beginning and had a normal timeframe to create the score rather than a last minute replacement, I'n certain the score and its theme would have been much better

 

I wholeheartedly agree with this.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

13 minutes ago, Disco Stu said:

I'm glad you like it.

 

Giacchino's work has always been quite shallow. And I'm a fan!  But the depth required for a Star Wars score, he just doesn't have.

Nobody does. And nobody ever will.

 

This score is not bad, orchestrated, it's the most closer to the williams sound that he ever has done. He quotes the themes that should be quoted. In fact probably its a concious idea to create a new Imperial/Krennic theme, and leave the Vader march only for him. (As it is not used in ANH). I  would have liked more rebel fanfare, but after thinking it, really the rebel alliance is a mess until they make up their minds and fight in the final battle so that may be also a conscious move.

 

As i said earlier some underscore is similar to some MOH music and that is cool, GIacchino returned a little to his old sound.

 

Another thing they have wanted to distiguish this so much from the main saga that they probably didnt force giacchino to make a pastiche of previous themes. And since it seems they werent forcing it any other composer would have done a un-stawarsy score. I didnt like the title card music, Luke's theme should have been used though.

 

I dont really see anymore similarities between this score and others this year than in other years. So i dont hear any straining ot tiredness.

 

Some quotations of old themes sound more in place than in Jurassic World or even  Williams' KOTCS and TFA shoehorned renditions. I think this score contains the most examples of correct blending of Williams homages with new music in most after-Williams-derivated films.

 

Really excluding the opening blast, the opening of 'He's here for us' doesnt sound like Williams star wars? COme on.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I wasn't dissapointed by the score, but I wasn't impressed either, but this doesn't mean it's a bad score. I think one of the possible reasons why a lot of reviews on this are negative, is because every Star Wars score to date has been exceptional and impressive. This one isn't exceptional, it's just your average-y movie score that has some good moments, but, all in all, it isn't something you'd listen to for hours by itself. It fits the movie, and it's a good effort, but I don't think it will win many awards. Giacchino isn't Williams, but he isn't a bad composer.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site, you agree to our Guidelines.