While the Star Wars movies since the original trilogy remain polarizing to fans, the one that most consider a quality addition to the saga was Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.
However, that title was a last-minute decision by Lucasfilm, and writer Gary Whitta said that he felt there was a better choice the studio missed out on.
Gary Whitta talks Rogue One: A Star Wars Story
Gary Whitta, the screenwriter from Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, said that the title was chosen at the last minute.
However, he said that there was a name that he thought would have been a better choice, one he called an “epic” title.
“Digging through old stuff, found the email where I submitted the title ROGUE ONE to Lucasfilm, along with some other suggestions,” Whitta wrote on Twitter.
“Still think they made the wrong choice, ‘THE RISE OF WHITTA’ has such an epic ring to it.”
Of course, he was joking.
Whitta went on and said, “One argument I made in favor of ROGUE ONE as a title was that all the saga films have titles that are three or four words long (true for all nine eventually), so a title comprised of only one or two words would help differentiate the first standalone movie. I think it helped?”
Star Wars: Rogue One
The movie was an exciting addition to the franchise that was not handcuffed so much by what hurt the other movies released over that time.
Solo had to tell the story of Han Solo, and fans almost demanded the addition of characters like Chewbacca and Lando Calrissian to make them happy. That meant it had no chance at originality.
The trilogy itself was a part of the Skywalker Saga, so anytime Star Wars tried something fresh, many fans rejected it because they wanted nothing but Luke Skywalker and didn’t care about the future of the franchise.
When The Last Jedi tried to do something different, those fans rejected it. The Rise of Skywalker had to go back and just retread the past to make those fans happy.
However, with Rogue One, the only thing the movie had to do was include the Death Star plans and their retrieval. The movie had free reign to do whatever it wanted, and it was all the better for it.
Fans will soon get more Rogue One on Disney+ when Star Wars: Andor premieres, and Patty Jenkins (Wonder Woman) will direct a new movie titled Star Wars: Rogue Squadron.