Honorable Mention 1 - Returning Star Wars Trilogy Favorites

This list is going to focus on the new characters from Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, but we'd be remiss if we didn't give some mention to the characters who returned to the big screen for the first time in decades.

Darth Vader's return was a highlight for many fans, one that reaffirmed his status as the biggest bad in the galaxy.

The use of computer graphics to bring Grand Moff Tarkin back has been met with mixed reactions, as did another use of the technology.

However, for the most part, it was fun seeing characters like Mon Mothma getting another moment in the sun, and particularly to see Jimmy Smits reprise his role as Bail Organa.

Honorable Mention 2 - Saw Gerrera

Rogue One: A Star Wars Story was Saw Gerrera's first appearance in live action and on a movie screen. However, the character was actually introduced to the Star Wars universe in the animated Star Wars: The Clone Wars TV series.

Still, it seemed like Forest Whitaker's performance as Saw was something worth noting here, particularly how Rogue One seemed to present the militant rebel as the Darth Vader of the rebellion.

Saw was a veteran of the Clone Wars and the adoptive father of Jyn Erso. After breaking from the Rebel Alliance, Saw set up shop on Jedha and waged his own personal war against the Empire.

8. Director Orson Krennic

Orson Krennic was the director of the Imperial military's Advanced Weapons Research division and was charged with overseeing the construction of the Death Star.

Krennic was billed as being cruel and obsessive. That was partly true, but seeing Krennic forced to bicker with his superiors and beg for power made him seem petty more than anything else.

Ultimately, even Ben Mendelsohn's performance couldn't elevate Krennic to represent much more that the middle management of the Empire, and he was overshadowed as a threat as soon as Grand Moff Tarkin and Darth Vader made themselves known.

Ultimate, Krennic just doesn't stand up to the other villains of the Star Wars universe.

7. Bodhi Rook

Played by The Night Of star Riz Ahmed, Bodhi Rook was an Imperial pilot who was convinced by Galen Erso to defect from his position and seek out the Rebel Alliance. The welcome he received from Saw Gerrera turned out to be a bit more than he bargained for.

Bodhi Rook is a character who seemed like he should have more going on, but the other shoe just never seemed to drop. He gets interrogated by Saw Gerrera and the audience is told he'll lose his mind as a result, but he barely seemed affected, and the mistrust that some of the rebels have for him never leads anywhere terribly interesting.

Ahmed plays Bodhi with an affable anxiousness that makes him pleasant enough to watch, but the character still ends up feeling more like a plot device to get the heroes on their way than anything else. His journey is more or less complete when he decides to defect, and that takes place before Rogue One even begins.

6. Baze Malbus

Baze Malbus, played by Jiang Wen, was one of the Guardians of Whills entrenched on Jedha after the sacred planet was occupied by the Empire and its sacred Jedi temple sacked for its Kyber crystals.

Too much time on Jedha fighting the Empire cost Baze his faith, and he came to rely more and more on his partner, Chirrut Imwe, to be his guide. Baze found his faith in the Force again during the battle on Scariff.

Baze isn't a bad character, but his depiction in Rogue One relies quite heavily on his relationship with Chirrut Imwe. That relationship in and of itself is a strong part of Rogue One, but Baze may not stand on his own so well.

5. Jyn Erso

Unfortunate truth: the Jyn Erso of Rogue One: A Star Wars Story isn't as cool as the Jyn Erso who was in the trailer for Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.

Jyn's emotional journey feels truncated in Rogue One. Her story picks up with her in an Imperial prison after being left in the care of Saw Gerrera, but there's a sense that something was skipped. Rogue One may have benefited from filling audiences in on what Jyn was up to that got her imprisoned, giving a better indication of who she was before the Rebel Alliance came looking for her.

Jyn has plenty of powerful qualities. She shows boldness and determination at every opportunity, and that she goes out of her way to save that young girl on Jedha shows where her priorities lie when it comes to balancing the little people against the big picture. It is just a shame that she lost some of the fire that showed up in the dialogue in the trailer.

4. Galen Erso

Galen Erso is a rare thing in the Star Wars universe in that he is a truly conflicted character.

Rather than having a singular motivation - light side or dark side, rebel or imperial, good or evil - Galen struggles with prioritizing a number of different important motivations.

Galen is clearly a brilliant man who wants to pursue his work, but is it worth handing that power to the Empire? He loves his family and does everything for them, including sacrificing the life of comfort they had previously inhabited. He let's his own personal reputation fall to ruin among the rebels in order to secretly stall the Death Star project and give it a fatal flaw.

Galen is a character of internal conflict and compromise, and a hero who uses guile and long term planning to succeed. Both are rare and special in the Star Wars mythology.

3. Captain Cassian Andor

Whether Rogue One knows it or not, Cassian Andor is the beating heart of the movie.

From the moment Rebel Alliance Captain Cassian Andor, played by Diego Luna, kills the informant that tips him off to Bodhi Rook's defection to cover his own tracks, audiences know they're in for a different kind of Star Wars movie.

That kind of ruthlessness has previously been reserved for the Empire, and Rogue One goes out of its way to show a duality between the Empire and the Rebellion, with Jyn even comparing Cassian to a Stormtrooper at one point.

In the end, Rogue One is about figuring out why the Rebellion is worth fighting for, why it isn't just a mirror image of the Empire. Cassian captures that theme when he remembers why it was he followed all of those questionable orders.

Cassian easily has the best-developed arc of any character in Rogue One. That it parallels the arc of the very Rebel Alliance he serves makes it all the more powerful.

2. K-2SO

Droids in the Star Wars movies have often been depicted as hapless comic relief or competent to the point that it stretches suspension of disbelief.

K-2SO falls into neither archetype, at least not completely. The reprogrammed Imperial security droid is given a dry wit by Alan Tudyk, who provides the droid's voice, but never strays into the goofiness that characterizes so many other droids.

When he isn't providing laughs, K-2SO is a valuable asset to the Rebellion, but Rogue One wisely keeps his use limited so that he doesn't completely outshine his fleshy comrades.

That's the case at least until the battle at Scariff, where K-2SO shows he's just as much a hero as any other rebel.

1. Chirrut Imwe

Back when the original Star Wars trilogy was still being release in theaters, who thought that the franchise would eventually grow to include some martial arts action?

There are elements of tried and true fictional archetypes in Chirrut Imwe's character, but the application of those archetypes to the Star Wars universe and the philosophy and religion of the Force is something special.

Given how the Force as a concept is so influenced by Eastern philosophy, it seems appropriate to finally see a character who adheres to the Force, even if he's not empowered by it, built in the mode of an Eastern monk rather than the religious knight model used for the Jedi.

Even if that's all a bit high-minded, Donnie Yen is just fantastic in this role, bringing Chirrut a sense of charm and depth.