Curious to see what people here think about Peter Cushing being digitally recreated in Rogue One. Fantastic leap in technology, or tasteless experiment?

It Worked Well For The Story.

Not the first time it's happened.

Furious 7 actually did reasonably well using Paul Walker's brother for a stand-in for some scenes.
Between the stunt double, his brother and CG, it's improved over the years since actors have died during production.

Yes, The Crow is a #1 movie where the actor died during production, but it's not noticable when you watch the movie.
It looks like it was the final day of filming when you watch the whole movie.
Or better script writing to shorten his screen time.


HBO started the challenge of working with stand-ins and CG facial replacement when Nancy Marchand died.
It was extremely awkward because it was the first step in this reproduction.
Here's what it looked like:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GS0DQKHMpM8

If HBO hadn't done it, others wouldn't have also done it and eventually improved upon it.

Of course, you can go super practical and entirely recast the character who will look nothing like what you expect.
Game of Thrones has recast, not because of death, but because of movie opportunities.

The fact anyone can make a movie, means that anyone can have any idea they want.
What they choose is really neither here nor there.
We can only accept that it happened.

I imagine the reason that Rogue One is the most talked about shenannigan is because it touchces base with the OT story arcs.
So being directly influential to the OT, I bet most fans would want to see a brand new actor taking Cushing's place to keep things practical instead of CG makeover.

In a world of CG, we can either move with the tides or you can fight it, lose your stamina and die.

I haven't seen the movie yet. But it won't phase me.
I've watched apes wear rubber masks only to turn green with ping pong balls all over their body with measles on their face.

I think games work out so well because the audience knows everything is CG from the start.
So suspension of disblief is simple. After that, nothing is too out of place in a universe that doesn't exist.

Like Michael Bay, I prefer things to advance.

It's alright.. I don't see anything wrong with it.. if the use is not abused. To homage someone in a movie, or something like that. It's alright, but let's this not be a thing where we bring all dead actors from the grave. No. Thankfully though, this is too much costly for that to ever happen. The tech has advanced and now it looks almost guliable.

His estate agreed to it, it helped with the story and it was a shocking/pleasant surprise. Due to me ignoring everything about the film and wanting to know as little as possible going in, I thought Ben Mendelsohn was playing Tarkin - up until his surprise reveal.

I thought it was weird, because the prime objective was clearly to make audiences see both Grand Moff Tarkin and Peter Cushing.
It implies that the actor performed in a role which he simply did not do.
It didn't seem like an homage. An homage has a degree of subtlety.

"Buh-buh-but the estate said it was okay!"

So what? Bernard Herrmann's estate said it was A-OK to release a highly impractical edition of Twisted Nerve; that doesn't mean it may have been the most attractive or appropriate decision.
What's worse, the effect isn't even convincing. His eyes are dead, his skin waxy. He had much larger a role than was necessary in the story. This all could have been easily avoided.

his skin waxy

That's DNR, what Disney did to TFA.
TFA is pure wax, but ever so clean an image. Dem lightsabers look purdy.

The humans in TFA, Leia, especially, looked like all makeup and DNR.
It was offputting. But I got through it.

Disney got permission from Cushing's estate which okay'ed the recreation. BTW, in England, there's no law preventing the use or misuse of an actor's likeness after his or her death. In the U.S., likenesses are protected by law.

The use of Cushing was respectful, dignified - like the man himself - and necessary to the story. Cushing, like his friend Christopher Lee, always brought a touch of nobility to whatever role he took. (I thought actor Guy Henry did a good job inhabiting Cushing.) Also, Tarkin was in charge of the Death Star, not Vader, not Krennic. It would have been rather obvious if Tarkin had not been present to make decisions.

And the film's final action sequence and IMO one of the best - Vader going Seven Samurai on the rebels - was a reshoot.

And a good one.

That's DNR, what Disney did to TFA.

It's not that. It's like they could only CGI 90% of a human.
They got all of the parts there, but they couldn't generate more than the sum of Peter Cushing's parts. It makes him look weird.

It's not that. It's like they could only CGI 90% of a human.
They got all of the parts there, but they couldn't generate more than the sum of Peter Cushing's parts. It makes him look weird.

I'm saying if even the humans look fugly and abnormal, the CG should fit right in.

Sorry that she's dead, but she was fugly on the big screen.
I would not imagine wanting to see her on a big IMAX screen in TFA.
Even Ford looked horrid as he was.
So much makeup for all the humans. Even the black guy was caked in makeup.
I think they did it to make only the main lead look normal and part of the movie.

Considering he's dead, I'd say the attempt looked wierd; not Cushing.
Cushing looks like a bone right now. Which might be weird to some.
Or if he was creamated, that's a different look.

It's really nothing to bitch about.
Of course they can't reproduce a passable AI computer graphic.
They could feed every movie of his into a computer and run an AI simulation of how he would react and start with a base form of polygons of a face to demonstrate how he *might* most likely react, but that's still not going to change what you want.

But fucked up faces is nothing new to Star Wars.
The old cast is ancient and belong in a museum.

Ford's face has been fucked up for years. Lots of punishment from fucking around and crashing planes. There's a reason his nose his bent! :laugh:

Yeah, but we've been attuned to by watching it over the years.

Fisher on the other hand.. :erm: WOW, was not preprared for that.

Get used to it. It's going to be happening more and more.