Reply to post:

" But these last two - especially R1 - are just too infested with PC messages to allow me to enjoy it properly. "

I'd like to point out that Lucas's original vision for Star Wars was for a female lead, so it's more Star Wars than you think. The fact that Lucas put a woman (Mon Mothma) high in the ranks of the Rebel Alliance should indicate that Lucas's galaxy far far away was also far far more equal than 1970s Earth.

As to the merits of female leads, well, the one in Rogue One is infinitely better than the one in The Force Awakens. How so? Because The Force Awakens was too knowing and conscious about their female lead -- the conversation between Rey and the orange alien woman was far too self-absorbedly "worthy". But then again, J.J. Abrams has never been one to do anything without making it painfully obvious. (Thank the Force he didn't smash the whole thing up with gratuitous lens flare!)

However, in Rogue One, you have a strong female character whose sex/gender/sexuality is not really relevant to the plot, and she's simply a strong character who happens to be female. The only place in the entire plot where her sex matters a damn is in the dialogue between her and her father, which is an extremely well-written father/daughter relationship.

And the men around her weren't "bumbling idiots". She was brash and reckless and her life was saved several times by men, and yet she wasn't "damselled" in the process.

And crucially it was men who convinced her to fight. They could have slipped into the same lazy "sisters are doin it for themselves" mode as Rey-and-the-orange-woman, and had Mon Mothma be the one to talk her into helping the alliance, but they didn't -- they went with the desert-dwelling terrorist surrogate father and the amoral secret agent.

In fact, the whole character development was one of absolute equality, because Jyn and Cassian were both jaded fighters at the start, and both taught the other to care -- Cassian taught Jyn to care about the cause, and Jyn taught Cassian that the cause was worth nothing if you didn't care about people.