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I just finished. Here's some thoughts.
All three of the films were not nearly as a horrible as I was led to believe.
a) Phantom Menace has some severe flaws that deal with pacing, character, acting, dialogue, and Jar Jar. The special effects are hit and miss, but I attribute that to 1999's standards. We have come a long way. I was especially reminded of the flaws of sfx in the stampede scene on Naboo, in which the animals are not very well integrated into the forest. I also thought Darth Maul was neither scary nor threatening. I couldn't stop staring at his little horns.
b) Attack of the Clones was fine, but once again, the clunkety speech tumbling from the actors' mouths made me ill. The best part, easily, was Christopher Lee kicking the crap out of everybody, and then lil Yoda steps in. There, the pacing is immaculate. Yoda's power is... developed through feats of strength, thus making it believable that he kicks ass. According to IMDB, this Yoda was all CGI, and it was good. The special effects were far better integrated into the real world than before.
My problems with the first two films comes from Lucas' quaint sense of humour. I'm sure I would have laughed if I had seen it as a child, but as an adult, it just didn't click with me. After something happens, somebody says something wickedly ironic. It just didn't make me laugh. That's not my kind of humour, unfortunately. My sense of humour has changed from when I found Star Wars funny. Thus, the jokes fell flat and forced me out of the moment. Luckily, there was less of that in the next film.
c) Revenge of the Sith. Well, this was good. No... it was awesome. This is the Star Wars that people wanted to see. Other than the fabulous duels between Anakin and Obi-Wan, and Yoda and Sidious, the best part was Mace Windu kicking ass. Man, I love Samuel L. Jackson. "There are clones on this motherfucking plane!"
Also, I read that many people found it to be unbelievable that Anakin could be so seduced so quickly. I, for one, found the transition to be almost non-existant, but in a good way. From the moment that Anakin leaves his mother and fears for her, to the moment he stands before the council and is accused of fear, I felt that he was already Darth Vader. I needed logical steps to get him to Vader, obviously, but they were placed there by... predestination, perhaps? His mother's death, the systematic revenge slaughter, the fear, the dreams. They were all pieces of a puzzle. It wasn't a simple transition, and I thought that right there was the new trilogy's greatest strength.
Question, however. Why didn't the Jedi Council, a very powerful collective of Jedis, sense that Palpatine had a mist of the Dark Side around him? I don't think Darth Sidious is not powerful enough to erect a smoke-screen that strong to counter the combined mind-tricks of Ben Kenobi, Yoda and Mace Windu, and that tall-headed fellow. It seems that the Jedis kinda deserved what they got. That's what you get for sitting on your tuckus, and training someone as dangerous as Anakin. They didn't want to do it in Phantom Menace, why did Liam Neeson push it?
Second question, why can R2 fly in the first three films and not the second? What's the deal?
It makes me think of predestination, really, as in the Novikov self-consistency principle. Like the viewer of the films have traveled back in time, and each little piece of the future (1977) was being made. I don't just mean my relationship to the films. In the films, things must happen and they could go no other way.
Now I must seek out the Clone Wars and fill in the gaps. Wish me luck. |
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