The Phantom Menace: It actually isn't that bad!

[JAWS]

For me the Prequels are in fact the Expanded Universe of Star Wars - whereas there are EU stories 100 times better than PT. I watch PT from time to time, but they are no more than any other regular movie I watch. When watching OT it's like a screen festivity for me.

The PT are fan fiction to me and do not tell the real story.

 

[Khev]

TPM also has the only good villain of the PT... Actually the two best villains. Maul and The Emperor... It's the only time the Emperor feels like the same Emperor from the OT and not an overacting goofball with bad make up.

Yeah in ROTS when he's hanging off the side of the Senate pod and laughing hysterically he always reminds me of Jack Nicholson dancing around and shaking his butt on the ledge at the end of Batman.

Who would have ever thought that this guy:

would become this:

The PT are fan fiction to me and do not tell the real story.

I'm fine with the PT telling "the real story" I just consider it a poor telling in many regards. Think of it like Michael Bay's Pearl Harbor. The movie might have sucked but those events still "happened" (for the most part.) I'm basically taking this approach because I really do think that The Force Awakens will be good and that it will reference something from the PT in some way, shape or form and I'm just not going to let it bother me. So I'm basically "fine, the PT tells the real story, just move on and make the movies better from here on out."

And I am serious when I say that each of the three prequels do have cool new moments and elements throughout (mostly in TPM of course.)

 

[JAWS]

Yeah in ROTS when he's hanging off the side of the Senate pod and laughing hysterically he always reminds me of Jack Nicholson dancing around and shaking his butt on the ledge at the end of Batman.

Who would have ever thought that this guy:

would become this:

I'm fine with the PT telling "the real story" I just consider it a poor telling in many regards. Think of it like Michael Bay's Pearl Harbor. The movie might have sucked but those events still "happened" (for the most part.) I'm basically taking this approach because I really do think that The Force Awakens will be good and that it will reference something from the PT in some way, shape or form and I'm just not going to let it bother me. So I'm basically "fine, the PT tells the real story, just move on and make the movies better from here on out."

And I am serious when I say that each of the three prequels do have cool new moments and elements throughout (mostly in TPM of course.)

There are too many inconsistencies with the originals... Enough that Lucas had to mess with empire to get the PT story to fit.. Even then there are too many issues with characters not knowing each other or flat out lies being told... Obi Wan's whole story that he gives to Luke about his father is basically BS (and I am not talking about the certain point of view stuff) Also everyone knows Yoda and the Emperor never used Light Sabers... They are too strong in the force for that

Plus Insect creatures did not create the Death Star.. Vader did more damage then just kill baby Jedi and Luka and Leia's mother did not die of a broken heart.... All fan fiction .

 

[Khev]

"The Emperor asks the impossible, I need more MEN." Obviously bugs weren't building the Death Star. And Geonosians were technically Separatists and Palpatine cut all ties with them when he created the Empire anyway. But I get your point. I just think the only "consistency" that matters is quality or entertainment value. Because we forgive continuity inconsistencies all the time between sequels and prequels when the end result is still "cool." "Kane said he saw thousands of eggs there, thousands." Um, no he didn't. But whatever, ALIENS rocks.

I don't think the OT has rock solid continuity with itself and neither does the PT + OT. Hell even the PT seems to suffer some issues internally. Wasn't Anakin big on visiting all the stars and freeing slaves? Shouldn't that have at least gotten a passing mention in Episode II or III? Otherwise why even bring it up in TPM? Eh, whatever.

At the end of the day I do find entertainment value in TPM and the PT and I like having options. To me there already are nine SW films. "Harmy trilogy" and "PT + OT SE." Is the Harmy trilogy the one I respect more? Of course. Just like I respect Schindler's List more than I do Return of the Jedi. But screw only watching respectable crap. Bring on the complete nine episode saga that we've been waiting for since we were kids.

And come on JAWS and all you OT fuddy duddies, you've got to be able to at least love the PT ironically. It's just funny. And I'm serious when I say that! Here's how to enjoy the PT:

1. Love the cool stuff (Darth Maul, Qui Gon Jinn, ummm, Padme's half shirt.)

2. Laugh that the stupid stuff "happened." Treat them like comedies that are so stupidly not funny that they ARE funny. Have you ever watched a buddy make a joke, and the response is so deafeningly silent that it's freaking hilarious? And then you can't help but laugh at him? And you don't suddenly hate him or go all "you're not my friend anymore, you're stupid now and inconsistent with who you used to be." No, that stupid moment was "real" and you laugh your *** off whenever you think about it.

We've kind of got that in Star Wars now. And I just think it's okay. Camp out in the Harmy OT till you're blue in the face. I have. But seriously, we can still enjoy this "saga." We really can. It really is all fun if you're willing to let it be. For crying out loud the freaking Holiday Special happened. And the "Ewok Adventure." SW can survive being stupid. It always has. But at the same time it's still cool. And that's the bottom line. /mic drop

 

[a-dev]

Will I respond with this?



this?



or this?

 

[Khev]

You see those three gifs some up perfectly how you should react when watching the PT. Nice job a-dev. Except maybe add a Shatner/McCoy head nod for Darth Maul.

Look at J Jonah Jameson. That dude is having the time of his life.

I think the greatest "sin" of the PT; worse than Jar Jar, worse than Jake Lloyd and excruciating "romance" dialogue was all the green screen cartoon backgrounds. That's what makes so much of AOTC and ROTS a struggle for me. People just walking and talking in front of 2D cartoon backgrounds. That's not fun, and definitely not SW.

 

[a-dev]

I dunno. Forgive me if I'm interpreting you wrong but if you're saying ''just accept and enjoy the crap'' well






quite simply because....I don't need to. There's better things to do than to ''try'' to enjoy something you've never liked before or to rationalise it's crapness so as it fits better etc etc. Easier just to ignore it. If I'm in a Star Wars mood I'll watch the originals, not the prequels. If I'm in a Terminator mood I'll watch the first two, not T3 or T4.

Having said that TPM is the best of the PT. I think I've already posted in here but I will reiterate, if it were some other characters and not Obi-wan and Anakin, I would consider it a pretty good entry into the Star Wars universe. I don't count it as such however because, halfway decent though it otherwise is as a movie, it ****s up the relationship between those two major characters from the very start and needlessly contradicts a bunch of OT dialogue.

 

[JAWS]

And come on JAWS and all you OT fuddy duddies, you've got to be able to at least love the PT ironically. It's just funny. And I'm serious when I say that! Here's how to enjoy the PT:

I gave the PT their chance... I did not hate AOTC and ROTS on first viewing... But things I thought were cool got worse with repeat viewings... I find NO fun in watching AOTC... There is not one moment I enjoy... I hate the film... First viewing I was just happy Jar Jar was hardly in it and I thought Yoda fight was cool in the fact they pulled it off (even though I don't like the idea if Yoda using a saber) But there is nothing else I enjoy in the film... I think it is by far the worst if the SW films and I mean BY FAR!!

Sith had things liked at first... Like Vader killing the younglings... But then Time went by and I realized that that was all the great and mighty Vader did... Kill Younglings and unarmed aliens.... Then he got his but kicked by the only person who could stand up for himself... Add that to the fact that I don't think Vader deserves redemption because he did kill children... The Final Duel between Ben and Vader should have been Epic but it was ruined by a drama free dual, cutaways to the awful Yoda Emperor fight, and finally awful green screen wire swinging and lava boats... Obi Wan is shown to be an ***** when he jumps in the middle of a hundred droids to fight Grevious and should have been killed on the spot..

The opening should have been EPIC.... The Space battle to end all space battles... Instead we end up dealing with tiny droids drilling holes in the Jedi ships.
Ian McDiarmid wielding a Saber is just awful and his battle with Sam Jackson... Gahhh


I know I am slamming on the films but I am just explaining why I don't care for them (there are many other reasons) Really Khev... I just don't like them... I stayed away from the OT because the PT ruined my enjoyment of them... I had to finally wipe them out of my mind.. Think of them as never happening and go with what I use to imagine so I enjoy the original films again...

AOTC and ROTS are completely joyless and cold. I could handle Sith being dark if it was exciting but it's not.. Not for me...

I wish I could watch them like you do and just enjoy them for what they are... But I cant...

I really....truly.... Deeply... Hate them




PS - Prometheus is fan fiction also... Just better fan fiction... I do not think of those films related at all.

PSS - Kane did see a lot of eggs... Why do you say he didn't?

 

[a-dev]

I think Kane's dialogue was ''....and it's filled with leathery objects, like eggs or something''

So he doesn't say ''thousands'' but maybe we were to assume he does say it at some point, off screen, after waking up from the facehugging.

 

[JAWS]

I think Kane's dialogue was ''....and it's filled with leathery objects, like eggs or something''

So he doesn't say ''thousands'' but maybe we were to assume he does say it at some point, off screen, after waking up from the facehugging.

That's right... Ripley says Kane say thousands of them in ALIENS.


Well at least she remembered that she had a robot on the ship... Obi Wan can't remember R2 even though he has been robotless on a desert planet for years

 

[a-dev]

Vader built Threepio ''dear oh dear''

 

[Mandible]

With you on all these points but for me, ROTS is my most unwatchable/hated and abhorrent SW film.

The script and acting are just unbearable. "Sith Lords are our speciality" ????????? WTF????? If I put all the crap lines in this thread it would probably end up being 90% of the script.

Palpatine is just terrible - the voice when he changes?? The fight with SLJ; his stupid faces he pulls...

The saber fight at the end is just a couple of girls doing callisthenics - twirling batons like a pair of fairies. Compare this to the Bespin showdown....please. You don't need the "show" if we care about the outcome of the characters. Who gave two craps about the outcome on Mustafar??? No one, because the characters were so wooden throughout all there PT films.

I could go on and on, but I'm just getting angry as I type

I gave the PT their chance... I did not hate AOTC and ROTS on first viewing... But things I thought were cool got worse with repeat viewings... I find NO fun in watching AOTC... There is not one moment I enjoy... I hate the film... First viewing I was just happy Jar Jar was hardly in it and I thought Yoda fight was cool in the fact they pulled it off (even though I don't like the idea if Yoda using a saber) But there is nothing else I enjoy in the film... I think it is by far the worst if the SW films and I mean BY FAR!!

Sith had things liked at first... Like Vader killing the younglings... But then Time went by and I realized that that was all the great and mighty Vader did... Kill Younglings and unarmed aliens.... Then he got his but kicked by the only person who could stand up for himself... Add that to the fact that I don't think Vader deserves redemption because he did kill children... The Final Duel between Ben and Vader should have been Epic but it was ruined by a drama free dual, cutaways to the awful Yoda Emperor fight, and finally awful green screen wire swinging and lava boats... Obi Wan is shown to be an ***** when he jumps in the middle of a hundred droids to fight Grevious and should have been killed on the spot..

The opening should have been EPIC.... The Space battle to end all space battles... Instead we end up dealing with tiny droids drilling holes in the Jedi ships.
Ian McDiarmid wielding a Saber is just awful and his battle with Sam Jackson... Gahhh


I know I am slamming on the films but I am just explaining why I don't care for them (there are many other reasons) Really Khev... I just don't like them... I stayed away from the OT because the PT ruined my enjoyment of them... I had to finally wipe them out of my mind.. Think of them as never happening and go with what I use to imagine so I enjoy the original films again...

AOTC and ROTS are completely joyless and cold. I could handle Sith being dark if it was exciting but it's not.. Not for me...

I wish I could watch them like you do and just enjoy them for what they are... But I cant...

I really....truly.... Deeply... Hate them




PS - Prometheus is fan fiction also... Just better fan fiction... I do not think of those films related at all.

PSS - Kane did see a lot of eggs... Why do you say he didn't?

 

[Khev]

Shoot, I'm starting to feel like I've got a little bit of "tears in rain" going on here, like I'm just some punk replicant on a rooftop spouting crap that will soon be forgotten in this this big never ending storm of animosity against the prequels. But here goes...

I dunno. Forgive me if I'm interpreting you wrong but if you're saying ''just accept and enjoy the crap'' well

Okay, fair observation. I can totally see how you might think that and would wonder why I'd bother. Kind of like if I said "Hey Battlefield Earth, if I go through the movie frame by frame there's actually one or two milliseconds that don't suck, let's all watch it and accept it and talk about it now." Ha. Yeah that'd be pretty strange. So let me give you some points of reference as to where I'm coming from, and if you disagree with *these* then yeah, I might as well be championing Battlefield Earth. They are:

1. I have a ton of respect and affinity for any backstory that was scribbled down before or during the OT. I think there was just pretty much "magic" in all of it. So when I read about Trader Barons and shipping embargos that cause planets to crumble which leads to Palpatine rising to power to calm an outraged Republic suddenly anything that touches on that becomes kind of cool. Not awesome, or perfect or even "good," because execution of a concept IS important, but at least it ties into sound backstory that I'm into and just want to see play out on screen in some fashion.

By the same token when I read that one synopsis a while back that had a Jedi defending his little kid on Tatooine from this badass Sith then suddenly the Maul/Qui Gon fight on Tatooine as Anakin runs away takes on a cool new resonance. From what I guessed, Lucas had this scene of a Force sensitive kid out in the desert wilderness and he is tracked down by a Sith. Right as the Sith is about to kill him the kid's dad shows up with a lightsaber and fights off the attacker. Then it kind of seemed like that moment evolved into Luke being attacked by Sandpeople and then being rescued by Ben, but then many years later Lucas went back and kind of gave us a version in TPM that had some elements that more closely matched his original vision.

So to recap I just like anything from those notes brought to fruition. And if I can trust that ALL OF IT is based on those notes, well then I can almost give a pass to the whole damn trilogy. But I know that that wasn't the case and that he did make up a number of new things seemingly out of the blue.

2. Since 1981 the OT has always been "4, 5, and 6." So it's not like he had this sweet story with no real backstory and then in the late 90's just contrived a way to make a lot more money and jarringly went decades into the "past." The episode numbers always foreshadowed the day that the prequels would come. Because of that, *in my opinion* the OT lacked a sense of completion. It felt like it was missing something that it clearly wanted to have.

Yes it started off with Luke becoming an adventurer for the first time and we all took his journey with him. And the OT does indeed tell the "story of Luke Skywalker" and you don't really need "prequel movies" about characters other than him to enjoy HIS story. You just don't. But as a "saga" it just positioned itself as having something more. We got so many references to things like the Jedi Order, the Senate, the Clone War, and so on. References don't have to be fully explained and they often help convey that there's a whole universe out there that goes way beyond what you're watching.

But with regard to Star Wars we kind of just knew that 1, 2, and 3 and 7, 8, and 9 were going to be a big deal at some point. For a while after ROTJ I never thought we'd see new SW again. And then the prequels happened. And now we have the "sequels" coming. What if 7, 8 and 9 just kill it. KILL IT. And they reference Battle Droids and *gasp* even midichlorians. Well, then we've got our saga. And if this thing wraps up well then we're going to have one heck of a 9 episode story that really just stuttered in the execution of it's opening act. But not necessarily irredeemably so.

3. As I've mentioned some of the stuff in the PT, even AOTC and ROTS is genuinely cool. And if you disagree on that then yeah, I'm telling you to give "Battlefield Earth" a chance. I just think that if the "cool" elements had a little more credibility, or perhaps were *allowed* to have a little more credibility then they'd be embraced by a lot more people. I think back to when I watched the SW SE opening day in 1997. I was BLOWN AWAY when Boba Fett walked on screen. I COULD NOT BELIEVE that he had a scene in Star Wars with Jabba that was left on the cutting room floor. Immediately all these things "clicked" in my mind. "Oh that's why he's the one action figure to debut on the previous movie's Kenner card. That's why he was on the 21 back, because he was always supposed to be there!" And then my mind went to all the cool implications of him being on Tatooine and bla bla bla.

Then I read that he was just digitally inserted into that scene when they made the SE and suddenly I got all pissed and thought it was stupid that instead of being this badass bounty hunter who was all over the galaxy he was just Jabba's dumb "lackey" and oh look he's mugging for the camera and it was nuts! The SAME scene that I thought was so cool was just "stupid." All because I had to sit in judgment of the motivations for why he was there. I could no longer enjoy it. I had to second guess every little detail all of a sudden. But that made me realize that I wasn't allowing myself to let these movies tell me the story. *I* had to cross reference every little detail with what *I* knew to be cool and proper about SW and sit there like Joaquin Phoenix with my thumb up or down.

And I'm not saying that any of you guys do that but for me that's just really dumb. Because I know, I *know* that if somehow Lucasfilm Ltd released some verifiably authentic manuscript that was 30 years old that detailed how George Lucas, Gary Kurtz, and Lawrence Kasdan envisioned Boba Fett being a clone of this guy named Jango, and that Anakin and "Padme" had this really awkward romance and that were all these cartoon pod racers I just know that I'd look at things differently. So I just thought, "well why the hell don't I just choose to look at things differently?" The stuff on screen doesn't change, only what I will "accept."

Because that's what I do with Return of the Jedi. It has dumb stuff. It has awkward scenes in front of 2D backgrounds (that Falcon painting, *shudder.*) ANH has goofy parts that you can make fun or be turned off by. I'm not saying that AOTC and ANH were executed with the same level of skill. Far from it. I'm just saying that if I want to have something more than "the story of Luke Skywalker and his dad," which I do, then I should AT LEAST watch the PT with the same mindset as that I give to ROTJ.

And that allows me to be less annoyed (or not annoyed at all) by the "story choices" that are kind of goofy or outright lame like Anakin building C-3PO or the existence of midichlorians. Because I don't see THOSE elements as defining the saga. Who built what droid? How do Jedi talk to the Force? As long as there's still faith, training, and displine involved then whatever if there's these weird microscopic creatures that sometimes play a part. Not really the point of the saga.

Which then gets you to execution of the story. Well, we all seem to agree that TPM is the best of the prequels. So lets move on to the "worst," AOTC. Well, John Williams score is still sweet is it not? The sports bar scene was pretty cool wasn't it? "Jedi business, go back to your drinks." Not bad right? That's something I could see Vader saying when he was still a Jedi. Jango, cool. Fight in the rain with Obi-Wan, cool. Clonetroopers had neat designs. Christopher Lee? Awesome to see in a SW movie. Yeah, it's the weak link. But as far as dismissing it altogether and saying "that's not the real history," well, why? It had clones in a war. It had Palpatine pulling strings. It had Anakin falling in love and starting to turn kind of bad. It basically featured stuff that we were all kind of expecting but just, well, it just didn't present it very gracefully. James Cameron called Alien 3 a "beautiful failure." I think AOTC was an "ugly *** win." You know? It didn't kill off everyone from TPM in the opening scene but it also didn't do a great job of making us love everyone who DID survive. But it moved the story and you either think there's enough cool stuff in there to give it a watch or not.

If you say "there is not" well, you're definitely in the majority but I do think that the broad strokes of the story were sound.

 

[SwiftC]

The Phantom Menace is the fourth best star wars movie.

 

[a-dev]

Well, while I still doubt that I can go along with your mindset, that was an applaud-worthy post. You explained yourself very well. I would rep but it won't let me.

One thing I'm aware of - the PT have not been disregarded with the new canon (they were never likely to be, Disney and Abrams wouldn't slap Lucas in the face like that) - and so chances are the new trilogy will reference them in order to tie the whole thing together - this may force me to look back at the PT - and if the new films are good.....maybe they could end up retroactively giving the PT some sort of credibility similar to what you're describing with the tidbits of backstory Lucas wrote back in the 70s and 80s making you excited about seeing those ideas realised in the PT. Seems unlikely, but not totally outside the realms of possibility. I mean even I've said that a McGregor Obi-wan force ghost could be interesting.

 

[Centurion]

Vader built Threepio ''dear oh dear''

...from a certain point of view.

 

[Khev]

Well, while I still doubt that I can go along with your mindset, that was an applaud-worthy post. You explained yourself very well. I would rep but it won't let me.

Thank you. Phew, I was really bracing for typing out this big long winded thesis only to have it be dismissed as apologist nonsense.

One thing I'm aware of - the PT have not been disregarded with the new canon (they were never likely to be, Disney and Abrams wouldn't slap Lucas in the face like that) - and so chances are the new trilogy will reference them in order to tie the whole thing together - this may force me to look back at the PT - and if the new films are good.....maybe they could end up retroactively giving the PT some sort of credibility similar to what you're describing with the tidbits of backstory Lucas wrote back in the 70s and 80s making you excited about seeing those ideas realised in the PT. Seems unlikely, but not totally outside the realms of possibility. I mean even I've said that a McGregor Obi-wan force ghost could be interesting.

Yes, and I feel like if there's one person who can instantly "validate" all the negative aspects of the prequels that it's Harrison Ford. I could see him saying something in his snarky sarcastic way that is simultaneously the voice of the audience but also do it in a way that says, "Hey, it's me--Han, and I'm signing off on all that crazy backstory so we can just accept it together and move forward with new kickass adventures." Kind of like in "Can't Buy Me Love" where the one cool girl said that Patrick Dempsey was cool so that gave everyone else permission to agree. And, like Harrison Ford, she was paid a hefty fee for her endorsement but it worked.

One thing I will say now is that I think that no prequels should ever be made for pretty much any movie series again, ever. They're just not a good idea. If someone wants to watch a "prequel" they should just go back and watch the first movie of any given series. ANH is the prequel to ESB. ALIEN is the prequel to ALIENS. But they were properly plotted and released in correct chronological order so everything evolved organically and you didn't have any forced "in jokes" with people saying "amusingly" ironic things. "They'll never get me on one of those starships." Oh if you only knew what's coming 3PO, tee hee hee. Yeah, that stuff pretty much always falls flat.

If you're into Harry Potter you can watch all seven movies and then when you're used to him being grown up you can go back to the beginning and be amazed at how young he used to be when the whole thing started. Or be amazed at going back to the first season of The Walking Dead at how altruistic and innocent everyone used to be. You just appreciate the whole thing better that way. It was neat that George tried doing the whole "middle story" first thing with SW, and it made sense for the LOTR/Hobbit because they were book adaptations and so forth, but really, hopefully never again.

 

[JAWS]

Okay, fair observation. I can totally see how you might think that and would wonder why I'd bother. Kind of like if I said "Hey Battlefield Earth, if I go through the movie frame by frame there's actually one or two milliseconds that don't suck, let's all watch it and accept it and talk about it now." Ha. Yeah that'd be pretty strange. So let me give you some points of reference as to where I'm coming from, and if you disagree with *these* then yeah, I might as well be championing Battlefield Earth. They are:

Ok PT is better the Battlefield Earth.

1. I have a ton of respect and affinity for any backstory that was scribbled down before or during the OT.

I think there was just pretty much "magic" in all of it. So when I read about Trader Barons and shipping embargos that cause planets to crumble which leads to Palpatine rising to power to calm an outraged Republic suddenly anything that touches on that becomes kind of cool. Not awesome, or perfect or even "good," because execution of a concept IS important, but at least it ties into sound backstory that I'm into and just want to see play out on screen in some fashion.

By the same token when I read that one synopsis a while back that had a Jedi defending his little kid on Tatooine from this badass Sith then suddenly the Maul/Qui Gon fight on Tatooine as Anakin runs away takes on a cool new resonance. From what I guessed, Lucas had this scene of a Force sensitive kid out in the desert wilderness and he is tracked down by a Sith. Right as the Sith is about to kill him the kid's dad shows up with a lightsaber and fights off the attacker. Then it kind of seemed like that moment evolved into Luke being attacked by Sandpeople and then being rescued by Ben, but then many years later Lucas went back and kind of gave us a version in TPM that had some elements that more closely matched his original vision.

So to recap I just like anything from those notes brought to fruition. And if I can trust that ALL OF IT is based on those notes, well then I can almost give a pass to the whole damn trilogy. But I know that that wasn't the case and that he did make up a number of new things seemingly out of the blue.

I never looked into what was Lucas's original notes... I can see how that might make it more interesting.. But it still does not excuse the crap that it ended up being.. I hate a lot of the story elements.. But if there was some love and care put into the films and not just a "one take lets move to the next scene" feeling then I could get into the story much more.

For me it is a combination of poor story telling and bad filmmaking.

2. Since 1981 the OT has always been "4, 5, and 6." So it's not like he had this sweet story with no real backstory and then in the late 90's just contrived a way to make a lot more money and jarringly went decades into the "past." The episode numbers always foreshadowed the day that the prequels would come. Because of that, *in my opinion* the OT lacked a sense of completion. It felt like it was missing something that it clearly wanted to have.

Yes it started off with Luke becoming an adventurer for the first time and we all took his journey with him. And the OT does indeed tell the "story of Luke Skywalker" and you don't really need "prequel movies" about characters other than him to enjoy HIS story. You just don't. But as a "saga" it just positioned itself as having something more. We got so many references to things like the Jedi Order, the Senate, the Clone War, and so on. References don't have to be fully explained and they often help convey that there's a whole universe out there that goes way beyond what you're watching.

But with regard to Star Wars we kind of just knew that 1, 2, and 3 and 7, 8, and 9 were going to be a big deal at some point. For a while after ROTJ I never thought we'd see new SW again. And then the prequels happened. And now we have the "sequels" coming. What if 7, 8 and 9 just kill it. KILL IT. And they reference Battle Droids and *gasp* even midichlorians. Well, then we've got our saga. And if this thing wraps up well then we're going to have one heck of a 9 episode story that really just stuttered in the execution of it's opening act. But not necessarily irredeemably so.

I think we are the same age Khev.. Old enough to hope for prequels and then accept there would never be any. For me.... The feeling of both, had me creating my own bits of back story that was picked up form the films. things that Lucas ignored or changed. I know expectations can be high.. But again I actually liked all three film with my first viewing.. it was after repeat viewings that the films started to have downward spiral effect.. I did not hate them all at once. It took a few viewings... Had Lucas knocked Sith out of the park, I could forgive Clones for it's awful pace, terrible love story, and non exciting action.. But Sith failed in so many ways that I already touched on so I wont do it again.

They are, for me, poorly done films with bad acting and bad plots.

3. As I've mentioned some of the stuff in the PT, even AOTC and ROTS is genuinely cool. And if you disagree on that then yeah, I'm telling you to give "Battlefield Earth" a chance. I just think that if the "cool" elements had a little more credibility, or perhaps were *allowed* to have a little more credibility then they'd be embraced by a lot more people. I think back to when I watched the SW SE opening day in 1997. I was BLOWN AWAY when Boba Fett walked on screen. I COULD NOT BELIEVE that he had a scene in Star Wars with Jabba that was left on the cutting room floor. Immediately all these things "clicked" in my mind. "Oh that's why he's the one action figure to debut on the previous movie's Kenner card. That's why he was on the 21 back, because he was always supposed to be there!" And then my mind went to all the cool implications of him being on Tatooine and bla bla bla.

Then I read that he was just digitally inserted into that scene when they made the SE and suddenly I got all pissed and thought it was stupid that instead of being this badass bounty hunter who was all over the galaxy he was just Jabba's dumb "lackey" and oh look he's mugging for the camera and it was nuts! The SAME scene that I thought was so cool was just "stupid." All because I had to sit in judgment of the motivations for why he was there. I could no longer enjoy it. I had to second guess every little detail all of a sudden. But that made me realize that I wasn't allowing myself to let these movies tell me the story. *I* had to cross reference every little detail with what *I* knew to be cool and proper about SW and sit there like Joaquin Phoenix with my thumb up or down.

And I'm not saying that any of you guys do that but for me that's just really dumb. Because I know, I *know* that if somehow Lucasfilm Ltd released some verifiably authentic manuscript that was 30 years old that detailed how George Lucas, Gary Kurtz, and Lawrence Kasdan envisioned Boba Fett being a clone of this guy named Jango, and that Anakin and "Padme" had this really awkward romance and that were all these cartoon pod racers I just know that I'd look at things differently. So I just thought, "well why the hell don't I just choose to look at things differently?" The stuff on screen doesn't change, only what I will "accept."

Because that's what I do with Return of the Jedi. It has dumb stuff. It has awkward scenes in front of 2D backgrounds (that Falcon painting, *shudder.*) ANH has goofy parts that you can make fun or be turned off by. I'm not saying that AOTC and ANH were executed with the same level of skill. Far from it. I'm just saying that if I want to have something more than "the story of Luke Skywalker and his dad," which I do, then I should AT LEAST watch the PT with the same mindset as that I give to ROTJ.

And that allows me to be less annoyed (or not annoyed at all) by the "story choices" that are kind of goofy or outright lame like Anakin building C-3PO or the existence of midichlorians. Because I don't see THOSE elements as defining the saga. Who built what droid? How do Jedi talk to the Force? As long as there's still faith, training, and displine involved then whatever if there's these weird microscopic creatures that sometimes play a part. Not really the point of the saga.

Which then gets you to execution of the story. Well, we all seem to agree that TPM is the best of the prequels. So lets move on to the "worst," AOTC. Well, John Williams score is still sweet is it not? The sports bar scene was pretty cool wasn't it? "Jedi business, go back to your drinks." Not bad right? That's something I could see Vader saying when he was still a Jedi. Jango, cool. Fight in the rain with Obi-Wan, cool. Clonetroopers had neat designs. Christopher Lee? Awesome to see in a SW movie. Yeah, it's the weak link. But as far as dismissing it altogether and saying "that's not the real history," well, why? It had clones in a war. It had Palpatine pulling strings. It had Anakin falling in love and starting to turn kind of bad. It basically featured stuff that we were all kind of expecting but just, well, it just didn't present it very gracefully. James Cameron called Alien 3 a "beautiful failure." I think AOTC was an "ugly *** win." You know? It didn't kill off everyone from TPM in the opening scene but it also didn't do a great job of making us love everyone who DID survive. But it moved the story and you either think there's enough cool stuff in there to give it a watch or not.

If you say "there is not" well, you're definitely in the majority but I do think that the broad strokes of the story were sound

I can't give AOtC ugly *** win.. It's a Ugly *** failure.. Nothing in it compels me to ever want to watch it again other then it's a Star Wars film... In fact if the PT (including TPM) were another series of films I would not even waste my time to type about them. Would my hate for them be as great?? Probably not.. But they would just be a forgotten mess...

I seriously can't think of any really cool moment that stands out during AOTC (other then the already mentioned Sand People Massacre).. And I am not sure I can come up with one for Sith.

TPM was not perfect but had a good villain, a great Saber duel, A fun Pod Race, and a decent hero (Qui Gon). The other films had nothing.. Hell they even made me hate the Jedi... Who was I supposed to root for again???

I wish I could enjoy them like you did... I can't... I am just lucky enough that they are so far removed form the OT in structure, style and time that I can ignore them as fan fiction.

As for Williams Score in AOTC.. By far his worst of the series.. Nothing new except the awful Love theme... Perhaps I would like the theme more if there was any emotion to the scenes it was scored for.


But you post was a good read... I guess you're Vader and I am more like the Emperor, as I am not as forgiving as you are..

 

[Khev]

But you post was a good read... I guess you're Vader and I am more like the Emperor, as I am not as forgiving as you are..

Ha ha, indeed.

Things I really liked in ROTS:

1. Anakin's duel with Dooku - best saber fight in the movie

2. General Grievous - I just think he's a fun character

3. The scene where Anakin is alone in the Jedi Council chamber and thinking about Padme

4. Bail Organa arriving at the Jedi Temple. "I'm sorry sir, it's time for you to leave." "And so it is."

5 Obi-Wan and Padme's discussion at her apartment. "Anakin is the father isn't he? I'm so sorry." I really do think that ROTS has a number of scenes that are actually well acted.

6. "You were the Chosen One!" I really do think that that was an iconic line/delivery (in a good way.) Obi-Wan's entire speech while Anakin burned actually played out very well IMO.

7. Yoda/Palpatine duel - I think I recall you saying that you hated this one but I just really like how Yoda went right after the head of the snake and just was done screwing around. I also LOVED that they kind of gave all those boring Senate meetings this huge payoff by having it be the arena in which Yoda and Sidious fought. And even though Yoda is CG and Sidious was acting over the top I still always feel like Sidious is really *interacting with Yoda,* looking at him, reacting to him, it didn't feel like a guy performing next to a cartoon, I always watch that part as two characters just really trying to take each other out.

8. Sidious smiling while Vader suffers - Yeah it follows the "noooo" but it's just so damn evil for him to be taking any glee in Vader's anguish. He really kind of makes you believe that he is invested in Anakin/Vader throughout the trilogy and that he does see him as a true comrade. But he just can't help but crack a smile watching Vader crack under the realization of the monster he has become.

I recently watched over the past month the entire Harmy trilogy and then PT + OT SE. And I found that I really enjoyed both approaches to the series. Harmy is great because I can just sit back and not wince or cringe at pretty much anything until some select parts of ROTJ. It's the classic OT, it always delivers. But as I mentioned earlier the very existence of the Harmy discs allow me to finally say "okay George, I'll try it your way, I'll watch your six movies with enhancements and revisions and see how they play together without getting pissed that you are forever denying me the option of watching them the way I remembered them." And it really was pretty cool to marathon the six over a period of about a week and a half (I think I did both AOTC and ROTS in two sittings each though.)

One thing that I got from watching all six is this huge thread of Sidious trying to replace Darth Maul. TPM kind of starts the saga with *everybody* having what they want. The Jedi have peace, Anakin has his mom, the Trade Federation have assumedly countless wealth, and Sidious has this young, devoted, athletic perfect instrument of death and destruction in Darth Maul, plus a good amount of power as a Senator from Naboo. But everyone *thinks* they want more, Palpatine included, and the more victories both good and evil characters achieve the more they just want things to go back to how they were at the beginning of TPM.

With regard to Sidious he gets all the power he could ever want but losing Maul just seems to be this massive cost to him. He clearly isn't satisfied with Dooku, because he likes his apprentices young and spry. It's almost kind of creepy but in an "evil bad guy" kind of way. So Dooku is a placeholder until he can get a more Maul-like apprentice. Which he sees in Anakin but then Anakin has to go and get himself burned and roboticized. That won't do. So you watch the OT after the PT and it seems so natural for Sidious to want to move on to Luke. It kind of feels like the Emperor has just been sitting atop the galaxy with this huge hollow victory for 30 years because he doesn't have his Maul.

When Luke rejects him he's got like decades of rage that pours out of his fingertips. It's just a dynamic that really only culminates in that specific way if you watch all six movies. And there were other elements and threads that I won't go off about but my point is that the "saga" as George presented it really does have merit IMO. And I realized that I'm not so much an "OT purist" at heart (and I thought I was) so much as I just always want the *option* to be a purist, even if I don't exercise it all the time. I need to have the option to just go back to the way things were. Heck I sometimes even break up the OT. I'll watch Star Wars and be taken back to watching it in the theater in 77 or 78 before I had any concept of further adventures. And I'll sometimes watch Empire with remembrance of how awesome a one-two punch it was with SW before ewoks and twin sisters came along. And his Special Editions denied me from doing that.

But now one day, or week, or entire year I can just be in "original theatrical OT mode" and at any other given moment I can give the whole saga a chance. I guess part of why I'm going off about all of this is because I think there's a good chance that the things that were so frustrating to me might be the same things that currently annoy other people who grew up with the films. To the point where if you see a clip from one of the SE's or Jar Jar Binks or something it's like this anger and sense of injustice wells up. I felt like if I acknowledged the PT or the SE revisions that I was accepting a "lie" that these movies were always meant to be different than they were. And that animosity really drove me to magnify the weaker aspects of the films just to make dismissing them even easier.

I think Harmy has just allowed me to let go of the bad and my anticipation (we'll see if it delivers or not) for The Force Awakens has allowed me to embrace those things that I think are good about the full Lucas saga.

 

[Username]

Some great points. And i did read all the original post!
In my mind, Palpatine's plan was never for the TF to capture Padme. He *knew* those bungling idiots would never be able to. He likely also knew the Jedi were on their way. Picking up Anakin might have been a lucky coincidence(Although, Tatooine was the next star system to Naboo, in a direct line to Coruscant, so you never know. Perhaps Naboo was chosen specifically because it was in line to Tatooine).
I also believe he only sent Maul to be a slight nuisance to the Jedi on the way to Coruscant. After they leave him on Tatooine, Palpatine orders Maul to Naboo(Because he *knows* Amidala won't be placated), to further make it look like Maul was the baddie all along(Shades of Trevor/The Mandarin here, lol).
The entire endgame is to engineer the vote of no confidence in Valorum. To do that, he needs Amidala to make it alive to Coruscant, see the corruption, and call for a vote in the senate. This wouldn't happen if she were captured by the Trade Federation, or taken/killed by Maul. Any of the anger "I want that treaty SIGNED!!" is all faked. If she signs a treaty, no-one in the senate will care. There will be no call for a vote to oust Valorum.
He needs her to call for the vote. The icing on the cake is that she goes back and could possibly be martyred for his cause. If she *was* killed, he might have gained even more support(And might have been able to set his plans in motion earlier for the next phases).
As it is, he had to engineer the courts letting Gunray free, so Gunray would ally with all the most powerful, wealthy conglomerate systems and be a real threat to the Republic. Irony of ironies, in the PT, Palpatine sets up the board to have his two main enemies, the uber rich businesses(The only people who could raise private armies against him), and the Jedi(Whom he very cleverly *gives* a clone army to them to command), and makes them both duke it out till they are both ground down to nothing. Meanwhile the army he so graciously *gave* to the Jedi, envelopes them(In what starts off looking like protection), and eventually turns out to be an elaborate trap, having the Jedi all on their own with an army of soldiers trained from birth to kill them...
Of course, all the while normal citizens of the Republic are probably glad Palpatine gets more and more powers to "deal with the separatists", until he declares the republic dead and the start of the empire.
I can understand why some people might be confused as to a plot you really have to think about to understand it, but for me it makes the PT stand high above the OT(Only in terms of the layers of the story of course).

I've loved the Phantom Menace ever since it first came out. I love it as much as the OT. Its my favorite of the prequels. I never could figure out why this movie is hated by the "fans" so much.

I've always loved it. They aren't the best movies ever made but i look at it like this(Even with Clone Wars, and Rebels): It's STAR WARS. I love it. Give me MORE!

Does it help to be really really stoned?

On the tenth anniversary of the release of the movie, i got absolutely wasted and watched all three prequels back to back.
Still loved them. And they did seem more fun when i was drunk.
For anyone who hates Jar-Jar, watch Bombad Jedi from The Clone Wars Season One. It uses Jar-Jar in the right scenarios, and he's hilarious.

That Jedi has summoned a monster!!!!