Okay, we need to talk. Although I was thoroughly warned, I was not prepared for how much I would dislike the Phantom Menace. I won't say hate, I'll say dislike. There were two major factors in this for me: Jar Jar Binks and little kid Anakin Skywalker. You guys, Jar Jar Binks is the worst. He's so horrible I couldn't stand any scene that he was in. I really don't even know what to say about him except that I'm so glad he wasn't a large role in the other movies. My husband said he thinks that is due to the fact that fans revolted after they first saw Binks. The whole movie was pretty odd. The little kid was horrible, the worst actor, and then some of the cheesy lines were annoying too.
As you can gather, I finished watching Phantom Menance, Attack of the Clones, and Revenge of the Sith. After watching these movies I can say that I'm so glad I started with the original three because I don't think I would've made it if I started with these three. They're pretty good, some of the lightSABER fights were awesome and it was nice to get most of my questions answered but overall I wasn't as into these as I was the originals. I had to kind of make myself watch them and I admit that I fell asleep a couple of times during Attack of the Clones and we needed to keep pausing and going back into it.
I didn't like the over usage of CGI but I know when these movies came out this was a new tool to use so I can sort of understand being overly excited about it. I definitely preferred puppet Yoda over CGI Yoda, something in his character just got lost there. And was anything on the set real or were they all just standing in front of green screens?
Let's talk characters.
Anakin Skywalker is of course the main character of the movies. The whole point of the series (for me) was to find out who he was and how he became Darth Vader. The writing in combination with the acting was distracting me from Anakin's character. The little kid in Phantom Menance and then Hayden Christiansen really fell flat for me. *deep breath* I didn't think the puppy love for Padme was cute at all. I feel like they tried to write him similar to Luke but he came off annoying instead of lovable. I was so excited to finally see how Anakin became Darth Vader but by the time Obi-Wan left him to die in the lava of Mustafar, he was so annoying I couldn't have cared less what happened to him. I was unconvinced that his anger towards what happened to his mother would harden him and make him weary to "the dark side".
Obi-Wan was another character I was interested in getting to know more about. In the second movie, Attack of the Clones, I was afraid we were going to get another stupid love triangle with him, Padme, and Anakin so I can be grateful they didn't go that route. I thought his character would be more integral for me...bringing up Anakin as a young Padewan and showing him the ways of the Jedi. The delivery of cheesy one liners, I could've lived without but overall his character wasn't too bad. He had some good lightSABER fights but I didn't really root for him...I guess I was suppose to feel for him when he was so disheartened by Anakin turning to the dark side but I was kind of just like "shut up".
I guess Padme is another main character. Going into these I wanted to find out about Luke and Leia's mom but I was ill prepared for the long drawn out love story. In the first movie I loved Queen Amidala. She was reminiscent of Leia by wiedling weapons and leading her troops. She had strategies and was really intent on making sure her people were safe. I really loved how they bait and switched me with her bodyguard, that was pretty cool. Then she falls in love and she goes totally pathetic on me. Like I said before, I was glad there wasn't a love triangle I would have to sit through. What was with that scene where Anakin is watching her brush out her enormous perm in the moonlight. Really? Who WROTE that scene? First, you don't brush OUT curls ever and second, no. And in Revenge of the Sith shes pregnant and just running around worried about Anakin and she dies from "a broken heart" and "lost the will to live"...even for your two babies? Whatever.
What I Learned:
- Palpatine! He is sinister to the bone. He ended up being my main source of curiosity throughout the films. His character is what makes me think there was some sort of talented writers on these movies because he is what you want in a villain. I learned how he manipulates Anakin into thinking that the Jedi are bad. Although Anakin spent his whole damn life with the Jedi and Palpatine says this to him once and now he's convinced of it too? Wait a minute! Maybe Anakin was suppose to be written as a big dumb kid?!?!
- If you are a Star Wars virgin, like me, don't make the mistake I made by asking a question on a Star Wars fan discussion board. All I did was point out what I thought was a tiny plot hole. I said "How come Obi-Wan doesn't recognize R2D2 in A New Hope when we see him spending all this time fighting along side R2 in the prequel movies?" Well, that upset the nerds. Within minutes...no SECONDs...I received answers like "Anakin owned R2D2 not Obi-Wan" and "R2D2 isn't a person, he's more like an appliance...do you remember the blender that you owned 20 years ago??!?!?!" to which I replied "Yes, I freaking loved that blender".
- The Jedi Order is all wiped out by a single order to the storm troopers to kill them. Although, I really didn't care too much about the Jedi for this moment to make a large impact. Sam L Jackson's character seemed like he was suppose to be a main character but I don't even remember his name, to be honest.
- The twins get separated as babies because of the order that killed all the Jedi. They move the twins to where Anakin/Darth Vader won't know how to get to them. Leia ends up on Alderaan and Luke goes to Tatoonie.
- The meaning of the different colored lightSABERs is all in my head.
- Some battle scenes and lightSABER fights go on for 20 mins and then the really cool one with Darth Maul gets cut way way too short.
Lingering Questions:
- Why doesn't Obi-Wan recognize R2D2 in A New Hope? He even freaking says "I don't remember owning a droid before". And yes, even though he technically didn't own him, you would think he would still remember him! R2 is fighting along side of them throughout the other prequels. It doesn't add up.
- How did the Jedi just end up using the storm troopers as an army? Were they just hanging out and waiting for someone to tell them what to do? Because then Palpatine shows up and tells them to kill all the Jedi and they're like "oh okay." And then as we know they become Darth Vader's army...I missed something with that one. Like I said, I kept falling asleep.
- What happens in between Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope? How come it seems like Leia grows up to already be involved with the Rebel Alliance? How did the Death Star get created?
- Yoda tells Obi-Wan that he should learn to commune with Qui-Gon (his former master) while on Tatoonie...what? That doesn't make any sense? Why would they put that in there if it never gets mentioned in the next one?
- How did Princess Leia get her message for Obi-Wan to R2D2 if they were suppose to be randomly sold at the end of Revenge of the Sith?
- Why does Darth Vader interact with Leia so nonchalantly throughout the first trilogy but immediately knows something is amiss when Luke is present? Does she not have "the force"? Or if so, shouldn't he be able to sense something with her too? When Luke and company arrive on the Death Star to save Leia, Vader says "I sense a something, a presence I haven't felt since...". Is he talking about Luke? Or maybe he's talking about Obi-Wan!
- And in the first trilogy...Palpatine tells Vader "We have reason to believe that the pilot who destroyed the Death Star is Luke Skywalker, son of Anakin Skywalker." Doesn't Palpatine know that's Vader? Why doesn't he say "Oh snap, we think you're son is alive!"
Overall, I think I can say all these movies were good for was to answer a lot of the questions that I had lingering since the first trilogy. They weren't bad but they definitely weren't good and they were no where near the first trilogy. At points in this movie I felt like they just threw in some old characters to be involved in the action for nostalgia? I'm not sure. Like Chewbacca? Why was he there? I understand there is a whole Wookie species but throwing in Chewbacca was just like, yeah okay. You're trying to make me excited to see a loved character.
Anyways, I could talk about these movies for days. haha. I am glad I watched them! But I'm not quite finished. I'm going to re-watch The Force Awakens and see if there is anything I missed. I started this whole series-watching to figure out my own theory on Rey's origins so that's what I'll be stewing up next.
Until next time, may the force be with you.
xoxo
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