The final piece of the Star Wars Saga has taken its sweet time getting here. And a disappointing time it’s been too. In his decision to make the prequels, George Lucas has really shown his weaknesses as a filmmaker. His penchant for special effects and merchandising left them painfully crippled, a hideous sight for the average fan. He seems to have no sense of the magnificence of the originals, giving me the feeling that the original’s greatness just may have been a fluke.¹

The plot of the first was a hideous mash of stupid and unlikely events. None of the characters were treated fairly and some were so annoying² they made me want to run to George Lucas’s house and choke him with his own shoddy merchandise.

The second attempt of the sequels had better set pieces and character development but still suffered from Lucas’s hideous dialogue. The plot was straightened out a bit and made more sense. These two movies had some extremely irritating parts. Aside from the aforementioned CGI and merchandising, there was Jar Jar Binks, bad dialogue between Anakin and Amadala, the droid’s ‘funny’ noises³ and the attempts at humour. There were also attempts to screw up the mythology of the Jedi with crap about ‘the chosen one’ and midichlorians.

With this running though my head, I was reluctant to see Episode III. But I was pleasantly surprised. Sure there was still crap dialogue and too much CGI and blatant inclusions for merchandising and crap droids trying to be cute. However there were some cool set pieces and characters.

R2-D2 was very influential at the start and continues to save the universe at every turn. That little robot amazes me.

Obi-Wan Kenobi seems to have improved in skill immensely since the last film and does cool stuff the whole film. Although he had trouble with Count Dooku, he easily dispatched General Grievous and held his own against Anakin. I guess a bit of maturing has helped. Given his, Yoda’s and Mace Windu’s abilities, I was surprised that more of the Jedi council didn’t make it. The Jedi were aware of the Emperor’s plot and generally didn’t look like the blind idiots they did in the first two films. If Mace Windu was less arrogant and had taken some competent Jedi with him instead of that bunch of hacks things might have turned out differently. Also it helps to not talk about your plan before you do it. If you’re going to kill the Emperor, just do it.

The unexpected enjoyable fight between Yoda and the Emperor was the highlight of the film. Unfortunately the end had to be a draw but I especially liked Yoda defending against the lightning and dealing with the red storm troopers. I think the red storm troopers have been hard done by in the whole series. I don’t remember them achieving anything. The audience laughing at Yoda’s ease in defeating them must sting like a jellyfish on a salted wound. The end of the fight was odd though, with Yoda just slinking off; very anticlimatic.

Finally the point of the whole film, Anakin’s conversion into Darth Vader, was handled well and believable. Anakin didn’t put up as much resistance in the end as I thought he would. He seemed very resigned to his fate. I’m not trying to explain a plot hole, but it felt to me that the Emperor has an evil force persuade going on. Anakin seemed more inclined to be evil around the Emperor instead of his usual disgruntlement when near Obi Wan. I didn’t realise that Darth Vader had no real limbs left. Luke’s scene when he finds out that his father also has a robotic left hand loses the significance now that I know that Darth Vader has no real limbs. I liked the amount of severing going on. It felt like it was a more adult and serious film and had a better blend of comedy and action than the first two films which I’m not sure if I’ve mentioned how much of a huge disappointment they were.

I’ll even overlook that corny scream at the end in my relief at seeing a semi-decent Star Wars film.

1. See the Fully Remastered Special Edition of the Original Trilogy Han Solo Debacle. This isn’t an actual reference so I’ll elaborate: Make up your bloody mind. Did Han shoot first? Did people scream as the fell down shafts? You can’t keep changing things, on a maniacal whim. Would Shakespeare like a chance to edit his plays if he knew they would be around for 400 more years? It doesn’t matter because he doesn’t get to. We like the film as it is; don’t keep making it worse because it’s not the way you want it. ↩
2. I’m looking at you, Anakin and Jar Jar. ↩
3. I don’t understand who would use these droids in an army. They seem to be terminally retarded, like clowns trying to amuse 4 year olds. They constantly shatter the illusion. I do like the droids with shields and the ones with the special staffs. If only there were more serious droids. ↩

This entry was posted by the illustrious Andy Cocker on Monday, June 6th, 2005. It concerns such pressing issues as film, star wars. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.