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Revenge of the Sith - Ten Years Later


Zerimar Nyliram
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So NOBODY likes the prequels...except for Star Wars fans (a huge number of people), kids (a huge part of that demographic), and people who saw the PT as kids (who are now adults). Do I have that right?

 

I would say all the qualifiers don't matter, because regardless of whether they're good movies, people still like them. :p

 

(The hilarious part is that at Nightly I always find myself defending the prequels, while in other areas of the internet I'm one of the people defending people's right to criticize them. I'm like a prequel moderate!)

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So NOBODY likes the prequels...except for Star Wars fans (a huge number of people), kids (a huge part of that demographic), and people who saw the PT as kids (who are now adults). Do I have that right?

 

I would say all the qualifiers don't matter, because regardless of whether they're good movies, people still like them. :p

That demographic is a fraction of the sample size movies generally aim for. If fans alone were enough of a target movies would be a lot more esoteric

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I was fourteen years old when The Phantom Menace came out. I don't know if that qualifies me as a "kid" or not, but it is what it is. It is notable, however, that this came just after I started seriously getting back into Star Wars in 1997, with the Special Edition of the original Trilogy in theaters, the computer game Dark Forces II: Jedi Knight, and really getting into the EU for the first time. In essence, I had been in "Star Wars mode" for two years, so it was easy for me to really get into Episode I and enjoy it despite the negative criticisms.

 

Naturally, this continued through the releases of Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith (the last one coming out when I was twenty-one) because I was now a pretty solidified Star Wars nerd (and still am).

 

However, as I progressed in adulthood, I became more and more a fan of literature in general, both written and film. This caused me to really rethink the prequels and come to view them in a way that is close to how most people view them, as Tank describes. Where before I adored them blindly because they were Star Wars, now I am highly critical of them. In essence, I still feel the idea behind them is solid, but the execution is what is lacking. (Not only that, but I see the prequels--and the movies in general--as vehicles ushering in some excellent EU stories, making for an experience a thousand times more enjoyable than the films, but owe their existence to them.)

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Guest El Chalupacabra

I was waiting for you Harry, I know you do. I thought of you when I said the list was small :)

 

And Chalup-- I don't mean the entertainment history, I mean any conversation where the PT comes up that isn't with fans. I'm not saying it's all inclusive of the world, but literally, the only place I see people who don't hate the PT is nightly.

 

 

OK I am willing to buy that has been what you have personally seen, and also I am in no way saying that PT is as popular as OT. I am not even saying they were "good," necessarily (I find them OK, but flawed, personally). I just think the term "adults universally hated the PT" is a strong term, and I don't know that there is any hard data that backs it up.

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I think The Phantom Menace was the weakest of the three, but has ironically aged the best with time. Attack of the Clones has aged extremely poorly, and Revenge of the Sith has mostly remained a constant, in my opinion.

I agree. Attack looks terrible for some reason.

 

I am most likely in the minority here when I say that TPM was the best of the three.

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If a had to pick a favorite it would be ROTS, if only because it actually felt like it connected to the OT-- but even it is full of idiocy. TPM has its moments, but between Jake Lloyd acting and Qui-Gon stealing Obi-Wan's story and George Lucas dialog it leaves me sour.

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If a had to pick a favorite it would be ROTS, if only because it actually felt like it connected to the OT-- but even it is full of idiocy. TPM has its moments, but between Jake Lloyd acting and Qui-Gon stealing Obi-Wan's story and George Lucas dialog it leaves me sour.

there was something about the fact that there was more physical sets in that film that sets it a part, atleast for me. To much CGI in the others.

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Found my review.

 

I'll bold the parts I agree with now. Safe to say I'm a bit more cynical now :lol:

I saw it last night and am still floored. Honestly, I don't know where to begin.

Caught the midnight premiere at Crown Towers in Melbourne, 3 sessions sold out at that same time. I was quite disappointed with the lack of people "getting into the spirit" but having said I can happily say our cinema was free of hooting and hollering, which I can't stand.

After seeing new trailers for Fantastic Four, The Longest Yard, War of the Worlds and Batman Begins (as well as an endless stream of ads) I'll happily conform to the cliche of getting goosebumps and shivers when the immortal words came up on the screen.

The opening sequence is one of the most fantastic things I've ever seen in my life. I felt physically ill watching the ships circle and roll through the endless stream of enemy fighters, it was THAT realistic and well choreographed. The opening scenes with Anakin, OB1 and R2 are hilarious after they board Grievous's ship, particularly R2. Some great moments of humour preceeding a humourless remainder.

Overall the visual FX for this film set a new benchmark for cinema, almost as much as ANH IMO. Everything from the lava flows, to the fight scenes, the blending of grand-scale cgi footage and real actors in editing is near perfect. There's simply so much to talk about when it comes to the amazing visuals that I'd prefer to just let people see for themselves.

The acting in this film is much better, I'm happy to say. Even clips from trailers that had me worried ("You're breaking my heart" "Don't YOU turn against me") work well in the moment and for the most part the performances are spot-on. Hayden has embraced his character much more this time around, and shows much greater range than the whiny, pouty padawan from AOTC. Unfortunately there is still much stilted dialogue, but for some reason it works much better in the context of this film. While Natalie is merely a spectator in this film (usually waiting in her apartment for Anakin to come visting) she's again not as stale as she was in AOTC. She actually sounded as though she believed her lines this time around. That's not to say that their scenes together aren't still painful at times, but it's limited this time around, and does improve as things heat up. I hate to say it, but her best scenes in this film (and probably the whole trilogy) were during her birth/death scene. The pain in her eyes, the tears, it's painful to watch and you genuinely want to do something to help her.

This is the role that will define Ian McDiarmid's career. His Palpatine is a smooth criminal to say the least, and of course his transition to the maniacal, cackling Emperor is like wearing an old pair of underwear for him. Oscar-talk is ambitious however. Ironically the strongest performance comes from Yoda to me. Again, the improvements in cg technology have now added so much character to an already iconic figure. When you see his reaction to the Jedi extermination, or crawling from his duel with Palpatine, it's heartbreaking. He's so ashamed of his failure, and even without seeing Dagobah you can understand why he goes into hiding.

Unfortunately for me the weakest performances this time around were from Samuel L Jackson, who never set the world on fire to begin with, and Ewan McGregor. Don't ask me why, but I found he performed much better as Anakin's master than his cohort (or more Guinness-like, if you will). During his own emotional scenes it was just lacking that extra push we know he can deliver, and have seen him deliver on other occasions. I was also disappointed with the handling of Grievous. His constant coughing and gutteral shouts made him near-unintelligible, and he wasn't given sufficient opportunity to show us what he was really made of. A waste of a really cool character (my thoughts on how Grievous could've been used better?).


Storywise, I can happily say that this story is much tighter than TPM and AOTC. Less exposition and mindless blabbering, This also works against it however when you think about it. The main complaint I have with the story (and I'm not alone) is that I STILL DON'T BELIEVE ANAKIN'S TURN. I feel this is more a flaw in the storytelling of the previous two films than this one. Anakin basically goes from being a good-hearted man with honour to heartless murderer in a matter of minutes. I know his reasons for turning, which I agree could justify him going to the Sith. But I cannot believe he has been given enough time and motivation to destroy the entire Jedi Order and slaughter younglings in the process. Even when he pledges his allegiance to Palpatine he still seems uncertain, yet in the very next scene he's marching towards the Temple with fire in his eyes and its downhill from there. I just don't see it. Also, I feel the quickness of the approval from the senate to become an Empire suffered the same problem (the script included Palpatine playing an edited recording to the Senate of the Jedi's attempts to kill him, which would've added much more credibility to the scene).

Otherwise, I cannot fault the story one bit. It ties everything up nicely with a bow and sets us up nicely. The final 45 minutes of the film (after what some consider to be a really boring hour) is simply non-stop carnage, and again it's heartbreaking to watch Order 66 being issued. The Jedi simply have no chance, and are gunned down while lying in the dirt. A lot of people will see similarities to the sequence from The Godfather (which Lucas was a crewmember for, useless trivia).

This brings me to the lightsaber duels...well...something else entirely. I prefered the OB1/Ani fight myself, but the Yoda/Palp fight is also spectacular to watch (however there's more quick-cutting in the Palp fight due to the fact Ian's not 25 years old). Both are not only spectacular to watch, but both are brutal, full of emotion and desperate. Add the music to these attributes (fanboys will be happy to hear a familiar tune, not included on the ROTS soundtrack, come in while these duels are taking place) and you've got some cool ****.

Overall, this is by far the most brutal and emotional SW film out there. You'll laugh, you may cry, you'll feel sick to your stomach, you'll wish you were there to stop this catastophe. That's what movies are all about, so for that reason I say EVERYONE ON THIS PLANET MUST SEE THIS MOVIE!

As for where it sits in the grand SW scheme of things, I'll need a couple more viewings to decide <======== REALLY bad excuse

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  • 4 weeks later...

Well, I was all over the Nightly boards back during the prequels, so I remember very well watching ROTS in theaters. I don't have my original review (not sure I even wrote one, I might have just quit all Star Wars forums after seeing the movie and never looked back), but I more or less remember thinking that this was their last chance, and they ruined it. Although I do like some of the lightsaber duels (I'd say Obi-Wan vs. Anakin is my 2nd favorite behind Darth Maul from TPM and just slightly above Luke vs. Vader in ROTJ), this was the film that was supposed to show us how Anakin turned to the dark side, and I thought that it was the dumbest thing yet (even more than Jar Jar). Now, to be fair, I was so looking forward to the prequels and when Episode 1 and 2 both sucked, I was pretty jaded going in to Ep 3. The opening space battle was pretty cool, but even that had some really dumb parts like buzz droids (probably the most pointless "weapon" ever invented in cinema) and the laser cannons on the ships having to eject shells as if they were tanks. The scene where Anakin and Obi Wan crash on the ship, jump out of their cockpits while the ship is crashing, and take out the battle droids in about 2 seconds is one of the most badass things I've ever seen. That might be the single best scene in the prequels. The fight with Dooku was okay but I didn't like the way that they pushed Obi-Wan to the side so quickly, because it made it harder to believe that he could beat Anakin later on. Then the movie just went way downhill from there. I'd say it took me a good 5 years to get over just how bad all of the prequels were, but especially how badly they handled Anakin turning to the darkside, which was the #1 thing that people wanted to see out of these movies.

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Can't believe it's 10 years. By this stage, I wasn't expecting much from episode 3, was just looking forward to seeing "the" lightsaber fight that I'd been wondering about ever since seeing Obi-Wan and Vader battle it out on the Death Star in the late 70's. And that at least did not disappoint.

 

It's weird thinking back to TPM, and seeing it in the cinema and kinda buzzing on the way home, still and bit blinded by the fact of seeing a new Star Wars film after such along time and another very well choreographed lightsaber duel. Took a day or two to sink in as to how awful the film really was. Odd really, that the excitement clouded how poor it was.

 

Still, here are a couple of good clips from the excellent series Spaced that sum the feelings of us all from that dark time...

 

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

Wow, I remember a few of the names here.

Captainbleh and Justus mainly!

 

I used to be called angeluss, posted on here circa 99-07.

I bumped a couple of older threads, I used to bicker with Justus a lot :)

 

Came to the realization years back that the PT was terrible and beyond repair.

Thought that now a new SW was on its way I would see if Nightly.net was still up and running.

Surprised to see that I recognise a few of the names on here, despite an 8-9 year absence! lol

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My ep3 experience, I booked 2 showings at 9:30am and at 12:30pm so I watched it twice back to back on release day with two separate groups of friends.

 

I remember thinking at the time that it was decent. (what did I know, I was a silly 22 year old).

I do remember getting slightly bored with the overly long end sabre fight between Anakin and Obi-Wan though, even then.

 

And Natalie Portman spent the entire film pregnant, so I didn't even have hot eye candy to make up for how bad the film was (unless pregnant women are your thing).

At least in Clones she had a bare midriff.

(You can tell I have matured a lot in the last 10 years :devil:

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