I think part of the problem I had with the prequels is that they’re a story the resolution of which is in another movie made almost two decades before. The point, I think, was clearly meant to be that the old Jedi orthodoxy was unworkable, that it needed to be replaced by a new type of Jedi, represented by Luke in RotJ - and there’s hints of that in the original films - Yoda insisting Luke should abandon Han and Leia to focus on his training, Obi-Wan insisting to the end that Luke cannot confront Vader while hoping to redeem him.
The problem I see is that I’m not sure they form a coherent story, especially divided and split up the way they are. The emphasis in RotJ is all wrong for that sort of story - It’s on Luke as being a “Jedi, like my father before me”, Luke as the last of the Jedi, the inheritor of this ancient tradition. Except looking at the prequels, it seems the point is that Luke rejects the emotionally repressed culture of the Old Republic Jedi just as much as he rejects the emotionally uncontrolled culture of the Sith.
I think it’s a shame the scene from RotS with Qui-Gon wasn’t filmed - it seems to me he’s at the heart of the story, as the one Jedi who sees their current philosophies don’t work, and the idea that after the death of the Jedi Yoda could finally see the truth of that and resolved to learn from Qui-Gon’s spirit should have been one of the key scenes of the prequels, making it clear that the prequel Jedi were meant to be interpreted as ineffective and flawed and that it was not their tradition that Luke was following in RotJ.
The problem I see is that I’m not sure they form a coherent story, especially divided and split up the way they are. The emphasis in RotJ is all wrong for that sort of story - It’s on Luke as being a “Jedi, like my father before me”, Luke as the last of the Jedi, the inheritor of this ancient tradition. Except looking at the prequels, it seems the point is that Luke rejects the emotionally repressed culture of the Old Republic Jedi just as much as he rejects the emotionally uncontrolled culture of the Sith.
I think it’s a shame the scene from RotS with Qui-Gon wasn’t filmed - it seems to me he’s at the heart of the story, as the one Jedi who sees their current philosophies don’t work, and the idea that after the death of the Jedi Yoda could finally see the truth of that and resolved to learn from Qui-Gon’s spirit should have been one of the key scenes of the prequels, making it clear that the prequel Jedi were meant to be interpreted as ineffective and flawed and that it was not their tradition that Luke was following in RotJ.
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