Fourth Entry: Star Wars Ep 3 Review
"A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away": Star Wars
And it was a long time ago when Star Wars was a fantastic film. Until, that is, in the year 1999 George Lucas decided to bring forth the long-awaited prequel The Phantom Menance. Torn apart by critics and old-school fans alike, TPM was too much politics and not enough Star Wars. The combination of Lucas's non-abilty to write and direct and bad choices for actors led tho TPM's demise. The only redeaming factor was the most hard-core lightsaber battle to date between Obi-Wan Kenobi, Qui-Gon Jin, and Darth Maul. If it is one thing Lucas can do right, it is make awesome lightsaber battles.
However, the laughable plot and emotionless characters made TPM a real dissapointment. Due to Lucas's desire to make his movies mostly Computer Generated instead of the costumes and models that gave the original trilogy its realism, the movie just seemed, sadly, like just a movie. To me and many other fans alike, the original Trilogy seemed very real, very life-like and the actors' ability to perform their lines made A New Hope, Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi more like documentries instead of films.
George's 2nd attempt at "revising" the series came with the horribly named 2nd prequel film; Attack of the Clones. Not to be mistaken with fan's long awaited battle, The Clone Wars (something we have heard and waited for ever since hearing about it from Alec Guiesness in ANH), AOTC was much better than TPM, but that is not saying much. While Hayden played anger rather well, his other emotions made him seem very whiney and bratty. The relationship between Obi-Wan and Anikan (which you would guess would be a very close bond considering Obi-Wan being so saddened when talking bout Anikan to Luke in ANH), was nothing but a battle of wits. You could see that Obi-Wan and Anikan disliked, if not hated, one another. The love scenes between Anikan and Padme were decent in my opinion, and the acting was just as terrible as TPM. This film would have been much better if Lucas had a differnt director to get the actors into the film more, but alas, he did not. Again, Lucas went with Computer Graphics over costumes and this was very noticable during the lightsaber battles. The fighting against CGI beings was very sloppy. The actors just swung their weapons without looking at their enemies and when deflecting lasers, they just swung around (Unlike Luke in Return of Jedi when he actually made it look like he was swinging at the lasers instead of air).
Again, Lucas waited until the last 10 minutes of AOTC to give fans a reason to see the movie. The Yoda vs Dooku scene was bloody awesome. Though Dooku is no where near as intimidating or interesting as Darth Maul (my personal opinion is that Dooku should have died in Ep 1 and Maul should have stayed for 2 and 3).
Don't even get me started with showing how Boba Fett looks like without his helmet....*snarls*
Than, about a year after Clones came out, Lucas decided to release a Micro-Mini-Series (that translates into 5 minute long episodes) of the Clone Wars. The animation was laughable at best, the voice actors as dry and unbelievable as the real actors themselves, and only long enough for the fans to realize they hated it and turn off the TV, The Clone Wars is the biggest cop-out in Movie History. Instead of putting time, money, and actual effort into the biggest, most hard-core war in the Star Wars Saga, Lucas had these piss-poor animators give us a chibi-sized series. I mean, yes, it was neat seeing Anikan get bad-ass, but it wasn't enough. The sound was aweful and 3PO was turned into a homosexual instead of it just being an old joke. When he disrobed for Anikan to show off his new body and they played stripper music? WTF?
But on May 19th, my birthday, I gave George his very last chance with Episode 3, the Revenge of the Sith. The only reason I gave him the benifit of the doubt was because long time Star Wars fan and Ep 1 and 2 hater Kevin Smith (Silent Bob) gave it the thumbs up. Don't get me wrong, I would have seen it without his opinion, but trust me, it helped.
Revenge of the Sith was a beautifully made movie. Although the first 5 minutes were the slowest in Star Wars history (The sound and music didn't match the intense battle going on. It didn't drag you into the war), the fight between Anikan and Dooku was the most shocking fight in Star Wars history. George finally brought Anikan and Obi-Wan closer together and made their friendship more pronounced. Gone was Jar Jar (for those who didn't like him. I did) and the acting was much better. The main characters finally got into their roles (took them long enough) and the emotional shyt Anikan was going through was very belivable. I really sympathized with him. Palapitine was just as maniupulative and if you can believe it, even more sadistic than his previous appearences. Mace Windu was eh as usual. Always trying to be TOO bad-ass in my opinion during this movie. Yoda was animated even better and I honestly forgot he wasn't there at times. The final battle was bloody amazine and I wasn't dissapointed at all in this movie, which, comming from me, means a lot. However, this movie is still nothing compared to the original trilogy, but it is a close 2nd.
I give it 8 out of 10. ^.^
************************************************************************************************************
The Following contains huge spoilers. If you don't want to know certain scenes, stop reading now.
What I liked
Likes:
The Light Saber battles: More realitistic. Still sloppy when blocking lasers and attacking the driods, but the timing has improved 10 fold.
The Humor: Anikan, Obi, and R2-D2 were hilarious. There were many scenes (like in the elevator shaft when Obi-Wan wakes up dangling from Ani's leg) where I was laughing tears. I missed the light humor that was pronounced between Han, Leia, and Luke in the original trilogy
The Intesity: OMG! What Ani did to Dooku was the most hard-core scene EVER! And what he did to the kids, I had never though Vader to be that cruel. Plus the downfall of Anikan, when he is turning darkside just to save his wife, by the gods, the emotion was so rich and powerful, it was heart-wrentching. Vader started out doing this to save his wife and son but turned utterly evil in the process. Beautifully written George. Bout time!
The relationship: Ani and Obi-Wan were so much closer this time around. They were bickering but very brotherly, very father/son. I was very pleased.
The Ending: The fight of Yoda and Palpitine and Anikan and Obi-Wan was powerful. Obi-Wan's final speech to Anikan as Anikan is burning up was heartbreaking. The tears in his eyes looked real and you could feel his pain at this betrayal.
What I disliked:
The battles: Lucas should have made the Clone Wars movie. Because he didn't, we missed out on how bad-ass Grevious was and how cruel Dooku was. The Wookie War, the battle between Grevious was TOO SHORT! Not even 5 minutes. You see the wookies start the war and then BAM it is over. That was it! If he added another 30 minutes (yes it would be 3 hours but who cares!) and added to the battles, i would have been very happy.
Grevious: General Grevious. I have seen him fight in the Clone Wars cartoon and I was very excited for him to fight in this movie. He was very evil and was a genius. I loved when he tore open the window of his ship to escape into space. Very well done. However, he died in a 2 minute battle. It was kinda a cop-out. The big lightsaber battle I was looking forward too (since he fights with 4 sabers) was reduced to him cutting apart the floor before his hands got lopped off. It was sad. If you wanted to see Grevious battle, you had to see the cartoon which, George is you read this, IS A COP-OUT and George has cheated the fans horribly.
Mace Windu's death: Sam Jackson had in his contract to have one of the best deaths in the movie. While his death by Palpitine was nice, it wasn't as hard-core as I expected it to be. But damn did he suffer.
The Names: How the names Luke, Leia, and Vader came to be was horrific. Palpitine pulled the name Vader out of his ass and when Padme was giving birth it was like this:
while Padme is screaming and panting due to labor
"It is a boy. What shall he be called?"
AHH!
Ahh! Luke!"
"It is a girl. What shall she be called?"
(Same as above. Replace Luke with Leia)
I would have liked to see Anikan and Padme talk over names. Just a bit to know why she chose the names, same with Palpitine. I don't like how these names were just pulled out of everyone's ass.
The Ending: Okay, so I said I liked the end. I also hated it. We have all scene the trailer where Vader rises on the platform in his suit. That was awesome. Hearing him breath for the first time was awesome, but when he found out Padme died and ripped himself off the table (looking like a black sci-fi version of Frankenstien) and screaming out "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!" while waving his arms dramatically...WHAT THE F*CK?! I couldn't believe that hard-core Vader, the man who destroyed his daughter's planet, who chopped off his son's hand, who slaughtered the entire Jedi Order, started his career like a little bitch screaming NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. *sighs* That was horrible.
And it was a long time ago when Star Wars was a fantastic film. Until, that is, in the year 1999 George Lucas decided to bring forth the long-awaited prequel The Phantom Menance. Torn apart by critics and old-school fans alike, TPM was too much politics and not enough Star Wars. The combination of Lucas's non-abilty to write and direct and bad choices for actors led tho TPM's demise. The only redeaming factor was the most hard-core lightsaber battle to date between Obi-Wan Kenobi, Qui-Gon Jin, and Darth Maul. If it is one thing Lucas can do right, it is make awesome lightsaber battles.
However, the laughable plot and emotionless characters made TPM a real dissapointment. Due to Lucas's desire to make his movies mostly Computer Generated instead of the costumes and models that gave the original trilogy its realism, the movie just seemed, sadly, like just a movie. To me and many other fans alike, the original Trilogy seemed very real, very life-like and the actors' ability to perform their lines made A New Hope, Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi more like documentries instead of films.
George's 2nd attempt at "revising" the series came with the horribly named 2nd prequel film; Attack of the Clones. Not to be mistaken with fan's long awaited battle, The Clone Wars (something we have heard and waited for ever since hearing about it from Alec Guiesness in ANH), AOTC was much better than TPM, but that is not saying much. While Hayden played anger rather well, his other emotions made him seem very whiney and bratty. The relationship between Obi-Wan and Anikan (which you would guess would be a very close bond considering Obi-Wan being so saddened when talking bout Anikan to Luke in ANH), was nothing but a battle of wits. You could see that Obi-Wan and Anikan disliked, if not hated, one another. The love scenes between Anikan and Padme were decent in my opinion, and the acting was just as terrible as TPM. This film would have been much better if Lucas had a differnt director to get the actors into the film more, but alas, he did not. Again, Lucas went with Computer Graphics over costumes and this was very noticable during the lightsaber battles. The fighting against CGI beings was very sloppy. The actors just swung their weapons without looking at their enemies and when deflecting lasers, they just swung around (Unlike Luke in Return of Jedi when he actually made it look like he was swinging at the lasers instead of air).
Again, Lucas waited until the last 10 minutes of AOTC to give fans a reason to see the movie. The Yoda vs Dooku scene was bloody awesome. Though Dooku is no where near as intimidating or interesting as Darth Maul (my personal opinion is that Dooku should have died in Ep 1 and Maul should have stayed for 2 and 3).
Don't even get me started with showing how Boba Fett looks like without his helmet....*snarls*
Than, about a year after Clones came out, Lucas decided to release a Micro-Mini-Series (that translates into 5 minute long episodes) of the Clone Wars. The animation was laughable at best, the voice actors as dry and unbelievable as the real actors themselves, and only long enough for the fans to realize they hated it and turn off the TV, The Clone Wars is the biggest cop-out in Movie History. Instead of putting time, money, and actual effort into the biggest, most hard-core war in the Star Wars Saga, Lucas had these piss-poor animators give us a chibi-sized series. I mean, yes, it was neat seeing Anikan get bad-ass, but it wasn't enough. The sound was aweful and 3PO was turned into a homosexual instead of it just being an old joke. When he disrobed for Anikan to show off his new body and they played stripper music? WTF?
But on May 19th, my birthday, I gave George his very last chance with Episode 3, the Revenge of the Sith. The only reason I gave him the benifit of the doubt was because long time Star Wars fan and Ep 1 and 2 hater Kevin Smith (Silent Bob) gave it the thumbs up. Don't get me wrong, I would have seen it without his opinion, but trust me, it helped.
Revenge of the Sith was a beautifully made movie. Although the first 5 minutes were the slowest in Star Wars history (The sound and music didn't match the intense battle going on. It didn't drag you into the war), the fight between Anikan and Dooku was the most shocking fight in Star Wars history. George finally brought Anikan and Obi-Wan closer together and made their friendship more pronounced. Gone was Jar Jar (for those who didn't like him. I did) and the acting was much better. The main characters finally got into their roles (took them long enough) and the emotional shyt Anikan was going through was very belivable. I really sympathized with him. Palapitine was just as maniupulative and if you can believe it, even more sadistic than his previous appearences. Mace Windu was eh as usual. Always trying to be TOO bad-ass in my opinion during this movie. Yoda was animated even better and I honestly forgot he wasn't there at times. The final battle was bloody amazine and I wasn't dissapointed at all in this movie, which, comming from me, means a lot. However, this movie is still nothing compared to the original trilogy, but it is a close 2nd.
I give it 8 out of 10. ^.^
************************************************************************************************************
The Following contains huge spoilers. If you don't want to know certain scenes, stop reading now.
What I liked
Likes:
The Light Saber battles: More realitistic. Still sloppy when blocking lasers and attacking the driods, but the timing has improved 10 fold.
The Humor: Anikan, Obi, and R2-D2 were hilarious. There were many scenes (like in the elevator shaft when Obi-Wan wakes up dangling from Ani's leg) where I was laughing tears. I missed the light humor that was pronounced between Han, Leia, and Luke in the original trilogy
The Intesity: OMG! What Ani did to Dooku was the most hard-core scene EVER! And what he did to the kids, I had never though Vader to be that cruel. Plus the downfall of Anikan, when he is turning darkside just to save his wife, by the gods, the emotion was so rich and powerful, it was heart-wrentching. Vader started out doing this to save his wife and son but turned utterly evil in the process. Beautifully written George. Bout time!
The relationship: Ani and Obi-Wan were so much closer this time around. They were bickering but very brotherly, very father/son. I was very pleased.
The Ending: The fight of Yoda and Palpitine and Anikan and Obi-Wan was powerful. Obi-Wan's final speech to Anikan as Anikan is burning up was heartbreaking. The tears in his eyes looked real and you could feel his pain at this betrayal.
What I disliked:
The battles: Lucas should have made the Clone Wars movie. Because he didn't, we missed out on how bad-ass Grevious was and how cruel Dooku was. The Wookie War, the battle between Grevious was TOO SHORT! Not even 5 minutes. You see the wookies start the war and then BAM it is over. That was it! If he added another 30 minutes (yes it would be 3 hours but who cares!) and added to the battles, i would have been very happy.
Grevious: General Grevious. I have seen him fight in the Clone Wars cartoon and I was very excited for him to fight in this movie. He was very evil and was a genius. I loved when he tore open the window of his ship to escape into space. Very well done. However, he died in a 2 minute battle. It was kinda a cop-out. The big lightsaber battle I was looking forward too (since he fights with 4 sabers) was reduced to him cutting apart the floor before his hands got lopped off. It was sad. If you wanted to see Grevious battle, you had to see the cartoon which, George is you read this, IS A COP-OUT and George has cheated the fans horribly.
Mace Windu's death: Sam Jackson had in his contract to have one of the best deaths in the movie. While his death by Palpitine was nice, it wasn't as hard-core as I expected it to be. But damn did he suffer.
The Names: How the names Luke, Leia, and Vader came to be was horrific. Palpitine pulled the name Vader out of his ass and when Padme was giving birth it was like this:
while Padme is screaming and panting due to labor
"It is a boy. What shall he be called?"
AHH!
Ahh! Luke!"
"It is a girl. What shall she be called?"
(Same as above. Replace Luke with Leia)
I would have liked to see Anikan and Padme talk over names. Just a bit to know why she chose the names, same with Palpitine. I don't like how these names were just pulled out of everyone's ass.
The Ending: Okay, so I said I liked the end. I also hated it. We have all scene the trailer where Vader rises on the platform in his suit. That was awesome. Hearing him breath for the first time was awesome, but when he found out Padme died and ripped himself off the table (looking like a black sci-fi version of Frankenstien) and screaming out "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!" while waving his arms dramatically...WHAT THE F*CK?! I couldn't believe that hard-core Vader, the man who destroyed his daughter's planet, who chopped off his son's hand, who slaughtered the entire Jedi Order, started his career like a little bitch screaming NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. *sighs* That was horrible.