Merry Christmas, CGB fans!  Boy, do I have a present for you!
Well, we’ve made it.  We had to get through two crummy prequels, but at last we’ve come to the third and final film in the Star Wars prequel trilogy. Will this one be better than the last two or will jerk Anakin drag another movie down with his childish complaints?

This is my review of Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith!

The film opens with Obi-Wan Kenobi and his apprentice Anakin Skywalker on a rescue mission to save Chancellor Sheev Palpatine from General Grievous and Count Dooku.  From there, a maturing Anakin learns that his secret wife, Padme Amidala is pregnant with his child.  Chancellor Palpatine begins to take Anakin under his wing and slowly but surely poison the young Jedi’s mind into giving in to the Dark Side, leading him on the path to becoming Darth Vader.

I will come right out with it: Fourteen-year old me loved this movie when it came out.  I saw it twice in theaters and it was the first time I had experienced the “good-guy-turning-evil” narrative as a teenager.
I will be turning twenty-four in five days, so let’s see if this Star Wars prequel still holds up for me as an adult.

The Hits
The first fifteen minutes are filled with promise.  Gone are the taxation talks and expositional drawls.  This time, we open with the kind of action that you would expect from a Star Wars film.
Finally we get some banter between Anakin and Obi-Wan!  They actually have a rapport that you would want to see between two friends.
The moment when Padme tells Anakin that she is pregnant is well acted.  With few words, Hayden Christansen and Natalie Portman express excitement, fear, anxiety and joy with their facial expressions.  Also I will give Anakin extra brownie points for his line to Padme, “Our baby is a blessing.”
The plot of this film is way simpler than the storylines of Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones.  I could actually follow what was being said, what was taking place, who was fighting who and so on.
Okay, okay, I know that I spent a good chunk of my Attack of the Clones review bashing Anakin.  However I think Hayden Christiansen gives a pretty good performance here…when he doesn’t open his mouth.  He is quite expressive and can convey so much with just a simple knit of his brow or tightening of his lips.  This is the pre-Darth Vader Anakin that I’ve been waiting for; a troubled young man conflicted by his growing disillusionment with the Jedi, tormented over the possible death of his pregnant wife, and vulnerable to Palpatine’s deception.  A Shakespearean villain like Darth Vader deserves an origin story of the same caliber.  Good bye, whiny lustful Anakin!  Hello, complex tortured soul Anakin!
Finally, finally, FINALLY we get an emotional Lightsaber duel between Anakin and Obi-Wan!  One of the biggest problems with these prequels is that the Lightsaber duels severely lacked the internal battle of the characters fighting.  Where the Lightsaber fights in Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi were rich with depth and drama between Luke and his astray father, the battles in Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones only had stylized choreography and obstacles, lacking the tension needed to make the audience emotionally invested.   In Revenge of the Sith’s climactic confrontation, you can hear Obi-Wan’s heart break with each swing of his Lightsaber while the surrounding lava and brimstone reflect the hatred and rage boiling within Anakin.

The Misses
Am I the only one who feels that Palpatine’s interest in Anakin is a bit too abrupt?  I kind of wish that the last two films had establish some kind of rapport between Anakin and Palpatine so that the friendship they form in this film would feel more natural.  It’s like he had little interest in Anakin in the last two movies and now that we’re at prequel #3, he’s suddenly taking Anakin under his guidance.
Okay, I’m really getting sick of this in movies: Other characters keep telling Anakin that he’s a great Jedi, but honestly he hasn’t done anything different from any other Jedi.  His fighting skills aren’t different, he can do the same things that his fellow Jedi do; other than his exponential midichlorian count (even now, that sounds so stupid), what exactly is Anakin doing that makes him so special?  Just because you have other characters telling me over and over that such-n-such is the best thing since sliced bread doesn’t make said character a special snowflake.

Guys and gals, it took two shizzy prequels to get here, but we finally have ourselves a satisfying conclusion to the Star Wars prequel trilogy.  Given that I love the Darth Vader character, I was quite pleased to see justice done with Anakin’s tragic tale.

Merry Christmas and Saint Ignatius of Loyala, pray for us.

Yes, we are going there.  Just as I reviewed the original trilogy, I will also travel to the Dark Side of the saga:
The Prequel Trilogy.

This is my review of Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace!

Okay, so given that halfway through the movie, I found myself having no idea what the heck was going on, I will summarize it the best I can.
Young Obi-Wan Kenobi and his master Qui-Gon Jinn are on a trade negotiation mission because–potatoes–and things don’t go so well, so they have to rescue the teenage Queen Amidala and hide her on the remote planet of Tatooine, where they encounter a boy named Anakin Skywalker.  Through a blood test, Qui-Gon discovers that Anakin’s (irritable sigh) midichlorian count is higher than even Master Yoda’s and so begins the origins of the boy who would go on to become the most iconic villain in cinematic history, Darth Vader.

I cannot believe that this crummy movie is a part of the Star Wars universe.  Sure, the original trilogy had hocky special effects and some okay dialogue, but it also had a good story, likable characters and, of course, an engaging internal conflict between Luke Skywalker and his evil father Darth Vader that is so rich in development and complexity that I could do a whole CGB editorial on those two guys alone.
What does Phantom Menace have in comparison?
Well, let’s just get on to the review.

The Very Few Hits
Fine, I’ll say it.  The Podracing scene is fine.  It does very little to move the narrative, but hey; something is happening.  Yes, the duel of the fates sequence is also fun to watch.  It’s devoid of emotion and significance, but again, at least something is going on and it’s not bogged down by expositional speeches and trade negotiations.
To be fair, I did sort of like the friendship between Anakin and Padme.  I can see where George Lucas was going with that and Natalie Portman does the best that she can.

The Plethora of Misses
In my reviews for Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, I had so much to say about the evolution of Luke and Darth Vader as father and son.  I could have gone on for hours about the peaks and valleys of their relationship.   Why?  Because both are well-written characters portrayed by capable actors.  Because the idea of having a protagonist offspring go up against their antagonist parent is interesting and full of depth.
In contrast, I have absolutely nothing to say about any of the characters in Phantom Menace.  Character evolution is traded for expositional speeches.  The people talking are just pawns with the sole purpose of explaining to plot.  The only relationship I kind of care about is the one between Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan.  I say “kind of” because they don’t spend enough time together.  They only have a handful of Jedi fights together and when they’re not fighting, they’re just spouting off exposition.  Yes, Liam Neeson and Ewan McGregor are enjoyable to watch, but even a great actor can’t make terrible dialogue compelling to listen to.
I did like the Duel of the Fates somewhat, but what kept it from being epic is that there’s nothing emotional about it.  In Empire Strikes Back, you could feel Luke’s anxiety as he fights Vader for the first time.  You could sense the conflict within Vader as he dukes it out with Luke all while trying to keep his son alive.  Once the big reveal comes, it puts Vader in a new light as a man consumed by darkness and can only be saved by his son’s goodness.  I adore Return of the Jedi because the philosophical and spiritual conflict between Luke and Darth Vader comes to a boiling point.  It becomes a battle for the souls of both characters.
In the duel of the fates, there’s no emotional depth to be found.  Even when Darth Maul kills Qui-Gon, it happens too quickly for me to care and there’s no enough time for Obi-Wan to convey the kind of hatred needed to get the audience invested.
Jar Jar…OH. MY. GOSH.  I’ve always known that Jar Jar is the most despised Star Wars character, but now I understand.  I see now why this alien squeak toy whose dialogue I can barely comprehend and who has the IQ of a stick of butter is loathed by the majority of Star Wars fans. Yet, as much as Jar Jar makes me want to stick a fork in my eye, I can’t place all of the blame on him because he is a victim of bad writing.  C-3PO was written to be annoying, but all three films in the original trilogy gave him a reason to be uptight and anxious about everything.  Also annoying characters are watchable when they have another character to play off of.  R2-D2 put C-3PO’s annoyance into perspective; R2-D2 was the straight man to C-3PO’s Debby Downer persona.  Jar Jar has no straight man to set him straight, so he is a screw-up character who never gets his comeuppance, making him unlikable at best and insufferable at worst.

Good Lord, Phantom Menace is difficult to sit through.  How this boring, not-engaging chore of a film has anything to do with the awesome Star Wars universe is mind-boggling to me.   Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go suffer through Attack of the Clones.

Saint Catherine of Alexandria, pray for us.