Obi Wan had the high ground back then as well, from his point of view.
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Is it time to accept Revenge of the Sith as "one of the good" SW films? SPOILERS
- Thread starter enigmatic_alex44
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Obi Wan had the high ground back then as well, from his point of view.
PM is a movie about nothing. They could have skipped it entirely and nothing would have been lost.
Sunster
Member
Well we wouldn't have the context behind Anakin's mom being a slave for ROTS
EDIT: Wait, was she a slave in PM?
Bonen no Max'd
Banned
What important information did we learn from any of the prequels that are lost by skipping them. That Anakin was a man who loved and had children? That he used to be a hero? That Palpatine was a Bad Dude? Nothing in any of the films adds anything meaningful to the original trilogy, which is a big part of why they're so bad! We already knew that Anakin is a fallen hero that betrayed his friends and that Palpatine took over the universe, teach us about something important!
Something I'm surprised isn't discussed here is that the movie sucks all the goodness of "He hunted down and killed all the Jedi." Like, that's a line with some pretty serious implications but in the end it was "clone troopers shot all the important ones up and then he killed some kids". Imagine if we had to watch Anakin be conflicted about instituting his fascist state because he thought it was the only way to bring order and peace to the galaxy.
Sunster
Member
We get detailed origins of the war and why it happened. and stuff...
Horse Detective
Why the long case?
Why wasn't ROTS just ALL bad Anakin. God these films waste a fuck ton of time
Boss Doggie
all my loli wolf companions are so moe
what's a respawn 1
When I finally saw ROTS in theatre I was soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo upset that they went this way!
The way the whole "he hunted down and killed all the Jedi" seemed like he HIMSELF went with his armies killing Jedis like bugs and personnally lightsabered them himself like you expect Darth Vader to do when he's not in his stasis pod.
You know like how Grevious went on a Jedi killing spree in the Clone Wars cartoon?
That's what I expected from the prequel, instead we got Order whatever and Jedis fall like punks and turns out Vader is a lameass idiot who could only kill children, so much for that
It's no better than the first two films. It just happened to benefit from being the one with all of the payoffs; TPM barely did anything but place the characters where they needed to start from, and AOTC was really just 2 and a half hours of exposition to set episode III up. Episode III is the only one where shit actually happens. It still has the same awful dialog, awful directing, and confused actors in a sea of greenscreens.
Have you ever skipped through all of the chapters in the film in a row? What you'll see is a bunch of fucking spaceships taking off. Constantly. Practically every establishing shot in the movie is a spaceship taking off or landing. Practically ever dialog scene is two people slowly walking together through some CGI hallway. The shots Lucas chose are so dull and repetitive, and I'm sure the lack of any real sets is part of the problem. The actors had to be told what to do by Lucas since they didn't know where they were going to be at or how they could interact with the surroundings, so they were at the mercy of the director for how they should be moving, and George obviously didn't have any interesting ideas there. Regardless of who the character is or what the situation is, everyone pretty much moves and talks in the same droning way, because that's what George told them to do. For all the talk about innovation and pushing into new ground with digital filmaking, the prequels all pretty much have the most boring and basic directing possible. Revenge of the Sith is just as much a victim of it as the others.
It's the kind of movie you might like at first, but after seeing again you realize how weak it is more and more. Even the few good sections, like the order 66 sequence and on, don't really work or make sense with the buildup that's been given.
The film's peak is a showboating 20 minute lightsaber battle between Obi Wan and Anakin juxtaposed with a really goofy, awkward fight between Yoda and the emperor... that was the best it got. If I have to give the movie credit for anything, it's that the CGI finally started to look convincing enough to work. The lava battle did look great.
Have you ever skipped through all of the chapters in the film in a row? What you'll see is a bunch of fucking spaceships taking off. Constantly. Practically every establishing shot in the movie is a spaceship taking off or landing. Practically ever dialog scene is two people slowly walking together through some CGI hallway. The shots Lucas chose are so dull and repetitive, and I'm sure the lack of any real sets is part of the problem. The actors had to be told what to do by Lucas since they didn't know where they were going to be at or how they could interact with the surroundings, so they were at the mercy of the director for how they should be moving, and George obviously didn't have any interesting ideas there. Regardless of who the character is or what the situation is, everyone pretty much moves and talks in the same droning way, because that's what George told them to do. For all the talk about innovation and pushing into new ground with digital filmaking, the prequels all pretty much have the most boring and basic directing possible. Revenge of the Sith is just as much a victim of it as the others.
It's the kind of movie you might like at first, but after seeing again you realize how weak it is more and more. Even the few good sections, like the order 66 sequence and on, don't really work or make sense with the buildup that's been given.
The film's peak is a showboating 20 minute lightsaber battle between Obi Wan and Anakin juxtaposed with a really goofy, awkward fight between Yoda and the emperor... that was the best it got. If I have to give the movie credit for anything, it's that the CGI finally started to look convincing enough to work. The lava battle did look great.
Anakin hunting down Jedi is a huge disappointment because it contrasts so wildly with what we already saw from Vader. In ANH and ESB we see his methods for ruthlessly hunting down the Rebels at all costs. He personally guns down X- and Y-Wing pilots with precision, kills his own men when they don't perform up to his expectations, charges on the frontlines into the enemy base, sacrifices men with suicide missions (asteroid belt) because he doesn't give a fuck and only cares to achieve his goal!
Here we had an emo Anakin, basically hoodwinked in the most basic manner and making him into an idiot, proceeding to kill a few kids and CG frogs before his mentor slapped him down.
He has more screen time than Skywalker in TFA but was a just a horrible waste compared.
This is exactly what I'm talking about.
It could play into a nice contrast if the Anakin we had in Episode III was the one in Episode I and then he gets more and more ruthless in II and III but nope he just magically change personality between the PT and OT.
superNESjoe
Member
Remember when a robot, a fucking medical robot, gave a diagnosis that Padme just gave up?
You know, instead of actually diagnosing a problem and saving the person like a robot who's whole job is to save people would do?
You know, instead of actually diagnosing a problem and saving the person like a robot who's whole job is to save people would do?
Crossing Eden
Hello, my name is Yves Guillemot, Vivendi S.A.'s Employee of the Month!
Fucking lol
I know I'm just parroting RLM by saying this, but watching the dialog scenes in any of the prequel movies really give you the impression that Lucas couldn't give any less of a fuck about the actual plot of the movies and just wanted to get the boring parts over with as fast as possible and as easily as possible before moving on to the action scenes and CG porn.
All the dialog scenes that are just shot/reverse shot, all the fucking CG corridors that people walk down, all the couches they people sit on, it's all so... nothing. There's nothing interesting in any of those scenes except maybe the architecture of the scenery, which, surprise surprise, is all CG and all Lucas had to do with that was hire some talented artists to crank it out on their computers. There's no love in the prequels. No passion. It's clear from watching these that Lucas was just making these movies purely to put big CGI spectacles on screen and make as much money as possible from the box office. I've seen more dynamic and well thought out scenes in the fucking Bayformers movies. It's appalling.
Oh, there's plenty of back story.
Sometimes I feel like that the only reason George Lucas allowed the expanded universe to exist was that someone else would be writing worse stories than him in the Star Wars universe.
Quote from wookiepedia:
Rad Shadow
Banned
Bad.
Still till this day.
Still till this day.
Crossing Eden
Hello, my name is Yves Guillemot, Vivendi S.A.'s Employee of the Month!
Good lord... evil Robots master plan is playing with doors?
Wooooow. Surprised Lucas didn't leap all over to film that.
bishopcruz
Member
Episode III, like all the prequels is a good idea with horrible execution. The acting is so bad, and the action is so boring, it just amazes me how people can like the movie. Hell I WANT to like the movie. The Clone Wars TV series gave me hope that upon a rewatch with greater context I would like the film more. I didn't, TCW makes Revenge's story actually make more sense, but the acting and overall direction is still shit. Anakin was handled so much better in that show than he ever was in the films.
His dark side flirtations in the show were almost all better than in this film too.
His dark side flirtations in the show were almost all better than in this film too.
Goes well with the other crappy lightsaber fights in the prequels lol. Man at least Yoda vs Sidious later on got interesting with them throw senate seats at each other.
Yup... Instead he's just constantly this petulant fuckhead....
It's like poetry.
Buba Big Guns
Banned
Episode 3 was absolutely terrible and in no way was it good.
The Clone Wars TV series did a great job portraying his disillusionment with the Jedi Order. Probably the best thing to come out of the prequels. I've seen a few breakdowns of how Ep 1-3 should have been structured, and something along these lines is probably what I would have liked:
Ep 1 Start with Anakin as a padawan already and ended with the start of the clone wars. This would be his rise to prominence and the origin of his idealism, but shown the seeds of his resentment. Still have Padme romance, but get someone who can write and direct to handle it.
Ep 2 should have been the clone wars and reflected the tv series - a turn to the dark side not through 'OMG Padme' but rather a growing resentment of the Jedi. Basically distill the TV series down to a movie. If you still wanted Padme to die as inspiration, having her killed through Jedi indifference/inaction would have been far better than a bad pregnancy. End Ep 2 on whatever really pushes him over the edge, killing a jedi in a rage, his idealism crushed. This is his turn.
Ep 3 should have basically been 'vader hunts down the jedi', with him gradually becoming more injured and machine like with each battle. Ultimately ending with Obi-wan's exile. This is his fall.
Basically frame his rise and fall as one driven by an idealism that the Jedi broke, and Palpatine then twisted. After all, Vader wanted Luke to join him to run the Empire, to end the conflict, to kill the emperor. He wanted peace through any means necessary. The TV show portrayed how this came about pretty damn well, the prequels did a terrible job given him a proper motive.
gutter_trash
Banned
I always find it odd what the picked to be in the movie and what should be left out in a descriptive scrawl or side things that are mentioned but never showed.
The Hamburglar
Banned
it is hands down better than TFA.
TFA is the worst one tbh.
This is why I think rogue one is utterly pointless. There are so many stories they could have told between episode 3 and 4, yet they choose again the safe option of some shitty plans to the death star.
Fully expecting a movie between 5 and 6 to tell how they learned of the new deathstar lmao.
TFA is the worst one tbh.
This is why I think rogue one is utterly pointless. There are so many stories they could have told between episode 3 and 4, yet they choose again the safe option of some shitty plans to the death star.
Fully expecting a movie between 5 and 6 to tell how they learned of the new deathstar lmao.
soxinthebox
Member
The Phantom Menace is the only one of the three I'd rewatch but even that's pretty rare. That end fight between Obi Wan and Anakin is so stilted and awful, there's no redemption for that.
Ah yes it's true that Rogue1 and TFA's stories are really pointless unlike Episode I&II that are still to this day inspirations to us all and pinacles of storytelling.
There's one stretch of the fight that I think is pretty good and that's the opening barrage of lightsaber dueling. It perfectly shows off Anakin's relentless and aggressive offensive style vs. Obi's calmer defensive style. It's intense and fast, showing that these are Jedi at their peak... without looking too ridiculous. You can see a slower version of this in ANH and a rougher version from Kylo in TFA.
But it ends after the hallway scene (with sabers strikes bouncing off the walls). They get into that control room and they do some terrible melee fighting, weird no-touch lightsaber twirl for cheap audience gasps, a goofy air high-five that pushes them both back and awful-looking jumps around the room. Plus more and more bad stuff.
It rhymes.
When Disney will have rebooted them and made a proper Episode III, sure.
It's been 11 years since ep III, if people haven't warmed up to it, it's not going to happen in 10 years.
No. The prequels, including 3, are simply incompetent in their construction. Just as a piece of film making they are not competent. That's not going to change over time.
That's not to say you can't enjoy them on whatever level. I also sometimes like things that are shit. But.. The prequels are shit.
The statement wasn't that 3 was competent, it was that 3 > 7.
If Jar Jar Bings wasn't enough, how about kid Anakin? I swear to god, Lucas got one thing right in the prequels: the kid actor who played young Anakin matched Christensen's abysmal perfomance 1:1. I totally bought that this kid is going to be Christensen's Anakin. Good job, George, you've casted the worst kid actor of all times!
What else?
Pod racing
Frog guys with French accent
Shitty art style
I could continue, but I'm too tired. PM is pure poo. All of the prequels feel like a "cheap" Telenovela with a huge budget for SFX.
Disagreed!
CrowdChant
Member
TFA hate is so trendy around here.
No fucking way ROTS is better. Watch it again. Then watch TFA. TFA has issues no doubt. But holy shit, just the dialog in ROTS makes it worse.
Not to mention many, many other things wrong with it. Anakin's turn was so poorly done. It makes my soul hurt when I'm watching Vader in the OT and remember that at one point in time he said, "From my point of view, the Jedi are evil!"
Also, you are supposed to have an emotional reaction to his "redemption" in ROTJ. Redemption for a guy that killed children. Just sliced them to death with a light saber.
I have a tough time buying into that redemption after watching the prequels. Do mass child killers really achieve true redemption? There was still good in him? Yeah ok. Kinda cancelled out by that child murdering. But hey, he's still a tiny bit good right? He saved his son. His son saved his soul. Ok. Let's look lovingly at his force ghost now. Yay!
Sorry parents of those Jedi kids. They weren't his kids, they had to die.
No fucking way ROTS is better. Watch it again. Then watch TFA. TFA has issues no doubt. But holy shit, just the dialog in ROTS makes it worse.
Not to mention many, many other things wrong with it. Anakin's turn was so poorly done. It makes my soul hurt when I'm watching Vader in the OT and remember that at one point in time he said, "From my point of view, the Jedi are evil!"
Also, you are supposed to have an emotional reaction to his "redemption" in ROTJ. Redemption for a guy that killed children. Just sliced them to death with a light saber.
I have a tough time buying into that redemption after watching the prequels. Do mass child killers really achieve true redemption? There was still good in him? Yeah ok. Kinda cancelled out by that child murdering. But hey, he's still a tiny bit good right? He saved his son. His son saved his soul. Ok. Let's look lovingly at his force ghost now. Yay!
Sorry parents of those Jedi kids. They weren't his kids, they had to die.
crackhead_bob
Member
What would have been the proper way to take the Jedi kids out of the picture without having to involve Vader? Would it have been a better option to have allowed the kids to survive, or did Lucas feel that doing so would have undermined the notion of Obi Wan and Yoda being the only sole survivors? I agree with you on not being able to buy into the redemption aspect of your argument. It wrecks Anakin's road to redemption in a way that didn't need to be.
Corronchilejano
Member
Maybe Auralnauts 3, but definitely not RotS
Crossing Eden
Hello, my name is Yves Guillemot, Vivendi S.A.'s Employee of the Month!
Have the stormtroopers do it since they're programmed to do so and then Anakin protests their actions since he meant to only kill the adults. Instead we get a comically evil version of Vader five minutes after he betrays Mace Windu.
CrowdChant
Member
Three ways I think it could have been handled differently. I'm sure other people have had better ideas, but here's mine:
1) Not even have children that young depicted in the movie. Yeah, that means the whole prequel methodology of Jedi training would need to have been different from the very beginning, starting with TPM. I don't necessarily think the Jedi needed to be portrayed as starting their training at such a young age. I know this still sounds sort of demented, but if the kids were in their early teens instead of 4-5 years old it would have been a bit easier to swallow when Vader slayed them.
Or
2) Keep the younglings in, but never show Vader or anyone else killing them. Show Vader killing older Jedi, but not the younglings. Mention somewhere that some of the younglings escaped and that they will need to be hunted down when Order 66 is executed. It can then be implied that this happens at a later time, off screen. Still an atrocity, but at least we don't see Vader doing it.
Or finally..
3) Have the Emperor do it. Sure, more narrative reworking required. Vader and Palps go to the temple together. Vader kills some big Jedi. Palps zaps a bunch of kids while Vader stands idle and doesn't stop him. Hell, there could even be a shot of Vader looking horrified as Palpatine kills them. Vader's horror slowly transitions into the realization in his mind that these are then lengths he must go to to save his own wife and child.
I just feel like Lucas was like, "what is something really, really, really evil that Vader can do to show that he's a horrible person? Oh I know, kill kids! That's really bad! Ok,that was easy. NOW GET ME BACK TO THE CGI MACHINE!" Instead of coming up with a more complex arc for his downfall, he came up with that. Just shit writing. Did he even consider what type of impact it would have on his "redemption" in ROTJ?
I wonder if Lucas has since realized he really blew the downfall of Vader. He's always seemed hesitant to find flaws in the prequels. I wonder if that's changed.
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