My Reaction…Finally
OK, I know my parents read my journal fairly regularly and they have yet to see Episode III. I’m sure there are others who might stumble across this and I don’t want to ruin the surprises.
So – I will place my reaction to Revenge of the Sith on the comments section of this post. Feel free to add your comments.
By the way, Anakin Skywalker is Darth Vader.
Oops…
I guess I gave it away.
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Howdy. I'm Matt. My wife, Christy, and I have four kids and two dogs, I'm passionate about orphan care. I'm a die-hard fan of the Evansville Aces, the Indiana Hoosiers, and Star Wars. I'm trying to live life by the Todd family motto: "It behooves us to live!"
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Episode 3
I want you to know that through a strange series of events I attended Hopwood on Sunday, and Tim Ross preached on Star Wars. He was comparing self-righteous Christians to the sith.
ps. Are you missing your Greek card file box?
Re: Episode 3
I would almost compare the Jedi to self-righteous Christians, but that’s a different discussion. There’s lots from the movie that will preach.
Is it a black box? I probably am missing it.
The Review
It is difficult to say that I loved this movie because it is so dark and tragic. I cannot say it is a fun movie or enjoyable to watch. The final 2/3 of the film suck you in and don’t let you go, like a good film should. Once General Grievous is killed, the quality of story telling improves dramatically. Is the movie predictable? Of course. To those of us who have immersed ourselves in the Star Wars universe, we already knew the story – Anakin turns to the Dark Side. Chancellor Palpatine becomes the Emperor. Vader becomes a machine as a result of his duel with Obi Wan Kenobi on a lava planet. These are all things I have wanted to see since Return of the Jedi nearly 20 years ago! In the unfolding of this storyline, Lucas does not disappoint.
Dialogue
Is the dialogue weak? Yes. That’s par for the course, however – especially with the prequels. Read my review of Attack of the Clones for more on the weak dialogue of the Star Wars saga. However unfortunate this is, you had to expect it!
Show, don’t tell
I took a creative writing class in high school, and the main point I still remember is the “Show, don’t tell” principle (thanks, Mr. Hughes!). A sign of strong writing is to actually show you why someone is evil or good – not just saying, “Oh, he’s a bad guy.” With Darth Maul, Lucas basically told us he was a bad guy, rather than showing us he was bad. He never really resonated with me because I didn’t think the character was that deep. Unfortunately, he falls into the same trap with General Grievous. Both characters were weak because we were told these were bad guys without really being shown they were bad guys. Within the first few scenes of A New Hope, you know Vader’s a bad guy because he throws a guy across the room by his neck. What does Grievous do? Run away and cough. Ooohh…scary. I know Christy didn’t like Grievous, but that was mainly because he was ugly, not because of his character traits. Grievous was disappointing. Weak supporting characters – the soft underbelly of the Star Wars saga.
Cameos
Mon Mothma was there for half a second. Chewbacca got two minutes face-time…maybe. This has happened before in the prequels and is frustrating. At least Yoda wasn’t relegated to cameo status.
Droids
I’m not a big fan of Artoo in this one. He was a little too fluid and had a few too many items in his bag of tricks – kinda like a Bat-belt, or something. And what was up with the Super Battle Droids talking to each other? Distracting!
Strong Women
George Lucas doesn’t know what to do with strong women. In A New Hope, Leia is straight-shooting and witty, not scared of a fight. In Return of the Jedi, she’s telling Luke to run away from Vader and then tells Han to “Hold me.” Her character got weaker. Same is true with Padme. She’s the one who flies to Obi-Wan’s rescue in Episode II. In Sith, however, she’s merely the means for Luke and Leia to be born…dying of a broken heart. Of course, she did see the Republic crumble and her husband turn evil and kill Younglings. All she could do was brush her hair, though. Must have been the hormones.
Continued…
The Review – pt. 2
“Virgin” Birth
Shortly after Episode I, I had read on some fundamentalist website that Palpatine was going to be revealed as Anakin’s father in Episode II. I thought, “They’re on crack!” Guess they weren’t.
Answered Questions
I was mostly satisfied with the way most of the questions were answered, even if they were done quickly. I do have some questions though – I still don’t know who Sifo-Diyas was and how he was connected to Palpatine; why did Yoda choose Dagobah, and how come the Empire didn’t focus on hunting him down?
Leia’s memory
Before I saw the movie, I kept saying, “They can’t kill Padme because Leia remembers her.” Since Leia has the same power as the rest of the Skywalker clan, maybe she could sense Padme and that’s why she remembers her through feelings and images. How come she doesn’t remember Luke, then? Why doesn’t Luke remember Padme? Is Leia stronger than Luke?
Tatooine
I still don’t like that Anakin was from Tatooine. Makes the galaxy feel too small. Wouldn’t someone have remembered Anakin – he was a popular pod racer, after all – and spilled the beans to Luke?
Opening Sequence
The opening space battle felt like I was at Star Tours at Disney/MGM more than I was watching part of the Star Wars saga. It’s sequences like this that make me glad it is the last installment. I’d hate to see what Lucas would do next.
Conclusion
When I was in high school, I came to realize that the original trilogy was really the tragedy of Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader. After realizing this, I bawled like a baby after watching Return of the Jedi again. I have already seen the final scenes from Jedi (we watched them on Sunday). It is even more powerful and moving than before! Although there were things that could have been better – especially in the first hour – it is a great film and definitely the best of the prequels. Nothing will ever match the magic of A New Hope, but Sith comes close to the same level of story telling.
It’s a movie Aiden and Alyson won’t watch for 10 years – at least! It’s a movie I don’t want to watch again for a very long time. It’s that good. It’s that dark.
Final Grade
I’ve graded the other two prequels, so I should do the same for this one. I have always given Lucas the benefit of the doubt (remember, I like the fact that the Ewoks help destroy the Empire). Sith is the only prequel that comes close to my expectations. If the first hour was better, I would give it an A+. I am satisfied with an A. I gave Phantom Menace a B, and Attack of the Clones a B+/A-.
Leia’s Memory
My wife has reminded me that she voiced the theory I have stated before I could articulate it. Credit goes to her for my suggestion.
Scott emailed me and said:
Leia can remember her mother because to Leia her mother was Mrs. Organa, who I might remark was beautiful like she says in
“Return of the Jedi”. Your alternate Padme theory might be right,
though.
So he believes Leia is talking about Mrs. Organa on Alderaan. There’s a whole thread on one of the fan sites regarding this issue. It’s an interesting discussion, I think.
The Review – pt. 3
Forgot two more things:
Creation of Darth Vader
I liked the juxtaposition of Anakin’s rebirth and Padme’s death. Good storytelling. Seems like this movie was a little more artsy than the previous flicks. I assume Vader’s reaction to Padme is some type of tribute to the Frankenstein movies. It still came off as pretty corny. That’s unfortunate, because it could have been very powerful. How come when Vader figures out that Luke is his son he doesn’t realize that means Padme survived the choke hold? Is it because the Dark Side has completely consumed him (“You don’t know the power…I must obey.”)?
Palpatine
Palpatine is the ultimate bad guy! He is so twisted and evil. He is so stinkin’ manipulative. Every time I heard him speak, it made my stomach turn. That’s the sign of a good bad guy! He twists words and the truth to isolate Anakin even more. Because of the arrogance and single-mindedness of the Jedi, he is left feeling isolated and alone with no one to turn to. Of course, Palpatine is there to pick up the pieces, steering him further down the Dark Side. The Council is partly to blame for Anakin’s turning. They should have paid attention to his struggles, rather than just saying, “buck-up, camper.”
Wouldn’t you think Yoda would have warned Luke to watch out for the Emperor’s hands? That lightning has to hurt!
Watching the movie a second time was much more difficult because I knew what was going to happen. I wanted to yell at Anakin to stay in the Council’s chambers instead of go to the Emperor’s office. It hurt me more the second time, I think.
Did Lucas go too far with the slaughter of the Younglings? I don’t think so. If he had actually shown their murder, that would have been too much. We had to see how far Anakin had already gone down the Dark path. No matter how painful it was to watch, it was necessary to reveal Anakin’s true nature.
My Take on EPIII
Well, Matt has heard some of this already, but I’ll throw my two cents in. I was seriously disappointed with the quality of all of the bad guys and their fight scenes. Matt touched on this too, but we all watched Dooko[sp] fight 10 times as well against Yoda as he did with Annakin in this movie. Grievous wiped out six Jedi in The Clone Wars cartoon series without breaking a sweat. Then KENOBI kills him in five minutes? Palpatine got beat up by Mace Windu, but Yoda couldn’t take him? Big disappointments.
That said, there is a TON of action in this movie, and pretty much any movie with that much action I’m going to like. Yeah the scenes are short and jump around too much, yeah the dialog sucks, but it’s still fun to watch. I have pretty much exactly the same problems with the main story points that Matt does, but I figures out a couple of years ago that if you want depth from the Star Wars universe anymore, you have to read the books. Either the books for the movies, or the books in between the movies.
I’d agree with Matt on the A rating. Definitely worth seeing, but not as good as the originals as far as storyline and breaking new cinematic ground.
Jarod
Re: My Take on EPIII
Palpatine was just “playin’ possum” (gotta throw in the Tennessee every once in a while) with Mace so Anakin would jump in and turn. That’s my theory, anyway.
Grievous is still a wasted character. Disappointing…
Crash
Did anyone else think the ship bursting through the atmosphere had allusions to the Columbia disaster – pieces flying off and burning up?
Star Wars
Thanks for the consideration. We plan to see THE MOVIE tomorrow night (Saturday, the 28)…. .yeah, I know, we are so behind-the-times!
Re: Star Wars
One week after the premier isn’t that far behind the times…
I’d like to hear what you guys think. Don’t expect too many “warm-fuzzies.”