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Who is the Phantom menace?
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Sith Master X
Darth Sadistic

Registered: Apr 2004
Location: The Empire

I might be the odd one out here, but personally I thought "The Phantom Menace" was a good title. Call me crazy, but I also find it to be not the most entertaining prequel, but the one that felt the most human.

The title I struggle with is "Attack of the Clones." For starters, when you think of the word "attack" you generally don't associate that with anything good, and the Clones in this movie are with the good guys...so that made little sense to me.

Aside from the lousy title, I'm not ashamed to admit that I actually think this movie had some of the best stuff from the PT....but had equally, if not more, the worst stuff as well.

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May 16th, 2014 12:40 AM

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Lord Lucien
Lets all love Lain

Registered: Jul 2005
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I have the most problem with 'Revenge of the Sith". "Attack of the Clones" can at least be explained. There are clones in it, and at one point, they attack someone (the droids).

But what do the Sith want revenge for? It's never explained why they're irked. And for that matter, what's a Sith? We're not told anything about them and the most the movie implies is that they're bad guys who use the Dark Side. But what are they?

And I'd call RotS the most human film. TPM may not have had Hayden Christensen emoting, but at least RotS had emoting. Grown up Anakin was at least a person with traits, albeit violent, obsessive, homicidal, sociopathic traits. But still traits. Everyone in TPM was either monotone, deadpan, lifeless, or Jar Jar. F*cking boring.

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May 16th, 2014 01:04 AM

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Sith Master X
Darth Sadistic

Registered: Apr 2004
Location: The Empire

I do like ROTS, a lot.

The clones do attack in EP2, I just feel like the word itself is more of a bad guy word. But that's just me.

You're right. It's not really explained why they want revenge. I always assumed it had to do with a line from TPM "The Sith have been extinct for a millennium..." and my guess was that the Jedi had wiped them out. But in most cases, the audience should never be left to assume. This should have been fleshed out a lot more.

One thing people say ruined the PT is the overuse of CGI and special effects. Oddly enough, TPM had the least amount of both as well as the most popular villain of the PT, but still is somehow regarded as the worst film.

I actually thought, (and I know by now I'm in the minority here) that Liam Neeson did a great job. The scenes on Tatooine with Qui-Gon, Anakin, and his mom I thought were nice as well. I bought it. I also loathed Sebulba, Watto, and always felt happy watching Anakin win the podrace for his freedom. The were plenty of monotone characters, but there was plenty for me to like as well.

People may not have liked kid Anakin, but...whether or not it was the right approach, I totally understand what George was trying to do with it. He was attempting to convey Anakin as an innocent child with unlimited and gifted potential. I personally enjoyed it and never understood why Lucas was crucified for this. If TPM was the first ever SW movie made, guaranteed no one would have had a problem with it. It's just because it was "different" and the OT didn't have a little kid.

Yes, Jar Jar sucked, but when I was a kid, I didn't care. I went and saw TPM 4 times because it had an awesome racing sequence and a guy with a double bladed lightsaber.

As a kid I thought it was a fun adventure, and I've carried that nostalgia with me even to this day.

Even more amazing is the fact that TPM is now 15 years old, yet many of us have been on here for 10+ years still talking about it like it came out yesterday.

With that in mind, I can't imagine these movies are really as bad as we make them out to be. They were certainly flawed, but I think we love to hate it because it's not as good as the OT, as opposed to being the worst set of films ever made.

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Last edited by Sith Master X on May 16th, 2014 at 06:54 AM

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May 16th, 2014 06:40 AM

Lord Lucien
Lets all love Lain

Registered: Jul 2005
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They are as bad, if you turn off the nostalgia blinders. A common defence of them I hear often is that people compare them too much to the originals and they wouldn't seem as bad if they weren't tied together. Yes, they would be. They would still be just as bad.

These aren't just bad Star Wars films, they're bad films, period. They're poorly written, acted, paced, blocked, framed, and executed. The one saving grace no can or has complained about is John Williams' score. I liked the PT a helluva lot more than the OT when I was younger, to the point that I still can't say I've seen the originals more. But I developed the ability to discriminate between feel-good youthful memories, and an appreciation for film. These movies deserve all the flak they receive, as disappointing followups/prequels to a prior-established beloved franchise, and as awful examples of cinema in general.

What Eps. II and III have going for them over TPM is a combination of almost no Jar Jar, and a hilariously bad acted Anakin. The "I don't like sand" scene will always make me laugh. Throw in some Palpatine being so delightfully evil and spirited in RotS and you've got yourself some entertainment. That's the point of film, to entertain, in some fashion or another (whether they intend for that fashion or not). Tommy Wiseau's The Room is worse that the PT in every aspect, but it's utter terribleness makes it entertaining, giving it worth. AotC and RotS are bad films, but they at least cross in to entertaingly bad territory.

TPM is just. So. Boring. We get a kinda, sorta, okayish lightsaber fight at the end, but it's still highly choreographed and using characters I don't care about. Good on Liam Neeson for having a reputation outside of Star Wars, but he sucked just as much as everyone else did. Boring. Lifeless. Stale. Monotone. Dull. Etc. No emotion or investment. I love hating these films because they deserve it more than most.

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Last edited by Lord Lucien on May 16th, 2014 at 03:48 PM

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May 16th, 2014 03:40 PM

Ace Hambone
Senior Member

Registered: May 2014
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[QUOTE=14719998]Originally posted by Lord Lucien
[B] But what do the Sith want revenge for? It's never explained why they're irked. And for that matter, what's a Sith? We're not told anything about them and the most the movie implies is that they're bad guys who use the Dark Side. But what are they?

Yes, they don't explain it. I remember Maul telling Sidious they would have their revenge, but for what he doesn't make clear.

Maybe the Sith want revenge on the Jedi for nearly exterminating them, reducing the Sith to only two individuals who must go into hiding until the time is right for them to rise up again and defeat the Jedi. If so, it was a perfect *** for tat revenge since they did exactly that back at the Jedi!

But that scenario doesn't account for the "Rule of Two" which implies it is the Sith's own choice to have only two at a time. Perhaps the Rule of Two was created by the Sith to save face: "The Jedi didn't reduce us to two, we wanted it all along. You see, we have this rule..."

Whatever the revenge is officially for, and whatever the reason their are only two Sith, I think the symmetricality of two secret Sith reducing the Jedi Order to only two secret Jedi is interesting. And I think I heard once that EP VI was originally titled REVENGE of the Jedi. Hmmmmm.

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May 17th, 2014 12:50 AM

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Lord Lucien
Lets all love Lain

Registered: Jul 2005
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It was, but Lucas changed the title at the last minute. He realized that 'return' is one letter shorter than 'revenge', and that by making the change he would save over $1,000 in ink on all the movie's products.

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May 17th, 2014 04:32 PM

queeq
Chaos

Registered: Oct 2000
Location: JP's bed

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Hehehe� that was not the reason. Someone started arguing with Lucas is revenge was something befitting a Jedi? And Lucas was convinced and changed it into "Return". Guess he had his revenge with ROTS to finally have the "revenge"-word in a SW movie.

I think ROTJ was the last movie Lucas gave some room to people who were not entirely yes-men. (although a lot less than with ANH and ESB). By the time of the PT, all he had was yes-men�.

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