It always annoys me when people downgrade and criticise ROTJ which is for me the best star wars movie. I've always felt, especialy younger, that it contains the deepest drama I've ever experienced in a film.
The final three-way confrontation between Luke, Vader and Palapatine is what the whole star wars saga is all about.
The opening scene shows us a new death star in construction and a beautiful imperial vessel (sentinel shuttle) docking with it. We then learn that the emperor will be visiting the death star and that he is not as forgiving as vader is. This tells you that the emperor is even more evil than the dark lord of the sith.
We encounter a battle against the most vile gangster in the galaxy and the saving of han solo. There you see the knew weapon luke has constructed and the fighting skills he has gained during the time after ESB.
Yoda, the jedi master who has instructed luke dies after confirming that Vader is his father, leaving him on his own as the last "jedi" in the galaxy. Luke is now on his own and must confront vader, his own father.
Shortly after that, Obi-wan tells luke that leia is his sister.
The imperial raliement at the emperor's arrival and the imperial march soundtrack gives a great showing of the empire's might. All the tie fighters flying in formation and the wide variety of troops in linemake a great contrast. We also see in the flesh for the first time the emperor who reveals his plan to turn luke to his side.
Han after assuring he has the situation undr control makes a clumsy mistake and tips off the scout troopers The speeder bike chase is very exiting, especialy when luke brandishes his lightsaber and kills that last biker.
Vader, the darkest most feared villain actualy begins to gain our sympathies. The brief exchange of dialogue between father and son, at the imperail endor landing platform, each trying to persuade the other into joining his own side. There we learn that there is still good in Vader and after when Vader finaly drops the dark side and dies, it goes a lot deeper than it initialy sounds. This combined with the emperor effectively relieving Vader of command (your work here is finished my friend, go back to the command ship and await my orders)further reinforces our sympathies for Vader.
The Endor Battle which contained three different battles all had a different part to play and which would decide the fate of the galaxy. If the Empire had won, then the galaxy would have stayed under evil control and luke, the last jedi would have joined the dark side. This would without a doubt destroyed any hope for the galaxy.
_The forest battle which showed us the captured rebels who then managed to free themselves from the imperials thanks to the ewoks (which are less anoying than jar jar and padme) and turn tables against their captors. You see an ewok dying and other crawling up to him calling something like "mama" and then realising what has dawned on his friend or relative and crying onto him. I used to get very upset when I was a kid at that scene. On the bright side, the ewoks manage to destroy a few AT-STs with primative ways and chewie and two ewoks manage to hijack one of the walkers and manage to caose mayhem against their foe. R2-D2 gets shot and so does leia. This battle was very important because it would allow the rebel fleet to destroy the death star.
_The space battle which showed us the rebel fleet arriving at endor only to find that they had been trapped and then encountering hundreds of tie fighters and a gigantic fleet of star destroyers is the most brilliant space battle in the saga. When Lando and Wedge fly into the superstructure and destroy the main reactor and then have to escape before the the daeth star explodes was also great. Lets not forget Piett desperately giving orders and diving into the crew pit with the other imperial as the a-wing sacrifices itself and crushes into the executor and ultimately destroys it. And all those exploding fighters and capital ships makes it even more intense.
_The sabre duel between vader and luke and the emperor trying to bring luke to his side by discouraging him with his piercing words. Once Vader learns that he has a daughter, Luke gives him a challenging scream of hatred and makes vader fall back and cuts his hand off is one of the best scenes in the saga. Luke realising he has gone too far and looking at Vader's hand and then his brings back memories when the exact opposite happened on bespin. Luke then stands up and throws down his lightsaber, showing the emperor he will never turn to the dark side and the emperor's line "so be it jedi" reinforces the emperor's evil and power. You see that Luke was not much of importance to him and that it wouldnt affect his rule of the galaxy in any way.When the emperor then uses force lightning on luke, you discover how powerful he is and why vader obeyes him. Luke then begging for his father to intervene and save him and Vader trying to make his decision as the conflict between good and evil ensues into him makes the scene very dramatic. He then looks back and forth at his son and at the emperor and then grabs hold of the evil being who had used him as his puppet and throws him down that deep shaft, before all that blue smoke flows away and Vader falls on his knees, breathing in a way that tells you that he is going to die.
The final dialogue between luke and anakin is also beautiful, sad and dramatic at the same time. Luke takes off the mask of the evil dark lord of the sith that we have seen in the two previous movies. We can now see how the person under the mask looks like and we are shocked to see all those bruises, cuts and burns that cover his bald head. The music in this scene is great: a sad twist to the imperial march played with a low harp strain.
Luke then burning the pire on endor where his fathers armour is layed and him then standing in front of it and watching it with the camera slowly levitating towards the beautiful night sky where the starfighters are launching fireworks, still brings a tear to my eye.
The ewok celebration is a great ending (I prefered the original version of 77) which us anakin joining Obi-Wan and Yoda as one with the force.
Luke then joins the main rebel caracters where we see him, han, leia, chewie, lando, c-3po and r2 all together in the sam shot. I remember wanting to be there at that exact scene and I never wanted star wars to end there. That's why I love EU so much.