Worth the wait.

Rating: 9/10 (20 May 1999)

Like many other STAR WARS fans, I had sixteen years of anticipation building up within me when I heard that George Lucas was going to finally bring the next (or, in this case, previous) chapters of the saga of the Skywalker family, their friends and foes. I have to say that EPISODE I was a good film. GOOD, but not great. The special effects this time were awesome, especially considering that the ones in the first film were done without any computer-generated images and in fact puts many of those to shame. The effects in EPISODE I really stand out, particularly in the way that the live-action actors interact with their computer-generated "co-stars". The story is quite good as we now know the relationships between some characters that were shown in the original trilogy. I didn't find the character of Jar Jar Binks to be a racial stereotype in anyway. Many people have compared him to Stepin Fetchit, this couldn't be further form the truth. If anything, Jar Jar recalls some of the clowns from the silent film era. However, I will say that a little bit of Binks DOES go a long way. Now, for the negative things: I thought that some of the dialogue went on WAY too long. Whatever happened to "show . . . don't tell"? For all of the build-up given new villain, Darth Maul, he had very little screen time as well as dialogue. I was also surprised to see that two of the new characters, and the most interesting ones at that, get killed here (You'll have to see the movie to find out which two. Sorry!). After this, all I've got to say is: Bring on EPISODE II!