The Phantom BS

Rating: 1/10 (14 April 2010)

Some people say you should stop comparing the Star Wars Prequels to the original trilogy. That it's like comparing apples and oranges. Well, not exactly, it's more like comparing apples and turds.
The reason for this is that the writing in the prequels is absolutely dreadful. Our characters aren't developed over the course of the story. Qui Gon-Jinn is not developed as a character. I'll certainly admit that he has character in that he is morally ambiguous. He has no problem trying to scam part dealers, stealing ships from the Gunguns and he has no qualms about fixing bets to his advantage. But he DOES have a problem using his powers to help the Queen to manipulate the Gunguns, even though he already did it ONCE near the beginning of this movie. I'm not so sure this guy is so much a Jedi anymore as he is retarded.
Ewan Macgregor at best delivers a half-hearted performance that isn't even a shadow of a good Alec Guinness impersonation. Like I said though, this may not be all his fault simply for the fact that the characters were not developed, and therefore had no character. The kid
Anakin also wasn't much either. George Lucas tried to write him as many different things, including being a slave. Now think about this. How can the kid be a slave, a pilot and a repairman?! That doesn't make any sense. Even more, how does a SLAVE get the time, money and parts to build his own droid and a pod-racer?! Therein lies another problem with Phantom Menace. The story makes no damn sense at all. We're never given a clear sense of what is at stake, or what the consequences will be of failure. From what I saw on the Queen's planet of Naboo, the Trade Federation is merely occupying the planet, and not doing anything else but that.
Since there is nobody really suffering from the Trade Federation's occupation of Naboo, you get no hint at all as to why this is such a terrible, terrible thing. Second of all, when the Queen goes(with the Jedi) to the senate on Coruscant, they don't believe her allegations that the trade federation have invaded Naboo! Why not have the Jedi testify then?!
Also, Anakin,his mom and countless others are slaves on Tattooine. You've got all these Jedi sitting around on Coruscant but not a single one of them can't be bothered to rescue the slaves?! There's also something wrong with Anakin constructing C3PO. First, he looks like ANY other old protocol droid, which doesn't make sense unless Anakin just took a half finished droid and just finished him. Secondly, how is a protocol droid supposed to help Anakin's mom? C3PO said in the original Star Wars "I am not much more than an interpreter!". Then what bloody good is he?! It makes absolutely no sense at all that Anakin would build a useless robot to help his mom! Darth Maul isn't developed as a character either, so he and his fight at the end is a total waste too.
Yoda is also wasted as a character. He just sits around and discusses things with the other Jedi. He is known for his wisdom and his witty repartee. We don't get to see any of that here. Instead he spouts off ten tons of BS including "Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to suffering.". Now not discounting the numerous flaws and fallacies with Yoda's argument here, you could interchange any one of those verbs with another and it would sound more credible. Hate could lead to fear, Anger could lead to fear, fear could lead to suffering logically since by definition fear is a form of suffering.
The trade federation is a group of spineless nitwits who aren't scary, intimidating and act like they have no idea what they are doing. In other words, they aren't good characters. I'd take the Ewoks over these clowns. The wooden spaceships of the Ewoks would be much more scary and imposing.
Also, how does it make sense that the Queen's ship managed to escape the Trade federation's blockade when there are literally thousands of those ships orbiting the planet?! R2-D2 repairs the shield generator but they never, ever get hit by another laser blast so what was the point of him repairing it? I would have found it much more interesting if the Jedi, the Queen and her security forces used um I dunno, a strategy of some kind instead of going into the fray completely defenseless!!! Then of course, Anakin through a bunch of retarded coincidences and accidents manages to destroy the ONLY trade federation ship orbiting Naboo at the end of the movie, effectively making us wonder what happened to all the other Trade federation ships?! Couldn't another take over powering the droids? That doesn't make sense!!!! If the priority of Darth Sidious was the invasion of Naboo then why did the other ships disappear?! That is retarded! Oh, and while I am on the subject how did they get back to Naboo without the Trade federation even noticing? Anakin destroying the ship, especially by accident is very disrespectful to all the other Naboo pilots that died before him, pilots who were experienced and capable. Anakin doesn't have flight experience! He has pod-racing experience! That is NOT the same thing! That's like saying I can fly an F-14 because I have 20 years of experience driving a Diesel locomotive! Also, don't tell me Anakin was using the force because in the cannon there is no indication whatsoever that somebody can use the force first without at least a tiny bit of training!
If that isn't enough for you, then think about this: I didn't even touch upon Jar-Jar or... the dreaded M-word!