Don't watch this movie through rose colored glasses

Rating: Null/10 (23 August 2001)

The most common complaint about this movie seems to be that it didn't live up to the original. I get the impression that a lot of these comments come from people who first saw them on video and had the benefit of being able to watch the trilogy back to back. I remember when Star Wars (nobody called it "A New Hope") first came out. Everybody I knew thought Luke was a whiny little pipsqueak. Chewie annoyed us. Lea was hot. Han was cool. Vader scared the poo-doo out of us. C-3PO and R2-D2 were funny. Before "Empire" came out, rumors were flying that Luke and Han would be killed on Hoth. We all thought that would be sad, but would run with it. Not to wax too "back in my day", but when we saw a movie, someone was telling us a story. Now everyone wants a say in the story. I'm no fan of Jar-Jar but I can appreciate his place in the story. My biggest gripe is that his dialogue was written by Mike Myers for Waynes World ie. "esqueeze me". I thought Phantom Menace was a great Sci-Fi fantasy movie and it gives a lot of insight into some of the stock characters from the first trilogy. I've lived my life as a huge Star Wars buff. But I will admit that most of the acting and writing in the first three films sucks if you watch it like you're watching The Godfather. These are fun, fantasy, comic book style movies. And as far as the CGI characters, how stupid would people in battle droid costumes looked? Or the Gungans for that matter? At least now, all the aliens don't have to look like humans with bigger heads and mouths