Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Cartoons

Rating: 1/10 (20 May 2002)

It took a while for me to figure out what really turned me off about the last two Star Wars episodes. Sure there are the obvious things like bad acting and go-nowhere scripts, as well as uninspired and unimaginitive dialogue, but there was something else. Then, it hit me.
It was the cartoons! Call them CGI, call them what you will, they're cartoons in every sense of the word. There is hardly a scene in the last two Star Wars episodes without some kind of corny cartoonish Disneyesque figure dancing about in some exaggerated way.
What's wrong with cartoons on the screen? People don't take them seriously, and when you can't take what's happening on screen seriously it becomes hard to suspend your disbelief.
The first three movies relied on human actors, and the aliens were humans in alien costumes, not computer graphics. Conversations between human characters and computer generated cartoons don't work, and come off looking quite silly. I think in a few years we'll look back on the infancy of this media with a touch of disdain. Episode I and II, and probably III will not have the timeless appeal of IV, V, and VI because of it.
When I go to see a Star Wars movie I expect to see a Star Wars movie, not Who Framed Roger Rabbit? (Sorry Roger, no disrespect).
Bring back the people! Lose the cartoonish "busyness" in every shot!