Great eye candy...but thats about it

Rating: 7/10 (17 May 2002)

I have been a Star Wars fan ever since 1983, when Return of the Jedi came out. I was 6 yrs old at the time and I was hooked ever since. I saw the previous 2 movies after that, and what great movies they were. Those movies had chemistry between the actors and the result was that Star Wars magic. Now George if your reading this somehow, listen carefully. Using your huge budget to create a film of this magnitude is very entertaining, and a treat for the eyes, but please retire as a director George. You can't direct pal. Maybe you can cyber direct on a computer, editing and cutting out pictures and scenes, but you cant get the most out of your actors, the guys who directed the original trilogy did.
In AOTC, I did not laugh once. C3PO and R2 had once decent scene but their limited screentime is due to the fact that George had to showcase his cgi's in terrible scenes like that Diner scene. EWWWWW!!!!bad. Special affect's are nice but nothing beats a good ol cheap mini set of a Millenium Falcon cockpit with Han getting on Leia and C3PO annoying the hell out of them with his nagging, squabbling and yelling with Chewie grunting in the background resulting in me laughing my butt off. Where's that Star Wars Magic George? Well, The Phantom Menace didnt have it and Attack of the Clones sure didnt. I was impressed though, a few scenes were jaw dropping, and I must admit Hayden Christiansen, stole the show by far. It was nice to see how crazy he is becoming and how in one scene in particular, was the best in the movie I think, where he explains and admits to Padme how crazy he acted. I thought that scene had the most emotion. The movie drags a bit after that. Obi-wan played by Ewan McGregor was a success also. He spends the whole time playing detective trying to find out who is planning on killing Senator Amidala. Decent Plot twists though, much, much better than episode 1. I loved the ending, not the colisseum scene, where dozens of jedi confused the hell out of me, not knowing who is who, and not caring who got killed or survived. Mace Windu? cool character, I didn't even notice it was Samuel Jackson playing him. That was Mace Windu, he is now an official Star Wars Character. Yoda? dissapointed me because he was a CGI. George, bring him back as a puppet dammit! yes I loved the fight scene where Yoda showed the world why no one ever messed with him, but use the puppet in the other scenes where it didnt require you to have him computer generated. Their was few space battle scenes as well, and the duels in the end didnt come close to the duel at the end of episode 1, with Darth Maul duking it out with Obi-wan and Qui-gon. that was the only thing better about Phantom than Clones. Well episode 3 must have a lot in it because I had many things I expected in this movie that just didnt happen. Please George, if you read this, for the sake of your fans out there, dont direct episode 3!!!

overall I give this movie 3 stars for its great affects , thats all.