The weakest link in the story of Anakin Skywalker & The Jedi

Rating: 7/10 (10 January 2017)

Attack of the Clones definitely has some flaws, although it has many redeeming qualities that bolster the movie to be good. As this is a personal review, this is my subjective opinion. Feel free to disagree. I found the characters of Count Dooku, Yoda, Obi-Wan, and Darth Sidious/Senator Palpatine to be strong supports for the story. They together explained the motives for the Jedi Order and the Sith Lords in trying to prevent civil unrest/war in the galaxy and on the opposite end, trying to begin this civil unrest and use it to create an army for the Galactic Empire and take control over the Jedi and the galaxy. The backbone, however, of the entire story rests on Anakin and Padme's love story and their relationship that leads Anakin to *choose* to go to the Dark Side.
The idea of the love story is great, I feel! Two young people, individually devoted to a cause that restricts their freedom and opportunity for romantic love. Anakin is restricted by the Jedi Order's culture and rules, having attachment linked negatively towards leading to the Dark Side, in my opinion because the Jedi do not understand how to control love and emotions so they rather wish to leave all attachments behind. Padme is held back by her commitment to politics and being a senator, unconnected politically with the Jedi and their desires. These two have committed themselves to a cause at an early age, Anakin around 10 becoming a Jedi and Padme as a teenager becoming Queen of Naboo, at they have had ample time to ponder about love and the prospect of not experiencing that in their life. But the execution is so unconvincing :\ Anakin's whiny tone and irrational dialogue takes me out of the movie and does not convince me that his character would so blindly reject the Jedi culture and destroy his/Padme's life by falling in love with her. Padme's acting is better, she has weak dialogue in my opinion on Geonosis when stating she loves Anakin....for some reason, maybe because he's whiny. Her first kiss with Anakin started the love story horribly, I felt, as the kiss came out of nowhere for Padme. She viewed him as a boy and I did not see any romantic attraction of Padme to Anakin before the kiss and barely any after until Geonosis. Long story short, the love story falls very short for me in this movie. Luckily, I believe the love Anakin and Padme have for each other in Revenge of the Sith, so the love story is redeemed in light of the whole saga of the Tragedy of Anakin Skywalker, how love made him turn to the dark side to save Padme and is a convincing reason he chose to turn and later, chose to kill the Emperor out of love for his son, Luke.
I did absolutely love the music of the film and the special effects. Seriously, it is amazing to see the starships of the Trade Federation, the Kaminoans, the Jedi, Jango Fett...etc. as well as the views of planets from space. Amazing Star Wars setting and atmosphere. John Williams is on his very high "A" game in this movie, I very much enjoyed the Anakin/Padme love scene music being on point with the movements on screen, giving the love story some sort of emotion and believability from the soundtrack. And the return of Duel of Fates I believe when the Clones arrive on Geonosis is an amazing touch. Williams is the best movie composer, no question.
Good movie, though I think it is my least favorite out of the 7. Pretty good the least favorite gets a 7/10 as its score, as I can watch this movie and enjoy the good points enough to be able to ignore the bad. Thank you Lucas and team for creating the link between the beginning and end of Anakin's Jedi story! It makes sense as a whole, though not so much in the love story details. Oh well! Lightsabers, Yoda wisdom, and epic music make up for everything ;)