By George....

Rating: 8/10 (11 December 2005)

This is just my personal opinion, but none of the three prequels have made an impact on me the way the first three Star Wars saga had on me. They were all average in the sense that visuals were only par with what you can see on TV in the '90s on ward, and story line lacked the suspense first three Star Wars movie had. It was basically a story to explain other stories rather than a stand alone piece. Still I think George could have done a little better job with plot and sub-plot development (the only good dialog in this movie was "So this is how democracy dies. With thunderous applause."). Plot lacked a binding central theme other than to explain how Luke and Leia comes into existence and how Anakin turns into Darth Vader (In which his transformation to the dark side seemed sudden and unnatural to me). I think George Lucas surrounded himself with too many yes men and non-thinkers. For instance, in all the CGI back ground and visuals, things are repeated too many times (like cars, robots, buildings etc.) which takes away from the visual by being too busy. There's generally too much of everything. This I guess is the art department just going along with the computer guys concept (because they can duplicate stuffs easily), and all earthly scenes all looks like they're shot in Europe: The buildings, large marble interior etc. etc. and costumes that also looks like they're feudal age Europeans, which just makes me feel not out there in a galaxy far far away. In contrast to this, ANH had many never seen characters, and back drops such as the storm troopers, battleships, tie fighters, X-wing fighters and yes, I did feel like I was in a galaxy far far away. ESB was even better in this regard. So by George, how did such an original concept filled franchise turn into so mundane a series ?
It's been few years since I've submitted my original review, and I've noticed an underlying theme that maybe this series is trying to tell. Padme says to Kenobi "Have you ever considered we may be on the wrong side ?""What if the democracy we believed we're serving no longer exists ?""And the republic become the very evil we've been trying to destroy?". Considering that "Clone Wars" has incorporated many urban legends in its plot - covertly, maybe this movie also has a hidden message to it. Also covertly, is Lucas trying to tell us something ? If so, my hat's off to him once more. So, when I see this with a fresh new eyes, I see that maybe the episodes are trying to convey more messages than I thought. Lucas is the only director who would be putting those deeper messages into his story. We need to look at the world around us, and see where Lucas is getting the hints for his stories. After seeing this movie with a fresh eye, my evaluation of this movie went up a notch.