Kind of like Star Wars, but too much

Rating: Null/10 (23 November 2015)

The Clone War approaches its end as Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi close in on Count Dooku and his nefarious sith master. Meanwhile, back at Coruscant, the political landscape is about to change as people elect to give more and more power to Supreme Chancellor Palpatine. And in the midst of all this the Jedi Order must plot its course.
Episode III was always going to be a huge movie. This was the turning point in the story, the beginning of the Galactic Empire, the foundation for the original trilogy. The first two films in the prequel trilogy had shown us a galaxy so vastly different from the one we'd seen before that we knew something massive was about to happen. And the movie doesn't disappoint. The story has been slowly building during the course of two movies and now we finally get to see the Emperor rise into power, the birth of Darth Vader, all that good stuff.
Unfortunately we still have to deal with the unconvincing romance between Anakin (Hayden Christensen) and Padmé (Natalie Portman). They are better than they were in the first film, having some genuinely good moments and some actual chemistry, but most of their scenes are still easily the weakest in the whole film. The movie is also in quite a hurry, having to cover a lot of ground in relatively short amount of time. Which makes certain scenes, some huge, important ones even, seem extremely rushed and almost glanced over.
But, there's also a lot of good stuff. Ewan McGregor and Ian McDiarmid are still absolutely fantastic as Obi-Wan Kenobi and Palpatine, respectively. Samuel L. Jackson also gets a few good scenes in this one. The special effects are great, the movie has some of the best fights in the whole trilogy and as a whole the film seems to be a lot more polished than its predecessor. And when it needs to be huge, it does that very well. In certain scenes perhaps a bit too well, even, seeing as the final fight is absolutely ridiculous and over the top. I know that a lot of people like it, but for me it was a bit too much.
Nevertheless, a good film, though a flawed one. For me the best film in the prequel trilogy is still the first one, seeing as it captured the spirit of the originals the best, but this one is a good film to carry you over to the originals in terms of story.