No Hope Left...

Rating: 1/10 (27 May 2005)

After a long debate, I finally decided to post my feelings about Revenge of the Sith. I despise the movie. There, I said it. Before someone screams "troll" to the top of their lungs, please allow me to explain.
The Original Trilogy The first film I saw as a child was Return of the Jedi. I could care less about the Ewoks, but that still didn't hamper from enjoying the movie. I'd already seen Empire Strikes Back, another beloved movie of mine, just a short time earlier. But in all honest, I never was very fond of A New Hope, except for a few scenes. Now with all the history out of the way...
The Phantom Menace I actually enjoyed watching The Phantom Menace for the first time. Once again, like the Ewoks, I could care less about Jar Jar. But unlike Empire, or Jedi, the repeat viewings of Phantom Menace only revealed more and more flaws and lapses in logic that my mind missed in all of the CGI clusters moving at rapid speed.
Attack of the Clones Sadly, after my first viewing of Clones left me will the hollow excitement of knowing I could write a better script. That's not arrogance, either. Empire, to which Clones' structure is suppose to mimic, has two plots that are interweaved through interior and exterior. Luke/Yoda are about interior. Learning the Force. Seeing the future. The cave is about a battle within Luke. On the other side of the spectrum, everything is exterior. The cave is revealed to be a monster. The Falcon struggles to elude the Imperial Starfleet. If all that is not enough, Luke's freezing on Hoth mirrors Han being frozen in carbonite. And to complete the film, Leia reveals her love for Han, which is followed by those four words that forever changed Luke's life. Clones has none of this. Only scenes lifted from westerns and Chinese flicks cobbled together with CGI clusters and that "love story." Revenge of the Sith Which brings use at last to the tragic demise of Anakin Skywalker. Only there is nothing tragic about him. He's either a beyond cute little boy, a spoiled teenage brat, or in this film, a naive fool who turns to the Dark Side on a whim. Somewhere I read a column that mentioned Anakin and Padme only fall in love because the plot said so. Well, now Anakin turns to the Dark Side because the plot says so. I remember Geroge Lucas's clever rib at Godzilla: PLOT DOES MATTER.
I have a better one: STORY DOES MATTER.
Sadly, I get no pleasure in writing this. There's no joy at all in watching something you love be destroyed on a whim.
"It is possible to destroy these things." - George Lucas You did it. The circle is now complete. Excuse if I don't jump for joy, I feel as though I've lost an old friend.