Tries too Hard

Rating: 5/10 (20 May 2005)

Well I wasn't expecting much from this really after the Dire Phantom Menace and the truly awful Attack of the Clones and it's safe to say I got even more of what I expected.
The entire film has that overall feel of "trying too hard" and I feel that in a vain attempt to give us everything we ever wanted "Mr No-Neck" has in fact given us a film that is; over long, has far too many boringly long battle scenes and saber fights, is filled with poorly constructed characters, has oodles of unnecessary CGI, many pointless planets and worlds, and quite possibly some of the worst acting I've seen since my school play of Macbeth back in 1988.
Now some may think I'm being too harsh here and that I should just sit back and enjoy the visuals and relish in the undoubtedly well produced battle scenes., but I'm sorry great visuals do not make a great film. Ten minutes in I found myself wanting something exciting to happen and was longing for the end of the film if only to see the transformation form Anakin into Vader and see how in fact they were going to tie up all the loose ends in order to match it into the original three. By the time this came I felt this too was badly done and the overall "Rise of Vader" scene just looking like a cheesy rip off of Frankenstein. The aforementioned plot ends were not all tied up well and the whole droid amnesia problem was done badly to say the least (I mean come on a 5 year old could have come up with that plot twist!!!) So by the time the final reel came to it's end and the credits were rolling to that beloved music it was not nostalgia that I felt for the original films, it was envy at C3-PO, as I found myself wishing that like him I could have any memory of these three prequels erased from my head once and for all.