He did return, but he left behind all the wonder and entertainment, in short, almost all that was good in the others

Rating: 6/10 (6 July 2008)

I'm not sure where it went wrong. Maybe Lucas just did not feel right about the middle one being dark, so he made this all warm and fuzzy. I didn't care for it, myself. Going by that this is about ten times further down the #250 list than the first two, I'm probably not alone in finding this a letdown. Of course, if the tone was all it was, this could still be great... but, alas, in neither case is that true. Marquand presumably also deserves portions of the blame. I don't know if he just can't do action, I haven't seen anything else by him. This just never actually engages, it certainly didn't, me. The light-saber stuff somehow never goes beyond "dull" and "flat". I know that it should, but it doesn't. The universe... honestly isn't that heavily expanded in this. A handful of new creatures, several of which are at least one of the following... irritating, more or less poorly realized visually and too cute. Designs aren't that imaginative, for a few. Places and ideas are revisited and redone. The sound comes off as not very unique. The score is still magnificent. Situations tend to be silly, their solutions, as well as how they come about. There are points of this where it seems like George forgot he wasn't writing a script for Indiana Jones. The effects don't particularly get better from the preceding entries(though, admittedly, some do). The pacing is reasonable, the film runs fairly smoothly. This doesn't have memorable or quotable lines. There is little of interest in the characters and their development is basically all in episodes IV and V. The DVD has a commentary track and it's worth a listen. I recommend this only to those who really must watch all of the Original Trilogy. 6/10