He returns... from where?

Rating: 9/10 (13 November 2004)

The final installment of the classic Star Wars Trilogy, Return of the Jedi isn't exactly what many people thought would be. A new, more powerful Death Star is being made, while Luke, Leia, Lando and Chewy try to save Han Solo from the clutches of Jabba the Hutt as a decoration. After saving not only Han, but everyone from Jabba, Luke returns to Jedi Master Yoda. The film, like Star Wars, starts out a bit slow and gets uninteresting in some parts. Granted, the make-up and costumes were kinda cool, but the lack of anything going on except deals and Jabba getting angry at the guards made the movie quite slow.
The shield of the new Death Star being made is located at a forest called Endor, where they aim to destroy the bunker that supports this shield. After a chase involving Speeders, Leia meets and Ewok. This is the part where Lucas decided to make the film feel more kiddy and added these unnecessary creatures. I didn't find them annoying, but the inclusion of their characters in the final film of the Trilogy is one of the most unnecessary things to Star Wars along with Jar-Jar. These small things throw rocks at Stormtroopers, to which they easily fall down and never get up. The whole scene was completely unbelievable and quite weird. It hardly became any fun at all.
Leia being Luke's sister was a pretty lame twist. It's like they added it to make sure that Han and Leia would be together no matter what. The film hardly had time for the characters and decided to just have lots of explosions and bears running around. It completely forgot the magic of Star Wars and decided to be a visual effects treat, cause, you know, that's what final installments of epic Trilogies like this should be. Hardly anything important happen to the characters. Hardly any drama goes between them except for Luke and Darth Vader.
The final space fight felt flat and forced, since so many new characters suddenly appear and the audience simply couldn't care less about their fate. Well, except for Lando, that is. Granted, it was more colorful and lots of different kinds of fighters are thrown in, but it just felt like one big mess and hardly exciting at all. Some of the effects even seem dodgy at some points, especially the Star Destroyers crashing and blowing up.
The best scene in the film would probably be the final Lightsaber fight between Darth Vader and Luke and what proceeds after that. Now that Luke knows the truth, he isn't just fighting some evil monster that kills many people: he's fighting his own father, for the life of his sister and friends, and the future of the whole galaxy. After almost defeating Darth Vader, Luke decides not to kill him, since he can still sense the good in him. But the Dark Lord of the Sith has other plans, and nearly kills Luke with his power. As Darth Vader watches his son in agony, he then decides to save his son and kills the Emperor. What then proceeds is the last moments of the half-man, half-machine Darth Vader's life, previously known as Anakin Skywalker. The death of Darth Vader is simply the most emotional scene of the whole Trilogy, and one of the best.
Return of the Jedi is a very, very flawed film. But it's moments like these in the film that make it worth it. It's still entertaining to watch, and the characters we love are still here. The final steps of Luke is done, and the whole galaxy celebrates as the Galactic Empire is defeated, once and for all One of the better changes in the film, where in the original ending, the Ewoks sing a song called Yub-Nub. I mean, seriously, what the hell?
8.0