Spoilers ahead!
Wow, I haven't been here in awhile. After watching Episode 3 though, I had to go some place to talk about it and what better place than OT.com.
Anyway, I agree with you about everything you said, Jay. General Grievous was just horrible, though if you know his background story, it makes his death more... Fitting. Otherwise you're just sitting there going "what the hell just happened?"
The scene where the clone troopers killed off the Jedi was very well done. The acting was much better from everyone, though I still think that Hayden Christensen was a horrible choice for Anakin. I didn't really understand the Qui-Gon Jinn thing... That only made me more confused about the force ghosts and dissapearing bodies. Could some one explain that?
The lightsaber battles- well, all the battle scenes actually, were very well done, but not the main focus of everything which I thought was good. It wasn't "Oh look at my flashy CGI and cool tricks/designs with lightsabers", it was much more "Look at how dark everything is and what it's all boiled down to." The fact that it was story, and THEN special effects really made watching the special effects alot more enjoyable.
And hearing Darth Vader's breath for the first time was very well done, though I agree, the lines were really... weird and didn't fit the scene.
I'm glad that Threepio had a smaller part. In my opinion, he shouldn't of been in the PT at all, even though I like him. So having him more out of the way was good. R2 was still in there to much though. Do you think when Darth Vader is firing on Luke in the Death Star trench, he notices that that's the same R2 unit that he went on several missions with during the clone wars? I mean, he was with R2 for a good 3 years in combat, and he had met him way before that in Episode 1... Something that was around so much in your life should be easy to spot when it's right in front of you.
Jar Jar binks didn't open his mouth, and so that right there added some of the greatness to the movie.
Bail Organa was way cooler than I thought he was going to be, and seeing the surface of Aldaraan for the first time (first time for me anyway) was awesome! Easily though, the coolest thing, was seeing all the things that tied in directly to the fourth one at the end. Like seeing Grand Moff Tarken, and the fleet of Star Destroyers, and all the officers on the ship... It really made me feel like I was watching a new Star Wars movie, and that's where episode 1 and 2 failed. They just didn't seem like Star Wars movies.
The biggest problem I had though, was that Padme died. Leia says in ROTJ that she remembers her mother's voice, and images of her. If she died, how can she remember her?
All the bad parts aside though, it was a great movie, and easily in the top three best Star Wars movies of all time. Empire > A New Hope > Revenge.
I can't wait to go see it again tomorrow.