but as is it would mess with the pace and tension release too much
You mean provide a welcome break from the snail’s pace of the Tatooine section?
Maybe for everyone who is used to Star Wars that’s how Tatooine feels, as a kid I loved the mystery of the barren planet with the droids before meeting Luke. And yes if there was an exciting chase through a tight winding cavern in the beginning of the movie it would cause diminishing returns by the end of the movie, the sequence the entire story is building up to.
I completely agree. I still love the down time with them for the reasons that it also is very much all visual storytelling and a good quieter part of the narrative after a strong action set piece on the Tantive IV. It gives us some time to process what we’ve seen so far before the story starts picking up again when we meet Luke. You need those quieter moments to contrast the bigger ones to get to know your characters. That’s partly why I think the down time in The Phantom Menace is so critical before the podrace. It gives us a chance to get to know Anakin as a person before he does something extraordinary.