What it really comes down to is, if given the choice, which would I watch again?
It’s the sequels and it isn’t even close. I know that on the internet that is taboo to say, but it is insane to me that there are people who call Revenge of the Sith the best one.
I strongly disagree with the most common critiques of the sequels, especially around “world building”. I feel like those who say that have no understand of what world building actually is in film, and that “lore” is secondary to storytelling.
The prequels have a consistent vision and style, yes. But that style absolutely sucks. The discussion has been done to death, and I could literally talk for hours about the problems the prequels have. They’re terrible films, and terrible additions to Star Wars. The only thing they’re good for is memes. I watched the internet collectively transform from ironic love to genuine praise as if they’re actually good pieces of cinema.
The sequels have their faults. They’re not perfect. But they capture the spirit of the original trilogy. Real sets, on-location shoots, practical effects, adventure films first and foremost. They feel more like Star Wars to me than the prequels do. And in spite of all of their flaws, I still think that films with ups and downs are much better than films that are consistently shit. This is a contraversial take, but even though ROS is bad, I still think it is a more competently made film than Revenge of the Sith on a basic level. Revenge of the Sith is the best prequel in a technical sense but it’s not hard to improve on absolute dogwater.
The Last Jedi has many issues, but overall I think it’s a decent film. I still like the broad-strokes story. This is another film where the discussion has been done to death, but I think it’s positives outweigh the negatives.
Rise of Skywalker is not a great movie. However there is still a lot to like in it, and I don’t think it’s terrible. In fact I think outside of some pretty bad editing decisions, it’s a mostly okay movie. The cinematography rips the prequels. The production design rips the prequels. And yes, even though there are some questionable bits of dialogue, the script is better than what we got in the prequels. A few bits of bad dialogue < Almost every bit of dialogue being trash. It’s just that “Okay” isn’t good enough for films that were once the pinnacle of cinematic entertainment.
I still love The Force Awakens, it’s just diminished a lot because of where the trilogy ended up. Yes it was derivative, but it was a movie about Star Wars on a meta level, and on a thematic level it was about history repeating itself. And at least they’re not making more changes to the sequel trilogy to accommodate it. The prequel trilogy negatively affected the preservation of the originals and meant we could never get the 77 or 97 releases in better formats, to the point where now I feel no excitement when a friend wants to watch Star Wars for the first time.
If anybody has digital upscaled versions of the 1997 special edition so I can make my definitive cut that’d be dope. It’s been a dream project of mine for years.