Aww, shucks, i remember it so well. I was 21, newly living in my own flat, working as a qualified fishmonger, and that month it came out was hot. Damn hot. A whole group of about ten of us, all school friends who had grown up with the trilogy (and each other), went to see it together. We spent all day trying to track down original trilogy lightsabers (£50 for a double bladed!) and managed to find the very last vader and luke sabers in Taunton, and bought the whole stock. They were £6 each. Bargain. And, frankly, i frickin` loved the movie. I saw it five times in the cinema, got a pirate copy, and me and my best mate proceded to watch it as much as we could, practically every day. I remember taking the piss out of the neimoidians every time they spoke, mocking Jar Jar for being a crap character, repeating lines as though we were the kids from South Park, shouting "Baby dawn" when Obi-Wan shouts "Noo" during the duel. We genuinely, genuinely loved the movie and could happily see past it`s faults and enjoy it for what it was. I still maintain to this very day that it was the last ever `proper` Star Wars movie. We could see past its faults because not only was it highly enjoyable, we believed that Lucas had a plan, that eps 2 and 3 were going to tie it all together really really well.
And then Clones happened.
The feeling of dread that i had going into that one, everyone saying it was a lot more like the original trilogy.. Well, i didn`t want it to be. I WANTED it to try to be different, to explore new avenues, be more like TPM. Coming out of that theatre, i was gutted. It was a cgi cartoon, Yoda being relegated to a sideshow, no character developement AT ALL, none of the promised conversations between Padme and Threepio as she fitted his coverings. But i digress..
Seriously, i thought TPM was an excellent overture to the rest of the saga, taking a very operatic stance to being a prequel (even if we had to suffer a fool). If it had only been backed up by the other two. The shame of it is that i can no longer enjoy TPM for what it was, and haven`t actually seen it since i bought the DVD. Maybe i should give it a try. But i`ll probably just be dissapointed