captainsolo said:

To put it bluntly: the freedom and energy of the first film and the darkness and development of the second are simply not present in Jedi. It is not a bad film by any means, but it is flawed and does pale in comparison overall to the two previous entries.

The story really does go nowhere.

Wait a minute, I'm getting mixed messages here. More main characters die in ROTJ than either of the previous ones combined. By your standard, I'm assuming, that would give the point to ROTJ, both in terms of number of people dying as well as "darkness and development" (whatever that means).

The story that you say goes nowhere resolves the conflict between Luke and Vader, restores freedom to the galaxy and all but guarantees that Han and Leia will live happily ever after. All that, and Anakin Skywalker is redeemed and dies as a Jedi Knight, reconciled to the good side of the Force and to Yoda and Obi-Wan.

I prefer ANH and ESB over ROTJ myself but how can you argue the story of ROTJ goes nowhere when it covers all that ground?