Our Fault, Not George's? — Page 5

I have to say, I don't feel Luke going dark in ROTJ was under the surface the entire movie.  In the way Luke is portrayed (acted, written) in ROTJ before he meets the emperor, I see zero sign of the dark side or struggle with it. I know that way back, like when making the film, Lucas said the black outfit was supposed to symbolise Luke's struggle with the dark side. But that sounds to me like just rationalization for putting Luke in a cool outfit, because I see zero struggle with the dark side in ROTJ before he meets the emperor. Luke is calm, collected and balanced. He even tries to negotiate politely with Jabba. He's the model of a good Jedi knight. Yes, he uses a force choke, but seeing as this was set in a portrayal of him that had no sign of the dark side, it ends up suggesting a force choke is ok for jedi to use rather than that Luke was dabbling in darkness. I think if the aim was to portray Luke as having troubles with darkness then they failed. It just doesn't come through. Only once he meets the emperor does he show any sign of the dark side. But his slide toward darkness in the presence of Vader and the emperor is portrayed vey convincingly, so that it works when he goes berserk at Vader.

Noting also, Luke's bionic hand, its damaging and the glove he puts over it is probably to some extent intended to symbolize elements of darkness in him, but this only works once he's in Vader's presence and chops off Vader's own bionic hand. Because actual darkness is nowhere to be seen in Luke earlier in the film. For example, we see him fight a whole bevy of foes in the Jabba section without the slightest sign of anger or lust for battle or going too far. Contrast that with Mace Windu with his I'm-badass act. Luke does look afraid in his fight with the Rancor, and fear leads to the dark side, but it seems so reasonable in that situation that it doesn't make you feel it's a sign of darkness and I doubt it was intended to be a sign of darkness. Nor does he show sign of special aggressive feelings toward the rancor. He does pull a gun on Jabba, which is aggressive, but that scene was getting confrontational anyway and he isn't foaming at the mouth or anything. He looks a bit bothered and aggressive in the speeder bike chase, but hardly unreasonably so, not in a way that looks like a guy losing control of himself. We've been told anger, aggression and hatred are the dark side and they're just not evident in Luke in the film before he meets the emperor. We can take note of the sinister implications of his black glove, but there's no follow-through in the character portrayal. And when he does meet the emperor, it is anger, hatred and aggression that's the problem, the very stuff that was absent before.

If Lucas wanted us to feel Luke was having problems with darkness, he should have shown it somewhere in the various situations he was in which aggression/anger problems might come to the surface in. As it is, it looks like Luke is having no such problems until he meets master manipulator Palpatine, in the presence of his father, while his rebel friends seemingly go to a doom orchestrated by Palpatine. So I don't see Luke as having any struggle with the dark side in ROTJ before he meets the emperor, because I don't feel it any time in the movie before he meets the emperor.

Contrast with dark siders Palpatine and Vader. Vader loses it every time an imperial screws up and then executes the guy. Palpatine seriously flips out once Luke refuses to be turned. This is the dark side. We see none of that in Luke in ROTJ before meeting the emperor. Nor anything like what Anakin showed in AOTC and ROTS. Look at Anakin in the Tusken village, or Anakin in his two fights with Dooku -that's the dark side. Loss of control, anger, malice. Like Luke when the emperor and Vader get him annoyed. But where is that or any hint of it earlier in ROTJ? Luke shows no sign of it. He's marked by distinct self-control. Thus the Luke-struggling-with-the-dark-side subplot does not work, except in his conflict with Vader and the emperor. Personally I suspect it was not something Lucas entered into more than half-heartedly, or else he would have put it more into the film.

There is a bit in the novelization where Yoda tells Luke there was vengeance in his heart when he was saving his friends. But this draws a big "Huh?" from me, because I see no sign of him being especially vengeful. The novelizations include things from Lucas that were for one reason or another not put in the film (maybe rejected? not considered important enough?), but they also include stuff invented by the novel writers. I don't trust the novelizations except where they agree with what's in the film (and then only as a guide to how we might be expected to interpret the film). Here the novelization is coming out with something that isn't supported by the film. 

Some people think the subplot of Luke struggling with the dark side is important part of what's good about the film. Personally, I think the film does fine with what's actually on the screen -the story of a nice guy who usually has no big darkness problems but who gets worked up when faced with the master manipulator who probably corrupted his father and who's orchestrated the probable deaths of his friends. Luke certainly struggles with the dark side when he's in the Death Star and that's enough for the story.

As for ROTS and Anakin's turn, I heartily agree with anybody who says that was badly done. We see clear signs of Annie getting dark as early as AOTC, but his actual turn doesn't work. One minute he's still a good guy and a short while later he's agreeing with Palpatine that jedi are going to attack the senate and he's going off to kill kids (and not Tusken ones he can pretend are animals). If there was a convincing actual transformation in that interval, it might work, like if he suddenly seemed evil and sinister and maybe powerful as soon as he turns, but he seems like a wet noodle right after his turn and then there's Hayden Christensen's lame attempts at making the character seem sinister and evil. Petulant sulks and big frowns do not a dark sider make.

Mind you, by what was indicated in the OT, Anakin should have gone to the dark side after he totally lost it and murdered a whole village in AOTC. I think it's revisionist that he was able to do that without going over too the dark side. Granted, it's supposed to be the first step, but it should have been a lot more than a step. 

The killing of the Tusken kids is a confused area. Clearly we are not supposed to feel it's as serious as killing kids in ROTS. Are we supposed to except Anakin's description of them as animals? After all, it's nasty to kill a whole lot of baby animals, but not as nasty as killing human children. In the OT, aliens are not always taken fully seriously as people. They are more so in the PT. But the Tusken Raiders are still portrayed as just vicious killers, as in them shooting at podracers for no reason. This leaves us in an uncomfortable position. We're in the new revised Star Wars universe that is full of increased integration of aliens and increased inclusiveness, but here we seem to be expected to treat the massacre of a bunch of alien children as not so serious. As if it's a mistake but not a cardinal sin. Padme just shrugs it off, while she's horrified by his ROTS child-killing. That double standard does not sit well the implied attitude of the prequels towards aliens.

EyeShotFirst said:

Vaderisnothayden said:

1. I'm never going to watch the second two prequels or the SEs.

Why is that? If you see them you'll understand better what went wrong with the prequels and what has happened to Star Wars. Those last two films are quite an eye-opener. They go wrong so horribly and in so many ways. I find it very interesting to analyze their fucked-upness and their mentality and mood. I think you could get much out of watching them and finding out what people here are talking about. Certainly, I think it is unfair to say ROTJ is similar to "the prequels", which indicates similarity to the dreadful later two prequels (along with the first), without having seen the two films you are comparing it to.

I am sorry but I believe it is better for him to not see them. Watching the prequels is like walking in your parents..... I am not going to finish that, we are adults here.

You basically ask yourself the same questions. "Why did I have to see that?" "Oh god my life is ruined." "I think I am going to be sick."

But really, I think it is better for Anchorhead to just end it with the OT. He is a happier guy for it. I wish I could be that way. But no, I am OCD, I have to see something complete. I love the Beatles, so I have all of there albums. I love Star Wars so I have them all. I wish I could love only one thing.

THE PT films bothered me too, but I'm much happier for having seen them. I'm not happy about what was done in them, but I'm happy I know that stuff and have some understanding of it. You can't know the prequels from having seen just TPM, because TPM is way better than the other two. The awfulness of AOTC and ROTS really needs to be seen. And some amusement can be gleaned from it. I'm into studying the prequels and their faults and I have reached the point where I can get quite a bit of amusement out of lines like "You underestimate my power!" and that crap about the high ground. Better to know something than to not know.

Good avatar, btw.

Bingowings said:

ROTJ was badly written, badly structured, directed in an anodyne way and at times it's painfully cartoonish (Henson style puppets around that time were very much the equivalent to the CGI creatures of today. ESB Yoda = LOTR Gollum, ROTJ Jabba's court = TPM Jar-Jar and most of the Pod Racers including Anakin).

While some of the special effects were amazing achievements those that were were undermined by some really sloppy work mixed in.

If it wasn't for the original cast (some of which are not doing their best) and Ian (who does a lot more work in the film than people give him credit for) it would be just as bad as the PT.

No major characters were killed in ESB but there is a palpable feeling of danger throughout.

Almost every loose end character is dispatched in ROTJ but at no point (even when I was 13) did I feel that our heroes were in serious danger.

The way Yoda is removed from the picture is almost comical in it's current form.

After a few weeks training Luke in the previous film and waiting for him to save Han, Yoda hangs on just long enough to die after a few sentences..."Hi Luke, nice to see you back, I've got a bit of a cough, I'm a bit old, actually I'm going to die right now, oh yeah Vader's your dad...Ben will explain the rest byeee!".

The whole film just feels like a giant post-it note floating in space saying, "Contractual Obligation Finale" in big amber letters.

George Lucas doesn't get Star Wars (he hates the "I know" line).

It's the heavy weight champion of paradoxes.

He gave us all this amazing toy and then charges us cash once in while to watch him smash it in front of us and we still come back for more.

 

ROTJ was badly written, badly structured, directed in an anodyne way and at times it's painfully cartoonish (Henson style puppets around that time were very much the equivalent to the CGI creatures of today. ESB Yoda = LOTR Gollum, ROTJ Jabba's court = TPM Jar-Jar and most of the Pod Racers including Anakin).

ROTJ's writing had some faults, but it was written much better than you seem to be giving it credit for. ESB's Yoda was way better than LOTR's overrated and unconvincing Gollum. Jabba's monsters were way more real than the horrible 2-dimensional cartoon cgi creatures in TPM. Not that there weren't some faults in the Jabba creatures -the Gammoreans weren't always convincing. But give me three dimensional creatures that at least try to be convincing any day over cartoon creatures that look 2d and seemed designed to be comical with no attempt at believability.

If it wasn't for the original cast (some of which are not doing their best)

There's a myth that Harrison did poorly in the film. But I looked very closely at his performance today and it proved to be the best performance in the movie. Leia isn't given a lot of good material, but Carrie Fisher is still good. Mark Hamill is at his best and does a great job maturing Luke. I don't see where they fall short. Lando is good. Kenobi is good. James Earl Jones is great. Quality performances all around.

Ian (who does a lot more work in the film than people give him credit for)

He does a very good job in ROTJ. It's overacting, but it's calculated controlled overacting that works as a believable distinctive character. Whereas his ROTS portrayal includes hamming that's just plain horrific wild hamming and falls flat. I now pretty much roll around laughing every time he does that horrific "gooood" in ROTS. He said "gooood" in ROTJ, but not in that awful overdone way.

it would be just as bad as the PT.

I think there's a lot more than good acting separating ROTJ from the PT. A lot of sincere feeling and heartfelt stuff. A conviction of vision. It's vibrant and alive and feels genuine. Maybe too cutesey at times, maybe a bit childish at times, but the foundation feeling is genuine. Whereas the prequels never ring true. 

The way Yoda is removed from the picture is almost comical in it's current form.

After a few weeks training Luke in the previous film and waiting for him to save Han, Yoda hangs on just long enough to die after a few sentences..."Hi Luke, nice to see you back, I've got a bit of a cough, I'm a bit old, actually I'm going to die right now, oh yeah Vader's your dad...Ben will explain the rest byeee!".

Maybe if you look for a fault there you can find one, but if you don't it works quite well. Luke's final encounter with Yoda and Yoda's death are portrayed well.

The whole film just feels like a giant post-it note floating in space saying, "Contractual Obligation Finale" in big amber letters.

Not at all. The film feels energetic, alive, vivid and heartfelt. There's lots of life and feeling. And the Luke-Vader part is striking stuff. There's tons of sincere real feeling in this movie, so it's way more than fulfilling a contractual obligation.

No major characters were killed in ESB but there is a palpable feeling of danger throughout.

There's a palpable feeling of danger in ROTJ. On the death star. In Jabba's palace. To be honest, I don't find that ESB always has a feeling of danger.

Almost every loose end character is dispatched in ROTJ but at no point (even when I was 13) did I feel that our heroes were in serious danger.

Maybe you didn't, but I did, as much as I felt they were in danger in the previous two films.

George Lucas doesn't get Star Wars (he hates the "I know" line).

It's the heavy weight champion of paradoxes.

He gave us all this amazing toy and then charges us cash once in while to watch him smash it in front of us and we still come back for more.

That much I can agree with, but with regard to more recent things than ROTJ. George did fine in ROTJ as far as I'm concerned. It wasn't perfect, but it was still a great movie.

C3PX said:

EyeShotFirst said:

 

But really, I think it is better for Anchorhead to just end it with the OT. He is a happier guy for it. I wish I could be that way. But no, I am OCD, I have to see something complete. I love the Beatles, so I have all of there albums. I love Star Wars so I have them all. I wish I could love only one thing.

 

I agree with this. Anchorhead didn't miss anything by not wasting his time or money on watching any of the prequels beyond The Phantom Menace. That movie was an absolute dog, he had no reason to expect the second one to be any better. I think he may have mentioned elsewhere that he figured he'd go see it if it was met with fantastic reviews and everyone talking about how wonderful it was, but that was not the case.

I don't really get the mentality of watching things that suck so you better understand how they suck, or even the need to see something through to the end even when you don't enjoy it. These things exist to entertain us, if we are not entertained, why even bother? Should I go see everything that sucks and also happens to be mildly related to something I love just so I can understand how it sucks and be able to compare the two? As if that would somehow benefit me in someway. It just doesn't make sense to me.

I have only seen AOTC two times I think, and I feel that is far too many times. Fortunately I only vaguely remember that films, and I certainly don't minds its memory slipping deeper and deeper into the obscure corners of my brain. I really cannot imagine any way how I am better off having seen that film.

 

VINH, don't you think you might be riding Anchorhead a little too hard? It is perfectly fine he thinks Return of the Jedi is crap, he has explained to you why he doesn't like it, and you have written off those reason as irrelevant or inadequate. There is really nowhere else for this particular branch of discussion to go. I know you want to engage the subject more indepth, but I don't think Anchorhead wants to play ball with you on this one. He has said his piece and heard yours, and being the old wise sage type figure my mind's eye probably quite inaccurately precieves him to be, I doubt he will make another post on the subject.

Now, with that said, to step into the conversation myself, I don't think I like Return of the Jedi half as much as you do, but I also seem to like it a good deal more than Anchorhead did. To me it is kind of a mixed bag, on one hand it has some of my absolute favorite parts of the OT, such as the speeder bike chase, the throne room finale, the space battle...*cough* Leia is a gold bikini *cough*, and on the other hand it also contains the parts I personally feel are the absolute worst in the trilogy (I think we have already discussed these at length). To me it certainly isn't worth throwing out the baby with the bath water on ROTJ. I can tolerate choking on a little cheese and fluff in order to enjoy the delicious steak that comes with it.

I don't really get the mentality of watching things that suck so you better understand how they suck, or even the need to see something through to the end even when you don't enjoy it. These things exist to entertain us, if we are not entertained, why even bother? Should I go see everything that sucks and also happens to be mildly related to something I love just so I can understand how it sucks and be able to compare the two? As if that would somehow benefit me in someway. It just doesn't make sense to me.

There's a lot more to be gotten from movies than light entertaiment. Analysis of a movie to tease out its mentality and figure out how it does things can be quite fascinating. And who says it's not entertaining to analyze how the films fuck up and laugh at their awful screw-ups? And the prequels are big for me no matter how much I dislike them, because they're where the Star Wars I love gets conspicuously fucked over and they're what we got instead of the long-promised other Star wars films we wanted all those years. They're a big issue. So I find it relevant to understand them and how they go wrong. And if I'm going to criticise them, I should know the material I'm criticising. You may feel there's no benefit in better knowing the stuff that ruined the franchise we love, but I do find benefit in such knowledge and understanding.

VINH, don't you think you might be riding Anchorhead a little too hard? It is perfectly fine he thinks Return of the Jedi is crap, he has explained to you why he doesn't like it, and you have written off those reason as irrelevant or inadequate.

I wrote them off as inadequate as proof that the film sucks, but I readily acknowledge that they're perfectly good as proof that he doesn't like the film. And it's perfectly reasonable for me to write them off as inadequate in defense of the film I love, as I do feel they are inadequate. He is entitled to dislike ROTJ all he likes, but if he implies that his reasons for disliking it are proof that it is a bad movie then I have a right to defend it against that criticism.

I don't see how I ever rode him too hard. I merely defended ROTJ against his criticism of it and defended my position that common criticsms of it are unfounded and unjust. Also, in my last post, I had to defend and clarify what I was doing, seeing as he seemed to be saying I was saying something I wasn't. And I disagreed with him about what we were both saying, because I didn't share his view of the discussion and I felt the need to make my view of it known. But I don't see that I rode him hard. I thought my behavior was quite reasonable in the situation and quite restrained. I don't feel I was the aggressive one in that discussion. 

On the other hand, I'm inclined to feel he rode me a bit too hard, with his unfounded accusations of trolling and baiting. Earlier on, he started his discussion with me on the ROTJ topic with what I felt was an angry and unnecessarily aggressive tone (though he denied that), but I still didn't expect accusations of trolling and baiting later on, as I felt I was being perfectly civil. I don't feel I wronged him anywhere on this board, but I do feel I have been wronged. I was pretty shocked and offended when I saw that accusation of trolling and baiting.

There is really nowhere else for this particular branch of discussion to go. I know you want to engage the subject more indepth, but I don't think Anchorhead wants to play ball with you on this one. He has said his piece and heard yours, and being the old wise sage type figure my mind's eye probably quite inaccurately precieves him to be, I doubt he will make another post on the subject.

And that is fine with me. My last response to him does not require any response from him. I was merely responding to what he said to me, as is my right. What he said to me needed answering.

And to be honest, I don't know if I'd reply to another aggressive post from Anchorhead. I don't come here for the arguments. I recently left a thread on this board because a poster was getting unnecessarily aggressive with me. I don't intend to leave this thread, but I may avoid replying to anybody who is repeatedly aggressive with me.

(Edit: Yes I asked him why he wouldn't see the later two prequels and tried to convince him to see them, but I don't consider that to be the same debate, because it's going off on a tangent. There was nothing hostile in my attempt to convince him to see them, merely a conviction that people are better off with knowledge than without. Nor was there any hostility in asking him why he wouldn't see them, just an interest in understanding his motivations. But if he doesn't want to discuss that stuff that's his right.)

C3PX said:

Vaderisnothayden said:

And who says it's not entertaining to analyze how the films fuck up and laugh at their awful screw-ups?

I do. It seriously doesn't entertain me. I don't enjoy watching crappy movies one bit, except sometimes when they are an amusing level of crappy, to me the PT isn't amusingly crappy, but rather just plain not fun to watch crappy.

I find my time better spent analysing good movies and what they got right. The way I see it, with how little I watch TV and movies, I will most likely die before I even have a chance to finish watching all the good ones, so why spend my time watching the bad ones, especially if I have already seen them before. Unfortunately, I have already seen Ep. 2 and 3, but I don't intend to ever waste time watching them again if I can avoid it.

Well, each to their own. But the prequels are important movies even if they're not good movies. They're supposed to be the Star wars prequels after all. And even if they aren't that, their claim to be that makes them important.

EyeShotFirst said:

I watched AOTC about 4 times. It doesn't really work, but I can still watch it. Now ROTS is the movie that really churns my stomach. I have watched 3 times. Only 1 out of those 3 was on my own accord. The other times I was at somebody else's house. I was hoping it was going to be good. AOTC really didn't bother me aside from Yoda and Hayden. But I gave ROTS the benefit of the doubt. I thought just from the poster that "Oh hell yeah, This movie can't suck. When the shit hits the fan George Lucas usually delivers."

My hopes had been bent over a counter and raped. I should have seen it coming. Everybody in the theater clapped and cheered. I was sickened. My family, who I thought had good taste even liked it. My mom thought it was the best one ever. I felt like an outsider when I told them at dinner that I hated it. It wasn't until I found this site that I realized that there are people who hate the prequels.

 

Good avatar, btw.

Thanks, Nien Nunb owns.

 

 

You're welcome. :)

I can understand the frustration over people thinking Revenge of the Shit is the best prequel. A whole dose of reviewers thought it was. One even called it the best Star Wars film since ESB, which REALLY pissed me off. ROTS was so bad it beggars belief. I expected it to be bad, based on my experience with AOTC and the trailers which had Hayden's I-frown-therefore-I-am-evil acting and some bullshit about "he is the chosen one". But it was way worse than I expected. The first time I saw it I had trouble staying awake during the earlier part because it was so fucking uninvolving. ROTS is bad in whole new inventive ways. Hayden's performance was like a nightmare. Natalie's performance was like a nightmare. Ian's hamming was horrific. Mace Windu was a pain the butt and so was fake Yoda. Everything about the movie was terrible. But I had to see it again, to understand how it managed to be so terrible and to make sure my first impression was fair. And there are times in my consideration of Star Wars when I have to go back to it to understand something better about what went wrong with Star Wars or the differences between the OT and PT. And by now I can get some amusement out of its moments of maximum lameness (sing "IIIIII have the hiiiigh grouuuund"). And I really do get a kick out of better understanding its fucked-upness. Star Wars being turned into shit is a matter of considerable emotional importance to me, and I like to understand it.

AOTC is pretty damn bad too. It's utterly flat, with zero real feeling, and everybody in it comes off 100% false. And there's so much uninvolving action (Jedi vs droids, clones vs droids, lightsaber battles, zzzz) and the awful Yoda vs Dooku swaggering match, complete with howling bouncing Yoda. And of course the romance, if it can be called that, which must be one of the worst romances ever put on screen. And let's not forget the stupid pointless droid factory obstacle course video game sequence.

I think we have gone a little hyperbolic.

Not really. The stuff is that bad.

Worse than the holocaust?

When did I say it was worse than the Holocaust? I never said anything of the sort.

As for accusation of being hyperbolic, let's look at what I said:

"ROTS was so bad it beggars belief."

-literal truth. It's unbelievably bad. In other words, it's hard for me to believe Lucas made it so bad. I'm still trying to get used to the fact that he made it so bad. So it does beggar belief.

"I expected it to be bad, based on my experience with AOTC and the trailers which had Hayden's I-frown-therefore-I-am-evil acting and some bullshit about "he is the chosen one"."

-again, nothing there that's not literal truth. And Hayden's acting in it did involve a lot of I-frown-therefore-I'm-evil.

"But it was way worse than I expected."

-again, literal truth.

"The first time I saw it I had trouble staying awake during the earlier part because it was so fucking uninvolving."

-literal truth. True account of what happened in my first watching of the film.

"ROTS is bad in whole new inventive ways."

-literal truth. It is. I'm not going to go into those ways here, but it is very inventive in finding ways to be bad.

"Hayden's performance was like a nightmare."

-Anakin and Vader being so horribly portrayed onscreen in a major Star wars movie would definitely qualify as a literal nightmare if some Star wars fan who cared about Star Wars dreamed it in a dream back before the prequels came out, so nothing hyperbolic here. It's a pretty accurate description and not over the top, considering how bad the acting was and how important the character is.

"Natalie's performance was like a nightmare."

-Similarly, if back before the prequels some dedicated Star Wars fan was having a peasant sleep and suddenly along came a dream in which Luke and Leia's mother was portrayed as incredibly stupid and incredibly lame plus weak and ineffectual (accurate description of how the character was played, NOT an exaggerration), then that dream would definitely count as a nightmare. So we're not dealing with hyperbole here. I wasn't exaggerrating how bad it was.

"Ian's hamming was horrific."

-straightforward statement of fact. It WAS horrific.

"Mace Windu was a pain the butt and so was fake Yoda."

-well, I didn't actually feel a literal pain my arse, but figuratively speaking they sure were.

"Everything about the movie was terrible."

 -well, in the strictest literal sense you might find something about the movie that wasn't terrible, but it's amazing how many different things in the movie were awful one way or another, so while there might technically be a bit of hyperbole here, there's not much. Most things about the movie were terrible one way or another. It was that bad. So it's a pretty accurate description and not really over the top.

"But I had to see it again, to understand how it managed to be so terrible and to make sure my first impression was fair. And there are times in my consideration of Star Wars when I have to go back to it to understand something better about what went wrong with Star Wars or the differences between the OT and PT."

-statement of fact.

"And by now I can get some amusement out of its moments of maximum lameness (sing "IIIIII have the hiiiigh grouuuund")."

-maximum lameness is a pretty accurate description. The film really does look like they tried to maximize the lameness.

"And I really do get a kick out of better understanding its fucked-upness. Star Wars being turned into shit is a matter of considerable emotional importance to me, and I like to understand it."

-it IS fucked up, not an exaggerration. And while Star Wars was not in a literal physical sense turned to shit (Lucas did not transmute old OT negatives to bodily wastes), turned into shit is an accurate figurative description of what happened to Star Wars.

"AOTC is pretty damn bad too. It's utterly flat, with zero real feeling, and everybody in it comes off 100% false."

-no exaggerration there. Well, maybe if you looked you could find somebody who doesn't come across false, but the important characters do and that's what I meant. I couldn't find any depth of feeling in it whatsoever, hence "zero real feeling". And it IS utterly flat. I meant what I said. I wasn't exaggerrating.

"And there's so much uninvolving action (Jedi vs droids, clones vs droids, lightsaber battles, zzzz) and the awful Yoda vs Dooku swaggering match, complete with howling bouncing Yoda."

-zero exaggerration here.

"And of course the romance, if it can be called that, which must be one of the worst romances ever put on screen."

-literal truth. The romance is so false it's questionable whether it deserves to be called a romance. There was nothing romantic about it. It was two people coming off totally false and lame. And as much as it could be called a romance it must indeed be one of the worst ever put onscreen.

"And let's not forget the stupid pointless droid factory obstacle course video game sequence."

-no hyperbole there either.

So I don't see all this hyperbole you see in it. And I certainly never said anything like it was worse than the Holocaust, nor would I. I take the Holocaust seriously. Nor was anything I said at all like saying the prequels were worse than the Holocaust, either in terms of hyperbole or in terms of offensiveness. I think the main hyperbole here is in your assessment of my post.

I said everybody in AOTC came off false. The literal truth is that not everybody did, but most characters did. Anakin and Padme came off utterly insincere and false. Kenobi came off like a pretentious poser. Yoda came off false, as he generally does in the prequels. Mace Windu generally doesn't come off genuine much anywhere in the prequels. Jango does not ring true as a character and nor does Baby Boba. The cloner aliens came off false. Bail Organa comes off like a moral-posing poser. Watto and Dex, being cartoon characters in a supposedly live-action Star wars film, do not come off real. Shmi didn't come off very real in TPM and comes off less real here. Zam Wessel didn't come off as much of anything. Daddy Lars is the only distinctly genuine character I can think of in the film. Owen and Beru don't come off as much of anything. I suppose 3PO and R2 are ok, but it's not like they stand out as especially genuine or false, they just run through an unoriginal routine. Dooku comes off like a pretentious poser, but maybe he's supposed to. Similarly Palpatine isn't supposed to come off genuine. These two coming off false, however appropriate, doesn't help in a film where most other characters come off false. The separatist aliens certainly don't ring true, and nor do the various jedi who appear. The jedi librarian Jocasta Nu comes off like a poser. You'd be hard put to find much in the way of genuine characters in this film. So loosely speaking it can be said that "everybody comes off false". It may be an exaggerration in the strictest sense, but it's not much of one. Hardly huge hyperbole that needs pointing out. 

Ok, I recant my previous statements.

But let me ask you a question, vaderisnothayden- do you think that the PT are the three worst films in the history of cinema? And BTW, I never said the PT was any good in the first place.

Yet I think that some people here on the site are unhinged, and IMO just as bad as GL in his treatment of the OT. And yes, I have acted pretty hyperbolic myself in prior years, but I realize now that  this way of thinking is counterproductive to the debate. Anyways, I AM NOT praising the PT/SE or fan gushing over Lucas, but I feel some persons make the PT out to be some great human atrocity instead of just a couple of bad movies. And that is what I was trying to say.

Flame on...

generalfrevious said:

Ok, I recant my previous statements. But let me ask you a question, vaderisnothayden- do you think that the PT are the three worst films in the history of cinema? And BTW, I never said the PT was any good in the first place. Yet I think that some people here on the site are unhinged, and IMO just as bad as GL in his treatment of the OT. And yes, I have acted pretty hyperbolic myself in prior years, but I realize now that this way of thinking is counterproductive to the debate. Anyways, I AM NOT praising the PT/SE or fan gushing over Lucas, but I feel some persons make the PT out to be some great human atrocity instead of just a couple of bad movies. And that is what I was trying to say. Flame on...

There are worse movies than the PT (anything by Jennifer Lynch, for example). But the PT is more than just a few bad movies. Because Star Wars was a classic beloved of millions and the PT totally screwed it up. That's not the case with most bad movies. If it was just a few bad movies, we wouldn't feel so strongly about it.

I don't think it's at all counterproductive to criticise the PT. There's a whole massive horde of fans out there who think the PT is the greatest thing and there's critics and other writers who praise/defend the PT films, particularly ROTS. And there's a whole Lucasfilm industry pushing the PT as the real Star Wars story while the OOT is crapped on. As long as all that's going on, criticism of the PT needs to be heard as a counterweight.

Ok, I understand you now. 

Vaderisnothayden said:

I don't think it's at all counterproductive to criticise the PT. There's a whole massive horde of fans out there who think the PT is the greatest thing and there's critics and other writers who praise/defend the PT films, particularly ROTS. And there's a whole Lucasfilm industry pushing the PT as the real Star Wars story while the OOT is crapped on. As long as all that's going on, criticism of the PT needs to be heard as a counterweight.

 See, I think you are buying into the internet too much, especially the wacko's at TFN.  The internet is such a small % of SW fans, and I would never think that this and that of the movies is determined by people who post regularly.

Plus, I think many PT fans are just spinning the trilogy and I think they know that the movies aren't as good as the OT.  Now of course there are always fanboys who like anything that comes out, that happens with anything in society, but what happened over at TFN is people bashed TPM so hard, and then bashed AOTC just as much, that they felt they had to defend these movies and just lie and say they are the greatest thing in the world.