Episode III - Trading Spaces in Space

I think the coolest thing about being a Sith has got to be your Confirmation name. You might be Harry Winklesteinwiener now, but when you become a Sith you get renamed "Darth Grievous Damage."

I learned a lot from watching Episodes I-III. For example, I learned that George Lucas is not the creative genius I used to think he was. Filmmaking is a collaborative process. Lots of people's creativity, blood, sweat, and tears get poured into any given movie - perhaps none more so than the original Star Wars trilogy (eps. IV-VI). I used to think movies by "auteur" filmmakers were the best kind of movie, but thanks to Episode III, I know that's not always the case.

Episode III begins with a long pan into a space battle. There are no cuts as the camera bobs and weaves and moves to follow a spaceship in a longshot that lasts several minutes. You can tell, instantly, that this is the type of movie George Lucas always wanted to make. It is the movie a technophile obsessed with special effects and a videogame tycoon would make. It is a movie made by a man who hates actors. Episode III might be a movie that George Lucas wants to see - but it's not really the kind of movie I'd like to see.

Episodes I-III resemble their predecessors only insomuch as the costume designs happen to be similar and they are all scored by John Williams. Apparently everything I loved about episodes IV-VI can be credited to Joseph Campbell, Lawrence Kasdan, and whoever else did the dozens of necessary rewrites. They may have worked from Lucas's original idea, but it turns out Lucas has good ideas that he executes very poorly.

In the end Episode III has some very good scenes. There are some good ideas buried somewhere in a crappy script and hidden behind those throwback optical wipes between scenes (why not a star-wipe? Throw one of those in there while you're at it). If your friend wrote Episode III and handed you the script, you might say, "There are certainly some good concepts here. I think another dozen rewrites and it'll be an awesome film." Apparently Lucas doesn't have friends anymore, only Yesmen.

A friend would tell you, honestly, that calling Jedi understudy youth "Younglings" is retarded, and it's embarrassing to see actors say the word "Younglings" on-screen. I guess maybe you could say it once, and it could kind of slip by - a tiny, cringe-able moment we could all forget about, but instead, we get to hear the word "Younglings" spoken at least three times. Seems like you would've caught the ear-grated qualities of that particular word if you read the script out loud to yourself, or say, did a table-reading with the actors... or maybe after the first take you'd realize it sucked. Or hell, in the editing room, hearing the editor put together scenes using the word "Younglings" you'd notice that it's pretty fucking embarrassing. But nope, not George Lucas.

In the Harry Potter novels, first year students are called "Firsties" and sometimes, "Ickle firsties." That's fine, in a novel. In a movie, it sounds pretty lame, although a bit less lame with a British person says it. Thank god they only say it once in the movie. Not like "Younglings."

While "Younglings" is a minor complaint, I think it is indicative of overall problems with Episode III.

I have often said that there are three types of movies: all-bad movies, all-good movies, and movies that fail to live up to their potential. All-bad movies can include anything from MST3K fare to regular B-movies to consistently bad Hollywood features. An all-bad movie can be enjoyable on a certain level for it's cheesiness. An all-good movie can be thrown into mediocrity with some sub-par scenes. But a movie that fails to live up to it's potential is truly the worst kind of movie. Moments of brilliance shine through occasionally, reminding you that the director could have made an all-good movie but failed. Inconsistent movies are the most disappointing.

I think we can all agree, as Star Wars fans, that Episode II - Revenge of the Clowns (ahem - Clones) was a really crappy movie. Yes, 20 minutes at the end of Episode II were really cool. We all wanted to see Yoda fighting and a big battle with elite Jedi forces. But this doesn't really make up for being visually and aurally assaulted for the first 100 minutes by some of the worst romance scenes in all of cinema history. After Episode II I vowed to buy metal spikes to drive into my eyes and ears during Episode III, just in case it was as bad or worse.

Well, the romance scenes in Episode III were just as bad. Or nearly as bad. I chickened out and didn't buy metal spikes. For some reason it didn't hurt nearly as bad as watching Episode II. I think it's the equivalent of getting sucker-punched vs. tightening your abs in preparation for someone hitting you in the gut. I was blindsided by Episode II's crappy romance, but Episode III's crappy romance did not take me by surprise.

I'd like to break here to conjecture that Padme wears like a thousand freaking outfits in this movie, and all of them are distracting and annoying (up to her traveling clothes, which are OK). But these non-stop elaborate costume changes are a real break from the narrative. For the love of god, it's like a Japanese dating sim where you can pick out what the girl wears! The most fetishistic of manga (like Chobits) will purposefully break the narrative flow for excuses to show the characters in different ridiculous costumes (a French maid outfit, junior high school uniform, a pastry store employee uniform, a swimsuit, etc.) Padme's outfits change in the same way.

Come on, people! How many outfits did Leia have? Like three or four? She dressed in all white, in Boba Fett's outfit, in speederbike gear, and as Jaba's memorable love slave - but that's four or five outfits across three movies. Padme wears a zillion outfits, just in this one movie. I don't even think it's to sell toys!

I have a laundry list of complaints about this movie. Most of the flaws are really obvious, so instead I'll focus my criticism on anyone who claims Episode III was a "good" movie, that "stands up to the originals." Episode III is a bad movie. A good movie doesn't have cringe-worthy scenes that punch you in the gut with how crappy they are. In a good movie the actors at least care about what they're doing, at least most of the actors - whereas in Episode III Ewan McGregor has given up. He's actually acting at cross-purposes with the director. In a GOOD movie most of the actors are giving their all, and there are some stand-out performances in the cast. In Episode III even Ian McDiarmid's (the Emperor) performance is kinda weird.

A good movie doesn't hurt to watch. A good movie can be watched more than once. I would watch Return of the Jedi again, in its entirety. In fact its inevitable that I will watch Return of the Jedi again someday. You know what I'm not going to watch all of ever again, or bother to purchase? Episode III. I guess it might be worthwhile to pick out some scenes on the DVD to watch again, but I wouldn't watch the whole thing, beginning to end, unless it was in an MST3K episode. There's a lot more to re-watch than in Episode II, but there are still huge chunks of Episode III that I never want to see again.

Episode II lowered our expectations, and we have to keep that in perspective. If a student gets an 'F' on an assignment, and on the next assignment he gets a 'C', sure, you could say that's a big improvement. But it's not an 'A'. All of the A and B papers in the class are still better than the C paper.

The New Yorker's reviewer says it most astutely:

"The general opinion of 'Revenge of the Sith' seems to be that it marks a distinc improvement on the last two episodes, 'The Phantom Menace' and 'Attack of the Clones'. True, but only in the same way that dying from natural causes is preferable to crucifixion."

To Episode III's credit - yes there are some good scenes. Some very good fight scenes (I wonder who choreagrapged them? I bet the initials of that fight choreographer are not G.L.). But some good scenes don't make up for the whole movie. It's like a broken clock. A broken clock is right twice a day. Episode III is like a used car where some of it's parts have been replaced with new parts. The owner proudly says, of the car,

"Sure, this car's a lemon, but the axles are brand new, the hub caps are new, and check out my kickass new stereo..." It doesn't really help when the car stalls out on the highway. A good car doesn't stall out on the highway. A good movie doesn't have scenes that hurt to watch.

Comments Individual Archive Index

May 22, 2005 02:28 PM, mom said:

Hey I think you are being a bit rough on ol' George. At least he knew not to have JarJar talk, to keep dialogue to a minimum, and to tie pretty much all the threads together. The volcano planet had a nice Hell-thing going on.

One question, in The Return of the Jedi, doesn't Leah respond to Luke, when he asks, "Do you remember your mother?" or maybe he says "our mother" and she says how the mother was very sad.

so...she was talking about the adoptive mother?

May 28, 2005 01:32 PM, Rick said:

Ok I just saw it and I have to say I don't understand why people are so down on the new trilogy. Sure the only reason I enjoy them is because they're part of the star wars series banking on the my childhood love of the original trilogy. But do you know why I love the original trilogy? Because of my childhood love for it. If the original trilogy were to be released today you would be complaining about it (and I would be too). All of your criticizisms of this movie would apply to the originals if they weren't shielded by your nostalgia for them.

The originals had plenty of ridiculous transitions from scene to scene (and I too was hoping that they would employ a star or heart wipe in ROTS since it was their last chance to do so)

Leia had quite a few outfits in the original movies that you weren't mentioning, her ice planet hoth outfit, the outfit she was wearing when she met Billy Dee Williams and probably a bunch of others that I've forgotten. But her various outfits were an obvious attempt to sell more action figures and were all a million times more noticeable than anything in this movie.

Yeah the movies have stupid dialogue and the originals may not have anything along the lines of "Don't let that kiss become a scar upon my heart" but they did have an awful lot of mystical crap about the force and were never what I would call an example of good dialogue.

C3PO's whining and bumbling is at least half as annoying as Jar Jar Binks was in the first movie.

This movie had the hot Sith on Jedi action that we all craved, so stop complaining. If you want to watch good movies have N. make you watch something by Bunuel.

As for your mother's question, the dialogue was

Princess Leia: Luke, what's wrong?
Luke: Leia, do you remember your mother? Your real mother?
Princess Leia: Just a little bit. She died when I was very young.
Luke: What do you remember?
Princess Leia: Just... images really. Feelings.
Luke: Tell me.
Princess Leia: She was... very beautiful. Kind, but sad. Why are you asking me this?
Luke: I have no memory of my mother. I never knew her.

And the official answer from fanboys on the internet is that Leia remembered her mother through the force and yes that is incredibly lame.

June 1, 2005 03:51 PM, Jen said:

I agree w/ Char, a little harsh on George. However, charactor development truly lacked in Episode III, and the timespan was weird, how do we know this war is lasting months? Padame's belly is growing, thats about it. Personally the sucker I am, I enjoyed understanding why Annikin and Padame were together and their love story. And why Darth is now so bitter and sad. I always felt sorry for him in the end of Return of the Jedi, taking the mask off and seeing this pitiful bald head with no hair, he didnt seem scairy more like laughable. Overall, I thought it was good.

June 2, 2005 10:34 AM, mightyplatypus said:

"If the original trilogy were to be released today you would be complaining about it (and I would be too). All of your criticizisms of this movie would apply to the originals if they weren't shielded by your nostalgia for them."

As someone who only saw the original trilogy when they were re-released in the 90s, I have to reply to the second comment. You have a good point when you say that they really aren't that great if you lack the childhood nostaligia. I found them to be rather mediocre. Reasonably fun, but nothing to write home about.

However- they are, in my opinion, still far superior to the more recent additions. The dialogue and acting are mediocre in the first three, cheesy but in a fun way. The same in Episodes 1 and 2 (I haven't, and don't plan to, see Episode 3) were disgraceful.

I have to agree with Rick regarding rewatching them. I would rewatch the first three. Not by choice, but I would be okay with doing so. I have no interest in rewatching Episodes 1 and 2, and would not be willing to do so.

June 2, 2005 10:56 AM, Jeremiah said:

Thanks for seeing this so that I didn't have to. I've been being assailed by differing viewpoints from people whose movie recommendations I can usually trust. But yours on top of another one I got recently have made me decide that even paying five bucks in Chinatown for a bootleg DVD would be money wasted. I'll put my ten towards your next party, instead.
Also, the Luke/Leia mother conversation was an inconsistency I hadn't seen pointed out yet. God, Lucas.

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