Episode VII is bearing down on us like a race car, so a retrospective on the entire series doesn’t seem amiss, right? Starting today, I’ll be watching one movie a week and rereading one novelization a week for maximum retention! Sorry, that sounds like I’m doing a weird digestive experiment. Never mind.
To start, the most maligned of the bunch. And before we all pile on, I wanna really dig into this movie because after rewatching, I find myself far less inclined to anger and the Dark Side in general.
Before we get into the movie itself, a few words about atmosphere, history, and critical analysis:
On my behalf, I am thoroughly dispassionate about judging the prequels in terms of my own level of “betrayal,” as it were. There are fans who are attached to Episodes I-III because they were young when they were released, or because they have fond memories of going to see them, or because they love all Star Wars in every form, and I empathize; no one is wrong to feel that way. But the prequels are still objectively terrible films. It’s an unavoidable truth of the universe. On the other hand, I have zero patience for the fans who say things like “You talked about the prequels like they were canon and, nope, they don’t exist, anyone who likes them is an idiot, THEY RUINED STAR WARS.” Dude, whatever. They’re movies. Whatever mean things you can say about them, they’re also still Star Wars. And as a Star Wars fan, I’ve made peace with them the same way fans make peace with bad television seasons. It’s not the end of the world.
I am deadly serious, here—it’s not that big of a deal. If you think it is, I advise you to sit down at your kitchen table and have a cup of tea every time you feel the urge to throw things/sob/write-another-hate-letter-to-Lucasfilm. (Every time I say something like this, there is an inevitable torrent of fan rage poured out in my direction, which basically proves my point; the prequels are a decade behind us, they don’t deserve this amount of attention—good or bad—for being not-awesome.)
When this movie came out I was only twelve, and being a kid, I adored it. The first new Star Wars movie since before I was born—why would I bother to critique it? I went to the theater dressed up as Obi-Wan Kenobi, with friends dressed as Amidala, Anakin, and Darth Maul. I read every snippet of background given out by companion books and the Star Wars Insider. I was spoiled for the plot (and then some) well before opening night. I had a terrible crush on Ewan McGregor for playing Obi-Wan, and I printed every production still I could find online and stapled them into “promo packets” for myself—one for ships, one for characters, one for locations, and on and on—staring at them before I went to bed each night in anticipation. That year, “Duel of the Fates” played on the MTV music video show Total Request Live, typically sandwiched between TLC’s “No Scrubs” and Ricky Martin’s “Livin’ La Vida Loca.” It was the only time I ever watched the show, and it’s still a bizarre thing to recollect now.
When I got a bit older and gained a better understanding of what constituted quality… I just phased the prequels out of my rotation. These days, I only watch them to jog my memory, which is fine. I have the Clone Wars television series available to be all the things I wanted the prequels to be. Vehemently hating Episodes I-III is counterproductive to me; I will always love Star Wars, and the prequels are still responsible for many things about it that I enjoy.
So I did my best to watch The Phantom Menace with a clear head. And here is what I think of it, fifteen years later:
The cardinal sin of Episode I is that it’s Too. Damn. Long.
At least an hour could be cut from this film and we would lose nothing. (And yes, I’m aware of the many prequel recuts where this film is shaved down to 5-30 minutes. It’s a common critique all around.) There are too many characters to juggle, and the movie somehow manages to have a dozen sub-acts shoved into the standard three-act structure. People talk SO MUCH. And I’m not one of those people who hates the political aspects of the prequels, I love those parts, but so much of the talking we are forced to listen to is not relevant. Amidala’s plea to the Senate? Cut that whole preamble where the Chancellor is recognizing people’s chairs and whatever. Anakin’s fate at the hands of the Jedi council? Cut the whole scene where they’re testing him and Yoda gives his “Fear is the path to the Dark Side” spiel. Revving up for the pod race? Cut Sebulba’s introduction where he threatens Jar Jar—we can tell he’s evil just fine during the race itself. Also, cut every scene with Darth Maul where he’s not fighting, and cut every scene with Darth Sidious that uses the word “treaty.”
In fact, cut the whole opening sequence, and start the movie with Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan landing alongside the droid army on Naboo. Then the title scroll will have interesting information to give us, instead of “The galaxy is sad about the taxation of trade routes??!?!”
CUT THE DAMN SEA MONSTER SECTION ON NABOO. WHAT IS THIS DOING HERE, IT IS POINTLESS. (Also, Qui-Gon Vulcan nerve-pinches Jar-Jar in that section, and it’s never set up or remarked upon again or reused as a Jedi power, what the hell.)
I could really go into the nuts and bolts of why so much of this film should have ended up on the editing room floor, but it boils down to the same thing it always does: no matter how much you love something, more of it isn’t always a good thing. And having so much filler in The Phantom Menace robs this opening chapter of all its gravity. Too many people are explaining the galaxy away, too many monsters are bearing their teeth, too many separate groups are squabbling for us to appreciate what’s supposed to be taking place in the narrative.
More importantly, it distracts the audience from what is actually interesting about the film. We never get the chance to understand why the people of Naboo would elect a fourteen-year-old queen (which is bad storytelling), but the real tragedy is in offering no explanation on the inner workings of a regal ploy where said ruler is surrounded by an entourage of lookalikes who take her place when she needs to do legwork, speak in code in front of strangers to convey information, and are willing to die for her at a moment’s notice. Forget galactic politics—you do not create the bond between Padme and her handmaidens and neglect to exploit that for all its worth. It’s easily its own movie, and that’s without bringing the fact that she’s Luke and Leia’s mother into the mix.
Imagine how different the world would be if the movie had been titled Episode I: The Queen’s War.
There’s also the realization that the intricate galactic politics we observe in the movie have effectively prevented the Jedi from doing their job for untold ages. After listening to Obi-Wan tell Luke about the glory days in the original trilogy, seeing the reality of this era is disturbing; Jedi doing the Republic’s dirty work, unable to help where they are needed, answering to a council that keeps its motives to itself. Qui-Gon is clearly a rogue element, and if the movie isn’t going to focus on Padme and her Magnificant Matching Brigade, then it should most certainly focus on him and his status as one of the few Jedi Masters on the outs with the Council.
No, just watch the one scene where he’s telling the circle of thirteen that Anakin is a convergence of Force Wheaties and that he should be tested for sparkle powers. It’s just a rotation of establishing shots where every Jedi capable of a facial expression is rolling their eyes to space and back. This guy, they’re all saying. He’s at it again. Today it’s the Chosen One, last week it was Midi-chlorian Yoga. If we don’t say yes, he’ll never go away.
Episode I: The Fate of the Master.
Then there’s the story of Anakin Skywalker’s birth, his childhood as a slave on a backwater world, the ways in which that upbringing will affect his development and create one of the worst tyrants the galaxy has ever seen. Poor Jake Lloyd got such a bad rap from this film, and it’s honestly not his fault; if you’re paying attention, it’s obvious that his dialogue is unreadable and he’s being directed atrociously. It also makes no sense that a fourteen-year-old girl is expressing deep affection for him after spending most of the movie talking about how she doesn’t believe in him, but that’s messy plotting for you. If you avoid all that, you’ve got a solid story to tell about a boy who is already being shaped by destiny and the strange, impartial will of the Force.
And no, he doesn’t have to come off evil for the film to work, no matter how many fans wanted that. (And a lot of them did, it’s still really weird.) The tragedy here is a child who tells Qui-Gon Jinn that he dreamt he was a Jedi who came back to free all the slaves on Tatooine, then growing up and enslaving countless others. A boy who wants to help everyone he meets corrupted by an order that tells him his emotions are wrong for the job.
Episode I: The Will of the Force.
There are certain missteps in this movie that are unfixable and it’s too bad that they can’t be scrubbed clean from history altogether. The accents given to the Gungans and the Nemoidians and Watto are straight-up racist no matter how you squint at them—it’s different when you’re looking at the Clone Wars cartoon and practically every species has a different accent, and none of them are portrayed as wholly good or evil. But a movie doesn’t have time to make those distinctions, and it’s impossible not to cringe.
The final act of the film is a raw, choppy mess of a thing. There are no less than four separate threads to follow, and only two of them are immediate enough to warrant our attention; the Queen’s assault on her own palace to arrest Nute Gunray, and the fight between Maul, Qui-Gon, and Obi-Wan. The Gungan battle exists entirely to make bad jokes at the expense of Jar Jar’s entire species, and the attack on the droid control ship is such an exact lift from the attack on the first Death Star that it’s utterly boring to watch. It makes the end of the movie a slog, which is such a shame.
For all that it was such a big deal in 1999 to watch Jedi in their heyday fight with lightsabers, the stunt choreography in this film is remarkably slow. The flow of action these days errs on the ultrafast side, impossible to follow, but this is an awkward opposite to that; when the fight is so easy to track with the eye, it makes every move look over-staged. We’ve already seen the Episode VII upheaval over Kylo Ren’s cross guard lightsaber for being impractical, but on a rewatch, I’d argue that Darth Maul’s double-blade is the worse offense. It’s completely ineffective because he’s using it like a quarterstaff—but quarterstaffs generally can’t cut through people like fake butter spread. The choreography is instantly better in the brief splice after Obi-Wan slices the thing in twain.
Yet even with all these missteps, there are puzzle pieces I can’t help but adore. The pod race is commonly derided, but I enjoyed it more than ever during this watch. It takes up time, sure, but it feels like it belongs in Star Wars even with all the goofy CGI aliens. Queen Amidala’s costume drama, her political theatre, is worth price of admission all by itself. I live for every new headdress, for the beading on each robe. Obi-Wan’s sarcasm, too pronounced in someone so young, is such a smooth contrast to Qui-Gon’s centered gravitas. And while the Duel of the Fates doesn’t seem quite as exciting as it did sixteen years ago, that final act, separated by walls of energy, is another perfectly encompassed story cell that does so much while saying nothing at all. (You could play it on mute without the context of the rest of the film and it would still hurt in all the right places.)
When all is said and done, I keep waiting for fandom to get over Episode I. Because there is too much going on here, too many discussions to be had about craft, about filmmaking, about myth building, and we miss out on them all by screaming into the void the instant the film is brought up. I enjoyed this rewatch, whatever flaws the film has (and it has so very many). And I find it far more rewarding to engage with it, then to throw it out entirely.
Emmet Asher-Perrin was kind of in love with sarcastic baby Obi-Wan, for real. You can bug her on Twitter and Tumblr, and read more of her work here and elsewhere.
I admit I still have a lot of fondness for this objectively terrible movie.
Having said that, the first thing I’d lose is the NASCAR announcer at the pod race. And after that, I’d probably take the Gungans and Neimoidians (and maybe others whom I’m forgetting) and replace their badly-accented English with subtitled alien gibble-gabble, a la Greedo and Jabba in the original trilogy.
Also: NO MIDICHLORIANS! I cannot emphasize this enough.
I do think that one stroke of accidental genius on Lucas’ part was casting Ian McDiarmid as the Emperor in RotJ and letting him come back and reprise the role in the prequel movies. Although I knew who he was from the moment he was introduced — I think the name “Palpatine” as Emperor appeared in the first page or two of the original 1977 novelization.
I agree that this movie gets judged unfairly. There are parts that are crap (anything involving Gungans and the Trade Federation, flat dialog), but there are parts that I genuinely love. I disagree with the final lightsaber battle. It is still one of my favorite out of the whole series.
For myself, I think the key to enjoying this movie is to follow Palpatine. This whole movie happened so that he could supplant Chancellor Valorum and assume control over the Republic. It is clear he could give two craps about Naboo, as it doesn’t really factor into the rest of the series at all. The whole prequel trilogy is basically him taking advantage of the corruption in the Senate to exact the Sith’s revenge. Creating Vader was almost an after thought. In that regard, I love the prequels. They showcased a Sith Master manipulating allies and enemies alike and coming out scarred, but on top.
Also, I always assumed Qui-Gon was using the Jedi mind trick to calm Jar-Jar in the submarine scene. It just worked a little too well because he is not only weak-minded, but dumb as a rock. I calming hand on his shoulder was just Qui-Gon being subtle.
We never get the chance to understand why the people of Naboo would elect a fourteen-year-old queen (which is bad storytelling)
How exactly is this bad storytelling? There have been child monarchs throughout history. The whole point of Padmé as a character is someone who spent her youth involved in politics and performing her duties, meaning she never had the time to indulge in a personal life, therefore forming zero emotional attachments, which is why she gravitated to the emotional Anakin.
Yeah, I can’t get through Episode II because of all the problems I have with the acting and dialogue, but I do still love this movie thanks to childhood nostalgia. Though I do love playing critic and imagining how I would change the movie, and you made some really good points about how the characters needed to be more distinctive and how that got lost in the spectacle and large cast.
Make Qui-Gon more overtly the eccentric Jedi who goes out and fights against evil and injustice (like charging into a Naboo blockade against the Council’s wishes) while the rest of the Jedi are cloistered monks who don’t want to get involved in politics until they’re forced to in later movies, and he drags around a sarcastic and embarrassed Obi-Wan who starts out pro-Jedi establishment but begins to understand his master’s point of view just in time for the tragic conclusion. And show how Anakin is inspired by his reckless rejection of authority that’ll get him in trouble later on.
And because the elected Queen thing was too confusing, have her be a monarchical, too-young queen whose parents died and who is supposed to just be a figurehead Palpatine could control/sacrifice in his power plots. Instead she comes into her own as a badass who refuses to surrender like she’s supposed to. And then have her abdicate the throne in the next movie so she can go fight injustice in the galaxy.
/end fanfiction mode
I recall an interview where George Lucas mentioned that while plotting the prequels 60% of the backstory was used for Revenge of the Sith, which leaves the remaining 40% stretched out over the other two films – hence all the padding.
I unashamedly love this movie, haha. I was 16 when it came out, and I was at the height of my Star Wars fandom. I watched it 22 times in the theaters and loved it each time, haha.
All that said I can hear what you are saying about the tighter editing. Looking back, it’s not my favorite, it doesn’t give me the same emotional highs the original trilogy did (although how can it – it’s a totally different story, and for me most of the satisfaction is seeing the backstory and at the time Palpatine was my favorite character from the OT so seeing him in action was just marvelous). But I will still watch it over AOTC. I would love to see more about Obi-Wan/Qui-Gon and more exploration of that dynamic and the OR Jedi.
I totally love the midichlorians too, so there :) At the time I was kind of obsessed with cell biology (in fact, I went on to get a masters degree in microbiology) so the whole combination of science and mysticism was right up my alley. I love that there are Force microbes! And really, we don’t know how they work at all. Perhaps they are just a concominant variable :)
I have to disagree with you on the Clone Wars series though. Ugh. We bought season 2 for Christmas last year and just now finished it, nearly a year later, and really had to force ourselves. Some episodes were great – but there were so many I just findboring and silly and I guess for some reason it’s hard for me to believe these are actual plots taking place in the Star Wars galaxy that are impacting the characters. And I think I resent Ahsoka’s introduction into the canon more than Jar Jar’s – especially as she often takes away from characters whose arcs I am actually enjoying. Honestly, I’d rather watch the interactions between Anakin and Obi-Wan, and Anakin and Padme, and see the other Jedi in action, more exploration of the Clones, and more of Obi-Wan and Satine, etc…than to see Jedi Mary Sue save the day again. (Sorry, I need to take this to the Clone Wars posts, haha. This reminds me I need to read your review of season 2).
I think the ultimate issue I have with the prequels is that they didn’t have the same balance that the originals had. The original three films had a perfect balance between the Jedi stuff and the galactic politics side of things. The prequel trilogies didn’t.
The main problem I have with this movie is there’s hardly any war in this Star Wars story. Could have started the trilogy with the Clone Wars and a teenage Anakin and nothing would have been lost. Unless trade negotiations are your bag.
But what’s done is done, and done to death. Cue the old Irish cop. “Move along, folks. Nothing to see here.”
A million times yes for that last paragraph! This rewatch review is great just because of that.
My biggest issue with the prequel trilogy is that it’s a chronicle of failure. Worse, it’s a chronicle of complete failure. We already knew going in that the trilogy would end with the bad guys winning and the good guys losing, with all but two Jedi wiped out and those two left living in seclusion. But the trilogy itself doubles down on it by making Palpatine basically invincible. He never loses, never is in any danger of losing. The Jedi not only don’t win any victories, they never even get involved in the fight; most of the Jedi who are wiped out in Sith are killed not knowing why they’re being killed. Every single thing that happens in these three films furthers Palpatine’s agenda and our nominal heroes are made out to be incompetent morons.
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
Forgive it for what? Being awesome.
I did not despise this as I watched it at midnight. Everyone in the theater really enjoyed the experience of watching it together, in fact… but it didn’t hold up. It was missing critical elements of the OT that made us long-time fans ultimately reject it. Its a bit of a hot mess.
As Emily pointed out, there are individual scenes that are very, very good. The podrace, lifted out as as a short, is great, fantastic entertainment. The lightsaber battles, while not holding up to recent movies and fight scenes, are still the best we’ve scene. Ewan McGregor and Ray Park were significantly more athletic than those who came before or after, and allowed for less stunt double work, which was great.
I read Terry Brooks’ novelization before the movie was released. I think that really helped me get inside the characters’ heads and fill in the cracks of what was otherwise awful, woefully inadequate characterization. And, of course, there is the immaculate conception of our hero/villain.
Since the Darth Plageous novels are no longer cannon, we are left without an explanation for that. It bugs me. I really LIKED the Plageous explanation. Its my head cannon until I hear otherwise.
I can’t say I particularly liked this Episode, but I don’t hate it nearly as much as Episode 6 (teddy bears defeating laser armed armies that control the universe is less believable than a 10-years old assisted by the force destroying a control ship).
That being said, I do love the mythology it established. The existence of Naboo, the first shots of Coruscant and the Jedi Temple, Qui-Gon, Darth Maul (especially when you combine it with Clone Wars and realize he’s still alive), Amidala. A lot of very good things and a lot of potential for tie-ins.
I do wish they focused more on that and the world as it was, with more emphasis on Jedi politics and their role in the galaxy. It makes it a little hard to care that they all die when you see them as useless.
Thank you for the rewatch, can’t wait for Episodes 2 (which I liked a lot) and especially 3 (which is my all-time favorite after 5).
And yes, Maul/Obi-Wan/Qui-Gonn is my favorite lightsaber duel precisely because it’s just slow enough to follow.
And by the time we got tickets all of the midnight showings of Phantom Menace were sold out, so we ended up seeing a 2:30 a.m. showing and driving home from the theater just as the sky was lightening in the east.
One interesting result of the prequels is that they turned the Jedi into tools of the bureaucracy who had forgotten to follow the will of the force, and this happened long before Palpatine started his fake war. (Slavery? Sorry, kid, we have to run errands for the chancellor. Love? You can love life, just don’t love any specific life-form.) Just old-fashioned regulatory capture. The Sith just took advantage of the rot, corruption and mis-application of their powers that was already underway. And it ultimately falls to Luke to find a third way (not Jedi or Sith) that allows him to love his family and friends without falling to the dark side trap.
Whether Lucas intended it that way, or it happened by accident, it’s one of the good things to come from the prequels, and I hope the new trilogy advances that story.
@VladZ, I’ll agree about the teddy bears (should have been Wookies), but the Vader/Luke fight in Episode VI is one of my absolute favorites in the whole saga because of the raw emotion that Luke fights with when Vader mentions Leia. Hamill really sold that he was a hair away from falling to the dark side in that scene.
I second the climax of Jedi as my favorite moment of the entire Saga. Watched it with my ten year old daughter on Saturday, and she loves everything Anakin. She cried when Vader asks Luke to remove his mask so he can see him with his own eyes, and then dies. I have difficulty seeing Star Wars as the story of Anakin’s fall and redemption. But watching her tear up in that moment, I realized that, for all the prequel era’s faults, children of the Clone Wars cartoon do experience Star Wars that way… and that’s kind of cool. More than kind of, actually. My daughter got to root for Luke to save Darth Vader, not defeat or kill him. And, as a father, that’s a message I can really get behind.
See, this is where I begin to get agitated with people who claim to be “critiquing” the prequels.
(Also, Qui-Gon Vulcan nerve-pinches Jar-Jar in that section, and it’s never set up or remarked upon again or reused as a Jedi power, what the hell.)
Actually, no, if you pay attention, you’ll hear Qui-Gon say “Sleep” to Jar-Jar, revealing that “vulcan nerve pinch” to be the same exact Force suggestion that’s been used from the start. It’s the equivalent to “These aren’t the droids you’re looking for” or “You don’t want to sell me death sticks” and “You shall be rewarded”. But no, we can’t recognize that it’s the same thing it’s always been, because the prequels are SO BAD it makes more sense to think they completely created a new Jedi power, unremarked upon, than to consider what actually happened here.
And here is where I peace out until I can finish reading this piece!
@18:
Or, because every other time we see force suggestion, it is accompanied by literal handwavium, rather than placing the fingers of the hand on the weak-minded fool’s neck/shoulder.
Please note, I’m not saying you’re wrong, in fact, I know you are right, and that’s exactly what Qui-Gon did. However, it certainly LOOKS like Qui-Gon is giving Jar Jar the Vulcan Nerve Pinch, so one can hardly blame people for seeing it that way.
My biggest beef with the prequels is droids using contractions; doesn’t, can’t, won’t… When did machines get so casual? Messy and lazy. Lucasfilm knew we would run and pay for anything they slap together.. and we did.
To me it’s sad that there is a whole generation who have grown up hearing from parents, older siblings, media, etc that Episodes 1-3 were utter trash and George Lucas sabotaged his own creation. At this point hate for the prequels is almost a fanboy trope. As an example, some media story on the latest Ep VII trailer included a tweet from a fan, exclaiming that there was “more Star Wars in that 30 seconds than in all of Episode 1-3.” Give me a break. Sure there’s some cringe-worthy stuff in Ep I-III, but there was also a lot of awesome.
I agree the best way to watch is to start with the Clone Wars, then episodes 3-6. That’s what I showed my kids, and they loved it. We haven’t watched Rebels, but it would be neat if they keep making animated shows fill in between movies and do the big set pieces more feasible with animation than live action.
When you start with the Clone Wars, it really does make Vader a character you want to see redeemed.
I find it interesting that so many people want to cut the first section with Obi-Wan and QG on the trade federation ship. I love the part with QG almost getting through the door and having the really badass druids show up and drive them off. It makes the universe better when at least some of the bad guys are prepared to face a jedi.
@19, When Luke used in RoTJ he did not wave his hand, but he did touch Bib Fortuna.
There’s absolutely plenty to love here. What is perhaps most interesting about it, though, as a piece of moviemaking is how explicitly it delineates what George is good at, and where he got by with a little help from his friends. It’s not precisely a secret that when he was making his bones as a youngster, Lucas wrestled with writing, flirted with animation as an alternative to dealing with humans, and was a little shy on a set where he was surrounded by a hefty slab of massively experienced British character actors- and so he got help, most notably with Empire.
What he does really, really well is summon up these distilled vignettes of the science-fantasy unconscious- the covers of a thousand emphatically drawn pulp magazines brought to life in all their telegraphing, evocative glory. Rescuing princesses from towers, binary sunsets, blowing up dams/Death Stars in rickety planes, bolo-ing giant robot war beasts- all done with a deftness that’s frequently imitated in the age of the modern effects spectacle, but tending to fail in the act of actually giving us an image clear enough to place ourselves into the action.
That’s what George wins at- and he wins at it plenty in Phantom. The podrace, the Venetian splendor of Naboo, the bubble cities of the Gungans, Darth Maul, Trantor reborn as Coruscant- this stuff is wonderful. So are the mythical poetry beats- the boy freed from slavery on the edge of a wager, the noble queen betrayed from within, the John the Baptist-esque notes of Qui-Gon not being the subject of prophecy, but the herald- also terrific.
It’s just that shit that happens in the middle- I believe they are known as ‘dialogue’ and ‘plot’ – that are pretty much completely disposable. There seemed to be a reach for a level of more sophisticated political discussion than the original trilogy that no one ever bothers to really finish out. There’s the whole serious implication that the Jedi are a broken institution whose distance from their own ideals is what’s really going to feed them to the wolves, and then we’re apparently just supposed to go on regarding them as heroes and buying their action figures. It’s plain as day that the heroic focus of this movie needs to be on Obi-Wan, as the carrier of the instructional lineage and an old enough character to have real volition in a story that hinges on plentiful violence, and instead we’re farting around with a tiny Vader, who is apparently here to teach us that victims of childhood trauma track inevitably- prophetically, cosmically- towards megalomania. Swell.
Anthony Pero@12 – oh, do I really have to explain this again? ;) If I don’t know CLB will beat me to it :) Anakin was not immaculately conceived. He was a virgin birth, which is completely different. Despite the fact it that it sounds like one of those ‘sex is icky, therefore a virgin birth is an immaculate conception’ ideas that slots in nicely with the ideas a lot of people have about Catholic teaching, the Immaculate Conception refers to Mary’s conception (which certainly involved sex) and the fact that she was a pure vessel to ultimately hold the Incarnation, because she benefits preemptively from salvation.
As to the rest of your posts the thing about your daughter wanting Vader to be redeemed and crying at that scene is ridiculously awesome and beautiful and in some ways gets to the heart of what this is really about. And YES about that scene in RotJ. Even without seeing the prequels or Clone Wars series, it is powerful. Which is why, despite it just being a movie, the series actually WILL be dead to me if they go the Luke is evil route.
(Also, yes to the comments at 15 and 16 – I find the evolution/devolution of the Jedi interesting and so I hope the movies continue to explore Luke’s path. In a non evil way.)
@@@@@ 3
How exactly is this bad storytelling? There have been child monarchs throughout history.
Yes, but were any of those elected?
I was also 12 and also adored it, and it’s still my favorite episode, even though it’s not the one with the rancor keeper and the Sarlacc. Because sea monsters, Jar Jar, podracing, Darth Maul, Qui-Gon’s compassion, kid Darth Vader, and did I mention Jar Jar? Basically, I love anything aquatic and have much more trouble getting interested in movies about things that aren’t. :-p
And to the various who have talked about the Clone Wars series and how other generations experience it, it’s something that is interesting to me as well since my son enjoys the Clone Wars series, and it is kind of weird to be watching/rooting for this character that we know is ultimately going to end up slaughtering children (which, as an adult/parent, I now kind of wonder if was going a bit too far in terms of ‘redeemable’. I mean, I believe theoretically anything can be redeemable, but do we see Vader actually do enough atonement/introspection/contrition for that? Perhaps there is Jedi Purgatory he had to go through before we see him become a happy spirit ;) ) but I think that DOES lend a really interesting perspective in terms of wanting (along with Luke) to see him redeemed and seeing what Luke might have glimpsed.
(Which again, is why I just don’t get the ‘it would be so cool if Luke was the villain’ people, because why would you enjoy seeing somebody FALL? I mean aside from cautionary or origin stories, I guess. But I’ve heard several people say they just think it would be cool for no real reason.)
I went to the midnight showing at age 17 thinking, “It’s gunna be uuuugee!” To prep I read the Terry Brooks novel since I enjoyed most of the extended universe series’. As I watched the film I was glad I had read the novelization because I could use the novel to fill in all of the elongated, awkward conversations and overly long silences. I almost fell asleep during the Naboo political sequences until the subwoofers woke me up whenever a Trade Federation Droid Armored Assault Tank came on the screen. I almost wished they had taken a Dune or Look Who’s Talking approach and provided actor audio for their thought processes to help fill in those gaps. I think the book was the reason I found Episode I to be more palatable than II and III. Although the most awkward choreography moment was not the Double Bladed saber, Emily. It was Obi’s arm launch out of the power shaft, lazy air flip over Maul while obviously force pulling QGJ’s lightsaber, igniting it, and casually slicing Maul in half. All the while Maul watching and being completely cool with it. Now the book explains the lightsaber force pull moment through Obi’s use of the Dark Side and that’s why Maul wasn’t concerned at all. All I could think of afterwards was Martin Short’s performance in The Three Amigos when he duels the German gunslinger after being accused of film trickery to speed up his draw times. Could have used a little of that film magic right then.
Overall, if Anakin had just been the same age as Padme everything would have made so much more sense to me (their gross forced magnetism, the Council’s reaction to QGJ’s request to train the kid and his decent into anxiety based control issues).
I saw this at a midnight showing during finals week in college, so I was 22 at the time. I thought it was okay; not great, but I certainly didn’t hate it. In fact, the very end had me hopeful for EpII: Remember how Obi-Wan strikes down Maul in anger? Surely that was the perfect place to plant the seeds that would result in Anakin’s fall, as he goes through his training guided by a master who once gave into his hate. But, alas, nothing ever came of that…
Anyone read the “William Shakespeare’s Star Wars” adaptations by Ian Doescher? They’re fantastic, but they highlight the fatal flaw of EpI: while Doescher’s dialogue is entertaining, and though he makes the characters interesting, he can do nothing about the plot, which remains so dreadfully dull.
I have several stories to tell about Episode I. I was and still am completely obsessed with Star Wars and even though I can barely make it through I-III these days I have watched them A LOT since they came out. I was 17 when Episode I was released and in full Star Wars hysteria. I camped out for a week, yes a full 7 days, at the local Edwards theater to get my ticket for the 12:01 showing and I still have it, full protected in a 1/2″ thick case. I actually got kicked off the track team just before State because I missed several practices when I was camping out. I do not regret it in the slightest. I don’t know the exact count but I saw Episode I at least 10 times in the theater. On opening night, also in my full Jedi home-made costume I had my mom put together, I was put on the spot to go down in front of the theater and lightsaber fight with my friend. I didn’t go down and duel it out, which I do regret, but my buddy got the whole theater chanting my name, on opening night of Star Wars. It is a memory I will cherish and take with me to the grave.
All this being said, Episode I really is not a very good movie. There are parts that I really like, mainly the Duel of Fates, but overall, especially in retrospect it is not good. I have been accused of not being a true Star Wars fan because of this opinion. But whatever, I still have never lost a game of Star Wars trivial pursuit and I don’t know anyone more excited to watch Episode VII in the theater 10 times than me.
Episode 1. This is my most favorite of the SW movies. I will never understand why star wars fans continue spreading hate about it.
After listening to Obi-Wan tell Luke about the glory days in the original trilogy, seeing the reality of this era is disturbing; Jedi doing the Republic’s dirty work, unable to help where they are needed, answering to a council that keeps its motives to itself.
This is why the prequels are great! You begin to understand how Anakin, until he makes the conscious decision to support Sidious, is mostly blameless for his fall to the Dark Side. The Jedi are hidebound and incompetent, beholden to traditions that have isolated them from the lives and experiences of regular people in the Republic. And Obi-Wan, loyal company man that he is, can’t even see it, not even 20 years after the fact. And I LOVE that that is their reaction to Qui-Gon. It’s reminiscent to how the Democratic Party in the US regarded Bernie Sanders, when their disregard of him has done them a great political disservice, so to does the Jedi Council’s disregard of Qui Gon come back to bite them in the ass. It’s the puncturing of the mystique of the Jedi established in the originals, and it’s a lot of fun to watch.
Because there is too much going on here, to many discussions to be had about craft, about filmmaking, about myth building, and we miss out on them all by screaming into the void the instant the film is brought up.
Thank you.
It’s not that this movie doesn’t have it flaws, most the ones you list I agree with. It’s just that the bones of a good story are there, and I am SO TIRED of having to try and find those bones over the screams of a thousand butthurt fanboys.
@24 and then we’re apparently just supposed to go on regarding them as heroes and buying their action figures.
Sure, you can support good hearted individuals stuck in a broken institution can’t you? Like, I don’t spit on cops everywhere I go, despite evidence that they as an institution no longer view protecting and serving as part of the job description, I can recognize that most of them just want to do a good job.
a tiny Vader, who is apparently here to teach us that victims of childhood trauma track inevitably- prophetically, cosmically- towards megalomania. Swell.
Except it’s not. The fault for Vader lies clearly with the people who took on the adult responsibility of providing for a traumatized child forcibly separated from the only life he’s known, after living his youth in slavery, who absolutely FAILED at getting him the help he needed to process his trauma and heal.
@15, A emphatic YES to your whole comment.
Look, this is not a great movie, but I don’t understand why it gets singled out among the prequels. Attack of the Clones is the worst film of the bunch. It’s plodding, shapeless, and boring. Worst of all, it fails at its crucial task–make us give a crap about Anakin Skywalker. His romance with Padme is supposed to provide the dramatic fuel for the tragic arc of the prequel series, and it goes over like a lead balloon. The Phantom Menace is harmless fun in comparison.
This is a great write up, and actually encourages me to rewatch the film. Not because it isn’t a bad amalgam of missteps and missed opportunities, but because there are some scattered pleasures that I’d not thought of in a while. Specifically, the idea of Episode I subtitled ‘The Queen’s War’ is brilliant. In fact, the failure of Amidala to be created as a fleshed-out, compelling character is probably the most under-the-radar failing of the prequels. We didn’t need to see Anakin as a kid; this film could’ve made itself count by focusing on the queen for real (or the Jedi, but that’s another story).
Re: The Clone Wars series, I am a more or less ‘old school’ fan who was at an age that the prequels didn’t go over too well with me–I did and do like Episode III–and in the past several years, TCW restored my enthusiasm for the saga in a remarkable way. The show isn’t perfect, but as Emily says, it managed to be nearly everything that the prequels fell short of being (for me).
Ahsoka is the female counterpart and apprentice that Anakin always needed, and all of the other Jedi Masters get actual screen time and character development. In retrospect, I think that Episode II should have literally been ‘The Clone Wars’ and covered the same basic ground as the show. It would’ve lent even more weight to Order 66 and the fall of the Republic.
The Phantom Menace looks absolutely beautiful, and has some kickass action sequences. It also has serious flaws, which I ascribe to nobody being able to tell George Lucas “no”.
I do not understand why anyone would be upset at someone who mentions these flaws. Do the imperfections not exist, do they not matter because of all the shiny, or what?
I have to strongly disagree with Emily on action sequences, though. The more recent ones where the action is too fast to follow bore me because I lose track of what is going on. Not being able to process the action means that I do not experience it as well as I would like.
Thanks for the insightful analysis, EAP!.
One thing this blog didn’t touch on… and not sure if the author caught it, but there’s another ‘version’ of Phantom Menace that is worthwhile to watch, but it wouldn’t require very many edits — just complete revisions to the scripts of Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith.
If the crazy-but-very-well-backed-up theory that Jar Jar Binks was originally supposed to play the part of the villain acting as a “fool,” as a force-wielding (potentially Sith) villainous foil to Yoda… then the answer to this blog’s question is YES! If that theory is true, and George Lucas lost his nerve because of the hatred of Jar Jar, then it was a huge lost opportunity. That reveal would have been more mind-blowing than Darth Vader being Luke’s father, and easily would have rivaled it in cultural relevancy.
I desperately wish George Lucas would come out and say it was true. It would explain just why he desperately wanted Jar Jar to work as a character, and was caught on camera talking about how getting Jar Jar to work was “key” on a video in the lead up to Attack of the Clones. I say that even thinking it would be a bad idea to make Jar Jar a villain in the new trilogy, as some crazy theories are suggesting JJ Abrams secretly has planned (the ship has sailed on Darth Jar Jar)… but just *knowing* the original intention of Jar Jar, with some idea about what he would have done in Attack of the Clones (with him perhaps acting as the villain of that movie instead of comes-from-no-where/why-do-we-care-about-him Dooku), would be freaking amazing, and make Phantom Menace a far more relevant and important and, in hindsight, entertaining movie.
If Jar Jar isn’t a villain, there’s literally nothing (not a single thing!!!) in Phantom Menace that the audience needs to know which isn’t explained in Attack of the Clones.
@40, I always assumed that Jar Jar’s importance in “needing to work” was based on him being a fully-CGI character, Lucas being somewhat preoccupied with technical details like that.
How exactly is this bad storytelling? There have been child monarchs throughout history.
Yes, but were any of those elected?
“Mr Speaker, members of the House, I will be brief, as I have rather unfortunately become Prime Minister right in the middle of my exams.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J9SQR04rVfU
I still remember watching the OT for the first time and loving it and simply wanting more Star Wars. Then, like a month or so after, I learned about Episode I being filmed. I was 12 and it seemed all my wishes are coming true. So yeah, I loved it. Watched many times. All the prequels.
It all changed pretty suddenly, when I was going through some old stuff in my drawer and found this piece of paper… I’ve written it after seeing the OT, but before the Episode I, it was basically fanfiction, and there was a picture (wel, doodle) in the corner – of Yoda duelling some Darth-someone (word Sith didn’t exist yet!) on Dagobah, while Luke and Leia’s mother (yet without name) is hiding with little Luke and Leia nearby in a hollow tree. And it reminded me, how I imagined the prequels, before I saw them, and it was so much more epic and awesome. They basically looked like the OT, with the same 80’s magic, Jedi were more like a secret order, and Obi Wan was more of a rebel and the story was centered around him.
Since then, I feel disappointed by the prequels. They could have been so much more. I still remember the time when I liked them though, so I’m no hater. But can I forgive them… don’t know yet.
My kids were little (3 and 4) when this came out so, in addition to my own inner fanboy, I watched it through the eyes of my kids. The kids who loved them and loved all the characters (even Jar Jar) and who wanted the Darth Maul/Obi-Wan/Qui-Gon banks with interactive lightsaber fighting action or the giant inflatable Darth Maul chair. Watching it later, yeah, I liked it less, but I still can’t find it in my heart to hate any of the prequels – and, yeah, I still like parts of all of them (and pretty much ALL of episode 3).
Twice we have to see a smaller fish swallowed by a bigger fish. Maybe Lucas was signalling the echos coming throughout, but Star Wars doesn’t have time for subtle. It’s supposed to be “faster, more intense” all the way through. And please, let’s stop blaming Jack Lloyd. He was just a kid who read his lines. He couldn’t know a bad line when he saw it, couldn’t know he’d have to go above and beyond to make it half-work, or what ‘above and beyond’ was. He trusted the people in charge, did what he was told, and lived every kid’s dream doing it. I’m really sorry about the legacy that it left him.
Ahhh The Phantom Menace. Still holds the title of “my least-liked SW film”, but I cannot hate it. This came out before I’d really gotten into Star Wars…I was 12 and my dad was going to take me to see it, but we never got around to it. AotC was when I really started getting obsessed!! Consequently, I really can’t even remember when I first saw TPM or what I thought of it…but I know I enjoyed it! Certainly not as much as the OT…but, well – it’s Star Wars, and hence I’ll still throw it in every now and again for a re-watch.
Parts I love: the opening scene(we get to see two Jedi!! being awesome!! young Obi-wan!! Nemoidians fear over crossing the Jedi!!), every single bit with Maul(…duh), any scene with the Trade Federation army(I’m sorry, I just love watching their droid army – all the different types, all the super technology and wondering how it all works…just fantastic – so interesting to me =)), the pod race(young Anakin being amazing at flying – just like Luke!!), all of Qui-Gon and Obi-wan’s interactions(they’re just hilarious together…too bad they’re separated for so much of the movie…), and the Duel of the Fates(of course).
Parts I don’t quite as much love: Most of Tattooine(it just…drags too much. That dinner scene. Ugh), the whole end-space battle(like someone previously said…it tries to capture the magic of the Yavin IV space battle…and it fails miserably. Such a terrible, terrible space battle).
Again – I don’t hate this movie at all, and do enjoy re-watching. I think one of its cardinal sins is not giving us characters to really care about. ANH – we had Luke! Han! Leia!! TPM – we have Anakin! Padme! Qui-Gon!! Obi-Wan!! Not quite the same. Sadly.
Thanks for this write-up, looking forward to the rest!! (Can I also assume you will be writing a full review of TFA at some point? =))
@26: I don’t know if there have been elected kids in history, but who’s to say it wouldn’t work? Each society works with its own system. Why not introduce a radical political concept in fictional storytelling? It’s called world-building. Having a system in which queens happen to be democratically electable 12 year old Naboo girls (Padmé wasn’t even the youngest queen) makes for a more interesting scenario than let’s say, a boring Imperial Senate comprised of fear-mongering adult male governors like Tarkin.
And besides, it’s a work of fiction in a Flash-Gordon-inspired universe. I think we can live with teenage royalty.
The sad thing is that this is actually the best of the prequels. Attack of the Clones is just tedious, Revenge of the Sith makes no sense at all, on its own or in explaining backstory from the original trilogy, and blows its every emotional beat. Most of the faults in The Phantom Menace are repeated in the next two episodes, but they get new problems on top.
@43 – hah, I am practically in the same boat! I was 14 when I first saw Star Wars (I know, I know, that’s old – it was when the Special Editions came out) and became almost instantly obsessed, and then within a few months found about the prequels. It was pretty much the highlight/dominating cultural force in my life for those years, haha.
Hah, I also have a fanfic hanging around about how I imagined the hiding of the twins going down. I think I wrote it in between AOTC and ROTS though.
@44 – I had those banks, lol. Man, I forgot about them until now.
I love your analysis of this movie. I was about 8 when it came out and I loved it. Padme as the 14-year-old queen was the coolest thing ever and Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon were my new favorite characters. There was a series of books that followed Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan from the time Qui-Gon first took Obi-Wan on as an apprentice to Episode I and they were my favorite. (My memory of the specifics is fuzzy, but I remember Qui-Gon still being the almost rogue Jedi Master who did what he thought was right even against the council, and Obi-Wan learning to be as awesome as him. I loved them and they cemented my adoration for Obi-Wan throughout the prequels. They also made my heart break whenever Qui-Gon died in the movie, because I felt like I knew him.)
As I got older I started to see the flaws in the movie but I still loved Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon, and parts of the politics. Padme is still pretty cool, but I’m usually haunted by the knowledge of the dumb romance coming. Little kid Anakin didn’t bother me too much, mostly because he was a little kid and my acting standards for kids aren’t high. But I still don’t watch this movie often. It’s just not very good.
Side note: I never understand why people hate Episode I the most. Episode II will forever be my least favorite. It managed to make me hate Anakin and the romance between Anakin and Padme was so poorly executed that even my 10-year-old self couldn’t stand it.
Imagine how different the world would be if the movie had been titled Episode I: The Queen’s War.
I want this now please.
By the way, I am so excited you are doing this rewatch – and I was rereading your intro and realized it was also a re-read! Awesome!
I can’t wait to talk about the RotS novelization. I think of all of them it is my favorite. It might also be my favorite soundtrack (heh, how about a Star Wars re-listen!).
I’m one of those old guys who watched the OT in the theater back in the late ’70s and early ’80s. I was 7 when Star Wars came out and somehow got my parents to take me to see it multiple times. Ditto for TESB. By the time RotJ came out I was old enough to be annoyed slightly by the Ewoks, but still loved all three movies. That definitely colored my opinion of TPM. I didn’t hate it (with one exception), but I was disappointed. I never felt it lived up to the OT. It went on too long, and Lucas’ blatant political commentary (Nute Gunray? Really? Could it be any less subtle?) didn’t help. But what really killed it was Jar Jar. One of my wishes for the new movie is that it reveals Jar Jar was on Alderaan when the Death Star destroyed the planet. Except that would be too quick. I don’t think the theory about Jar Jar being the intended villain is correct – nothing in the prequels indicates that Lucas could create that deep and complex of a story – but I wish that it was. That would have at least made sense. When you’re trimming down the movie by an hour, include trimming him out completely and I’ll watch that.
@30: I enjoyed “Shakespeare’s Stars Wars” muchly, especially all the new speeches by the TPM sea monsters, Jar Jar, the rancor, and the rancor keeper. If only the Sarlacc had gotten some lines.
Never understood how anyone could hate Jar Jar, but I am incapable of hating anything with webbed feet.
It has a flawed view point. It should have been the story of how Obi Wan lost Anakin to the darkside. The actors are not to be faulted but I don’t buy into Anakin’s modivations. I can point at different fight scenes that I love but overall I do not feel that there is much depth to the stories and characters in the prequel movies
Years after I saw the movie, I saw a documentary from when the movie was being filmed. In it, George Lucas was describing a new character he had introduced, a character that would be CGI, and primarily be there for comic relief. As I remember it, he said, “I hope this character works, because if it doesn’t, the movie doesn’t work.” So he pretty much called it before he had finished filming.
But to me, the worst point in the movie was when young Adolf Hitler, I mean Darth Vader, yelled, “Yippee!” as he careened through space.
I enjoyed all the Star Wars movies, and even the prequels, because even bad Star Wars movies are still fun adventure stories. But there is a reason why good authors learn to leave backstory in the background, and the prequels prove that point.
I believe the initial trade federation scene gave us one of the best Star Wars lines “Now there are two of them…?” I don’t hate the Phantom Mencance…some parts of it I love. Qui-Gon is one of my favorite Star Wars characters despite beging the origin of the term midi-chlorines. The film could have done more with interesting story lines..like how are these two species sharing the planet…? Electing a teenage Queen…etc etc. I liked the intro though…that was actually cool but I lot of scenes coul have been cut away.
Hey, overall I appreciate this article. More than I appreciate this film.
To the comment of “Episode I ruined Star Wars!”, I agree. It didn’t ruin it, it can’t. But it diminished it. I like sushi, and gravy isn’t a bad thing, but don’t put gravy on my sushi. It makes it harder to enjoy. In a similar way, the prequels put a lens on the excellent original trilogy that diminish my ability to enjoy it. I don’t avoid the prequels because I hate them but because I want that dang gravy off the sushi. Every year I don’t watch them, I forget a little more…
I really appreciate all the analysis in here about the strengths of Episode I. More than the other two, it was a strong movie with moments of agonizing acting, scripting, storytelling, or what have you. When surgically removed, there’s a surprisingly strong skeleton and I like dwelling on all the things she’s called out – the role of the Jedi, the character that the queen could have been, etc. It’s too bad that the best the Phantom Menace had to offer didn’t make it to the surface.
As for the other two… yeah. As for the other two.
I re-watched Ep 1 a few weeks ago. I saw nothing to change my mind about it…it’s a bad movie full of some very good moments and some wonderful scenes.
Though the Amidala plot wasn’t great, I loved it anyway, and loved her character even more in the next two films. Yeah, getting interested in a young Anakin is a little creepy, but that’s life.
The pod race is one more fun than most racing scenes in better films. And though the battle between the Gungans and the battle droids is crap, the whole lead-up to it, with the two armies preparing, is awesome.
Probably the best thing about this movie is the opportunity to hear new John Williams Star Wars scores. That’s worth the price of admission.
Episode 1 came out when my oldest son was old enough to enjoy it and my youngest son to be captivated by it. To them, especially the youngest, it is their formative version of Star Wars. I can’t agree with that, having seen the original film between my junior and senior years in college, but at least I’ve trained them to see the worth of the story as a whole.
I know it’s not canon (now), but the Darth Plageuis novel did wonders for my understanding of the prequels. Probably as much as watching the Clone Wars series did for the 2-3 gap. I did not read the prequel novelizations.
Noooo…., where is the Potterness? :( ;)
I’ll admit I have a soft spot for this movie and think its average. Not as good as any of the Original Trilogy but light-years ahead of the next two movies. I think it is telling, however, that a significant amount of this movie’s problems have been solved by fan-edits/dubs such as The Phantom Edit. With good editing, this rapidly turns into a good movie. With a few changes, it probably could have been great. Top of my list would be simplifying the political details/clarifying parts, aging up Anakin so he has agency of his own and can be Padme’s equal, not killing Maul and toning Jar-Jar/the Gungans down pretty hard (and have them fight alongside the Naboo on the streets of Theed).
teg
So many great comments in this thread; everything I was going to post has already been said (and much more cleverly, I might add).
1. The Midichlorians are an Abomination Unto Nuggan and are, therefore, not to be countenanced. I wouldn’t mind if they were attracted to beings strong in the Force; but this great, galaxy-spanning energy has been reduced to essentially a bacterial infection.
2. Even Jar Jar could have been fixed if he had been given some kind of interior life; had he become the holy fool, someone through whom the Force operates without knowing it, how much better would that have been?
3. Anakin’s a virgin birth? Seriously? I mean, DAMN. Why not just let him be a whiz kid and be done? I checked out the second someone said, “He is the Chosen One.”
4. Finally, and most importantly, George Lucas should have let someone else write the screenplays. Whatever Lucas’ gifts as an artist, WRITING IS NOT AMONG THEM.
Edit: One more thing: Darth Maul says, “At last, we shall have our revenge.” For what? THEY NEVER SAID. That bit at the end, where Qui-Gon sits waiting for the force shield to drop, would have been a perfect time for Maul to lay out the Sith’s grievance(s) against the Jedi. But nope.
“too many monsters are bearing their teeth” You mean “baring” here :) though I admit the image of monsters carrying their teeth around made me giggle.
Excellent write-up, and I have to agree with much of what you said, as well as orcaman (#62) who said the Force was reduced to a bacterial infection. That made no sense to me, especially since Obi-Wan says in Episode IV that the Force binds the galaxy together (and Han’s skeptical “all-powerful invisible force controlling everything” reply), and was probably the most disappointing thing for me when I first watched it. Logic, how do?
Padme and Anakin = yes, squick regardless of how you look at it.
Wonderful input from the other comments. I grew up with the original trilogy and still love it as it is because it felt more organic to me somehow; the extra CGI Lucas added later spoiled that part for me, and I don’t care what he said about technology finally catching up to the story he wanted to tell (including the racist stereotypes, George? Really?). I feel that he tried too hard to make Episode I grand and sweeping and blah blah blah.
So, I was never more of a casual fan of the first 3 films (ANH, TESB, ROTJ). Enthusiastic, but not over the moon, immersing myself in the novels and merchandise, etc. But I liked the original trilogy, and I felt the excitement my friends had over new movies coming out.
The Phantom Menace, I’m sorry to say, actually did kill all of my interest in Star Wars, I’m sad to say. I won’t watch it again. I haven’t watch the other two films. And I can’t say that I’d go out of my way to watch the original trilogy.
Does it have something to do with the fact that I was around 30, rather than around 10, when The Phantom Menace was released? Probably. But the horrible psuedo-ethnic accents of the Trade Federation villains, Watto and Jar-Jar didn’t help. Nor did the creepy romantic vibe between Padme & Anakin (the thing I hate most about the film). The pacing, the dialogue, the acting, the general irritation towards Jar-Jar … I didn’t have fun at the movie, I was bored, and I lost trust in George Lucas’s abilities as a storyteller. For those whose mileage varies, that’s cool, but yeah, this film did sever my (not terribly strong) connection to SW fandom.
So, do you consider mitochondria bacterial infections? Or the billions of bacteria that keep our digestive and immune systems running? We have more bacterial cells than human cells in our bodies.
Seriously, microbes are the shit ;)
Nice analysis. I particularly agree with the point that it’s far more valuable to engage than to dismiss. We need to learn that. Coupla points:
1. What’s up with everyone’s love affair with the three act structure? It’s not really all that great. I prefer structures that fit the story to be told. Five acts, more, whatever. Just whatever the story actually demands. Three act structure is NOT a staple of good storytelling.
2. I know this is way too picky, but for the record, Darth Maul’s lightsaber is not used like a quarterstaff. A quarterstaff is gripped on the back third of the weapon, and your hands slide around on the staff as you fight. In other words, more of the staff is above your hands than below it to start with, and you can grip it pretty much everywhere. You could try that once with Maul’s weapon, I suppose.
The biggest crime of the prequels is that they are entirely unnecessary. We didn’t need to see Vader turn to the Dark Side, nor did we need to know a bunch of stuff about the Clone Wars. Lucas started using the Hero’s Journey as a template for storytelling, which wrecks the universe he created. But worst of all is that you can SEE him doing it.
I think how much you like these movies, and how much you’re willing to forgive their transgressions, depends on how old you were when you first saw them. The younger the better.
Lucas has never made a secret of the fact these films are targeted at kids. In one of the very first interviews he did back in the 70s about them he stated they were for young audiences.
I was 12 when Star Wars came out. (None of the “Episode IV” junk for me.) Pretty much the exact target demographic, so of course I loved it. It didn’t hurt that we had never seen anything like it before. That opening shot of the Star Destroyer chasing the blockade runner has almost no equal in the history of cinema. By the time Empire came out, I was 15 and I hated it.
Everything that’s wrong with the prequels has its seeds in The Empire Strikes Back. The nonsensical story-telling, the dumb dialogue that makes no sense, the faux “wisdom” that sounds like it comes from a fortune cookie, it’s all there. The “I am your father” bit was out of left field and ruins the whole thing. But since it was in the Hero’s Journey, Lucas felt he needed to put it in there.
The virgin birth also comes directly from Campbell’s book. Cramming that nonsense in there alongside the considerations of a billionaire in his mid-50s who has lost touch with the fun things that inspired the original movie made for bad storytelling. Since Lucas was surrounded by people whose jobs depended on him, no one dared to say anything against his ideas, because they saw what had happened to those who dared question him.
But hey, the kids like it.
There are two reasons I could perhaps be persuaded to forgive Phantom Menace.
It inspired Weird Al to do this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEcjgJSqSRU
And Jeff and Maya Bohnhoff to do this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hpvlTVgeivU
I have three kids aged 5, 7, and 9. In preparation for Episode VII, I decided to watch all six Star Wars movies with them, since they’d never seen them (in some ways, I’m a bad parent, I guess). I cannot express how happy (and relieved) I was when they all came out as Star Wars fans. They adored the movies. All of them.
Want to know something that’s going to shock all of you? Episode I is by far their favourite. Unequivocally so. Their least favourite was Episode V. That’s right; when they rank their movies from favourite to least favourite, it’s the exact opposite from what all the critics and adults say.
I can go into the reasons why they order their favourites the way they do, but it doesn’t matter. Whatever you may think about the prequels and George Lucas, he knows how to market to kids. And he nailed it with the prequels. At least when it comes to the small sampling that is my family.
Some day, I hope my kids will grow into preferring Episodes IV and V, but I’ve come to realize that it doesn’t matter. They like what they like. I like what I like. And it doesn’t bother any of us. That’s good enough for me.
First of all, thanks for doing this rewatch.
Put me in the camp of people who like the movie. It’s interesting to see people say that it’s a bad movie with good parts, because I kind of see it the other way, as a good movie with bad parts. There are a lot of things about the prequels I don’t like. I realize that there are a lot more things to not like in the prequels than there are in the originals. And I guess I can understand that maybe people felt those things ruined the movie for them. But when I think about the things that make a subjectively “good” movie, this one fits the bill. I can sit through it, I can get into it, I have fun, and I would watch it again. That’s a lot more than I can say about a lot of other movies that come out, either before Phantom Menace, around the same time, or now. I would still rather watch this again (and gladly!) than a lot of other movies.
I LOVED this movie when it came out, and didn’t really understand why people said they were disappointed. All of my friends liked it too. I saw it six times in the theater, and would quote it all the time with my friends.
Once at a friend’s house, one of use brought the pan & scan version of the VHS, and someone else brought the wide screen. We watched one, and when it was finished, decided to put in the other version–that’s right, we all watched this movie twice in a row, and loved it. I never really got annoyed by Jar Jar, and the humor worked for me. Maybe that’s a huge deciding factor, ha. Also, I think part of it may have been that I got it–I fully understood the whole time from the first viewing that Palpatine was the future emperor and therefore Darth Sidious, and I understood that what the movie was REALLY about was him manipulating things to gain power. The line, “We will be watching your career with great interest,” was a HUGE deal to me. I think when people try to explain Anakin’s fall and talk about this thing or that thing, I think it is often overlooked that one of the greatest Sith Lords of all time had been poisoning him over the whole course of his Jedi career–since he was a child, not just in the last movie.
Now that I’m older and I am not as excited by movies in general and feel that maybe some of the rose colored glasses may have come off, it seems natural to wonder if I’d feel the same way. And know what? In a recent rewatch with my son, I found myself thinking, “Yeah, this is a pretty good movie, and holds up.” So while the big fish stuff might not make much sense, the laser barriers are only there because plot, and the podrace can be dropped entirely, in general it’s a solid, fun film that’s better than a lot of the other crap that comes out.
Honestly, I feel like there’s more opportunity to feel a “disappointed” feeling with episode VII. I was so nervous about it for so long, and tried to adopt the attitude of, “Well, if my kids like it, that’s what matters…I had my Star Wars and childhood, they have theirs.” But now that these trailers ACTUALLY have me EXCITED about the film…if my earlier misgivings turn out to be true, I think I’ll be more upset.
I loved Amidala’s costuming. I loved all the details and relished reading about where they found the lace for her wedding headdress or how they came up with some of the design elements. I bought dolls in the red and black costumes, and really really wanted the $1200 FAO Schwartz exclusive white costumed doll, but never did buy that one.
Anakin was cute enough, but he was too young, next to Padme’s maturity, for me to get behind a love match between them.
As to the bad accents on some of the characters–I hear them, but I can’t identify what they are bastardizations of, so for me, the oft-talked-about echoes of racism don’t resonate. I watch a lot of UK TV, and there are a whole slew of different accents and dialects used in those programs, some of which I’m sure are over-exaggerated to the point of being racist or stereotypical, but they doesn’t resonate with me, either, as I have no familiarity with what they might be mocking.
I was, er…39 or so when TPM came out. I took my young nieces and nephews with me to see it, who were so-so fans, but it was an excuse for me to go see it, since my then-husband had no interest, and my son was off at college. I went to see it four more times, by myself, after that. I was trying to find that feeling I had when I saw A New Hope the first time, but I just couldn’t locate it. I couldn’t find an emotional connection to the characters, as I had found with Luke, Leia, and Han. This is what left me disappointed. The fact that we had more Star Wars, though? That was awesome and is, once again, as we await Epsiode VII.
Yes, I will be having a Clone Wars marathon all weekend. I need this.
Also, anyone with a problem with Ep I, try watching the movies in ‘machete’ order…. IV, V, II, III, then VI to wrap it up. Skip I completely. Shockingly, they do make sense together.
“CUT THE DAMN SEA MONSTER SECTION ON NABOO. WHAT IS THIS DOING HERE, IT IS POINTLESS.“
But… It gave us Summon Bigger Fish! More generally, the best thing with the prequels is that they gave us Darths and Droids.
At (5) – bigK: yes, I remember the same interview where George Lucas stated 60% of the prequel trilogy arc ended up in the Revenge of the Sith. When I read that I write up how I’d rewrite the trilogy, keeping all the plot points but spreading the arc more evenly over the three films. I may find the file and post this in the comments for Revenge of the Sith.
Instead, I’ll talk about what I’d leave in. A lot of people have posted about what they’d cut, and it seems to me to be the scenes that correct a lot of what I find missing from A New Hope.
If you leave in Anakin being responsible for blowing up the droid control ship, then you’ve got the deliberate echo of Luke blowing up the Death Star.
And yes, I see the irony of using echo to refer to an event that happens in a film set before the event it’s mirroring.
In A New Hope, we’re told a lot of things. For instance, that Luke is a superior pilot. Biggs vouching for him (again something that happens off-screen, and then only referred to in a scene added to the Special Edition) seems to be the reason he’s allowed to pilot an X-wing. We’re never shown before this anything to suggest his piloting skill, we’re only told. Even Ben says “I told you’re quite the pilot”.
Compare this to Anakin. The pod racing scene shows his skill at dealing with the sort of challenges you’d face while steering a one-man fighter through corridors inside a space ship.
Talking about those corridors, during the scenes the Jedi are running about the ship at the beginning, we see the ship is designed with corridors big enough for two of the huge droids to travel past each other. That it happens to be barely wide enough for a star fighter to fit down is incidental, we can understand why the Trade Federation has corridors like that.
Compare this to the Death Star. The vulnerability was discovered by the Rebellion after a very short analysis of the plans. The Rebels’ intentions were accurately determined by the Imperial analysts from their attack pattern shortly after beginning their assault. Which gives us three possibilities: it’s glaringly obvious yet somehow got overlooked at the pre-construction phase; the Empire was already aware of it but decided to risk it as you’d only know about it if you had the top secret plans; or it’s a deliberate flaw a Rebellion sympathiser snuck into the design and the Rebellion analysts were looking for it. The film does not indicate which it is. There’s no hint of why the flaw existed.
Yet the Phantom Menace makes clear there is no such weakness in the Trade Federation ship. Their shields are more than a match for the Naboo Star fighter weaponry. The only way a Naboo star fighter could cause a critical overload is if somehow they crashed through the fighter bay into the heart of the ship, zooming down corridors with inches clearance each side. The ship designers didn’t put in pinch points because to beat the blast doors closing you’d need to travel at a speed that required years of practice and Jedi reflexes to avoid crashing on the bends. Which is why they didn’t put in extra protection around their power plant because the whole ship was built around it. If the enemy had already got through you’re shields to reach the power plant, you were probably already dead.
The Phantom Menace *shows* rather than tells us exactly how a one-man fighter can take out a capital ship without a convenient exhaust port. And it’s all done in scenes people would have cut…
And I’m shocked no one has commented on the subtle hand gestures Qui-gon makes during the pod race… Suggesting he’s using the Force to influence the result!
In defence of Jar Jar Binks…
I think people do Jar Jar a disservice.
He’s obviously intended to be an outsider figure like Solo was to the Holy Trilogy, but he can’t be a smuggler. That would make him too much like Solo, and to dark for the plucky comic relief character he’s supposed to become.
Note I said “become”, because people seem to overlook his character arc.
Limiting ourselves to the Phantom Menace, we first meet him as an exile from his own people. Not through any malicious crime (again that would make him to dark), but because the cost of his constant blunders got to great for his people to carry. He’s both negligent and heedless of the consequences. He’s shown to be cowardly and hedonistic (or at least gluttonous), even when he’s in a completely different planet.
Then you get the scene where he’s greedily snatching as much food as he can. This is the turning point for his character. He’s lectured by Qui-Gon about how these people have little, yet are sharing it, and they as guests should respect that and not take more than they need.
Jar Jar then spends time with Anakin. With his mind opened by Qui-Gon’s words, Jar Jar listens to the young boys selfless ambitions.
At this point Jar Jar’s character changes. From here his association with the Jedi mean people expect him to be as selfless as they are… And instead of taking advantage, he tries to live up to those expectations. His own people, to whom he was a short time earlier persona non grata, make him a general based purely on his association with the Jedi and the Nabooese.
He is still obviously scared almost out of his mind, but he doesn’t run away but bravely blunders through the battle. Rather than be heedless of the consequences, he knows his people won’t win the battle, but the war for Naboo will be decided by the assault on the Palace and the fight in space. His people’s attack is a distraction, designed to keep as many of the battle droids as possible away from the defence of the palace.
And then we have his smartest move. Finally surrounded, he doesn’t fight to the death in order to take a few more battle droids with him; he instead surrenders. Processing and guarding captured Gungans will occupy more battle droids than if he forced them to kill him, keeping them in the field of battle instead of scurrying back to the palace…
Which gives the Nabooese time to win the two pivotal conflicts (capture of the Trade Federation officials at the palace and the destruction of the droid control ship).
I’m not counting the Sith/Jedi fight as a win for Darth wouldn’t probably have affected Naboo’s fate.
So is Jar Jar really that bad? Or was he a scape goat for the dissatisfaction many felt with the film?
WillMayBeWise: Everything you mention conveniently ignore that he’s an offensive racist stereotype, which is really the biggest problem with the character.
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
Well, I suppose YMMV may vary on that, because even Ahmed Best has said he doesn’t see him that way in interviews. I think he was going for a physical, Buster Keaton type portrayal. (Which is not to discount that other people might see it that way and feel hurt by it; I’m not trying to illegitamize their perspective).
I think there is a lot of potential for Jar Jar to have been a more poignant character (the clutz, the hapless one sucked into things way over his head, the loveable idiot, etc) but they didn’t stick the landing. Although Ahmed Best has said he does get fan mail from people who really like/relate to the character. Jar Jar is not my favorite part of the prequels by far, but he’s actually not my least favorite either (That dubious honor goes to Anakin’s portrayal in both TPM and AOTC. Oh, and fart/poop jokes, although Jar Jar IS in those scenes. And that dumb droid assembly line scene).