Jake Lloyd 10 Years Later

[Elfdart]

No they're not. To point out the PT's financial success would amount to an appeal to popularity, unless what was being debated was the PT's financial success - in which case, the numbers would actually be relevant.

If the assertion is that it's a small minority who didn't like the movies, then the fact that they did great at the box office is relevant.

And pointing out "...but the OT was flawed too!" is a red herring. Nobody (least of all me) is saying the OT was without flaws; for me, the films succeed despite their flaws. But criticising the OT in response to criticism of the PT isn't addressing said criticism. It simply obfuscates any reasonable debate over the matter.

I didn't know that comparing and contrasting were red herrings.

Perhaps. Although what you cite as flaws in the above are things that have never registered to me.

And many of the things people complain about with the PT don't register with others. For example, I give less than half a shit that Anakin put C-3PO together.

Fair enough, although I don't have to like it.

Why not? It didn't bother you with the OT.

[Tanasinn]

I honestly find TPM one of the least bothersome of the prequels. Anakin is a goofy kid and the gungans are ewok-stupid, but it gets from point A to B and even manages to show us that the Republic wasn't exactly a shining star of justice and competence. It sets the stage and manages to use important characters far enough back in time or people new enough that the bad bits don't really ruin anything. For me, anyway.

Things start to get poorer as we move into AOTC and ROTS, where we're presented with an unrelatable aged Anakin who delivers cheesy lines when he isn't busy whinging and complaining. He doesn't come off as a hero, he comes off as a fucking dick with a lot of power, and that definitely reduces the impact of him actually becoming Vader. (The actual process of which was no help - one minute he's agonizing over making a choice, the next he's murdering children with no apparent ill feeling. It kinda reinforces the whole "Well, he always WAS a bit of an asshole" thing). Considering that these movies are supposed to be about him and the fall of a hero, his ineffectiveness/unrelatability is much more aggravating than a stupid CGI sidekick like Jar Jar Binks. The antagonists getting goofier (mostly in the B-1 droids) takes away some of the intimidation factor an army of heartless robots could project (and do rather well in some scenes of TPM) and, in my opinion, pulls you out of the movies a bit further. Compare that to Imperial figures like Tarkin or Piett, who were never played for larfs, or even the stormtroopers, who were uniformly pretty nasty guys when they weren't getting thumped by ewoks or smacking their helmets on low doors.

Small aside, the final warbling "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" probably could have been improved by making it more than one or just incoherent yelling and force powers lashing out. Palpatine grinning like the asshole he is definitely made that scene better than it could have been.

[Vympel]

The Battle Droids didn't really get played for laughs until RotS, and even then, it was quite minor- the worst part was really how stupidly high pitched their voices got. It's really only in The Clone Wars cartoon that they become bumbling fools with fully-fledged, idiotic personalities, which is one of the few things I despise about TCW.

Too many writers/ producers/ directors / whoever else is responsible for these decisions don't understand that you're meant to build up the villains, build up the threat, build up the suspense, make the heroes work for it. Instead, they make the primary grunt of the enemy little more than a joke.

Nothing illustrates this more than the Battle Droid commander in TPM ordering the AATs to cease fire and they all stop at the drop of a hat. In the first episode of TCW, the same order is given, and they keep firing for ages while the Battle Droid commander hollers his head off for them to stop. How they could've wrote this scene without keeping TPM in mind is beyond me.

On the other hand, one thing TCW does right that RotS got inexplicably wrong was the voice for Super Battle Droids. Who didn't look at them and imagine they'd talk with a deep, booming voice? Instead Lucas gave them the same nasal whine as the regular Battle Droids.

[Stofsk]

Sorry Elfdart, I missed your reply.

No they're not. To point out the PT's financial success would amount to an appeal to popularity, unless what was being debated was the PT's financial success - in which case, the numbers would actually be relevant.

If the assertion is that it's a small minority who didn't like the movies, then the fact that they did great at the box office is relevant.

That isn't the assertion at all, but the point that it would amount to an appeal to popularity still stands even if one were to assert there was a minority or majority who didn't like the movies.

If I illustrate by way of analogy, if 100 people went and bought 100 tickets to see a film, and that makes a certain amount of revenue, all that information provides is that a 100 people went to the cinema. What if most thought the film was average, or passable? With smaller percentages who thought either that the film sucked or was excellent? But as far as the numbers are concerned, 100 people went and bought 100 tickets. To say that that then proves a 100 people thought the film was great isn't logical at all.

And pointing out "...but the OT was flawed too!" is a red herring. Nobody (least of all me) is saying the OT was without flaws; for me, the films succeed despite their flaws. But criticising the OT in response to criticism of the PT isn't addressing said criticism. It simply obfuscates any reasonable debate over the matter.

I didn't know that comparing and contrasting were red herrings.

It's not, but that's not what I'm talking about. What I'm talking about amounts to responding to criticism of A by criticising B; B has nothing to do with specific criticisms of A.

If I were to say the prequel trilogy had lousy acting, and you replied "But so did the OT", my counter would be so what, that's not the point. That's just an example, for the most part I don't have a problem with the acting of either trilogy (my problems with the PT are more to do with the writing/directing and creative side of things).

Perhaps. Although what you cite as flaws in the above are things that have never registered to me.

And many of the things people complain about with the PT don't register with others. For example, I give less than half a shit that Anakin put C-3PO together.

Of course. What anybody likes and dislikes in a film will vary from person to person.

Fair enough, although I don't have to like it.

Why not? It didn't bother you with the OT.

*shrug* What do you want me to say? I liked the OT and parts of the PT but didn't like certain parts of the prequels. I didn't like certain things in the OT either, but they're more or less isolated in Jedi. I liked ROTS the most out of all of the prequels, I just wish Lucas hadn't put in buzz droids in the opening battle and that we'd gotten to see more of the ARC-170s rather than see them get vaped.

[Big Orange]

Simon Pegg was famously crushingly disappointed with The Phantom Menace, although he fits the profile of the early middle-aged fanboy (as does Iain M. Banks, that goes double for him). However I knew of a fair few people in a similar age bracket to me now (early to mid 20s) who were pretty young when TPM came out and who were either indifferent to the movie or actively disliked it, but that is fairly anecdotal by definition.

Jake Lloyd was only a boy at the time and the relative annoyance of his character stemmed from the directing and scripting of Lucas. However in The Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones, and The Revenge of the Sith we got very strong cast members that seemed to get lost amongst the towering CGI sets, swarming sprites, rippling ILM explosions/laser beams, and invasive model work; it came across as cold and distant. In TPM Bryan Blessed was wasted as a virtual muppet (he was better utilized in Freddia as F.R.0.7), Darth Maul was excellent but underused, Qui-Gon played by Neeson was generally successful, and Ewan McGregor almost seemed to be phoning it in as a young Obi Wan from the start, although he improved as the PT went on.

Only Ian McDiarmid as Palpatine was very successful and done proper justice in all three movies.

Jar Jar Binks was the perfect storm of misjudged marketing, gimmicky CGI animation, irritating voice acting, and forced attempts at comedy relief that pleased nobody. Natalie Portman started off reasonable, but ended up awful, and Hayden Christensen was pushed into the deep end like Jake Lloyd was.

The Phantom Menace was nowhere near on the same level of fail as Wild Wild West (Will Smith's Pluto Nash) but I did slightly prefer The Mummy to it as entertaining hokum, and The Matrix was more creatively groundbreaking (although let's not dwell on their unnecessary sequels that were worse than PotC: The Curse of the Black Pearl's).

My personal scores for the PT films:

The Phantom Menace - 6/10

Attack of the Clones - 5/5

The Revenge of the Sith - 7/10

[Vympel]

Jar Jar Binks was the perfect storm of misjudged marketing, gimmicky CGI animation, irritating voice acting, and forced attempts at comedy relief that pleased nobody. Natalie Portman started off reasonable, but ended up awful, and Hayden Christensen was pushed into the deep end like Jake Lloyd was.

I personally have never understood how anyone could claim that Jar Jar 'wasn't that bad' or variants thereof. It did play a huge role in ruining the movie. He has no precedent in the original trilogy, and for the life of me I've never met anyone in my entire life who found Jar Jar tolerable or even funny.

When I showed Star Wars to a friend of mine who had never seen it, they literally could not sit through Phantom Menace. At all. Think about that. They had already seen the OT and loved it, and even though I dampened their expectations on the PT with some tactical 'eh' noises, that was the result, the moment Jar Jar appeared. This isn't a case of fan expectations gone wrong, this is a case of disastrous writing that's unacceptable anywhere, never mind a Star Wars movie.

We skipped through the DVD in roughly 20 minutes, me explaining what was happening as a narrator, stopping at the final duel, and then ending the whole affair.

Of course, there's more wrong with TPM than just Jar Jar, mainly that the ending is weak because the ground battle and space battle both sucked. Only the duel held it together.

[Themightytom]

I actually really liked seeing Liam Nieson (Sp?) as Qui Gon. Up until TPM I ahdn'tt really see a jedi in his prime. Obi Wan was old, Yoda was older, both were also trying to keep a low profile.

I think one of the reasons Lucas let TPM drag is because he was worldbuilding as though he needed to. if the movies had been done in order, the first one MIGHT be considered the slow introdutory one, the problem is we already HAD an introduction to the star wars universe, and it was TOO ponderous.

Also pulling naboo out of his ass was rediculous. How much more awesome would it have been if the events of Naboo had just been on Alderaan. Vader watching Alderaan destroyed would be the final demolition of his memory of Padme, the complete lack of reference to Naboo in the OT would have been more plausible and we would have actually cared when Alderaan blew up instead of "Oh no, not the blue planet that is blue!"

I wouldn't have minded some more demonstration of Anakin's raw power. What we saw in the movie wasn't "power" so much as awareness. he was depicted as really in touch with the Force, which is fine, but so is Yoda, so is Qui Gon So is Obi Wan. Anakin throwing a climactic temper tantrum that devestates the droid army, now THAT would have been a bit of sinister foreshadowing. Padme dragging herself out of a crater going "Wow, glad he's on our side!" While obi Wan muses "yes..." thoughtfully.

[Stofsk]

Also pulling naboo out of his ass was rediculous. How much more awesome would it have been if the events of Naboo had just been on Alderaan. Vader watching Alderaan destroyed would be the final demolition of his memory of Padme, the complete lack of reference to Naboo in the OT would have been more plausible and we would have actually cared when Alderaan blew up instead of "Oh no, not the blue planet that is blue!"

You hit the nail on the head. Not only should Naboo have been replaced with Alderaan for the simple fact that we've never seen Alderaan before, but I would go so far as to say it should have played an important part in the Clone Wars as well as the origin of the rebellion against Palpatine's brave new world. Plus, I would have loved to have seen a younger Tarkin. I mean if Lucas is gonna get someone like Ewan MacGregor to play a younger version of Obi-wan, why can't he get someone to play a younger version of Tarkin? Alec Guinness' shoes have to be a lot deeper than Peter Cushing's, at any rate.

It would have been interesting to see Bail Antilles square off against Tarkin too, with them instantly hating each other. It would have added a new dimension to Tarkin's actions in ANH.

[Darth Wong]

I actually really liked seeing Liam Nieson (Sp?) as Qui Gon. Up until TPM I ahdn'tt really see a jedi in his prime. Obi Wan was old, Yoda was older, both were also trying to keep a low profile.

I think one of the reasons Lucas let TPM drag is because he was worldbuilding as though he needed to. if the movies had been done in order, the first one MIGHT be considered the slow introdutory one, the problem is we already HAD an introduction to the star wars universe, and it was TOO ponderous.

True; he felt he had to explain everything, when he could have left it more vague, as he did in the original trilogy. Interestingly, the parts that most people found most tedious about the PT were often the political parts, which were the most "grown up" parts. Critics love to bash the idea of trade routes becoming a cause for war, but that's actually quite accurate to the way things often unfold in real life. Critics love to bash the stupid-shit political rhetoric from the senators and other leaders, but perhaps they haven't looked at the preposterously self-righteous things that real politicians say. Unfortunately, Mr. Lucas apparently failed to recognize that we don't necessarily want to see grown-up themes or somewhat accurate politics in our space opera. We want to see simple-minded bombastic morality plays, which is why most people preferred the third film (or the OT).

Also pulling naboo out of his ass was rediculous. How much more awesome would it have been if the events of Naboo had just been on Alderaan. Vader watching Alderaan destroyed would be the final demolition of his memory of Padme, the complete lack of reference to Naboo in the OT would have been more plausible and we would have actually cared when Alderaan blew up instead of "Oh no, not the blue planet that is blue!"

Oh come on, the last thing we need is more "it's a small galaxy" recycling of planets and themes. It was bad enough that he had to insert Tatooine into both trilogies; why add Alderaan? It's supposed to be a huge galaxy with countless worlds.

I wouldn't have minded some more demonstration of Anakin's raw power. What we saw in the movie wasn't "power" so much as awareness. he was depicted as really in touch with the Force, which is fine, but so is Yoda, so is Qui Gon So is Obi Wan. Anakin throwing a climactic temper tantrum that devestates the droid army, now THAT would have been a bit of sinister foreshadowing. Padme dragging herself out of a crater going "Wow, glad he's on our side!" While obi Wan muses "yes..." thoughtfully.

People generally liked ROTS, so if I were to change anything, I'd leave ROTS alone and look to AOTC. The whole romance was terrible, and should have been done by having Anakin and Padme continually evading assassins. She falls in love with him as they escape death time and time again thanks to his bravery and skill. It's an incredibly cheesy action-movie cliche, but audiences would go for it much better than they did the original romance.

[Havok]

The whole romance was terrible, and should have been done by having Anakin and Padme continually evading assassins. She falls in love with him as they escape death time and time again thanks to his bravery and skill.

I like that approach. It also would have allowed for more of the witty banter type of dialogue that made fans like Han and Leia and their relationship. It also would have saved Christiansen and Portman from those agonizing scenes.

[Elfdart]

If I illustrate by way of analogy, if 100 people went and bought 100 tickets to see a film, and that makes a certain amount of revenue, all that information provides is that a 100 people went to the cinema. What if most thought the film was average, or passable? With smaller percentages who thought either that the film sucked or was excellent? But as far as the numbers are concerned, 100 people went and bought 100 tickets. To say that that then proves a 100 people thought the film was great isn't logical at all.

The fact that The Phantom Menace had tremendous staying power at the box office is proof that people enjoyed the movie. People don't pay to watch something a second or third time if they don't like it. What's more, there aren't enough hardcore fans to keep a movie on the weekly charts for several months. Someone was buying those tickets.

On the flip side, take a look at the second Matrix movie: great opening weekend, then... <crickets>

Of course. What anybody likes and dislikes in a film will vary from person to person.

And yet you keep trying to bring "logic" into a discussion of personal taste.

I personally have never understood how anyone could claim that Jar Jar 'wasn't that bad' or variants thereof. It did play a huge role in ruining the movie. He has no precedent in the original trilogy, and for the life of me I've never met anyone in my entire life who found Jar Jar tolerable or even funny.

Maybe it ruined the film for you. Most people who watched it, liked it.

Jar Jar Binks was the perfect storm of misjudged marketing, gimmicky CGI animation, irritating voice acting, and forced attempts at comedy relief that pleased nobody kids, the audience Star Wars was always meant for.

Case in point.

[Darth Wong]

My boys always liked Jar-Jar. Frankly, I think a lot of the anti-JarJar hate was just sexually insecure young men who are trying to prove their masculinity by spewing irrational hate for a wimpy minor character.

[Elfdart]

The whole romance was terrible, and should have been done by having Anakin and Padme continually evading assassins. She falls in love with him as they escape death time and time again thanks to his bravery and skill.

I like that approach. It also would have allowed for more of the witty banter type of dialogue that made fans like Han and Leia and their relationship. It also would have saved Christiansen and Portman from those agonizing scenes.

Actually, the editors who cut some of that lovey-dovey crap in the IMAX version already did that.

The real problem is that Padme is such a bland character. In most heroic stories, the woman who gives birth to the hero(es) or gods is a minor part of the story, not one of the main characters. One reason ROTS worked better than the other two prequels is that Padme is really a glorified cameo in the movie. She tells Anakin she's pregnant, sobs on cue a few times, gives birth, then dies. In other words, the character fits the role and vice versa.

For Padme to be a centerpiece of the other prequels without really expanding the character ( a ray-gun, hifalutin titles and an outlandish wardrobe doesn't cut it) makes her look even more shallow than she already is. One simple thing Lucas could have done was to make Padme a bitch like Leia. If she had spent most of AOTC busting Annie's balls in a dismissive way, and sneering at his lame sweet talk, rather than looking all starry-eyed, it would have worked much better -and maybe the less intelligent viewers would have noticed that Anakin isn't supposed to be clever and glib with chicks.

[Elfdart]

My boys always liked Jar-Jar. Frankly, I think a lot of the anti-JarJar hate was just sexually insecure young men who are trying to prove their masculinity by spewing irrational hate for a wimpy minor character.

Maybe if Jar-Jar wore a black trench coat and held a pistol sideways while brooding and reciting his dialog in a low whisper...

[Havok]

My only real problem with TPM, is that it is Episode I. I liked the movie. It just wasn't the story I wanted from Episode I in the Star Wars saga. I wouldn't change anything about it except that I would have made it a prequel novel, or maybe a cartoon like the Clone Wars, because really, that is mostly what it is... back story to be told later.

[Vympel]

My boys always liked Jar-Jar. Frankly, I think a lot of the anti-JarJar hate was just sexually insecure young men who are trying to prove their masculinity by spewing irrational hate for a wimpy minor character.

Anecdotally, women can loathe the character as much as men. From friends, my sister-in-law, cousins - they all couldn't stand to watch TPM either. And he's really not that minor of a character - he's constantly poking his face into virtually every scene with the heroes after we meet him - and doing something that's not funny*. If he had the screentime he had in AotC, that's a minor character- but he was a big part of the supporting cast. Heck, he was the focus of the entire ground battle. That's probably most of what makes it hard to watch. There's not really much objectionable in TPM apart from that, the story works, except for the weak finale.

* I wouldn't have had a problem with the character if the character's designated role as "comic sidekick" (Lucas' description of him) actually worked, but it just totally fell flat for me.

By contrast, the other huge fan objection is midichlorians - which I don't give a crap about, in retrospect. How else could you objectively prove that Anakin is the Chosen One, without a way to measure his potential? Sure you could have some dialog saying he's *really* strong, but there'd always be doubt.

[Drooling Iguana]

A lot of the midichlorian hate is due to people not understanding what they're supposed to be, anyway. They're not the Force and they don't generate the Force; they're simply the mechanism through which organisms interact with the Force. The existence of midichlorians doesn't stop the Force from being the energy field described in the OT, it just provides a little bit of extra detail on how it works.

[Jim Raynor]

A lot of the midichlorian hate is due to people not understanding what they're supposed to be, anyway. They're not the Force and they don't generate the Force; they're simply the mechanism through which organisms interact with the Force. The existence of midichlorians doesn't stop the Force from being the energy field described in the OT, it just provides a little bit of extra detail on how it works.

Either way, I think Midichlorins take some of the "magic" out of the Force. They just don't sound right. However their existence in movie canon is limited to all of a few lines of dialogue. The Midichlorins certainly didn't ruin the movie for me.

People's reactions to Jar Jar definately vary. I was indifferent to him when I first watched TPM as a young teenager. When I saw the movie years later as a twenty-something I found him to be marginally annoying. My friends and family generally liked the prequels and never hated on the movies because of him. I still think he's a minor character; his screen time wasn't that much. Same thing with the botched Anakin/Padme romance in AOTC. I watched AOTC again and could have sworn that their love scenes took up all of 10-15 minutes. AOTC runs 2 hours and 22 minutes, so it wasn't that much at all. The movie focused on so much more than just their relationship, such as Obi-Wan uncovering the conspiracy, and all the fighting. Yet many of the negative reviews and fanboy bitching focused primarily on how "wooden" Anakin was around Padme. Did the fanboys really go into AOTC looking for romance, and not the epic battles?

It's not that the prequels are perfect. I and many other people on this forum will readily admit their flaws. But the bashing has been extremely exaggerated. If the SW prequels are really among the worst movies you've ever seen, then you either have tastes that differ from most of the non-fanboy population, or you've been fortunate enough to avoid most bad movies.

[Darth Wong]

My boys always liked Jar-Jar. Frankly, I think a lot of the anti-JarJar hate was just sexually insecure young men who are trying to prove their masculinity by spewing irrational hate for a wimpy minor character.

Anecdotally, women can loathe the character as much as men. From friends, my sister-in-law, cousins - they all couldn't stand to watch TPM either.

I had a totally different experience. Every one of the mothers I know found TPM much better than AOTC, for example.

And he's really not that minor of a character - he's constantly poking his face into virtually every scene with the heroes after we meet him - and doing something that's not funny*. If he had the screentime he had in AotC, that's a minor character- but he was a big part of the supporting cast. Heck, he was the focus of the entire ground battle. That's probably most of what makes it hard to watch. There's not really much objectionable in TPM apart from that, the story works, except for the weak finale.

* I wouldn't have had a problem with the character if the character's designated role as "comic sidekick" (Lucas' description of him) actually worked, but it just totally fell flat for me.

Jar-Jar is clearly aimed toward kids, and kids found him funny. Yes, it would be nice if he was more like really well-written kids' humour which works for both adults and kids, but frankly, parents are more accustomed to that kind of thing that non-parents are. And this doesn't justify the kind of anti-JarJar hatred that you see on the Internet.

By contrast, the other huge fan objection is midichlorians - which I don't give a crap about, in retrospect. How else could you objectively prove that Anakin is the Chosen One, without a way to measure his potential? Sure you could have some dialog saying he's *really* strong, but there'd always be doubt.

Frankly, I think midichlorians would have gone over better if he simply changed the name. It's a goofy name which doesn't roll off the tongue well, and the arguments against it sound like the sort of ad hoc thing that people manufacture in order to justify a knee-jerk reaction.

[Anguirus]

I think the prequels get an undeserved bad rap. But from another perspective, I recently had to convince my girlfriend to watch Episode III, as in the theaters she had seen Episode II, found it just as bad as Episode I (which she hated) and given up on Star Wars entirely.

She was riveted throughout Episode III, absolutely loved it from start to finish.

I think Episode I's got a near-fatal flaw in Jar Jar, as there are a fair number of people who just want to bash their brains in whenever he shows up onscreen. Anakin was also cast too young...nothing against Jake Lloyd, but having Anakin that young probably helped the marketing campaign more than the story. He is constantly sidelined in important sequences, does not get very substantial dialogue, and flies the intergalactic equivalent of a fighter jet while yelling "Yippee!"

Episode II does have a really obnoxious romance...people just don't like watching an awkward romance, even if it's intended, and the actors just did not sell that their attraction was worth throwing everything away for. (Well, maybe Christensen, but in a creepy way. Portman, not so much.) I also think that AotC has the weakest and least straightforward plot of the bunch.

When you get right down to it, all the story and most of the drama is in Episode III. And then it gets a bad rap because it's a prequel, and the media/internet has long since settled into the narrative of "Lucas: once a genius, now everything he touches turns to shit." He's always had basically the same strengths and flaws.

[Vympel]

I think the prequels get an undeserved bad rap. But from another perspective, I recently had to convince my girlfriend to watch Episode III, as in the theaters she had seen Episode II, found it just as bad as Episode I (which she hated) and given up on Star Wars entirely.

She was riveted throughout Episode III, absolutely loved it from start to finish.

I had the same experience. RotS was the only movie I saw with a girl as opposed to my (fellow) nerd friends in the cinema, and she was glued to her seat and didn't say a word. She came out thinking it was one of the best movies she's seen, and she still thinks that.

No surprise, since Episode III really is the best film out of the prequels, and I like it as much as RotJ, if not more.

[starfury]

No surprise, since Episode III really is the best film out of the prequels, and I like it as much as RotJ, if not more.

Same here, if anything after seeing constant reruns of all the movies on Spike, I say ROTS was considerablely better the ROTJ, as during their SW marathons, I mainly watch just ROTS and TESB. The others just didn't grab me as much.

[dworkin]

My main problem with TPM is the pacing. At the start we get to see the Jedi in their prime, they battle their way out of a hostile spaceship, negotiate with the locals for help and then rescue the queen. It's fast, fun dramatic and then CRASH! They and the plot hit Tatooine and it everything slows to an expository crawl. Our heroes are stymied because they have to stay on this boring beige set a while longer while it is hammered into even those of molusc like intelligence that A.Skywalker is the chosen one. Well, duh. It picks up again once they leave Boring Beige World. However by then most people are bored out of their mind.

[Havok]

For me, TPM is the only one of the prequels that flows and 'feels' like a movie. The other two, just feel... off for some reason. And also dworkin, TPM does drag on Tattooine, but that is because the DVD has the extended podrace scene. When it is in the theatrical, and I presume, television cut, it doesn't drag much at all.

And speaking of the whole Chosen One bit... and the fatherless birth, that is the one thing I would have changed with TPM, so I retract my earlier statement on that. Anakin could still have been exactly what he was without being a prophesied Jedi messiah or whatever. He could have still been off the charts, and he could have even still been a vergence, i.e. a coming together of light and dark.

[dworkin]

Unfortunatly my memory is of the theatrical cut. Boring Beige World works in ANH because it's the place Luke leaves, presumably never to return again. In the TPM you get the feeling you're never going to leave, ever.