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ROTJ vs ROTS - the showdown

What say you?

  • Return of the Jedi was better, Revenge of the Sith was okay too

    Votes: 27 42.9%
  • Return of the Jedi was better, Revenge of the Sith sucked

    Votes: 20 31.7%
  • Revenge of the Sith was better, Return of the Jedi was okay too

    Votes: 16 25.4%
  • Revenge of the Sith was better, Return of the Jedi sucked

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Total voters
    63

Mach5

Admiral
Admiral
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I've noticed that there many people who prefer Revenge of the Sith over Return of the Jedi, and since I can't figure out for myself why would anyone prefer a movie without Luke, Han and Leia over a movie WITH Luke, Han and Leia, I thought I'd just go ahead and ask.
 
Revenge of the Sith here.

I think part of it has to do with the movies that come prior to these two. Revenge of the Sith ended the lackluster prequel trilogy on a high note. Return of the Jedi had the unenviable honor of following The Empire Strikes Back, which is one of the top ten sci-fi movies of all time. But Jedi's failings are far more than it was the follow up to a great movie... it just comes across as tedious and redundant.
 
Yeah, I actually think ROTJ is the much better film, but there is an argument to be made that it was just a remake of ANH with a bigger budget. And while ROTS was still pretty awful, it was the most coherent of the prequel trilogy.
 
Yeah, I actually think ROTJ is the much better film, but there is an argument to be made that it was just a remake of ANH with a bigger budget.
Meh, blowing up a death star is where similarities both begin and end, IMO.

Plus, Leia's slave girl outfit is iconic, so thats like +10 for ROTJ. :D
 
ROTJ. I quite disliked ROTS, despite it having the least blatantly wrong with it. That last half hour of the movie was a real chore to get through.
 
Yeah, I actually think ROTJ is the much better film, but there is an argument to be made that it was just a remake of ANH with a bigger budget. And while ROTS was still pretty awful, it was the most coherent of the prequel trilogy.

Not exactly a remake... it felt more like a mash-up of A New Hope and The Empire Strikes Back. Once we got to The Return of the Jedi, it felt like Lucas had run out of ideas.
 
Option 3.

Wookies beat Ewoks on any day of the week.

Ah, well, and then there are scenes like the one at the opera with Palpatine and Anakin. McDiarmid was certainly more awesome in ROTS than ROTJ.
 
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Pretty good poll. Sith was imo clearly the best prequel movie and Jedi clearly the worst OT movie. I voted Jedi good, Sith OK.
 
Honestly, I can never really decide which one I like better. ROTS was the only prequel movie I thought was actually worth anything, but it still has plenty of flaws. I think I'd have to go with ROTJ. It's #3 in my personal rankings, but ROTS is a strong #4.
 
The space battle in ROTJedi beats the battle in ROTSith by a lightyear, in my opinion. The lightsaber fight between Vader and Luke is also sooo much better than the fight between Anakin and Obiwan. And the ground battle of Ewoks vs. Stormtroopers is also much better than the battle between Wookies and that other army. And the list goes on and on.

Less is more, I guess.

Sith sucks the least of the Prequels, but it still sucks.
 
Yeah, I actually think ROTJ is the much better film, but there is an argument to be made that it was just a remake of ANH with a bigger budget.
Meh, blowing up a death star is where similarities both begin and end, IMO.

Plus, Leia's slave girl outfit is iconic, so thats like +10 for ROTJ. :D

The slave girl outfit is pretty fantastic.

The argument usually also states that Jabba's palace is a long, elaborate version of the cantina scene in addition to the fact that they blow up another Death Star. Let me be clear, I don't agree with this argument. I felt the character arcs and story of the film were different enough to separate it from ANH and while it's the weakest of the OT, it's still miles better than ROTS. I only brought it up because there is a little merit in it as an argument.
 
The argument usually also states that Jabba's palace is a long, elaborate version of the cantina scene in addition to the fact that they blow up another Death Star.

I wonder who came up with that.

The cantina scene is about Luke and Obiwan trying to get of the planet, so they seek a freighter pilot. In the meantime, Luke gets bullied by a criminal, and Obiwan kills him. After all business is done, Han is stopped by Greedo, and then Han shoots. And only Han shoots.

Jabba's Palace... Han Solo is frozen and needs to be rescued. Lando and the droids arrive first, then Leia and Chewbacca infiltrate the palace. Leia removes Han from the carbonite block, but they get caught. When that happens, Luke arrives to free them all. He walks into a trap and has to fight a Rancor. After that, they are all sentenced to death. But they manage to escape in a big action sequence.


Where could ANYONE see ANY similarity in there?
 
The argument usually also states that Jabba's palace is a long, elaborate version of the cantina scene in addition to the fact that they blow up another Death Star.

I wonder who came up with that.

The cantina scene is about Luke and Obiwan trying to get of the planet, so they seek a freighter pilot. In the meantime, Luke gets bullied by a criminal, and Obiwan kills him. After all business is done, Han is stopped by Greedo, and then Han shoots. And only Han shoots.

Jabba's Palace... Han Solo is frozen and needs to be rescued. Lando and the droids arrive first, then Leia and Chewbacca infiltrate the palace. Leia removes Han from the carbonite block, but they get caught. When that happens, Luke arrives to free them all. He walks into a trap and has to fight a Rancor. After that, they are all sentenced to death. But they manage to escape in a big action sequence.


Where could ANYONE see ANY similarity in there?

Got me - I'm not the one making the argument. It's pretty superficial if you ask me. I think it has more to do with the scene being a menagerie of weird aliens all gathered in one place. It is very similar in appearance, but again, I'm not making this argument, I just brought it up as a Devil's advocate kind of thing.
 
Where is the "ROTJ sucked, but ROTS sucked more" option?

More seriously, ROTS was the best of PT, and ROTJ was the worst of the OT, but still ROTJ > ROTS. I guess it's just a matter of OT > PT for me. It could be also my age showing.

Of the option presented, I voted number 2.
 
SITH rocked! ROTJ... I like the Jabba stuff and the space battle, but the Ewoks are dumb, and as much as I love Sidious, I never thought the Luke/Vader/Emperor stuff was that interesting.
 
This isn't a universe like Star Trek where there is so much material that is ripe for reuse.

They reused the Death Star, went back to Tatooine (you could've placed Jabba anywhere in the universe), the light saber fight between Vader and Luke felt exactly the same as the one previous in Empire right down to one losing their hand (I'd hate to be the insurance company paying for replacement limbs in this universe), the re-use of Snow Walkers on a forest world, the Death Star battle felt eerily familiar, another big reveal about a member of the Skywalker family...

Like I said earlier, Return of the Jedi felt like a mash-up of the first two films.
 
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