I personally think Timothy Dalton is the best James Bond, followed closely by Roger Moore. Sean Connery, while excellent in the role, is a distant third for me.
Your first indication the prequels would be bad?
- Thread starter Mr. Sin
- Start date
I personally think Timothy Dalton is the best James Bond, followed closely by Roger Moore. Sean Connery, while excellent in the role, is a distant third for me.
I heard a lot of negative buzz, but being like 13 at the time, I was willing to think it was just fan-hate.
Some people watching the film disliked the opening scrawl, I actually thought it provided necessary information.
Yeah the Neimoidians seemed a bit "uh...a bit heavy Asian accent" I waved that off as "so what, the Imperials are evil and British"
That online review thing later pointed out all of the logical fallacies in the opening fight scene; i.e. why not just leave the conference doors closed and wait for the gas to kill the Jedi? I mean they survived through Jedi conserved breathing tricks or whatever, but shouldn't they leave the door closed for hours?
But again, I didn't think of this either. I honestly thought it was just a nice opening fight scene, as opening fight scenes go.
Basically as soon as Jar Jar Binks came on screen and it was a lot of forced slapstick humor, I mean just the way he talks, that I started to realize something was off.
But every scene involving young Anakin was so "nails on chalkboard" that I couldn't like it.
Episode III was good. Episode II wasn't that great but the letdown wasn't as big compared to Episode I.
Episode I had nearly two decades of hype going into it.
Episode II suffers from middle child syndrome in a funny way: its not good like Episode III, but its not *quite* as bad as Episode I. Further, all of the CGI action in Episode III dwarfed what came in Episode II, so its not very rewatchable.
Some people watching the film disliked the opening scrawl, I actually thought it provided necessary information.
Yeah the Neimoidians seemed a bit "uh...a bit heavy Asian accent" I waved that off as "so what, the Imperials are evil and British"
That online review thing later pointed out all of the logical fallacies in the opening fight scene; i.e. why not just leave the conference doors closed and wait for the gas to kill the Jedi? I mean they survived through Jedi conserved breathing tricks or whatever, but shouldn't they leave the door closed for hours?
But again, I didn't think of this either. I honestly thought it was just a nice opening fight scene, as opening fight scenes go.
Basically as soon as Jar Jar Binks came on screen and it was a lot of forced slapstick humor, I mean just the way he talks, that I started to realize something was off.
But every scene involving young Anakin was so "nails on chalkboard" that I couldn't like it.
Episode III was good. Episode II wasn't that great but the letdown wasn't as big compared to Episode I.
Episode I had nearly two decades of hype going into it.
Episode II suffers from middle child syndrome in a funny way: its not good like Episode III, but its not *quite* as bad as Episode I. Further, all of the CGI action in Episode III dwarfed what came in Episode II, so its not very rewatchable.
I disagree here. Yes, it's possible people were always going to like the OT more because they were first, but they could have done a much better job with the PT. Less boring characters would have been a really good place to start. It's a shame that the characters with the most personality in the PT were all robots.
Same here. I was young and naïve, so I forgave Lucas for the first one. 5 minutes into AOTC I knew this would be a waste of my time.
I liked them. Good space fantasy movies, but not the classics the originals were. Less about character, more about visuals.
Lucas tried to do too much, when he should have had good people in there shoring up the weaknesses he still posesses.
Lucas tried to do too much, when he should have had good people in there shoring up the weaknesses he still posesses.
startrekrcks
Fleet Captain
I thought the original trilogy films were far better then the prequels in my opinion
Nardpuncher
Rear Admiral
I think the OT is better than the PT.
I also think that 100 pounds is heavier than 50 pounds. That a 7 foot man is taller than a 6 foot man. That water is wet and the sky is blue. Though that last one's debatable if you include the night sky or cloud cover.
If that was true, my favorite movie from the OT would be A New Hope instead of The Empire Strikes Back.
Nardpuncher
Rear Admiral
Excellent point.
I was reviewing the posts to make sure i wasn't copying somebody and i found this. Yes, we should have seen that the series was surrendering to the idea of pandering to 9 year olds back in 1983.
Star Wars & Empire Strikes Back were movies for 'young-at-heart' people that little kids could happen to enjoy. Return of the Jedi had the climactic scene of the movie (the final battle on Endor) aimed squarely at little kids.
"Teddy bears defeating storm troopers---aw how cute"
Guess what George?----the 'resistance' movements in WWII didn't defeat the Nazis----giant armies with tanks and planes and ships did!
So don't give me some crap about asymetrical warfare and try and shove it down my throat.
Here's how I definie 'nostalgia', as per my experience with incredibly ardent SW fans:
1) Complaining about the dialogue in the Prequels while simultaneously ignoring the well-documented fact that the dialogue in the OT is just as bad (if you need proof of that, go watch 'Empire of Dreams', and count the number of times that the 3 main leads comment about the difficulty they had in delivering their lines and taking them seriously. Even lines from the OT that worked - like Vader telling Luke that he's really his father - aren't truly the height of sophistication from a writing standpoint, as evidenced by the fact that even said line has ended up becoming the subject of parody and distortion.
2) Complaining about hokey sequences in the PT while ignoring equally hokey sequences in the OT. I'm a SW fan, but if you were going to ask me what the hokiest thing about the OT was, I'd tell you that it's Threepio constantly getting blown up/knocked apart and having to be repaired. Yes, it works, but it's extremely hokey. Most of the situations that Jar Jar finds himself in in TPM are just as hokey, yet nobody seems to complain about the hokiness of Threepio getting knocked about and falling apart.
3) Complaining about 'flat, one-dimensional characters' in the PT (the Neimoidians, some of the Jedi Council members, etc.) while ignoring the fact that, outside of the main characters, almost everyone else in the OT is equally 'flat and one-dimensional', particularly the Empire's officers. Even Tarkin is a very one-dimensional character at his core.
It should be noted that none of these things detract from my enjoyment of either the PT or OT; they're just simply part of what SW is, yet nostalgia has dulled people's acceptance of that to the point where they pick out flaws from the PT without considering and recognizing that the same flaws are part of the 'OT' as well.
1) Complaining about the dialogue in the Prequels while simultaneously ignoring the well-documented fact that the dialogue in the OT is just as bad (if you need proof of that, go watch 'Empire of Dreams', and count the number of times that the 3 main leads comment about the difficulty they had in delivering their lines and taking them seriously. Even lines from the OT that worked - like Vader telling Luke that he's really his father - aren't truly the height of sophistication from a writing standpoint, as evidenced by the fact that even said line has ended up becoming the subject of parody and distortion.
2) Complaining about hokey sequences in the PT while ignoring equally hokey sequences in the OT. I'm a SW fan, but if you were going to ask me what the hokiest thing about the OT was, I'd tell you that it's Threepio constantly getting blown up/knocked apart and having to be repaired. Yes, it works, but it's extremely hokey. Most of the situations that Jar Jar finds himself in in TPM are just as hokey, yet nobody seems to complain about the hokiness of Threepio getting knocked about and falling apart.
3) Complaining about 'flat, one-dimensional characters' in the PT (the Neimoidians, some of the Jedi Council members, etc.) while ignoring the fact that, outside of the main characters, almost everyone else in the OT is equally 'flat and one-dimensional', particularly the Empire's officers. Even Tarkin is a very one-dimensional character at his core.
It should be noted that none of these things detract from my enjoyment of either the PT or OT; they're just simply part of what SW is, yet nostalgia has dulled people's acceptance of that to the point where they pick out flaws from the PT without considering and recognizing that the same flaws are part of the 'OT' as well.
Well, the big difference here is that in the PT, the main characters are also very flat and one-dimensional. I don't give a shit about the background characters, but when the main characters are boring, you've got a problem.
Besides, it's ok for a character to be "flat and one dimensional" if the actor cast has the chops to transcend the material. Peter Cushing did that in spades.
I personally disagree with you that the PT's main characters are flat and one-dimensional, but if they are, then that's a comment/complaint that could be leveled against the main characters from the OT as well, since each set of characters adheres to a specific set of archetypes that is/are more or less carried over between the two trilogies.
When I learned they were going to make them.
More seriously, when I read that Anakin was to be a little kid instead a young man.
I don't think they were bad, but little kid Anakin did put me off, yes.
I think my first moment of worry came with the trailer. As others have said, it took a while to download it, and then I watched it a dozen times. I was wowed by the effects, and I was eager to see Neeson as a Jedi, but the first shadow to fall over my anticipation was "Yousa 'fraid ... yousa people gonna DIE?"
I know it's cliché at this point to harp on Jar Jar, but it was the first moment where I thought, "What the hell is George doing?"
I know it's cliché at this point to harp on Jar Jar, but it was the first moment where I thought, "What the hell is George doing?"
I'm gonna go point by point, I guess.
1. Dialogue is often reflexive of the characters and the type of story. In the case of the OT, they were using variations of mythological archetypes. That's why they were simple. Things like the production design as well as what was said aby the characters about the universe made the universe that SW is in seem much bigger. The characters also worked. They were not deep characters, but they were tangible, relateable, and, most of all, believable. As simple as they came across, it also felt like there was more beneath the surface, and to wach them even in non-speaking moments is to see them thinking, to anticipate how they would react. You know that Han wanted to object to Obi Wan as being crazy long before he actually said it verbally (and, even then, it was only after Chewie voiced his dissatisfaction first) This nuance is often lost in the new films, as everything is telegraphed and delivered in a flat, cardboard way. We are told that characters in the prequel films are friends, but in the OT, we feel that they are. Plus, the "bad" dialogue in the original film really felt fresh, because it was a homage to simpler, serial-type story telling. As a kid I loved the bickering and loose tension between Han and Leia. It didn't feel forced. Lucas (back when he had drive, talent, and checks and balances) tested the actors together to see the chemistry with each other,
2. C-3P0 was effeminate comic relief, and, for all his antics, none of the things that happened to him in the OT seemed to fly in the face of phyisics. He was only taken apart n Empire, and for good reason. In the original, we have Jar Jar in cartoon style running to avoid blue spheres by contorting his body like the cartoon he is. We have C-3p0 falling and hitting a flying platform, grabbed by a claw and thrown about as if he is made out of nothing. My least favorite sequence in the PT is the R2 units repairing the queens ship. i know that these movies don't follow science at all, particularly with regards to space, but at least the original trilogy treated flying in space with the same kind of respect as if tehy were flying in the air or anywhere, so, as a result, the R2 units always fit into a slot on the ships so they wouldn't fly away from momentum when the ship went forward, but this sequence, the ship is moving, the droids are rolling around on top and working. That was too much too swallow. For more on what I mean, see here, the dissolution of tension.
3. This was covered already. In any film, characters other than the main ones could be considreed flat, unless they are written exceedingly well for what they are, and if the character himself or herself has presence. Tarkin had presence to spare, and through him, we got into what must be the typical mindset of all the Moffs. He inbued this simple role with a lot of presence and we really felt that the Empire was larger than we could ever see on screen. Some of the other minor characters in the OT had presence too, but this is lacking in the new trilogy for background characters. I mean, one bounty hunter hires another to do his job, and he gives her a tube of centipedes, and all she does with it is walk four steps and put that tube into a droid. I ask, why couldn't he do that?
Last edited:
I'll give Jango props. He did have presence.
Similar threads
