You feel old when it takes you two days to recover from a midnight showing of Revenge of the Sith.

So what did I think of the movie? Well, I argued with Whateley for what seemed like hours on how he thought the movie was awesome and I thought the movie was just plain... okay. Good but not great. Well, it had some great moments, but overall... well, I wasn't disappointed cuz I came in with low expectations, but the bad acting and directing and writing just got me a little down. But the story is good. Now, how is that possible, you say? Well, the overall story, the 6-part arc, if you will, is a fascinating tale of the hero's journey, and the complexity of the story sets up this amazing universe where nothing is like us, yet it's so believable that it could exist long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away.

But... with dialogue like "Yipee!" coming out of young Anakin's mouth as he was about to leave the only family he knew... well, that's bad writing.

Watching Project Greenlight this season, it just showed the importance of test screenings. I mean, it might have resulted in too many leaks to the public, maybe even a camcorder bootleg, but still, then they could've gotten better feedback than Lucas' yesmen.

Anyway, I will proceed to give my thoughts on it, so if you haven't seen it, then stop reading now.













The Good:
Well, it's the story we've been waiting for. How did Anakin become bad? We saw a hint of it in AofC when he killed all those Sand People in revenge for his mother (by the say, so Padme's willing to marry the guy who massacred a tribe of Sand People, but she's shocked when he massacred the Jedi Temple?), and this story just continued that by magnifying the path he was going. Palpatine was actually an excellent manipulator, and you can see how he did corrupt Anakin. His fight scene with Mace was reflective of the fight scene at the end of RotJ. I even liked Padme's outfits, though she changes clothes more often than Cher at her concerts. That outfit at the end, where she runs after Anakin... it's so 70's it's cool.

Ewan MacGregor did an excellent job acting with a bad script, and you can see his love for Anakin and his hurt when Anakin goes bad. A true Jedi to the core, the emotions he shows are subtle, breaking out the full force only at the end, to show a gradual building. My acting teacher would have been proud.

And the best part of all? One word: YODA. Man, he is so damn cool. And so cute! Thinking on it, though, he was so powerful, yet not powerful enough to defeat Palpatine, he could've acted better, shown more of the struggle. Cuz you barely see him break a sweat. Maybe if he had some bruises or cuts....


The Bad:
I actually liked the fight sequences, although there were too many. I mean, he probably could've cut down the fight sequences by about ten or twenty minutes and added that much more in character development. Like I said, there were a lot lacking in the character development department. He put so much thought into the creatures, the worlds, even the friggin' technology, that it seemed like he neglected the most basic necessity of a movie, which is a character's motivation. I mean, if you look at the character arc of every person over the entire trilogy, there is a definite arc, a change, a slope. But over the course of just the one movie, it's so shallow, that it's virtually flat. Like looking at a portion of a circle and seeing a flat line.

I argued that Anakin's turn was a little abrupt. Whateley argued that it was obvious. Eh.



The Ugly:

Hayden Christenson's acting. Period.