Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith

First I would like to say that I liked the first two Star Wars movies of the new trilogy. Unlike most critics and many moviegoers, I didn’t see them and thought they were awful. Jar Jar Binx did not offend me. I enjoyed watching Darth Maul and Yoda fight in the second movie and bits of information, like how the stormtroopers came to be, were great moments to connect the dots to the originals for me. I didn’t expect the new series to be as good as the first because the kind of magic that the first three Star Wars movies created is impossible to repeat. I accepted the new movies on their own terms, and by doing so, I was able to enjoy them where others couldn’t.

With that being said, I can say that I was very disappointed in the latest Star Wars installment. Revenge of the Sith was just awful. I didn’t like it at all and considering that it was the creation of Darth Vader, by far one of the best movie villains of all time, I find it hard to accept that a movie with such great potential could go so wrong. ..and it went wrong.

First of all, there were just a few story issues that I couldn’t get past. For example, the Star Wars movies take place on many, many moons in the future, but Padme had no idea she was having twins? I mean, did they ever stop doing sonograms? She had robots to deliver her baby, for God’s sake, but had she no idea there were two of those little fools cooking in there?

Also, the whole volcano planet thing was kind of ridiculous. I accept the fact that the objects they were flying over wouldn’t melt, but humans are still humans and unless we evolved a layer of heat-resistant skin in the future that George Lucas forgot to mention, then they should have exploded or al less melted flying so close to the molten lava.

Oh, and the fact that Anakin Skywalker’s burned, hairless, legless, armless body could be saved, yet again I say, everyone had no clue to the fact that Padme was having twins amazes me. Can we save someone who essentially looks like a worm but can’t tell how many or the sex of a pregnant woman’s babies? Give me a break.

My other big problem with the movie was that Skywalker’s dissent from the dark side happened too quickly. He was so willing to take the Chancellor’s word about the Jedi Council, he never stopped to question where those nightmares originated and he never questioned the Chancellor’s motives or why killing a bunch of baby Jedi might seem like a bad idea. It was just “Hey, you won’t respect my powers, I want to be number one, so let’s go to the dark side.” He wanted more things than that.

The movie had its high points: fighting Yoda is always good and it was even better the second time around. Seeing Chewy was great and seeing Anakin put on the Darth Vader suit was great. James Earl Jones is the man and hearing his voice even for a few seconds was worth my six bucks. I wish the entire movie would have been as good as those select moments.