I've done it and just in bloody time too! I'm writing this with an hour until I get to see The Force Awakens (but I'm publishing it far later because I got sidetracked... oops). The saga is complete and though I can't say I've loved every minute of it, I do have a renewed appreciation for the world George Lucas created and even more so, the script writing of Lawrence Kasdan!
Return of the Jedi is loads of fun. People might bemoan the cuddly Ewoks, but I love them. Yes, Lucas knew they'd sell like teddy-bear hotcakes, but hell, what doesn't in the Star Wars universe? It's funny too how the film turns from being this seedy exploration of Jabba the Pimp's underworld on Tatooine to the much more cuddlier and friendlier tree-hugging moon of Endor.
I'd forgotten how sleazy everything round Jabba is. From the laughing little runt below to Leia's bikini and chain, it's all a bit hellish; like I've walked up in da club on the wrong side of town and all my friends have suddenly ditched me. Jabba's so damn bad, that he even has his own Han Solo poster hung on the wall. I wish that this scene could have been even grimier. I wish Lucas had really sunk into adult territory and we could have seen Jabba snorting the Tatooine equivalent of cocaine off Leia's tummy or something equally disturbing.
Before my mind gets too stuck in the gutter, we move on to muppets and teddy bears. It's back to Dagobah where we get to watch a ghostly Alec Guiness signing another pay cheque, Yoda gets the most boring death scene in the entire saga and then off to Endor for a violent teddy bear picnic. I don't know what Lucas did to that speeder chase through the forest, but even in the special editions, it still looks bloody rubbish. It's at this point I remember David Fincher worked on Return of the Jedi. Bet he's a little embarrassed by all this really. He'd have kept demanding more takes and the film would probably only just be being released this year.
Where's my money man?
Speaking of embarrassment, I can sense that Harrison Ford isn't happy about being surrounded by teddy bears. Han Solo doesn't really get the chance to be very cool while he's being upstaged by the furry critters. I don't care what fans say about the Ewoks, I think they rock. The Na'vi ain't got nothing on them, and I bet they cost a hell of a lot less to render. Shame we don't get an Ewok sex scenes though. Bet they do it like they do it on Discovery Channel.
Then after six films (three if you're trying to forget), it all comes down to Daddy Vader and his boy. The action might be happening on Endor, but high up in the stars is where the war is really happening. The war for Luke and Anakin's souls. I know people hate the prequels and I'm not going to pretend that they're not bloody awful in many places, but in parts of the original trilogy like this, memories of the prequels do add something special. Both Anakin and the Emperor have now been developed over six films and the relationship between them is given more depth by knowing the backstory created in the prequels. No, it's not necessary, but I think it is even more fascinating to watch. It's great to see Pappa Vader having a change of heart in the face of the the ex-Palpatine's supreme evil.
When Vader finally takes his mask off, I almost wish Lucas had done some of his digital tinkering here. Instead of this funny little egg man, we could have had one last look at Hayden Christensen's brooding concentration face. I know Vader's supposed to look a little pathetic by this point, but this guy looks really laughable.
Oh wait, we do get one last look at Hayden Christensen as a force ghost on Endor. I love the way Alec Guiness looks over at him, like 'Who the fuck are you?' Meanwhile, Hayden's guilty little smirk sort of looks like he's saying 'Sorry about all of this... really made a boo boo with all of this... sorry'. Best bit of acting in the saga, hands down.
Except this: Han's face when Leia tells him that Luke is her brother. This face says everything we've all been thinking. He looks like he's going to vomit. Now wouldn't that have been a killer ending?
Well I'm shocked. Until yesterday, I've always considered A New Hope to be the best Star Wars film. I refused to listen when people claimed that Empire is better, darker, funnier, whatever. But now I've seen the light. Nope, now I've seen the dark (side). Empire is the best film in the saga, without a doubt. I'm sorry I ever doubted the true believers.
Part of the reason for my change of heart is that A New Hope is a little bit tainted when you watch it straight after Revenge of the Sith. Perhaps that's my fault. Perhaps it's old George's. I'm not hear to muck rake. I've done enough of that already with the prequels.
Whereas A New Hope's showdown between Obi-Wan and Vader is all a little anti-climactic after watching young Anakin burn half to death on a volcanic planet, Empire's Luke vs Vader showdown is still epic. And also, A New Hope leaves you crying out for more. It may have quite a nice self-contained story, but it left so much unexplored and Empire goes deeper and darker and is all the better for it.
One of the reasons I didn't watch Empire all the way through until I was about 15, even though I grew up watching A New Hope on video frequently, is that as a child I had the attention span of a fish. I used to only watch Die Hard from the moment the terrorists took over the building. The stuff before: boooooring! I'd fast forward through loads of films just to get to the first major turning point in the scripts.
I still find the stuff on Hoth a little boring. Is it just me? Luke out in the snow goes on and on. I feel like it's filler. Even the battle with the Empire and the AT-AT's is drawn out too much for my liking. It's only the stuff between Han and Leia that really pops. You can tell the screenplay is written by someone else other than Mr Lucas. The dialogue fizzes and the performances are way sparkier than before. It pleases me no end that Empire co-screenwriter Lawrence Kasdan is involved with The Force Awakens. Ford and Fisher have great chemistry and to be honest, I could have done with a lot more of this than watching Luke piss about in the snow.
To top it all off, there's this wonderful bit of family-friendly incest. It makes me wonder how important incest is to making a box office success. With Back to the Future and this, there's definitely something funny going on and I'm sure Freud would have loved to have been around to see these films. Look at the way Chewbacca and C-3PO are looking on. I guess as they were in the prequels, they might actually know just how wrong this is. Perhaps they could have mentioned it to someone.
Abrams has clearly been taking notes from Empire. As soon as I saw this shot, I thought of good old fanboy Kylo Ren in the Force Awakens trailer. Which leads me to wonder, is Abrams making some kind of point about Star Wars fans by having Kylo Ren obsessed with Vader? Have all the fans turned to the dark side? Have we all been corrupted and lured into being horrible about the prequels, because our obsessive fandom has started to warp our fragile little minds? Probably not.
Empire is also where we start to get these wonderfully brief bits of backstory starting to emerge about dear old Darth Vader. We see a glimpse of him without the helmet, we meet the Emperor and hear of Anakin Skywalker. Vader is being transformed from a plastic action figure into a damaged human being before our very eyes. Of course, the prequels have sucked any mystery out of this backstory now and ruined the big reveal, but it's still news to Luke and that's kind of all that matters.
Luke and Kermit have a great time on Dagobah, which is so brilliantly crafted and a thousand times more believable as a place than any of those CGI cities in the prequels, that you wish Lucas had just dreamed a little smaller sometimes. It's great to see that after the events of the prequel trilogy and spending 20 years in a swamp that Yoda has developed a sense of humour. He's so serious in the prequels that it's easy to forget that he's almost as fun as Kermit the Frog in Empire. He sounds younger and happier than ever before which is a little strange, but the puppetry makes him appear older than the CGI pinball-version in the prequels. Dagobah goes on a bit too, but next week I'll probably be complaining that The Force Awakens is too fast-paced so don't listen to me.
It's also great to spend a bit more time with Chewie in Empire. He's so expressive and so watchable. Peter Mayhew does a great job beneath the costume and Ben Burtt's sound design is just beyond words. I could go on about this at some length, but we all know just how important Burtt's work is on Star Wars. In terms of characters though, what he has done with R2 and Chewie is just incredible. If anything happens to Chewie in The Force Awakens, there will be tears I can tell you.
Anyway, let's move on swiftly before I star blubbering. Then we get into the whole Lando double-cross and reversal before Empire takes its rightful place in cinematic history. Forget all that stuff with Boba Fett and his new Kiwi accent. It's when Han delivers his iconic improvised comeback to Leia that Empire cements itself in the hearts of fans across the world. It's what boys across the globe have probably tried to imitate with their girlfriends a thousand times, most often to receive a resounding slap or the sight of their partner welling up suddenly. Only Solo gets away with a line like that fellas.
With so much iconic imagery in the saga so far, it's hard to imagine how it could be topped, but Empire manages it with ease. The duel between Luke and Vader takes place on two fantastic sets, beautifully lit and perfectly complemented by the sound of Vader's breathing and the sabers clashing. It is of course aided by the poignancy of Anakin trying to get his son to join him and Luke's stubborn refusal. The stakes are so high because we know damn well Luke isn't ready for this, so it's gripping stuff, no matter how many times you've watched it before. Just look at these images. Good luck topping this J.J.
Another hand is lopped off, Han is frozen in carbonite and Luke and Leia are left with their arms around each other like they might still get it on. It really is a dark place to leave it, but that's exactly what they did. I wonder what it was like back in the early 80s to have to wait three years to see how this story ended. AND without the internet to constantly keep updating you with who is on set, where they're filming, what time Harrison Ford takes a poop in the morning etc.
Also, one final thought. After quite a lot of C-3PO being carried around on Chewie's back in the film, I wonder if C-3PO would have been considered the original trilogy's Jar Jar if it had been released at the end of the far more cynical 90s. He certainly annoyed the piss out of me.
Down to business. After heckling at the first two prequels like some kind of impotent chimp throwing his own poop at the screen, I actually quite enjoyed Revenge of the Sith and now I'm back to where it all started; for me and many other Star Wars fans out there.
A New Hope is the first Star Wars film I ever saw as we had it taped off TV when I was a kid in the 80s and it was one of those tapes that just got played and played again and again in my house. I've said it before on this blog and I think it's time to 'fess up again. I'm not the biggest Star Wars in the world: far from it. None of these six films makes it in to my all time top 100 films. Don't hate me. I get why people love them and I love many aspects of them myself. There's just a lot of films out there that I like more. OK confession over.
A New Hope is Star Wars to me. I didn't even watch Empire and Jedi until much later in life. I always tried to watch Empire but found it a bit dull. So this film is where it not only all started for me, but also where it ended! Any of my childhood memories of Star Wars are from this film, and though I remember a lot of the images well, it has also been a looooong time since I've watched it.
The first thing that strikes is me is how much cooler everything looks. The droids have lost their shine. Both C-3PO and R2-D2 look proper scuffed now; like real things that have lived a life and been in some adventures of their own. It's amazing how Lucas starts the film with the droids and doesn't even introduce Luke for around 15 minutes. These two droids are so key to the saga and I kind of wished they hadn't been shoehorned into the prequels to sully their names. Lucky for them, those stormtroopers must have been doing absolutely zero target practice over the last 20 years and so the droids are free to potter around the ship with no chance of getting hit by a single shot from a blaster.
Now for some controversy. I know Darth Vader is probably the most iconic and most loved villain of cinematic history, but when he first steps on board this ship, in full black get-up, I almost miss the sight of Hayden Christensen burning to a crisp, all charred and raging in Revenge of the Sith. I wish there was some consistency between the voice of Christensen in the prequels and the voice of James Earl Jones. The two characters just feel so different and it's hard to reconcile the Anakin of Sith with the Vader of Hope.
It's ironic. After moaning about having too much Anakin in the prequels, and especially because it's Hayden Christensen, I now want some kind of reminder of the man that Vader once was in the earlier films. Honestly, I want to punch myself.
Once things move to Tatooine, it's again amazing how real it all feels. I'm watching the Special Editions so it's not really until Mos Eisley when Lucas splashes a bunch of CGI silliness all over the screen. Until then, it's amazing how real it all feels, even if it is a galaxy far, far away. No wonder kids fell in love with this all those years ago when it first appeared. There's real sand. A real desert planet. Those droids have scuff marks on them. They're old and worn out. They're really there, in a real landscape. When R2 is rolling around the rocky landscape, it is truly magical. Far more magical than all those backdrops of CGI cities and flying vehicles moving in impossibly straight lines that populate every bloody scene in the prequels. Even the Jawas look real. They're actually there. No one needs to stare at nothing in order to talk to them. These scenes hold up beautifully well, even now.
And then, we meet Obi-Wan. Alec Guiness' hair is awesome. He's living the hermit dream, hiding out in Taliban country with his little beard and spouting off about some religious gibberish. Personally, I wouldn't let my kids anywhere near the man, but he's still legendary and I didn't find myself missing Ewan McGregor as soon as I saw Old Ben. One thing I'm incredibly surprised about is how little time him and Luke spend together. His training of Luke is so short in A New Hope. I guess as a kid, watching a film felt like a whole afternoon in another world and you get swept away and swept up in it all. Watching it now, I can't believe how quickly his time is up with Luke. He basically goes 'here's a sword, use the force, now watch me die and bugger off'.
Lucas, it appears, not only has a thing for severed arms, but also for burned bodies. Seeing Luke's Aunt and Uncle all burned on the floor is pretty harsh for a kids film. Not Anakin-frying-slowly-with-his-legs-cut-off harsh, but still pretty vicious. Luke manages to get over it fairly quickly, so there's a good message there for the kiddies about not letting your grief get you down. Chin up eh?
Then it's off to Mos Eisley where Lucas behaves like a small child scribbling all over his own drawings because he hasn't used up all his crayons yet. Suddenly, everything looks fake, and we're right back in prequel-land. Luckily, Han and Chewie show up and Han shoots Greedo or Greedo shoots Han or something else I couldn't give a whimpering shit about happens. Either way, Han struts out and into our collective consciences forever, so just chill out. Han's a sneaky bugger whichever way you look at it, and if it worries you that much who shot first, you need to go outside and take a look at the real world. It's fucked, so don't get in a tither about Star Wars.
Eventually, our heroes make it to the villain's lair to rescue the princess. Ah, the Death Star. This is where it all happens. This is the stuff that sticks in my memory from childhood. The trash compactor thing. Obi-Wan vs Vader. Luke and Leia swinging to safety. There's so much iconic stuff here, it makes me want to weep. For some reason, the one image that I will never forget and that I was most looking forward to seeing again is this one:
It's from the part where Obi-Wan is sneaking around the Death Star by himself and about to shut down the tractor beam. I have no idea why I was so desperate to see this, but it's an image that has always stuck in my memory. Again, this is Star Wars to me. The Death Star feels so real here. And I love the idea of sneaking my way around it on a secret mission I guess. I'm off to get my dressing gown.
I'm sitting on the edge of my seat by this point, waiting to see the Obi-Wan vs Vader showdown that is the real reason why the entire prequel trilogy exists. 'I've been waiting for you Obi-Wan. we meet again at last'. Those lines were filled with so much backstory, so much menace and so much history that I couldn't wait to hear them again. Somebody slap me for what I'm about to say. I don't want to type this...
After watching Revenge of the Sith yesterday, this lightsaber duel suddenly comes across as a bit anti-climactic. Vader doesn't sound angry enough. Has he mellowed right out in the nearly 20 years since Sith took place? He should be fucking steaming after how Obi-Wan left him. I wasn't a huge fan of Hayden Christensen's performance in the prequels, but at least he seemed pissed by the end of them! James Earl Jones' voice sounds cocky, laid-back, calm. Perhaps this makes sense. Perhaps Obi-Wan should be the one who is afraid. After all, he's been cowering in a cave for a couple of decades, while Vader has been lording it up on a freaking planet-sized spaceship.
Still, at least they're both real actors having a real fight in a real location. There's no silly CGI enhancements as Obi-Wan does cartwheels or Vader does back-flips down the corridors. it's just two dudes with a lot of history duking it out once and for all. And then Obi-Wan smiles and it's over. I'm gutted. I could have done with way more Obi-Wan in the sequels, but this is possibly the best moment in the entire saga so I should probably just suck it up and enjoy it. Sob.
I slightly lose interest in the final space battle, but I know that this is the kind of stuff that really got kids hooked on Star Wars back in the day. It is all very exciting and much better than watching little Anakin way back in The Phantom Menace taking down a spaceship. Unfortunately, I've seen all this a few too many times and I'm still getting over how quickly Obi-Wan has been dispatched. After sitting through seven hours of prequels and waiting patiently to see Guinness take over as Obi-Wan and have that all-important rematch with Vader, it was all over far too quickly.
I'm actually quite amazed by how fast-paced the entire second half of the film is. I must have been an impatient kid, because I remember thinking that Star Wars were looooooong, slooooooooow films. Before I know it, we're here in a scene that has permanently been ruined for me by the video below:
And now it's on to Empire! Thanks for reading if you stuck with me through all that and please don't forget to share and comment below!
Imagine trying to explain to someone who has only seen the prequels why you're a Star Wars fan. Must be tough. Where do you begin? I guess a lot of fans would argue that this is not a conversation worth having. Unless the person you're speaking to has seen the original trilogy, there's really no use trying to convince them of the wonders, the magic and the potency of Star Wars as a saga.
Now I've watched Revenge of the Sith, it has become incredibly clear to me that the prequel trilogy just should have been one film. If you'd asked any Star Wars fan exactly what they wanted to see in the prequel trilogy before it had come to pass, I bet they would have said something along the lines of 'I'd like to see the first time Obi Wan and Anakin faced off against each other'. Maybe some would have said they'd like to see Obi Wan training Anakin. Maybe some would have said that they'd even enjoy a bit of younger Yoda getting into lightsaber fights with people three times his size.
No one would have said that they'd like to see Anakin as a little boy. NO ONE would have said that they'd like to see half a fucking film of Darth Vader falling in love and smooching and sitting in pretty countryside. Good Christ. If you haven't read my recaps of Episode 1 and 2, here they are below. It's not big, clever or pretty.
If Revenge of the Sith had been basically the only prequel film to the original trilogy, I think that George Lucas and everyone else would now be a lot happier. This is what it's all about. We've suffered through some pretty unspeakable shit to get here, but once it gets down to Anakin turning on Obi Wan, it all suddenly and astonishingly becomes almost worthwhile.
Even Lucas sounds excited, starting the film with a full-on exclamation of 'War!' in the opening crawl As in violence! As in action! As in NOT SITTING IN A FIELD FUCKING SMOOCHING! Thanks be to the Gods! I breathed a sigh of relief when I read this. No more tax, no more trade routes. Looking good.
Ewan McGregor seems less bored with the whole shebang. Then he gets thrown through the air by Dooku, and it looks like shit. Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee! How come some special effects just don't work? At least McGregor isn't stuck talking to tennis ball after tennis ball.
Padme is preggers! There's a few scenes of the pair together, but luckily not enough to get me proper wound up. It's suddenly all so dark. Luke and Leia are just little innocent fetuses growing inside of her. Hopefully Luke isn't coming on to Leia in the womb or anything. I wouldn't put it past him. Anyway, after enduring Attack of the Clones I just can't wait to see these two pretty people torn apart. Stop hugging and do something dastardly Darth! I'm getting ahead of myself again. This is the eternal problems with prequels.
I'm guessing if you've seen The Clone Wars series, then General Grievous is more exciting to you than he is to me. I spent a good ten minutes wondering why a droid would be coughing before eventually finding out, he isn't a droid, but some kind of creature in droid armour. Anyway, he seems to only exist so that Lucas can stuff the frame with more lightsabers. Look! He's wielding four at a time! He must be terribly badass. Nope, Obi Wan makes fairly short work of him and for the record, more lightsabers does not a better lightsaber battle make! I suspect J.J. Abrams has made a note of this and is taking us back to basics in The Force Awakens.
Speaking of baddies, what a difference a hood makes. No wonder people worry about 'hoodies' in the UK. Doesn't everyone look more badass with their hood up? Palpatine finally turns real nasty and has a decent fight with Mace Windu. It looks to me in this fight that Ian McDiarmid didn't do a huge amount of training and therefore, he's barely involved. It's all stunt doubles and CGI bobbins. I'm not even sure Sam Jackson is there for much of it either. And then before you know it, Palpatine has a face like a Klingon and you're just desperate for him to put his hood up to save him from any more embarrassment. Forget moisturizer. This calls for a hood to get that silly forehead covered as quickly as possible!
Finally! Finally! After something like seven hours of suffering (us, not him), Darth Vader is born. And then... wow does it escalate quickly. Kids are culled and suddenly Hayden Christensen looks the part. It's the hood. Must be the hood.
The final fight between Obi Wan and Anakin is stunning. It's got a fantastic location that somehow avoids looking too fake (mostly). And these two characters that we care about are suddenly determined to kill each other. The full tragedy of the situation is abundantly clear. It really is bloody sad. Meanwhile, cutting to Padme dying while giving birth is a decent decision and you almost start to think that Lucas can be forgiven for everything that came before. These were the secenes he wanted to write. This is the backstory he had in mind when writing the original trilogy. If the fat had been trimmed, and all that Padme/Anakin stuff could have been cut right back to a bare minimum, maybe, this prequel trilogy could have been one great film. Shame Peter Jackson didn't get the memo in time for The Hobbit.
And it's absolutely horrifying seeing Anakin die. How they got away with a 12 rating for this is beyond me. It's brutal. I've seen Irreversible, Human Centipede, You name it. If it's sick, I've probably watched it. But people burning is always hard to handle. Anakin burns slowly and painfully after having his legs lopped off. And Obi Wan just leaves him to suffer. It seems like a particularly nasty thing to do, even after Anakin has slayed a bunch of Jedi kids. And if Obi Wan had just finished the job, well then there'd be no original trilogy so maybe that's not the best idea. Thanks Obi Wan for just watching him burn before walking off. Bastard.
After three films, Lucas seems to have finally found his mojo. It's
almost like even he didn't care about all the stuff that came before.
Once Anakin turns, it all goes so damn well. McGregor reminds us he can act. And Christensen has never been better. And then this...
Noooooooooooooooooooooooo. I know how you feel Darth. What a laughably awful moment. It had been going so brilliantly for a little while and then Lucas fucks up the birth of Darth Vader as we know and love him. Couldn't he have fallen to his knees? Punched a hole in a wall? Anything but this raising his hands and head to the sky crap! Oh dear. Well, never mind. Lucas kind of manages to pull it back from the brink with the Tatooine double sun shot below:
If you're not excited to dive into the original trilogy after this, you may not have a pulse. I'm writing this with three days to go until The Force Awakens. Revenge of the Sith has given me A New Hope! Let's do this!
