Was this really hated when it first came out?
Or was the hype too big, they forgave the faults?
shareI remember mostly people being psyched for it and it became pretty obsessed over. Only later did people start to articulate a dislike for it. But it's hard to say why, exactly, it got turned around like that. My personal theory is that it's just a bad movie but people got so hyped up over it just existing that they told themselves they loved it over and over again until they believed it. Later on they finally owned up that it just wasn't a good movie.
When I watched it in the theatre, I remember being thrilled as the familiar music stings came on (20th Century Fox, followed by quiet as "A long time ago..." comes up, followed by that fanfare! It was pretty great. But something felt off right from the title crawl and the opening sequence. It was hard to put my finger on, but just...it felt like something crucial was missing. Throughout the film, it was always there: Jar-Jar wasn't funny, Yoda was just "there" and didn't seem wise or interesting, and so forth.
i remember most disliking or disappointed but liking Darth Maul, rumor is the cartoon spinoffs improved the films only later
shareI've never been a fan of Darth Maul. Leading up to the film there was such hype for the guy, and I remember thinking that he looked like Satan and that was kind of an unoriginal look for a bad guy. I couldn't figure out why people were jazzed about him. Even the double-bladed lightsabre looked gimmicky to me. I do remember seeing it in the trailer and thinking, "Oh, sure. Now they have TWO blades! This movie 'must' be twice as good as the other ones..." It was like Lucas wanted people to be as blown away with his new weapon as with the original lightsabres. Everything about his design was trying too hard.
Then the movie came out and people still loved Maul and he was the blandest baddie of all-time. Yet, for some strange reason, people loved Darth Maul. Couldn't shut up about him. I never figured that out.
I wanted very, very hard to like it, and managed to only be mildly disappointed when I left the theater.
I managed to do the same thing with "Star Trek: The Motion Picture", which is an even worse film. just goes to show how much a person can mess up their own perceptions if they try.
Actually, The Motion Picture is a GOOD movie. It just doesn't have the ridiculous PEWPEWPEW Star Wars-type crap that modern people crave. How can you bash Star Trek's answer to 2001: Space Odyssey??
I agree wholeheartedly here. The Motion Picture felt like a big-screen version of a Ray Bradbury story - that classic '50s sci-fi stuff that was intriguing, paced, and had a cool twist near the end (who/what is V'ger!?) A lot of people expect Star Trek to behave like Star Wars and it doesn't have to. They're confused because sometimes Trek does go "boom" with more action-heavy entries (First Contact, Wrath of Khan, '09 Trek, etc.)
shareHey, I hate "2001", too! it's another film I tried to like for decades, because all the other nerds assured me it's profound and I just didn't get it. Well, I was right the first time, it's a mess with a few good scenes.
"ST:TMP" is a flat-out mess, trimming might have helped because that was not a cast that could hold things together when the director sets a glacial pace, you know? "Phantom Menace" is a another mess with a few good scenes, plus a great score.
I actually like Star Trek: The Motion Picture. Foebane summed it up pretty well there: it's got that great sci-fi 2001: A Space Odyssey vibe. It ain't flawless (an editor could trim twenty minutes and have the same experience come across to a viewer), but it soaks a viewer in the core elements of science-fiction and I think it really works.
shareAgree with both of you. Even though it was a copy of the episode "The Changeling" I still enjoyed it. Trim the ship reveal sequence by half and you have a decent Trek episode. We also finally get to see a transporter accident when poor Lt Sonak shows up a pile of shrieking carne asada.
(I created a sort of dice game a decade ago revolving around sci-fi and there was a Star Trek subsection within it. Maybe I'll post a segment of it in a Trek board)
There are a lot of sections that I think could use a trim. The biggest one for me is, yeah, the ship reveal sequence. It goes so long that they run out of music and have that extra-epic final shift; it winds up sounds like the music built to the climax, looked over at the visuals and went, "F---! You're *still* going...!? Alright, uh...play it EVEN SLOWER AND MORE 'IMPORTANTLY'!"
shareLol, yup.
Even though I liked it, I laughed at the shit talking about its flaws.
"... the Slow Motion Picture"
"... Where Nomad has Gone Before"
A friend of mine once referred to it as "The Motionless Picture". I like the movie, but I still laughed hard at that one.
shareHere is the Trek excerpt from that dice game:
(played by rolling 3 dice, an 8 sider, 12 sider, and 20 sider. A sum of 20 ends game and is a "SETI" score)
STAR TREK GATE
After a Shatner 1,2,3 or an Enterprise 1,7,10(inverted 10), Balok (1st hand 6,7,8)Star Trek gateway opens
sum of 4: Alley
sum of 9: Quark (game ends if roller leaves gate)
sum of 31: Section 31 or maybe Sloan or Bashir
1,1,1:April 2,2,2:Pike 3,3,3:Kirk 4,4,4:Decker
5,5,5:Harriman 6,6,6:Garrett 7,7,7:Picard 8,8,8:Riker
3,5,9: Borg (game ends and lose all scores other than Borg)
14,1,4: Transporter Accident/Sagan combo: Sonak
17,1,7: Transporter Accident/Buck combo: Anthony James
17,6,4: Defiant
18,6,4: Khan
19,7,9: V'ger
19,8,2: Judson
19,8,4: Larroquette
19,8,6: Gracie
19,8,9: Sybok (Trek gate closed for night and roller cannot score Shatners)
19,9,1: Valeris
19,9,4: Soran
19,9,6: Cochrane
19,9,8: Ba'Ku
20,1,3: Weller (ungreased backdoor)
^Both lower numbers of a roll appear in higher number: Transporter Accident
(example: 13,1,3 or 16,1,6)
Shatner: Coburn
2nd Coburn: Jack Lord
3rd Coburn: Cawley or Mignona (roller's choice)
4th Coburn: Pines
7th Roddenberry: roller experiences "cancellation," game ends, and
Roddenburys uncountable for rest of the night.
Warner: Meyer (opens Time Gateway) +Mini Side Roll: roll the dice ten times without
counting the scores. Any person rolled cannot be scored for the rest of the evening and roller scores a "Ripper"
Ripper a Shatner: Nexus
Gellar: Kahless
Star Wars: Deep Roy (exit Trek gate)
Galactica gate: Kor (exit Trek gate)
Babylon 5 gate: Chekov (exit Star Trek gate)
Time gate: Keeler (exit)
This looks complicated.
shareIt is as simple as throwing 3 dice. The hard part is remembering the 500+ scores we came up with. Constantly had to look up things we would forget.
Spawned a decade or so ago by boredom while waiting on my turn in a big 8 player game. It started with 10 simple scores and was a trifle. But when everyone is taking looong turns in whatever game, it was a brainless distraction ... that grew. "Hey, '4,5,1' should be a Bradbury! Hell yes, adding it!"
Something crucial was missing. It was cold and uncharismatic. It didn’t grab at your heartstrings the way the original trilogy did. I appreciated some aspects of the story, but it wasn’t MY Star Wars. I just didn’t feel engaged.
shareI think the biggest problem with The Phantom Menace, and the prequels in general, is a lack of a central ensemble who we want to see together.
Luke, Leia, and Han meshed together. We waned to see what they were going to do next. Each one individually was fun, but together they were dynamite.
Qui-Gon was a cardboard cuttout "Jedi sage", Obi-Wan just sorta said, "I cannot sense that, Master," every now and then, Anakin was a little kid, Jar-Jar was just loud, and Padme/Amidala alternated between this austere queen and a bland teenager (who didn't even do any rebellious teenager stuff).
I think you're right: it felt cold; I think the reason is the lackluster character and a chemistry-less ensemble.
Thanks for responding. You’ve articulated very well some of my feelings about the prequels.
In addition to the cardboard cutout characters, there were also long sequences of cgi metal machinery—cold, emotionless, bland, unengaging. So boring. I felt disconnected and struggled to keep my mind on the film.
You nailed it insofar as its cold.
The CGI stuff is clearly Lucas just going, "I *can* do this!" without thinking whether or not he should. Red Letter Media pointed out that he's moping about Titanic's success and how can he beat that (wrong priority there) and about how he follows a bunch of trends. Gladiator comes out, so Attack of the Clones has an arena fight.
For me it's never illustrated better than in Episode III. The fight between Obi-Wan and Anakin is, or was at the time, the longest on-screen sword-fight. I have a feeling Lucas said to himself, "I'm going to have the longest sword-fight in cinema history!" without thinking about how he was going to carry the emotions and continue to tell a story through the whole scene. He doesn't even bother. It's just lava surfing and backflips. He's interesting in spectacle.
Of course, we would be remiss in overlooking his infamous reputation as a director for his inability to connect with actors. I heard a story where the crew made him director "paddles", one reading, "Faster" and the other "More intense" because that was all he ever had the actors do. The prequels clearly don't care about the human element, and that's the whole reason to watch the movies.
Star Wars blew everybody's minds with the effects and the creative universe, yes, but the real reason it endures is because we want to spend time with Luke, Han, Leia, Chewie, R2, 3PO, and even Darth Vader. Without the human element, we have Avatar. That was a meticulously created world - a believable, immersive planet with its own eco-system, animal life, plant life, inhabitants, and culture. It was realised with the highest-grade effects, and the best use of 3D to date (depth of field used to draw the viewer in). Did any of that matter? No. The characters weren't interesting enough to carry a film (with the possible exception of Sigourney Weaver...)
Thanks again. :-)
Re longest sword fight. Oh, I remember how excruciating that was! Unsustainable. It was downright painful to sit through.
Re Your last paragraph
Back in 1977, I got special Star Wars edition of Rolling Stone Magazine with the cast on the cover and a long piece about the film. And I remember interviews with Lucas on tv, describing his favorite adventure stories and films while growing up, and that’s why SW has the story details it has, like Lucas’s childhood adventure stories. I think Lucas lost sight of that in the years between the two trilogies, and for the exact reasons you specify.
SW started out as a film to recapture the magic of Lucas’s favorite adventure fiction, but then SW became a legacy of groundbreaking special effects. that led to GL setting up a special effects studio in a ranch and becoming the premiere “shop” to create effects for other films. The prequels are like GL’s showcase.
That's a great insight regarding that article and Lucas' quote. To me, this is why the original is the best one. Empire Strikes Back reinvented the wheel with a darker tone, deeper look into the Force, a mega-smash plot twist, and a new quest direction for Luke (enlightenment, not glory), but the first one has that wide-eyed journey into adventure and that's special. Not many films can capture that magic (E.T. is another one...uh...almost anything by Hayao Miyazaki, I guess...) but to do so while inventing this amazing, original, "lived-in" world was top notch.
Ugh. The sword fight. Interminable. We get it, you have the best computers. Moving on...
It doesn't really add much to the overall story. Someone who has never seen any of the movies and knows nothing of the plot could watch Episodes 2-6 and still understand everything of import.
There are two important points that Episode 1 seeks to show. One is Anakin's closeness to his mother; the other is Obi-Wan's growth from a cautious Padawan into a wise mentor. But both of these are badly underdeveloped. We never see, for example, Anakin getting into a fight and defending Shmi's honor, or insisting Qui-Gon free her too. Nor do we see Obi-Wan be forced to go somewhere/do something on his own without Qui-Gon (like we do with Anakin in Episode 2).
If the movie had focused more on either of those themes, it would have been better for it. But they're so underdeveloped that, when later episodes make reference to them, it seems out of place. The subplot on Tatooine in AOTC serves a purpose, but doesn't jive completely with what we saw here (Anakin was young enough that, judging by his actions in PM, he would not have simply dropped everything to go to Tatooine based on a hunch to rescue someone he hadn't communicated with in 10 years). And by the time we get to Obi-Wan's final scene with Yoda in ROTS, their reference to Qui-Gon is completely out of the blue and makes no sense.
I don't think I-III added anything in terms of story, frankly. They didn't make IV-VI's story fuller. Star Wars IV is such a tightly-plotted story that it doesn't need anything else to work. The fall of the Empire is presented in the remaining two films and the Vader-Luke connection was crafted to give a personal journey to the hero. I-III didn't tell a story that justified the telling. I wasn't sitting on the edge of my seat, watching events slowly forge Anakin into the cold monster of Vader. I watched a kid with a lot of power turn into an angry (whiny), arrogant man who is basically okay with genocide and fascism from the get-go. He doesn't seek power or get corrupted, he's just a bratty teenager who grows into a jerk.
You're right: Ep. 1 doesn't show anything. Take Obi-Wan: he's cautious and becomes a wise master. Shouldn't he start out headstrong, then have that pay off for him which makes him cocky and sets him up to fail as a mentor to Anakin? He's basically Obi-Wan Kenobi as played by Sir Alec Guinness from page one, just with different hair. The character has no arc!
As far as story goes, Episode 1 seems as focused on Qui-Gon Jinn as anybody; he's almost the main character, but he doesn't really have an arc either, and he's out of the picture in Episode II.
The themes are underdeveloped as you say. But everything's so poorly written and plotted. It's sharp contrast to Episode IV. Almost a decade has passed between Episode I and II, and Anakin is meant to be motivated by his connection to his mother, but he hasn't gone back to free her from slavery? Obi-Wan didn't go back? Okay, maybe the Jedi are super-strict on cutting ties, but why not use that as a reason Anakin gets bitter and turns on the Jedi? But even if they couldn't go, why not ask Padme to help? The plot is so bad.
I liked the world building in I-III (the Jedi temple, the different planets), but the plots, not so much. And you hit on my biggest beef with them. I don't need my villains to have a back story. Picture in your mind the moment we first see Darth Vader in ANH. He is walking into a white hallway, dressed head to toe in black (i.e, he's different from everyone/everything around him). As he enters, the music makes a dramatic "dum DUM" sound (he's important). He is making weird breathing noises (he's creepy). We recognize him INSTANTLY as the villain. Before he says one word, we know he's the bad guy. We don't know why. We don't care. It's enough that he's bad.
A bad guy's backstory can be great if it's well done. The problem is the only time I've ever seen this done well is when the person is a real person from history. And despite Star Wars taking place a long time ago, that doesn't apply to Vader.
Vader's entrance is one of the all-time best in cinematic history. It tells you everything you need to know about him in that moment. In fact, the BIG REVEAL in Empire works *better* if you don't know. I can't help feeling like Episode IV would play a little strangely if you're seeing it for the first time after having watched the prequels.
Giving villains backstories usually backfires, I think, because they aren't necessary AND are poorly-done. The prequels take a great concept - the tragic fall of a hero into corruption and evil - and bungled it so thoroughly that it's dull, perfunctory, illogical, and cringey.
I've said it other places on these boards: I know I'm in the minority, but I didn't like the world-building in I-III. It seemed like every detail added was disappointing to me. Episode I shows us the Trade Federation and the planet Naboo, but with no detail, the sense of who or what the Trade Federation is just isn't cool. It inspires no mystery, wonder, or story-seeds to enter my mind. Naboo's okay, the Gungans are kinda neat, but nothing is built up. Coruscant is a big city, but we never get a feel for its society or how it works (compare to the metropolises of Blade Runner or Minority Report, or even Gotham City in Batman). Don't get me started on midichlorians...
Even the philosophical or religious stuff seemed weird to me. Jedi Knighthood doesn't allow for marriage, they train from age - what? - six or something like that, and they all wear Tattooine robes. They're not Jedi robes, Uncle Owen's wearing them in Ep.IV. The Sith Rule of Two was also weird... So, yeah...
*the BIG REVEAL in Empire works *better* if you don't know.*
Exactly. I'm not old enough to have seen Empire when it first came out, but I can just IMAGINE the huge collective gasps in the theaters. And I have seen home videos of kids watching Empire for the very first time, going into it knowing nothing except what they had previously seen in ANH, getting to that scene, and yelling "NO!!!!" just like Hamel does. Some even start to cry. It works THAT WELL.
If one MUST watch the prequels (a friend of mine watches them just for Ewan McGregor, and I can't say I can blame her), the best way to watch them, IMO, is to watch AOTC and ROTS in between Empire and Jedi. Watch Phantom for the mindless entertainment if you want (or for Ewan McGregor; I won't judge), or skip it all together. But it isn't critical to understanding the rest of the storyline.
I've heard of that running order before. I just never feel the need to watch the prequels. McGregor did turn in a great performance - all the more laudable because of the junk he was given - so props to him for that. For me, it just interrupts the flow of the films. It's unnecessary to begin with and poorly done on top of that. The big reveal is the perfect example: that twist is designed to go into the story where it goes and the "prequels" should be viewed *after* Episode VI's credits roll.
If there had to be prequels, they should have led into the OT more directly.
Episode I: The Spark of Rebellion; begin the story at the formation of the Rebel Alliance. The movie begins on Alderaan where Princess Leia lives an idyllic life. Her greatest concern is that her aging father is under a tonne of stress at work. She doesn't know why until one day he takes her to a Senate meeting on Coruscant. Leia witnesses the evil of the Empire first-hand. She asks why they can't vote the Emperor out and Bail tells her of the dictator and his military (Vader, Tarkin). Leia becomes a senator to try and fight, eventually getting wind of extremists who want to fight for freedom. She joins the Rebellion with its founders and they fight. They get their butts handed to them.
Episode II: The First Flight; follows Biggs Darklighter on Tattooine dreaming of the Rebellion - with Luke, of course. Biggs leaves, joins the Rebellion. Luke remains, naturally. Biggs flies many unsuccessful missions, the Empire is too strong. He goes on a quest to find out if there are any remaining Jedi: nope. All gone. The story would follow Luke at home and Biggs in the Stars and would basically set up the myths and legends of Star Wars. You'd play it so they didn't "really" exist for a triumphant surprise later.
Episode III: Basically Rogue One, but like a good version where Leia masterminds/spearheads a heist/spy mission to swipe the plans. Also: the characters would be likeable and I'd care about them.