That philosophy would certainly align with Revenge of the Sith’s undisputed MVP: Palpatine himself. (In retrospect, Anakin and the try-hard Kylo Ren had a lot in common.) We all make fun of Anakin first donning the iconic Darth Vader helmet and shouting “NOOOOOOOO!” for the sheer ridicule such a moment provides. With all of his impulsive, petulant, and self-destructive behavior, Anakin didn’t make villainy look cool he made it seem pathetic. Rather than build upon the myth of an epic villain like Darth Vader, the prequels tore him down.
#Revenge of the sith clone fighter ship full#
Can He Give ‘Star Wars’ a Boost? ‘Game of Thrones,’ ‘The Rise of Skywalker,’ and the Challenges of Modern Fandomĭefending some of the ways in which Lucas scripted these reveals is a losing battle, but there are genuinely devastating and engrossing sequences in the path toward Vader: the anguish when Anakin concludes that he must embrace the Dark Side to save Padmé from death when he activates his lightsaber in a room full of young Padawans after pledging himself to Palpatine the consequences of Order 66 when he confronts and Force-chokes Padmé, fulfilling the thing Anakin feared most the venomous rage in Anakin-cum-Vader’s eyes after Obi-Wan Kenobi slices him in half from ( I know) the high ground and before his body is slowly incinerated.Īs cringe-worthy as Hayden Christensen’s acting could be-in his defense, the scripts rarely did him any favors-it did end up serving what appeared to be Lucas’s motivation. The ‘Clone Wars’ Finale Perfectly Tied Together Every Era of ‘Star Wars’ Taika Waititi Revived the ‘Thor’ Franchise. And, of course, Chancellor Palpatine would have to finally reveal himself to be a Sith Lord-a moment that hopefully didn’t register as shocking for anyone since the prequels basically made it an open secret to everyone but the Jedi. However clumsily it was set up, Anakin had to betray the Jedi Order and something had to happen with Padmé, but not until Luke and Leia were born and separated. (The movies’ respective Metacritic scores at least confirm that Revenge of the Sith is the best reviewed of the trilogy, as it should be.) By 2005, Lucas hadn’t totally worked out some of the prequel’s kinks-namely, an inability to write dialogue that doesn’t, at its very worst, feel like Elon Musk trying his hand at a screenplay-but Revenge of the Sith was too tantalizing to completely fail because of what the trilogy-ender represented.įor all the bizarre directions of the earlier entries, with dry Trade Federation detours and a wasted Christopher Lee performance as the pointless villain Count Dooku, Revenge of the Sith was destined to fill in one of the most exciting gaps of the Star Wars mythos: Anakin’s inevitable transformation into Darth Vader. While the three films are typically grouped together as low points for the franchise, I contend that Revenge of the Sith shouldn’t be treated with such indignation. Navigating the space between adoring something undeniably flawed and providing a critical retrospective for the material is like trying to slip a torpedo through the Death Star’s tiny exhaust port.īut not all prequel derision should be created equal.
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I unironically believe podracing is cool-maybe even the part in outer space when young Anakin says “now this is podracing!” when he is not, in fact, podracing.
I have tried my best to understand the logic behind the first opening crawl of a new trilogy describing the taxation of trade routes (kids love their Space Tax). I know every reason why Anakin Skywalker doesn’t like sand. I remember every detail of the ‘50s-style American diner that somehow exists on Coruscant. Like the rest of Star Wars on the big screen, I have watched the prequels more times than I can count. It’s more like we’ve all come together to laugh and confess that we love trash at the altar of our lord and savior, George Lucas. (Prequel memes are ubiquitous enough that I began my pitch for this essay with “hello there.”) While it would be a touch unfair to make a blanket statement for the intent behind meme-ing The Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones, and Revenge of the Sith to death, many of the executions don’t seem mean-spirited, despite often highlighting the trilogy’s wooden dialogue, overabundance of CGI, offensive caricatures, and terrible acting. Far from having a limited shelf life, prequel memes have continued to thrive since the trilogy’s release in the early 2000s-even evolving to make their way onto emerging platforms like TikTok. If the strength of a franchise’s legacy were defined by the number of memes it spawned, the Star Wars prequel trilogy would be among the most heralded works in the history of cinema.
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