Comments on: Star Wars, Episode III: Revenge of the Sith http://www.cinemadiscourse.com Movies as mythologically informed literature. Tue, 27 Dec 2011 07:47:27 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.1 hourly 1 By: Larry Pearce http://www.cinemadiscourse.com/star-wars-episode-iii-revenge-of-the-sith/comment-page-1/#comment-7912 Larry Pearce Tue, 19 Oct 2010 11:29:32 +0000 http://www.cinemadiscourse.com/wp/star-wars-episode-iii-revenge-of-the-sith/#comment-7912 Episode III isn't nearly as horrendous as I remember it back in '05. I know this is years late to the controversy, but watching Revenge of the Sith today, in the latter quarter of 2010, it is easily, by far, the most watchable of all the prequels. I think that's due in large part to there being a fairly coherent story arch as well as a discernible (however clunky) beginning, middle, and end. The visual effects are also the most dazzling of the prequel films (Episodes I and II look like flatly rendered Pixar films.) The vehicles, weaponry, robots, creatures, and environments are relatively imaginative as well(though lovingly, albeit flagrantly, ripped from the pages of Moebius.) Episodes I and II are just so dull; they don't seem to go anywhere. But you know what the most ironic aspect of the entire prequel trilogy is, John? Nearly all of the principle science fictional concepts of the Star Wars universe (all of which were, by the mid 70s, staples of the genre) are tropes that are more accurately "science fantasy" or "space opera" (light speed travel sans time dilation, laser weaponry, planets which all seem to be ludicrously and conveniently "earth-like", dinosaurs, ape-men, space wizards, etc.) than science fiction proper, right? So when Lucas pulls out his one and only true blue SF concept as a key element his larger story, he virtually destroys the fundamental magic of the Star Wars ethos completely. By having a science fictional explanation of The Force, this geek felt the same sort of profound disappointment and disillusion as when I found out there was no Santa Claus. You mean to tell me that the Jedi are mutants, no better than X-Men in a galaxy far, far away; born freaks with superpowers? That means the phrase "may the force be with you" is a total sham! Hands down, that's the worst part of the prequel series. It's not the godawful acting, the crappy dialog, Jar Jar, or even the overly pristine, lifeless, digital panoramas (though those are bad too.) It's the fact that the ubiquitous, beautiful spiritual cosmology The Force as understood in IV, V, and VI isn't ubiquitous nor spiritual at all. It's privy to only an elite few. That sounds rather Imperial, doesn't it? Episode III isn’t nearly as horrendous as I remember it back in ‘05. I know this is years late to the controversy, but watching Revenge of the Sith today, in the latter quarter of 2010, it is easily, by far, the most watchable of all the prequels. I think that’s due in large part to there being a fairly coherent story arch as well as a discernible (however clunky) beginning, middle, and end. The visual effects are also the most dazzling of the prequel films (Episodes I and II look like flatly rendered Pixar films.) The vehicles, weaponry, robots, creatures, and environments are relatively imaginative as well(though lovingly, albeit flagrantly, ripped from the pages of Moebius.) Episodes I and II are just so dull; they don’t seem to go anywhere.

But you know what the most ironic aspect of the entire prequel trilogy is, John? Nearly all of the principle science fictional concepts of the Star Wars universe (all of which were, by the mid 70s, staples of the genre) are tropes that are more accurately “science fantasy” or “space opera” (light speed travel sans time dilation, laser weaponry, planets which all seem to be ludicrously and conveniently “earth-like”, dinosaurs, ape-men, space wizards, etc.) than science fiction proper, right? So when Lucas pulls out his one and only true blue SF concept as a key element his larger story, he virtually destroys the fundamental magic of the Star Wars ethos completely. By having a science fictional explanation of The Force, this geek felt the same sort of profound disappointment and disillusion as when I found out there was no Santa Claus. You mean to tell me that the Jedi are mutants, no better than X-Men in a galaxy far, far away; born freaks with superpowers? That means the phrase “may the force be with you” is a total sham! Hands down, that’s the worst part of the prequel series. It’s not the godawful acting, the crappy dialog, Jar Jar, or even the overly pristine, lifeless, digital panoramas (though those are bad too.) It’s the fact that the ubiquitous, beautiful spiritual cosmology The Force as understood in IV, V, and VI isn’t ubiquitous nor spiritual at all. It’s privy to only an elite few. That sounds rather Imperial, doesn’t it?

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