Author Topic: Post your ROTS reviews and thoughts!  (Read 32971 times)

Offline Hemish

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Post your ROTS reviews and thoughts!
« on: April 30, 2005, 02:25 AM »
here
Sounds good
Can't wait now less than 3 weeks
« Last Edit: May 19, 2005, 07:09 AM by JediMAC »
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Offline Ben

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Re: ROTS review
« Reply #1 on: April 30, 2005, 02:33 AM »
I want to read it, but I'm trying to stay away from the plot.

It's driving me mad.
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Offline CloneF13Y35

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Re: ROTS review
« Reply #2 on: May 19, 2005, 04:01 AM »
I'll try to keep it spoiler free
oh where to begin. words escape me, I am so emotionally drained.  not because it's over, because, in my opinion, this was a very emotional movie. moreso than I imagined.
The first third to half is a lot of cool action, the opening space battle and rescue is more than I imagined. Great visual effects as the camera zoomed, dove, dipped and twirled with anakin and obi's ships. the drama and tension worked well, I thought.
the lightsaber fights were like nothing we've ever seen.
I thought that the interaction between anakin and obi-wan was well done. the dialogue was much better,  but there were still some cheesy lines here and there but nothing too distracting.
the interaction between anakin and padme was also much better, I got the sense they really loved eachother yet chafed at having to keep it secret.
Ian Mcdirmid should get best actor, his delivery was awesome, plaintive when he wanted to appear mild and thouroughly menacing when he got his evil on.
Ewan was great as well, I thought he finally got into the role, totally becomg Obi-Wan Kenobi.
Hayden and Nat did very good jobs. most of the dialoge was good wih only a few cringe inducing lines but light years better than ep1 and 2.
But the last third of this movie made me choke up several times. Now I am kinda wimpy and sentimental but man, does it get emotional and very intense.
I walked out very sad, when it was over.
I need to see it again and thanks to a sound system that cut out right as Vader rises on his medical bed to where C-3p0 is on a certain ship - about 5 or so minutes WE HAD NO SOUND!!!!
So I get a fre pass to see it again. :)
The wookies were cool but not in it as much as I had hoped.
Yoda is the MAN or frog or whatever he is.
Grevious is good, he's BIG, and way cooler than maul was. So I'm happy with him.
The CLones are cool - at first and I like how they were done.
But due to the graphic and intense final third of the movie, I will not take my son to see it. That's just my perogitive and I won't judge parents who do take their young (under 10 is right) children.
What akain does, seen and implied in the jedi temple; how he decided to join the dark side; how palpatine has been manipulating things for a VERY long time and how he KNOWS the buttons to push on anakain - you almost feel sorry  him, Palps is one evil SOB.
 I saw many of the little easter eggs, which will be discussed once more people report in.
I drove home in slience, no radio, no star wars music, just alone with my thoughts on the movies.
WHew. I recomment it totally but be prepared.
8 outta 10 galactic stars.
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Offline Cory Chaos

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Re: ROTS review
« Reply #3 on: May 19, 2005, 05:05 AM »
I took in "Star Wars: Episode 3 - Revenge of the Sith" this evening. The overall experience was sheer fun. I strolled in at 8:00 PM, was ushered almost directly into the theatre where Alison and I got seats dead center, bullseye in the stadium seating. Best seats in the house, no doubt.

The opening crawl rolled up to thunderous applause, and from that point on, we all knew it was the beginning of the end. Episode 3's opening dogfight sequence was simply awesome. The CGI ships and atmosphere looked more polished than ever, provided a nice segway from the "Clone Wars" micro-series, with the easy going camaraderie between Anakin and Obi Wan ever present. A welcome change from the smug, wooden, emotional robot Hayden Christensen played in the previous installment. From that point on, I knew I was going to be pleasantly surprised with the film. He executed his heel turn to near perfection, save the trance-like dialogue between he and Palps in his office.

What Lucas achieved in the script of Episode 3 is exactly what the previous 2 episodes were missing, that being the casual nature of the dialogue. Too often we were subjected to regal, stale, monotone diatribes and corny, prim and proper sounding quips. This time around, the character interaction was more believable, less contrived and trivial, and you felt as if they actually known one another for quite some time. In addition, he maintained a great pace with the storyline. Never abandoning one segment for too long, it all pieced together quite nicely, all eventually focusing righ back onto Anakin, the beef of the film.

Ian McDiarmid headed up the overall acting revival that was so sorely missed over the past 6 years in the franchise. This was a personal film, one with actual relevance and meaning to Star Wars lore, not filler. McDiarmid actually taking his dialogue and running with it, showing Palpatine for what we all knew he was. IMO, it was Christensen story to mold, but McDiarmid's movie through and through. Hayden, dropping his prowess for playing an angry, angst ridden, wooden Anakin, in its place, a dark and brooding soon to be Vader..with true emotion! Honorable mention to the staples in Kenobi and Amidala, but absolutely no kudos to the one man who blew his once chance at redemption in Samuel L. Jackson. Even Jar Jar, who was on screen only twice, was more welcome than he.

That said, there were some instances that seemed a little less than inspired, and were more for the sake of fulfilling a bridging of the final episode and the Original Trilogy. Kashyyk was introduced, along with Chewbacca, neither of which really held no relevance. Very minimal nods to otherwise important characters such as Tarkin and Antilles were appreciated, but somewhat forgot when Padme's ultimate demise is described as merely "losing the will to live". The birth of Vader seemed extremely rushed, and tarnished the lore of how Vader came to be, having been condensed to a 15 second building scene, after which he's seen clumsly stumbling to his feet, followed by a cartoonish bellow, which made me just shake my head in disapproval.

While there were some missed opportunities, and some nonchalant tie-in's, which seemed obligatory at best, overall, it was a very entertaining movie, which finally improved on the mistakes of its precursors. Lucas delivered a much more mature film, overall. It was witty as the original, scripted and delivered with ease, no contention, the action sequences were polished, and the battles were wholly engaging. It was promoted as dark and sinister, and that's what it was.

After 1 of 3 scheduled viewings, I'm giving ROTS a 7/10. Big ups for finally writing a flowing script, motivating the players, and remembering the true motivation for this new trilogy. Docking points for the gigantic, enormous, Mack truck sized plot hole in the fact that Anakin's turn to the dark side was to learn how to save Padme from dying, of which he never asked how, never trained to do so, never expressed interest in doing, and factually almost killed her himself.
« Last Edit: May 19, 2005, 01:11 PM by Cine »

Offline Pete_Fett

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Re: Post your ROTS reviews and thoughts!
« Reply #4 on: May 19, 2005, 08:57 AM »
I liked this movie a lot - I would say that it ranks up in the top two of the six movie Saga. In fact, in terms of strengthening EPs 4, 5 & 6 it does that nicely.

The effects were amazing. The acting was a HUGE improvement over either of the previous two prequels. Hayden and Ian both did great jobs. The movie was extremely emotional in the last third so when it was over it what finally sunk in for me was "that's all folks" and I was left with a twinge of sadness felt both for the characters but also the end of the SW movie franchise.

As I drove home, I did start to bemoan the fact that the movie didn't contain so many of the nicer parts of the book and/or comic-book.

While I don't know whether or not some of these issues are addressed in the "longer" digital version, it was a shame to NOT see some things included:

1) Where was Qui-Gon? Lucas couldn't even get Liam to record some new lines?
2) We've been given figures of both Shaak Ti and Bariss Offee - where were they?
3) Even the boy behind me (who seemed to know A LOT about Star Wars, which was cool to hear) - was like "why didn't we see Yoda land on Dagobah?"
4) Where was Mon Monthma? or the rest of the Senators who start the rebellion? Where was Bail's line to Yoda and Obi-Wan that basically says, "do not believe what you hear we say on the senate floor?"
5) Lots of little lines here and there which were in the comic and I presume also in the original screen-play, but not in the final edit. Like when Obi-Wan is saying the last few lines to Anakin and says (in the comic) "I love you....but I will not help you" - to me even having dialogue like that would have made the move all that more powerful.

So like I said, I still think it was a great movie, but for me at least, I had read all of the material and in a way, I had definitely ruined the movie for myself - I envy any of you out there who had stayed away from as many spoilers as possible.
Peter

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Offline speedermike

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Re: Post your ROTS reviews and thoughts!
« Reply #5 on: May 19, 2005, 09:39 AM »
"The birth of Vader seemed extremely rushed, and tarnished the lore of how Vader came to be, having been condensed to a 15 second building scene..."

Wow.  I saw the whole movie as being the birth of Vader.  The point was that Vader was not the suit, but a guy who made some lousy, selfish choices.

Overall?  I loved it.  It really, really sucked me in. Finallly a prequesl film that I won't have to defend all summer!

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Offline jokabofe

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Re: Post your ROTS reviews and thoughts!
« Reply #6 on: May 19, 2005, 09:39 AM »
I wasn't going to post this, but what the hell....

Arriving at the theater at around 10pm, we found that it as already about 60% full. We had to sit kind of up in a corner, next to a family of seven (!!), including 4 children who couldn't have been older than 8 - 10 years old at the most. Why bring such small children to Midnight Movie showing? For the first hour of waiting, the children did nothing but scream, and run around in circles, while the father (I'm guessing he was the father, at least) did nothing but curse and complain to the wife (again, just a guess) about the place they were sitting in and the fact that he did not want to stay. At around 11pm, they all got up and walked out. I don't know where they went, and I didn't care, I was just happy to see them leave. But this isn't about the other people in the theater, is it?

As the opening crawl started, I was sitting in my chair, reading and thinking about the past movies. Thinking about how much fun they were, and how much I had enjoyed them. Well, most of them, anyway. Except for the one. Anyway... as the film opened, and we see the huge space battle taking place, I could tell something was... different. Anakin and Obi-Wan laughing and joking? What? Laughing and joking while fighting a huge battle? What was this? I didn't really get it, and thought it was kind of out of place. I know that it was trying to show how the relationship between the two had grown and become such a bond, but seriously... joking at a time like that? Strike one...

And from there - it just kept spiraling downwards. Farther and farther. I don't even know where to start, and I sure as hell can't remember everything in order, so I'm just going to type out some random thoughts as they come to mind.

Ian McDiarmid/Palpatine/Sidious: should win an award for biggest ass on screen. He was somehow able to turn the most evil, vile villain in the entire Trilogy into a freaking clown. Saying his acting job was "over the top" would be an understatement. He belongs in the next Dumb and Dumbererer movie alongside Jim Carey after this performance. Very, very sad.

Droid voices: WTF? When did the droids turn into Abbott & Costello? Every time one of the droids made a sound, I couldn't help but laugh. The droid voices and dialog through the first two films didn't sound like this, why start now?

Obi-Wans Boga (or whatever that thing was): again, WTF? Why waste time with this ridiculous beast, and the annoying stupid noise that it made... was that the best they could come up with?

Wookies, Clones: where were they? I would have to say that I was most disappointed by this. The biggest thing I read about was how we were going to see Kashyyk, which we did. For about 30 seconds. Another wasted opportunity in my opinion. And Chewbacca? Again, why make the big deal about making the distinction that Chewie is in this movie, when all he does is pick up Yoda and walk away?

Darth Vader = Frankenstein? Just when I thought it couldn't possibly get any worse, it did. After Sidious tells Vader that he killed Padme, he breaks free of the medical table, takes two stumbling awkward steps away from it, raises his clenched fists and yells in a fit of rage. If I was James Earl Jones, I would have flat out refused to do the voice over for that.

Anyway, I've got a ton of other disappointing things to say, but I fear that I've already said enough. I don't know if my expectations were just so high to see this movie, or what, but I left the theater with my head hung pretty low. I would give it about a 4 out of 10 stars, and rank it in the #5 spot:

1) Empire Strikes Back
2) A New Hope
3) Attack of the Clones
4) Return of the Jedi
5) Revenge of the Sith
6) The Phantom Menace

Offline jadesfire

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Re: Post your ROTS reviews and thoughts!
« Reply #7 on: May 19, 2005, 09:41 AM »
I loved it.  It really, really sucked me in. Finallly a prequesl film that I won't have to defend all summer!


That about sums it up for me.  Short, sweet and to the point. 
This really was the one I was waiting for (out of the three prequels).  Empire will always be my favorite though.


Below is the review I had sent to our local paper at 3:00 am since they need it by 8:00.  It's not as detailed as it could be but I was trying to keep it spoiler free:

My review of Revenge of the Sith (spoiler free)


This really was the one Star Wars fans were waiting for!!  From beginning to end, Lucas kept the audience enthralled in the downward spiral of Anakin Skywalker.  The beginning starts out with a spectacular battle and goes straight in to the loyalty between Anakin and Obi-wan and how Palpatine starts to slowly turn Anakin to his next apprentice.  The light moments in the beginning (who knew R2-D2 had so many neat gadgets) draw you in to how hard it is for Obi-Wan to accept what Anakin does in the end.  The light saber battles were each spectacular (but I was hoping Mace and Palpatine’s would have been longer) with the finale between Anakin and Obi-Wan so intense, I couldn’t follow the swirling of the sabers all the way through.  How Vader finally receives his suit and the contrasting scenes with Padme were really tied in together well and John Williams score throughout the movie was probably his best yet.  You can hear Luke and Leia’s theme and, combined with the last few scenes, really flow right into Episode IV, A New Hope.

All in all, it was the best of the three prequels and if you want to see a special cameo by George Lucas himself, look for the blue faced man on the bottom left of the screen when Anakin is going to see Chancellor Palpatine at the opera house.

« Last Edit: May 19, 2005, 09:55 AM by jadesfire »
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Offline Xander

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Re: Post your ROTS reviews and thoughts!
« Reply #8 on: May 19, 2005, 09:42 AM »
OK, just a quick rundown -

First thing I said: "I wanna see it again!"

I sat with some local collectors (actually GH contributors) down near the front, on the walking aisle that separates front seats from stadium seat. Perfect for me.

I noticed right off the look of the movie - its much more classic cinematic looking, a bit darker, deeper tones, and the lighting has just improved immensely. All the actors/actresses look better too! I was trying to pick out what was missing from the book (during the first part at least), and the movie zipped right along and included so much of the good parts of the book (not all the best dialogue, but that's expected.) Dialogue in general was MUCH smoother than Ep. 1 and 2, meaning some was great, and there were only a few groaners (The things he makes Padme say, sometimes unconscienable).

Acting - finally these people were allowed to act. As Cine pointed out above, Ian McDiarmid was just perfect. Impecable mastery of the dialogue, and he seemed to be able to take it beyond just Palpatine's gift for language. I never expected this in a Star Wars movie. Ewan did a fine a job, and Hayden did more with less dialogue. The movie as a whole seemed more "cinematic" in that respect. Many times the characters did not speak, and simply told the story by expression, or simple gesture. There were more shots of detail, for instance the clones' feet as they were preparing. Montage type shots that seemed to be missing from Ep 1 and 2.

I didn't think all the scenes had great significance, but I was never waiting for a scene to be over in this one.

I found the funeral scene well done.

The rest of the ending, of course, being a fan, that could have gone on much longer, but I was pleased with the choices he made.

Next viewing - Friday.

Offline Morgbug

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Re: Post your ROTS reviews and thoughts!
« Reply #9 on: May 19, 2005, 02:10 PM »
I'm ok with the movie.  It wasn't great, spectacular, fantastic but I thoroughly enjoyed it.  I'd suggest my expectations were maybe a little lower than most peoples.  I also didn't read the book beforehand because I've seldom, if ever, found a book that has been outdone by a motion picture, simply because there isn't ample time for plot subtleties in a movie. 

I can't say I'm surprised by the people that were disappointed either.  I don't disagree necessarily, but at the same time I think many of us presumed too many of the details that didn't show up, if only because the promotional material led us to believe they'd be more important.

Kashyyk and the wookies were sort of a let down, but at the same time, it was a single battle in a huge war, so spending tremendous time on it would have served what purpose?  I know it may be a touch of blasphemy, but I was fine with the limited screen time of Chewie.  Outside of enjoying the character, I really don't know what more time would have accomplished for the movie. 

The same can be said of Tarkin, but did we know he'd have lines?  Oh, and where was Mon Mothma?  Is this the first action figure for a character that was scripted into the film but not actually shown?  Gee, I wonder how the sales of that figure will be now.  I suppose she was in there, but I missed a fair bit with mister twitchy foot behind me >:( ::)

The Droid dialogue was a bit odd at times, but seeing R2 take out a couple of SBD's certainly indicated the hard core geeks in the crowd that applauded at that point :-\  Not surprisingly they were the guys in front of us that grew from 3 people in line to over 15 and then bitched when one of their friends that showed up at 11:45 couldn't sit with them and didn't have a good seat.  Morons.  Anyway.... a lot of the humour did feel forced, as did some of the dialogue. 

I basically just enjoyed the movie for what it was.  There's no way Lucas could win here.  A movie filled with lightsaber battles would please some, but the cost would be plot development, a major complaint from the preceding two movies.  I thought it was a not unreasonable balance of the two, seeming to me more action than dialogue. 

For the most part I'll agree with jokabofe here and his Frankenstein analogy?  Was that intentional, to draw that comparison, because it immediately was brought to mind?  I didn't mind the limited Vader in costume screen time, I knew it was coming and that aspect of Vader is part of the OT.  I'm inclined to agree with speedermike, the whole PT was the birth of Vader, the costume is secondary to this particular aspect.  I think Anakin/Vader was amply evil without the big, black costume in slaughtering the children. 

As an aside, I've already read any number of complaints that people have about not seeing children/padawans/younglings actually physically murdered on the screen :o  Shake your head folks, it's not a slasher flick.  And please don't move into my neighbourhood, I don't really like your sense of visual entertainment.

I'm reluctant to rank it just yet.  There's so much I missed by being overwhelmed (I didn't see the Falcon) that I'll need to see it a few more times.  There are parts that will remain annoying, but I did enjoy the movie.
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Offline Nathan

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Re: Post your ROTS reviews and thoughts!
« Reply #10 on: May 19, 2005, 04:11 PM »
Holy crap ... ROTS KICKED MY ASS This thing is amazing. I liked Episodes I and II, but III is so far beyond my expectations that it makes the last two look like **** in comparison.

A couple of things stand out: John Williams' score and the acting. Natalie Portman's performance is so much better than in the last two that it's like watching a completely different actress.

Now, I freely admit the film is not perfect--the Frankenvader bit comes to mind, as well as a couple bits of clunky dialogue and most of the Super Battle Droid scenes. I was also disappointed with how little screen time there was on Kashyyk, particularly after the huge buildup of hype around them. But on the whole I think this is an improvement over the last two on every level.

The only downside: five minutes from the end (the scene where certain people are on the bridge of a ship), the film melted. The film ******* MELTED. You could literally see the filmstock bubbling away. After twenty minutes or so they got it running again so we saw the last couple scenes, but by then the dramatic tension was utterly ruined and the moment had passed. &$&%#@#&**&!!1  >:(

The odd thing is, apparently this happened on the other screens as well.

A more coherent and in-depth review is forthcoming after I see it a couple more times.
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Offline Herbert_Ackermans

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Re: Post your ROTS reviews and thoughts!
« Reply #11 on: May 19, 2005, 04:20 PM »
Well, here goes...

Ever since the trailer I thought this was going to be a very good movie, I read spoilers that made me feel convinced it was going to be good, the soundtrack sounded great in many numbers.

The opening battle blew me away, it was impressive, it was awesome, it was breathtaking.

The rescue, the Dooku-cameo (oh, and don't say it was more than that!) that all looked good, the first steps of Anakin to Un-Jedi dealings, Palpatine playing him, well done.

And then... it all falls flat on it's face.

Palpatine becomes some demented cackling clown. Making weird faces, the long drawn out talks with Anakin, who in those talks seems utterly dim-witted to not understand who he is talking to.

The first Padmé Anakin scene was good, subsequent ones sank deeper and deeper away.

This is also the first time I think Ewan McGregor delivered a bad job in acting, or he'd been given a bad job to act. Man... if he really thought of Anakin as a brother to love, how can he just sit there, almost smirking, gloating in the council while Anakin suffers humiliation?

As said before, Wookiees... what wookiees? What was the hoopla with Wookiees? What was all that fuss about, why was a whole webdoc devoted to Wookiees who we don't even see long enough worth mentioning?

The lightsabre battles, yeah well... I'd take them a lot slower and with more bantering vocally, thank you very much.

The final sabre fight was pittiful, I was expecting something epic, something groundbreaking, something deeply impressive, but what we got was just 2 guys battling it out and ending it in the cheesiest way possible, the end was plain stupid.

And why did they even cast someone to play Tarkin? Did you see him? No? Guess you blinked at that moment.

I still don't see Anakin inside Darth Vader's armour. Darth Vader is not a person who sheds tears, Vader is not someone who goes to pieces and trashes a room having a fit.

Oh, and thanks Ben Burt, you've successfully massacred the soundtrack with your overwhelming genius in sound-editing, well done. NOT!

I hadn't even missed Mon Mothma until reading about her here again, what the hell happened to her role?

I get the feeling that ROTS was a rush-job, despite all the time taken. Well, seems most has been put, once more, in making fancy SFX.

AT-TE's, AT-RT's, AT-PT, Turbotanks, all thrown in with the idea "we had that in the first trilogy, just tuck 'm in and we get that old school feeling again." They didn't work. There were plenty of easter eggs back to the OT:

- The walking sound of the AT-PT is exactly the same as that of the Scoutwalker
- The howling siren on Mustafar, also heard in AOTC, is the same as in TESB when the 2 ISD's collide
- The hatch Yoda drops down from is exactly the same as the one Lando takes Luke down from in TESB-SE.
- Several lines:"Lock S-Foils in attack position" or "There's too many of them", also Obi-Wan's "Hello there" and Palpatine's "Good, good" were all quite explicit links to the OT.

I really had great expectations of this one, reading several reviews from charity screening I thought I was going to see the second best SW-movie.

When the end credits rolled, I couldn't help feeling cheated, I was in no way moved by anything that happened, the killing of the younglings.

Oh, and if Ewan's idea of playing a man who is breaking down consists of cupping his chin... well... that didn't quite cut it, did it?

They promised us a movie to answer all answers and tie up all the loose ends.

I think that we are left with more loose ends than we had before.

A very, very disappointing closure to a very, very dissappointing prequel trilogy to one of, if not THE, greatest trilogy of movies ever.

What a waste of energy, time, resources...

Offline JayDouble

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Re: Post your ROTS reviews and thoughts!
« Reply #12 on: May 19, 2005, 04:37 PM »
(Spoilers)

Let me preface these comments by saying I read the book first.

I saw the movie last night and.....I really don't know what to write.  My thoughts are actually jumbled at the moment.

The movie just seems to move very fast compared to the book.  I hope he comes out with and extended version ala Peter Jackson in LOTR.  There were a lot of scenes that didn't play out from the book, which I believe would of helped or at least enjoyed watching.

My whole view on Vader has changed.  I remember watching OT and thinking "WOW, Vader is the baddest mofo in the Galaxy."  Now I realize what a tragic hero he is instead.  Went to the darkside to help Padme, but ended up killing here instead.

The one gripe I have is when Anakin does go to the dark side and Palpatine says we'll find this power together.  If I'm Anakin I'm like "WTF."  I just killed Mace and you don't have the power.  Screw you off with your head.   :P

Overall, Im very pleased with the movie.  Very entertaining and yes very emotional.  Maybe I'm just realizing that there's no more movies coming out or it's kind of an end to an era.  The only thing I can compare my feeling to is like watching a sitcom's series finale.  You watch or follow it religiously and its just over.  Feels weird.

Offline Matt_Fury

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Re: Post your ROTS reviews and thoughts!
« Reply #13 on: May 19, 2005, 05:25 PM »
I think I'm one of (if not the) first person to stay relatively spoiler free for this film.  So now on to my review:

I thought it was great!  The characters showed more emotion and range than in the previous movies (my biggest complaint for the PT has been Lucas' strentgh is not in directing), and they played their roles well.

The story added a lot more depth the Vader's character in the OT.  When I first watched SW, Vader was just this pure evil guy.  After watching ROTS, he's a self hating tragic hero, now well into a downward spiral that will take him 20 years to pull himself out of and redeem himself.  I too sort of cringed ant the Frankenstienesque way he got off of the operating table, but I thought he would stumble a little since he's got legs he's never walked on...although the breaking the chains part I could've done without.

Jokafobe, you'd be amazed by what people in the armed forces do during combat situations.  I thought the joking banter was actually well done here.  They've been fighting this war for about 3 years according to the  timeline of the movies, and all the combat would sort of make them jaded, and hence the joking-type banter.

I think the only things I would change are show a little more about the formation of the rebellion...I was kind of suprised Mon Mothma was not in the movie at all.  I'd also would've liked to have seen Qui-Gon, possibly appearing in front of the Jedi Temple to try and stop Anakin, or appearing to Obi-Wan around the end of the Duel or on the Tantive IV when Yoda explained he found a way back.  Minor gripes, but I think they might've added that something special.

From reading the rest of your reviews so far, I'm glad I stayed away from spoilers.  Seeing as it is probably the last SW film, it was nice to be suprised.
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Offline Angry Ewok

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Re: Post your ROTS reviews and thoughts!
« Reply #14 on: May 19, 2005, 06:47 PM »
I, too, stayed away from spoilers - and I warned my buddies that if they read too many spoilers, and read too much into all of the marketing crap - they'd expect far too much out of the movie. Sure enough, most people who were deep into the spoilers found the movie pretty disapointing.

Come on, people… you know this - the book is always better than the movie! You’re supposed to watch the movie a couple of times, and then read the book to enhance the spots where the movie was weak.

If you read the book first, you'll just notice every single gap.

I've seen the movie twice, now. And I'm still not sure what to think. I do know that I hope Lucas makes some sort of Extended Edition of this film, like Lord of the Rings had. This movie really needs another 30 minutes at least, for some of the scenes that were cut, and other scenes that need more room to breathe.

Pro's off the top of my head:

The acting and the actor's chemistry was so much better this time around - Anakin and Obi-Wan really flowed well together, finally... during their big duel you could see a resemblance in their styles - it shows that these two are used to fighting together. I really appreciated that attention to detail.

Yoda's scenes were particularly good, I never once stopped to think - hey, Yoda isn't real. He looked and sounded great. Seeing him alongside wookies (although only for a few seconds) was great, seeing him rub his brow in utter frustration (which reminded me of a particular scene of Colonel Kurtz in Apocalypse Now) was cool, seeing him take out two Royal Guards was amazing – Yoda was a real star here.

Bail's scenes were all fantastic. His scenes had me wishing he had an even larger role in the films.

Everyone's dialogue was pretty good - better than the last two films, at least. The delivery was much better, too. I enjoyed hearing some of the recycled dialogue, like Palpatine’s “Good, good!”… Obi-Wan’s “Hello there.” was perfect.

The scenes showing the executions of the Jedi were all really sad to see. I found myself hoping that at least a couple of the Jedi would have some chance at surviving. I kept hoping that we'd have some clue as to someone elses survival, besides only Yoda and Obi-Wan. Those of us who follow the EU stuff were really feeling the hurt, I think.

R2D2 had some cute/funny scenes throughout the beginning of the film.

One of  my favorite scenes is with Anakin pitching that fit in front of the council, for not being promoted to Master. Windu’s expression read something like, “Boy, if you don’t sit, I will bust your scrawny ass.”


Con's that stood out:

I really didn't like how long and drawn out the space battle was. It had to be 15 minutes long or so. Why spend 15 minutes on a space battle, and then not give more important scenes any sort of time to develop? It just seems like the priorities were a little mixed.

Anakin's decision to betray the Jedi occured far too quickly - there didn't seem to be enough inner turmoil. There didn't seem to be any real craving for power, which I thought was Anakin's major downfall. Palpatine's revelation about being a Sith Lord came too fast, too... It was just tossed out there.

There was hardly any time given to the attack on the Jedi Temple... I'd think there was quite a bit of a fight there, judging by all of the smoke rising from the temple a day or two later. Why didn't we get to see more of that? I'm not asking to see children chopped up, I'm asking to see the troopers storming the temple.

Since I've avoided spoilers, including sneak peak photos and visual guides, etc, I couldn't tell you if the Clone's outfits were all that different from AOTC... because you only see any of the background characters for about a 10th of a second. It took a second viewing to find the clones resembling the Target Exclusive clone trooper figure (they kill the Jedi on the speeder bike). It took a second viewing to see Ki Adi Mundi was killed by Clone Snowtroopers. This has been a complaint with all of the prequels, but especially for this one - It takes multiple viewings to get what's going on in these big battles.

Overall, I was disapointed with all of the big battles... because they really didn't seem epic, as they should... they were more epileptic than anything else. Swarms of "whatevers" blurring past other "whatevers" and explosions and lasers... All I can say is I cannot wait for this to be out on DVD so I'll be able to slo-mo the battles and figure out what the hell is going on.

Palpatine was pretty lame. He was a carbon copy of Gollum, especially when Mace Windu had him pinned down. He practically shreaks out, "GOLLUMMM!" at one point. Lame lame lame.

The ending was far too rushed. Obi-Wan doesn't even speak to Beru, he just plops the baby in her arms and takes off.

The absolute worse was the Frankenstein scene. What the **** was Lucas thinking? It only took a matter of moments for Anakin to be asthetically transformed into Vader... I was really hoping to see (or have implied), a long and painful operation.