Red Letter Media RotS Review Up

[Stravo]

His little exercise in having people describe the characters without referring to clothes or profession was an amusing illustration on how poor the characterization was in the prequels.

"Han Solo - roguish, sexy, dashing, thief with a heart of gold."

"Qui Gon Jin - who?"

"C3PO - prissy, fussy, anal retentive, clumsy"

"Queen Amidala - aw c'mon that's just not fair."

[Guardsman Bass]

His little exercise in having people describe the characters without referring to clothes or profession was an amusing illustration on how poor the characterization was in the prequels.

"Han Solo - roguish, sexy, dashing, thief with a heart of gold."

"Qui Gon Jin - who?"

"C3PO - prissy, fussy, anal retentive, clumsy"

"Queen Amidala - aw c'mon that's just not fair."

He has a point on Amidala, but Qui Gon's easy. When he brought that up, I immediately thought "Zen master".

[Gunhead]

There's not a single really memorable character in the whole prequel trilogy. Being the most memorable character in the prequels doesn't require a whole lot. This is not to say I think Qui-Gon was a bad character as such, he just had no other reason to be other than give the viewers expose and make Maul more menacing. It's kind of sad really, three movies with neither a villain or a hero that really stands out.

-Gunhead

[Tiriol]

I have to be honest: I haven't watched any of his reviews.

Why? TPM came out over ten years ago, for Christ's sake, and even ROTS has been out for five years and counting. I have no interest in watching a frame-by-frame criticism/nitpicking/whatever done by a nerd with too much time on his hands, as evidenced by the length of his reviews.

The movies weren't stunning or that great, but neither they were as bad as some say they were. If I were to listen to every nerdrager on the net, I'd conclude that the movies were written and directed by Uwe Boll with Ed Wood as his co-writer and co-director all the while Those Nasty Studio Executives were throwing feces at them and demanding more cuts and changes. I'm quite content with knowing that they aren't classics, but I didn't expect them to be. From time to time I wonder if the audience (or, at least the audience on the Internet) did expect them to be insta-classics.

But to each one his own, I guess. If you like his reviews, more power to you. If not, more power to you. But I do take offence at the idea that only butthurt "Star Wars EU supernerd" would object to his criticisms.

[Metahive]

The thing about Qui-Gon is that he's rather superfluous and gratuitous as a character, everything he did in TPM should have been done by Obi-Wan himself instead (minus the dying), it would also have nicely tied in with the "I thought I could train him as well as Yoda" line from ROTJ which gives the distinct impression that he thought of Anakin's fall as a personal failure caused by his own hybris. Making it so that he got involuntarily saddled with Anakin because he honored his dying master's wish weakens that considerably.
Having Obi-Wan start as a freshly knighted Jedi, bursting with self-confidence and being eager to train the newest prodigy of the Force even against the objections of his peers would have made TPM less thematically muddled I daresay.

[Marcus Aurelius]

I have to be honest: I haven't watched any of his reviews.

Why? TPM came out over ten years ago, for Christ's sake, and even ROTS has been out for five years and counting. I have no interest in watching a frame-by-frame criticism/nitpicking/whatever done by a nerd with too much time on his hands, as evidenced by the length of his reviews.

The movies weren't stunning or that great, but neither they were as bad as some say they were. If I were to listen to every nerdrager on the net, I'd conclude that the movies were written and directed by Uwe Boll with Ed Wood as his co-writer and co-director all the while Those Nasty Studio Executives were throwing feces at them and demanding more cuts and changes. I'm quite content with knowing that they aren't classics, but I didn't expect them to be. From time to time I wonder if the audience (or, at least the audience on the Internet) did expect them to be insta-classics.

But to each one his own, I guess. If you like his reviews, more power to you. If not, more power to you. But I do take offence at the idea that only butthurt "Star Wars EU supernerd" would object to his criticisms.

I agree with you fro the most part. I only watched the reviews around the new year when I had a lot of time in my hands. They are somewhat funny at many places, so i didn't feel that the time was wasted any more than watching some other average movie from TV or anything. He also makes very good points about what is wrong with the PT, which can be educational, especially of you have any interest in the process of filmmaking. I usually don' do too much deep analysis on movies which do not impress me, so there were some points I hadn't consciously noted, such as the very mechanistic use of camera and cuts, although in retrospect that is quite obvious. Those still shots from Citizen Kane spell with five foot red letters "Visual talent and imagination", whereas the dialogue scenes of the PT spell "Space Soap Opera directing".

This also brings us nicely to a larger point: it is all too easy for a director to get extremely lazy with the intimate character based scenes, if he devotes most of his time and energy to the SFX scenes like Lucas obviously did, and especially so if the SFX are CGI rather than traditional stunts and pyrotechnics. After seeing this review nobody should wonder why for example Christopher Nolan uses CGI only when necessary and not all the time.

Apart form the general film making points, the interest in these reviews is simple: the SW prequel trilogy is part of the most successful and popular scifi franchise ever, so it should not surprise you that people nerds are still interested in analyzing what went wrong with them, because as much as I agree that they are not bottom of the barrel poor movies, neither is any of them a good movie even to the extent of ANH or RotJ. I have never been a huge fan of Star Wars and although I have of course seen all the movies, even the PT many times, I don't even own them on DVD or anything. Nevertheless it is quite clear that the prequels are inferior in almost every way. Even the SFX does not impress, because Lucas overused virtual sets, so the interiors and sets don't look as good as the physical sets in the OT and probably never will, unless Lucas completely re-renders them in 2020 or something...

[TOSDOC]

I enjoyed his reviews, and was glad to see no serial killer subplot in this one, as it really detracts.

As an ex-fencer, I really love a good duel on film. It really hit home in his review what was bothering me when I saw ROTS in the theater--the final duel between Anakin and Obi Wan was overly long and boring. To compare it to Die Another Day's duel, which was done in a live set with no CGI at a third of the running time, was a very good example of how it should be done. David Gerrold once wrote his rule number one as a writer was "Don't bore the audience." It could easily apply to any entertainment medium, but I remember actually looking at my watch while the ROTS final duel dragged on in the theater. Last night I checked on both The Princess Bride and Aragorn's fight with the orc at the end of Fellowship of the Ring. The Princess Bride duel clocked in at about 2 minutes, and Aragorn's at about 50 seconds. Both were on live sets, and both are very exciting, to say nothing of the OT duels, where Luke was inexperienced and just trying to survive in ESB, lending the duel a great deal of tension. Is bigger and longer better? Not necessarily.

Zen Master is not an adjective. Are there any good adjectives for Qui Gon and Amidala?

[Stofsk]

I like Qui-gon Jinn.

He's about the only thing from TPM that I do like though.

[Imperial528]

I've always thought of Qui Gon as being patient, wise, and a planner. Much like Obi-wan of the OT.

Amidala, however, is to me a walking wardrobe that later became a walking badly written love interest for a badly written protagonist.

[Purple]

Am I the only one who actually liked the 3 episodes and the way they connected everything.

[Aaron]

Am I the only one who actually liked the 3 episodes and the way they connected everything.

Considering they made hundreds of millions of dollars, I'd say your not alone.

[Metahive]

I've always thought of Qui Gon as being patient, wise, and a planner.

I had the exact opposite reaction, I thought of him as being impatient, rash and prone to not thinking things through which ultimately resulted in the downfall of the whole Order. I think if he absolutely had to be in TPM, he and Obi-Wan should have switched dispositions and attitudes.

[Uraniun235]

Hey Jim Raynor, I have a quick and fun thought experiment for you.

Let's say Rick McCallum - or, hell, even the Big Man himself, George Lucas - basically says "yeah, the RLM reviews are about right, we kinda screwed up on the prequels."

Would your position change at all?

[Bakustra]

Hey Jim Raynor, I have a quick and fun thought experiment for you.

Let's say Rick McCallum - or, hell, even the Big Man himself, George Lucas - basically says "yeah, the RLM reviews are about right, we kinda screwed up on the prequels."

Would your position change at all?

Why should it? I mean, if I enjoyed the prequels (which I did), then I enjoyed them for personal reasons, not because George Lucas told me to. So whatever Lucas or McCallum or Chiang or Guinness (Hell, if I took my opinions from Guinness, I couldn't like Star Wars at all) think about the quality isn't really relevant to my opinion.

Now, it may be that Jim Raynor does take his opinions solely from other people, in which case I have only unkind words for him, and so I will not speak for him. But I will speak for myself. What I have noticed in any discussion of the prequels is that the people who didn't like the prequels tend to assume that this is an objective, factual statement, and so they must convince people who did enjoy them that they're wrong, wrong, wrong. Or at least, this is what I observe.

So this hostility means that people who liked the prequels in general feel defensive, and feel that "well, I liked them" is inadequate and only earns scorn. So they cast about for defenses, but since the hatred of the prequels is also personal and fairly fixed, the people heaping scorn don't care about the defenses- indeed these become targets for further assaults (with often hilarious results). This applies to more than just the prequels- you can see this behavior wherever a person reveals an interest that is disliked in a group. But it takes a lot of courage, when you're in the minority (and on this subject, despite what the critics believe, the person who likes the prequels is always in them minority on the internet) to say "I don't give a rat's ass what you think, I liked it", and it still probably wouldn't shut you fuckers up.

In fact, you're exhibiting this behavior right now by assuming that Raynor could not possibly have enjoyed the prequels on their own merits. Now, you could criticize people for feeling defensive, assuming that you agree with me to a certain extent, but frankly, that's like yelling at the tides.

[dworkin]

I'ld say Qui-Gon's flaw and defining feature is that he's a true believer. He follows the force unquestionly whereever it might lead. It never occurs to him that the force is not beneficient or that there may be others manipulating the force for their own ends.

[Nephtys]

Am I the only one who actually liked the 3 episodes and the way they connected everything.

Considering they made hundreds of millions of dollars, I'd say your not alone.

Hey. I contributed to that three times, just to see the trainwreck. That doesn't mean I liked those slopheaps.

[Aaron]

Hey. I contributed to that three times, just to see the trainwreck. That doesn't mean I liked those slopheaps.

Yeah, I know. I think I saw TPM a couple times by itself. That said, I'm sure some repeat viewers liked it.

[Uraniun235]

It's not impossible or wrong to enjoy something that is flawed.

I like TNG and I even like some of the first season episodes, despite knowing that there's a lot that is wrong with them. I love Captain Harlock, but I'll readily acknowledge that there are times when the writers were very lazy or made mistakes or otherwise didn't make sense, and I'll totally admit there are times when the animators overreached and what was supposed to be wicked awesome kinda fell flat.

The argument is not about "it is bad to ever like anything that is not perfectly written and produced." That's nonsense - we'd have so little consensus and room for debate that we might as well shut down the fiction section of the forums. The argument is really over whether certain aspects of the movies should be considered flaws or assets, and sometimes (but not always) this boils down to an argument over whether some aspect of a movie was deliberate or accidental (or lazy).

[Galvatron]

Yeah, I know. I think I saw TPM a couple times by itself. That said, I'm sure some repeat viewers liked it.

I've seen it many times in bits and pieces, and several times from start to finish. I wanted to like it. I still do. I wish something in the taste-center of my brain would click so I could actually enjoy the prequels. Alas, I don't think it's in the cards.

Strangely, I do enjoy the Clone Wars cartoons. Explain that.

[Stark]

That's probably because the people that replace Ewan Macgregor and Hayden Christensen in the cartoon actually perform better.

[Aaron]

Yeah, I know. I think I saw TPM a couple times by itself. That said, I'm sure some repeat viewers liked it.

I've seen it many times in bits and pieces, and several times front start to finish. I wanted to like it. I still do. I wish something in the taste-center of my brain would click so I could actually enjoy the prequels. Alas, I don't think it's in the cards.

Strangely, I do enjoy the Clone Wars cartoons. Explain that.

I don't think I've ever seen the Clone Wars cartoons except for the one with the baby Hutt. I have TPM on VHS with a huge coating of dust on it, because after the novelty of OMG! NEW STAR WARS! wore off...well, you know.

That's probably because the people that replace Ewan Macgregor and Hayden Christensen in the cartoon actually perform better.

I hear Skywalker isn't a massive prick in it as well.

[Stofsk]

I hear Skywalker isn't a massive prick in it as well.

Pretty much. The best thing about the cartoon is that Anakin is actually heroic. The characterisations are a lot more on target.

[Bakustra]

It's not impossible or wrong to enjoy something that is flawed.

I like TNG and I even like some of the first season episodes, despite knowing that there's a lot that is wrong with them. I love Captain Harlock, but I'll readily acknowledge that there are times when the writers were very lazy or made mistakes or otherwise didn't make sense, and I'll totally admit there are times when the animators overreached and what was supposed to be wicked awesome kinda fell flat.

The argument is not about "it is bad to ever like anything that is not perfectly written and produced." That's nonsense - we'd have so little consensus and room for debate that we might as well shut down the fiction section of the forums. The argument is really over whether certain aspects of the movies should be considered flaws or assets, and sometimes (but not always) this boils down to an argument over whether some aspect of a movie was deliberate or accidental (or lazy).

You, like, massively misunderstood my post. The problem is that I get a sort of inquisitorial attitude whenever somebody likes the prequels and dares to say so. People come down, insist that they suck and people must acknowledge this, treat this as some sort of truth that must be unveiled to all the unbelievers. This produces defensiveness, so putting all the blame on the individuals trying to defend it; well, take a look in the mirror to make sure you don't have a plank in your eye first! That's the thing. There are people (or "is a person") that will, I suppose, rabidly defend every episode of S1 TNG or insist that the vintage Harlock animation is absolutely perfect or will defend their beloved Earth-2. But attacking such people (which is what most "discussion" of the prequels amounts to, alongside persecution complexes and hypocritical elitism) doesn't produce fruitful discussion, which I assume you want. If you don't want it, then please say so and disregard.

Hell, the review is an example of something that's massively flawed but still enjoyed by people. The difference is that the consensus is in favor of the review or neutral rather than being against it, so you don't see complaints about it, and people do their best to shield it from any criticism, as we saw earlier in the thread, though thankfully people don't like the guy so much that any discussion has been shut down altogether.

[Galvatron]

The problem is that I get a sort of inquisitorial attitude whenever somebody likes the prequels and dares to say so.

Whoa, there. Try backtracking to the first page of this thread and tell me who you think started spewing bile first.

[Bakustra]

The problem is that I get a sort of inquisitorial attitude whenever somebody likes the prequels and dares to say so.

Whoa, there. Try backtracking to the first page of this thread and tell me who you think started spewing bile first.

I'm speaking in general, and more importantly, consider that literally everybody jumped on Raynor for doing that. The majority of prequel discussion has been on terms of how horrible it is, with like two or three people defending them actively. I'm not so sure that you can deny that most attitudes towards the prequels are hateful rather than dismissive, which is a large part of my point; the attitudes towards the prequels are violently negative and people who enjoy the prequels are generally treated negatively too, which contributes to defensive attitudes like Raynor's. But I guess we can only consider threads in isolation now or something.