Chefelf.com Night Life: rhino - Viewing Profile

Yes, I have now finished the prequel trilogy. And yes, I have nitpicks about Episode III that I didn't see in Chefelf's 91 Reasons. Once again, I'm afraid I'm repeating things that have already been said. And fear leads to anger, anger leads to hatred, and hatred leads to me posting on this forum.....

(1) Yoda, wherefore art thou Yoda? Has anyone else considered that a root of many of the bad Jedi lines and plot points was George's idea that Yoda be so wonderful? It all started with the painful line that "even master Yoda doesn't have midichlorian count that high!" Yoda's made out to be so wise, but that only raises questions of how he couldn't see that Palpatine was a Sith, or the Clone treachery, or Annikin's unreadiness to properly protect Amidala by himself, etc. So then George comes up with the "hard to see, the dark side is" or "clouded, the future is" crap. Yoda's also made out to be a master fighter, which results in the awkward scene of him leading the clone troops in battle and, worse, raises the final question of why he had to go into exile when he had held his own against Palpitine by himself (how about trying again Yoda, this time with Obi-Wan?). Not only would the Degobah exile have made more sense if Yoda was just a regular Jedi who truly could not defeat the Sith, but ESB would have become more meaningful, in that a humble Jedi trains Luke, and even though he was not the greatest of Jedis, he still lifts the X-Wing from the swamp.

(2) Nice work, C3PO While nothing could have made me glad that C3PO was in any of the prequel trilogy movies, wouldn't it have been nice if he provided a language interpretation just once? I bet it pissed him off that everyone understood each other's languages without needing a translator.

(3) Call my stylist, Annikin has broken my heart Not sure exactly, but I think the last couple days of Amidala's life went something like this: telepathically realize Annikin is in spiritual crisis, change hair and outfit, ask Annikin what happened at Jedi temple, change hair and outfit, attend special Senate meeting to lament death of liberty, change hair and outfit, learn from Obi-Wan that Annikin is evil and must die, change hair and outfit, fly to lava planet to get heart broken by Annikin, change hair, have babies and die. Maybe she wouldn't have "lost her will to live" if someone had offered her a free makeover.

(4) What? Luke is raised by Owen and Beru?! It was perfectly fitting that the prequel trilogy ends with unnecessary scenes. Does anyone need to see Luke and Leia delivered to their respective planets in order to figure out that they were delivered there? Thanks for the spoon feeding, George. Seems to me that the only questions needing answers were "how did Darth Vader turn evil?" and "to whom did he make sweet, sweet love?" Instead, the trilogy treated us to answers to such questions as what were Greedo's toddler years like?, did Jabba the Hutt ever attend sporting events?, were Yoda and Chewbacca ever buddies?, and how many Siths does it take to change a lightbulb? (two, always two it takes)

As with Episode I a couple weeks ago, I just re-watched Episode II for the first time since in the theaters. And again, I love the 64 (no, 82) Reasons to Hate Episode II, and again I have to add some new ones! It's harder for me to nitpick Episode II, though, because the movie's failings are so broad that I could just say "every scene with Anakin and Amidala," or "the entire robot factory scene." And I could go on and on about too little originality (you could make a drinking game based on how often a jedi gets parted with his lightsaber) or too much originality (after seeing a hover chariot, a hover wheelchair, and a hover robo-taxi, I find it odd when giant robotic-gun-things have to walk on four legs). But I'll just stick to my distaste for faulty dialogue....

1. Job Description Misunderstanding. As Amidala's decoy dies in the beginning, she says "I failed you." Um, no, actually you didn't... you did your job. What's the point of a decoy other than to be attacked or killed in the Senator's place? Could you imagine if someone tried to shoot our President, but a Secret Service agent took the bullet, and then as he died he said "I failed"? And then the President started to cry? Completely nonsensical.

2. Wait? What's My Brain For? From what I remember, the Force is about letting go and trusting your feelings. I think in Episode I, Qui Gon tells little orphan (to be) Ani to "Feel, don't think." But Episode II muddies everything up. Outside the nightclub, Obi-Wan tells Ani "Use the Force. Think!" Then when Yoda is embarrassing Obi-Wan in front of a bunch of kids, he says "Clear your minds. A thought?" Then later we learn Jedis can't love, but isn't love a feeling, which Jedis are supposed to trust?

3. Cliegg's Quick Peace Cliegg comes to peace about his dead wife apparently in a matter of seconds. He tells Ani that he'd still be out looking for her if his leg didn't need to heal. In the same monologue he says he doesn't want to give up hope, which means of course that he still has hope. Then, five seconds later, he delivers the line, "She's dead, son. Accept it." I suspect that while Ani goes flying off on the speeder bike, Cliegg is placing an ad in the personals.

4. Every Man's Dream There are so many bad lines in the Ani-Amidala romance, you can get kind of numb to it by the time that, going into the arena, Amidala gives in to Ani's many charms. To be honest, I think there's actually some surprisingly decent acting here as Ani is stunned to hear Amidala's confession of love. But wait! What is the big cause for Amidala's change of heart? After all her resistance? "I think our lives are about to be destroyed anyway." Wow. That's about as romantic as "Maybe if you were the last man on Naboo." I could now start into the fact that none of Amidala's behavior from that line forward indicates that she really did believe she was going to die, but I'll just stop here.....