Were a generation of fans too harsh on the Prequel Trilogy? Tom Jolliffe revisits The Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith to see whether they’re worthy of reappraisal, and how they hold up post-Disney Sequel Trilogy…
Remember Spaced? The much loved and all too shortly lived sitcom from Edgar Wright, Simon Pegg and Jessica Hynes (then Stevenson) was zany and loaded with pop culture references, not least persistent references to Star Wars of which Tim (played by Pegg) was a huge fan. His fandom of the Original Trilogy was such that the mess that was Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace brought about a rage within.
The joke was with a heavy pinch of salt but carried with it some truth. From 1999 when The Phantom Menace was released upon us (after a 16-year wait) up to The Revenge of the Sith in 2005, long-term Star Wars fans had an affinity with the Prequel Trilogy not unlike a vampire’s to garlic. The consensus around the time was that a generation of young kids kind of dug The Phantom Menace and to a lesser extent the next two, but that there was a big sense of vitriol toward the new trilogy.
Step forward to 2015 and Disney unleashes its first (of now innumerable) stabs at bringing Star Wars and its many spinoffs to the big and small screen. If you thought the backlash to the Prequel Trilogy was bad, then it’s nothing compared to the vitriolic response aimed at Rian Johnson’s second of the Sequel Trilogy, Star Wars: The Last Jedi.
J.J. Abrams had made something enjoyably passable a couple of years prior with The Force Awakens, which temporarily gave (a new) hope to fans that the franchise was back to nearer its best and had washed away the bitter taste of Jar Jar et al. But from the moment Johnson put his stamp on Star Wars, the whole enterprise felt slightly toxic. It was a backlash (in spite of admittedly generous positive critical reception) that was unlike anything before it.
Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker did little to bring fans back, and whilst the majority of Star Wars streaming series have been met with indifference at best, with a few highlights like Andor and the first season of The Mandalorian being an exception. Increasingly fans have a feeling that Disney is now treating this like a disposable commodity and don’t care, which leads us to a curious trend among some fans upon revisiting the Prequel Trilogy.
In the passing of time some claim that George Lucas’ prequels, focused on the rise from childhood to mech suit of a certain Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader, was deserving of reappraisal. I’d recently been on something of an old fantasy binge with my young daughter. I sat through an entire franchise of Harry Potter that I’d previously been indifferent about, now finding it thoroughly enjoyable, so much so that we started again more recently to introduce my wife to it. Then, as someone who grew up in the 80s and 90s, high on the majesty of films like Star Wars, I inevitably introduced her to the OG Trilogy.
As if it needed saying, but rest assured A New Hope and The Empire Strikes Back were both still sensational (the latter especially). Some in more recent times have suggested that Return of the Jedi isn’t all that great and whilst it’s the weaker of the three, it’s still great fun and an undeniable classic that is miles better than anything in the lore which has followed it.
Inevitably, with my daughter enjoying the OG Trilogy and there being much more Star Wars ‘content’ available, I found myself resigned to the prospect of revisiting a Prequel Trilogy I’d previously decided I had no need to ever see again. As is the way of being a daddy, if she enjoys something then I can too. Then curiosity struck me. Were a generation of fans really too tough on the Prequels?
I recall the huge sense of anticipation for The Phantom Menace and sitting down in the cinema as a 17-year-old ready to revisit the galaxy far, far away. My thoughts exiting the cinema were that something felt stiff about the whole thing, whilst much of the humour, even considering it was part of a franchise of family entertainment, felt infantile. It lacked the characters and engaging storyline of the Original Trilogy and the performances felt decidedly flat in comparison. Yet, I still enjoyed the pod ace and the impressive lightsaber duel.
So now as a 42-year-old, how do I view the film? Well, no differently. I came away with the same feeling that the film meanders to a couple of highlights. In time some of the awful stereotypes are even more cringe-worthy, chief among them Jar Jar Binks of course. That being said, my antipathy to Jake Lloyd has lessoned, after all, for what he was given to do, he did fairly well.
He’s very much the ‘gee,’ ‘shucks mister’ kind of kid as a rambunctious youngster who almost blunders his way to glory, be it a pod race victory or accidentally blowing up an enemy ship and saving the day. As for my daughter, she drifted off at the many senate sequences and a lot of the lifeless greenscreen interior shots. Her franchise highlight thus far is Return of the Jedi and whilst The Phantom Menace did entertain it certainly didn’t compare.
If The Phantom Menace lacked a certain grounded earthiness present in the Original Trilogy, then Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones, the first film shot on digital, was even worse. More green-screened backdrops and overly lithe sets gave the feeling of those old video simulator games like Wing Commander IV. The limitation of movement in a green screen studio showed and there are a lot of almost static shots of characters talking against unconvincing CGI backdrops which didn’t look up to par in 2002, let alone 2023.
For many, Attack of the Clones is arguably the worst in the entire franchise, and this was certainly my feeling back in the day. The awkward romance between Padme (Natalie Portman) and a now young adult Anakin (Hayden Christensen) has at least dated well, if only because it’s less excruciating than it was and more (unintentionally) amusing thanks to a decade of merciless meming. In some places, Attack of the Clones has at least improved as a comedy.
Unfortunately, the film’s stiffness is undeniable (and the dialogue is insanely bad) and it has a distinct lack of noticeable highlights, among which the Jango Fett sequences are the best. The less said about Yoda bouncing around like Kermit the Frog on crack, the better.
Noticeably the film couldn’t hold the kiddo’s attention for any great length of time, aside from the final lightsaber duel (which was actually decent up until the CG Yoda bounced in). Sadly, the middle of the Prequel Trilogy doesn’t have much to recommend and not much of any redemption to find either. That being said, The Rise of Skywalker is such an almighty cluster fudge of a mess that it is undoubtedly the worst film in the franchise.
Another film which has found a significant resurgence in meme form is Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith. The rather excessive and melodramatic final battle has been mocked mercilessly, but Revenge of the Sith was always deemed the strongest of the prequels, with George Lucas pulling himself away from his new-fangled toys and bells and whistles and focusing a bit more on some of the drama. I’d always felt on watching this one that it had some highlights such as Palpatine’s continued wooing of Anakin as well as the inevitable battle between student and master.
Christensen’s awkwardness was to the detriment of Attack of the Clones but was a little more honed and effective in this, even if there’s still an inconsistency. Yet, all the other performers bar Ian McDiarmid faced similar problems with a lack of direction and the difficulties of acting against nothing but green on occasion.
The film’s intermittent dark themes, awkwardly mixed with infantile dross like General Grievous and a Chewbacca cameo, made this one less palatable than the previous two for the sprog, but consistency is important. She’s not averse to this maturity level, given that the Potter films get considerably darker as they go along, but Lucas still only hit highlights rather than a consistent movie.
If there’s one thing to be said about the potential reappraisal for Revenge of the Sith, it’s that the film still has more interesting elements within its structure than the Sequel Trilogy had. The highlight of the latter still remains The Force Awakens, which is just too much of A New Hope rehash.
Revenge of the Sith is at least worth a re-watch, not least because John Williams produces some pieces that are right up with his franchise highlights. There are some really great new pieces throughout the film, particularly during those darker, intimate moments where Lucas actually does an effective job of showing Anakin’s final fall to the dark side. Is the soundtrack better than the film itself? Probably.
What do you think of the Prequel Trilogy? Were they underrated, and how do they compare to Disney’s Sequel Trilogy? Let us know on our social channels @FlickeringMyth…
Tom Jolliffe is an award-winning screenwriter and passionate cinephile. He has a number of films out around the world, including When Darkness Falls, Renegades (Lee Majors and Danny Trejo) and War of The Worlds: The Attack (Vincent Regan), with more coming soon including Cinderella’s Revenge (Natasha Henstridge) and The Baby in the Basket (Maryam d’Abo and Paul Barber). Find more info at the best personal site you’ll ever see here.
