It is always sad to watch potential die. This film, this story had it all. It could have been the greatest of them all. The heartbreaking tragedy of the man who gave up his name Anakin Skywalker to become Darth Vader. Instead we were given, crap. This is why: (contains spoilers) The first problem is that since the first two movies were boring and nothing really happened, everything has to happen now. So we've got approx. 4 hours of plot to be shown in 2 hours. The space battle: Mr. Lucas does only care about one thing, his need to show the world how great the guys in ILM are to create special effects. So what we see is 5 or 10 minutes commercial. And let us add some cheesy dialog for Ewan and Hayden so everybody will know it's actually a movie. Because it's not exciting, it's not amazing, it's impossible to get an overview what's going on, it's just light flashing and speakers trying to make the loudest BOOM-sound. "Oops here comes Dooku that I for some reason didn't kill off in the last flick. Well let him fight for three minutes, say some cheesy lines and then die." And Lucas or Hayden, you made me believe Anakin killing Dooku would be the first step on his path towards the dark side. That he would be torn apart by agony of his action and the inevitable satisfaction of letting go of his hate. None of this happens. Anakin says something like "Oh perhaps I shouldn't have killed him lalalala, well, well, nobody's perfect". So Dooku is dead. But hold on we've got another villain, General Grievous. Darth Maul was underused. It's even worse with Grievous only he's not cool. The idea of the mix between droid and alien is great, however nothing of this is revealed. Grievous is just another stupid villain. And the actor that provided his voice for him should seriously think about changing professional. "Sh*t, I've already spent like 20 minutes of the film; I really need to make Anakin evil now." So we see some more wannabe-sound-of-music love scenes where poor, poor Natalie Portman yet again has to fight against lines and dialog that is absolutely horrible. I pity her, she must curse the day she signed on Star Wars. Not your fault Natalie, we know the truth. Yes, Anakin has more nightmares and yes, it is shown in the same bad way as the last time. And yes, the Jedi council that never seem to do anything useful, just sit and watch and do nothing (no wonder you all will die) appears in a few scenes. "Oh my, I need to make Palpatine subtly persuade Anakin of the pleasure of the dark side. Should we say like 2 scenes are enough?" Basically it's just "Anakin join the Dark Side!" "No." "Yes do it." "No." "Yes come on now." "Okay." No wonder you could not persuade Luke. "Aah I still have to kill Grievous. Well, well more time for my lovely fellows of the ILM to show their skills." Let me say that Grievous dies easier than Maul did and have even less screen time. Rubbish NOW COMES WHAT BUGGERS ME THE MOST Finally after about 2 minutes of persuading Anakin, Palpatine reveals himself to be the Sith Lord. Anakin's life is shattered, everything he believed was in fact a lie. This is dramatic, this is the purest betrayal. How does he respond? Something like "Oh really, hmm, I suppose I'd better alert the council" Either Hayden is the worst actor or Lucas the worst director. Poor Sidious, I reckon he wanted a better reaction than that. And when Anakin tells Windu about it, Windu who has dedicated his life to the Republic and to destroy the Sith? "Palpatine's a Sith Lord, damn, well, well, I think we need to catch him, you reckon it can be done before lunch break?" Yoda was humiliated to a mere action figure in AOTC. Here Palpatine gets the same punishment. The death of Windu is kind of cool though (thanks Jackson for at least making Lucas fulfill our wishes concerning that scenes) Anakin helps Palpatine kill Windu. How does he react? "What have I done? I'll do anything you want (to Palpatine)" Yes that really does make sense. Anakin you may have a high level of midi-chlorians (yes they are mentioned) but your IQ-level is about zero. "I fight for peace and justice and in order to achieve those I have to kill a bunch of innocent children." Are you playing stupid games with me or something Lucas? Which person would think that way? It is not logical, it's pathetic. Every single scene with Anakin is in some way illogical. In the end we have the Fight. With mystical dialog and with a tense of broken friendship and love? No we get "fast-forward" 10 minutes of a blue blurring light. And yes cuts from when the emperor throws chairs at Yoda. You read it right. Poor Natalie is made to say her final cheesy lines and is then allowed to die. Darth Vader is awoken; he really doesn't seem to care about anything save that he screams "no" that is a parody of the screams-of-no's-movie-history. The End The dream is dead. Lucas failed us fans, for him showing a 2½ hour commercial of how great he can make special effects were more important than conveying a powerful story. On the night bus home a man clad in Jedi robes wept. We all felt like it. This movie could have been everything we could have asked for. In hands of a better director, with corrections by a real writer, this could have been a new TESB. Now we were watching a fallen hero. Not Anakin. Lucas.
