Hey apparently it’s Star Wars Prequel Appreciation Day! And there’s a challenge going round which is, list 10 things you loved about those movies! So, okay, I will. (In no particular order.)
10) The costumes. God damn, the costumes. Not even just Padme’s ones, either, though those are the ones that get the most attention – all of the costumes are friggin’ works of art.
9) The introduction of many more great female characters to the Star Wars universe, starting with Padme and her Handmaidens. I agree with that post that goes “how many other movies can you name where a bunch of 14-year-old girls save a planet?” and yeah, that’s what happened, and it was Good.
8) I’ve mentioned this before, more than once, but: the political commentary. Star Wars was created by a god-damn ‘SJW’, you guys.
7) People are always complaining about the acting in the Prequels, but I don’t understand why, because Liam Neeson, Ewan McGregor, Samuel L Jackson, Christopher Lee and Ian McDiarmid especially were giving it their all. And clearly having LOTS of fun.
6) Everything about Duel of the Fates. It’s just a really, really well-done bit of cinema.
5) The fact that even now, ten years down the line, people are still passionately arguing about who was right and who was wrong in these movies. Were the Jedi baby-stealing monsters who deserved what they got? Was Anakin’s fall the result of some innate evil or did his past and the Jedi push him into it? Was his killing the Tusken Raiders justified? And so on. So much for those movies having no depth.
4) The music, which is all incredible, but a special mention for: “Duel of the Fates”, “Across the Stars”, “Padme’s Ruminations” and “Anakin vs Obi-Wan”.
3) The beauty of the cinematography and all the carefully constructed parallels with the other movies
2) Qui-Gon Jinn, who is one of my favourite fictional characters ever, and the sheer amount of Interest going on with him
1) Whenever I watch TPM I’m reminded of when I was thirteen and the summer was so long and whenever you opened a bag of something a Star Wars toy would fall out. That’s not a bad place to go back to, regardless of the funny looks you get when you rank it first among Star Wars movies.