ST Best Opening Space Battle

Hard to pick. TLJ's opening suffers a fair bit for me because the score isn't as brilliant as that of ANH and ROTS (this has been the only major disappointment of the ST for me - not sure if Williams was asked to produce something more understated for these films, but it certainly hasn't had the iconic bombast of the first two trilogies).

 

I think each battle accomplishes different things brilliantly, which speaks to how nicely varied they are.

The opening of ANH is instantly symbolic of stakes through scale, and also introducing us to the visual language of Star Wars itself.

The Battle of Coruscant in ROTS also communicates scale, but more importantly shows the strength of the relationship between Anakin and Obi-Wan, which will eventually crumble by the end of the film.

The Battle of D'Quar in TLJ implies the film's mantra "This is not going to go the way you think," and how the characters respond when a situation changes on a dime.

 

Other than the prank call, this scene was so great, well shot and emotional, even though we had no idea who the young bomber was who died. She was excellent, Poe's X-wing action was well done and the FO Captain Kannady was awesome. It's a shame this was so early in the movie. Felt almost like a climax in terms of a space battle. There was urgency.

 

I thought the new one was pretty average.

 

Opening of ANH because it's effective and utterly efficient in terms of storyelling, conveying so much with so little. It's not much of a battle, but then that's the point.

TLJ is a close second. I don't much like the too quick shredding of the bombers, which implies they're really not very good at doing their job, but this seems more of an editing for time thing. It's basically over too quickly, that's the only complaint I have about it. Captain Canady is really great, Leia is great. The stakes are high and there feels like actual consequence to the whole thing. The results of the battle impact the story.

I don't like the opening of ROTS much. The best part, by far, is the broadsides of the two ships exchanging fire sequence (which occurs much later). It's actually one of the best parts of the entire trilogy. But everything with Anakin and Kenobi is pretty bad. The opening shot doesn't actually make sense, the tone is all over the place (excited quippy Anakin followed by concerned Anakin 5 seconds later), the buzz droids are one of the most ridiculous things we've seen and the whole 'let's board the enemy capital ship by just flying into its hangar' is a bit too convenient.

 

It's not as flashy as the others, but the ANH opening is SO iconic, it's hard to beat.