ROTS Is Not The Darkest Of All The SW Films

Agree with Green_Destiny_Sword, I must. Very disturbing this presentation is. See for it myself I would have liked.

 

Exellent points, Destiny.

 

I think that Palpatine's transition to emperor, is much like the rise of Adolf Hitler.
When hitler came to power, the German people had no idea that he was planning the mass murder of six million jews(my grandfather managed to avoid that)and was also planning to start a conflict that would cause hundreds of millions of deaths and leave hundreds of countries in rubble.

 

So once again the scope of what the "evil" of the Empire is very apparent in ANH. in ROTS we get none of this.

Agree with Green_Destiny_Sword, I must. Very disturbing this presentation is. See for it myself I would have liked.

I'm sorry. The argument against this being the darkest movie is full of holes. I'm frankly not seeing why you wouldn't see the Empire as evil. And keep in mind that in ROTS, Palpatine is the Empire.


Did you guys step out to get popcorn during Palpatine's seduction of Anakin and scheming to get Anakin and the Jedi at odds? Or during Order 66? Or during the Seperatist slaughter? Or when the Clones were leading the Utapauns off in handcuffs or looking for Wookiees for slaves? Or when Palpatine informs Vader that he killed his wife to slave him to the dark side for the next twenty years? Or when they discuss having to hide the twins from Palaptine in order to procure their safety?

That doesn't even go into how he corrupted a young promising Jedi and destroyed the relationship between he and his best friend. Or how he turned the people against the Jedi that used protect them. Or Anakin against the Jedi that were his family...

 

Yeah...we needed to see checkpoints by the newly formed Empire...that would be a way to convey evil is taking over. Forget the fact that the clone troopers are turning and killing on the very people they've been fighting beside for years. And that they're killing all the Jedi children in a sneak attack. And that the clone-troopers, while they're killing the Jedi children inside, point their weapons at an innocent Senator (Bail Organa) and threaten him just because he wants to know what's going on in the temple. But hey, a few checkpoints and two more people being killed could have really hammered the point to all those imperial sympathizers.

ROTS clearly showed the galaxy falling under the grip of a fascist military rule. Plus, there?s the whole matter of Palpatine killing a whole group of people (again, the Jedi) just so he could stay in power far after his term limit.

Plus, the man was clearly EVIL!!!

 

Let's see. In the OT, is apparent to both the audience and to the characters that the baddies are in charge. In the PT, including ROTS, it is not so obvious to most of the characters, while to the audience it is clearer by ROTS. In fact, the victory of the dark side is insidious. Moreover, we have Anakin committing his evil crimes not only out of love for Padme, but also out of belief in that he is being loyal to the Republic. And by the time of the Palpatine's creation of the Empire, we have thunderous applause. Remember, in many sci-fi novels and films, the modern democracy destroys itself from within. ROTS is in this vein. And I find this tragic, twisted, descent of a democracy into a dictatorship not only to be both more subtle, but to be darker as well. If you boys who want the apparent had your way and we got to see the Empire overtly assert itself beyond Order 66, it would not have been as dark. GL chose well to leave much offscreen. Even without sequels and EU, to leave a lot offscreen is great filmmaking. And in this case, it further contributes to the darkness.

 

Who is worth Palps or Adolf

 

Hmmmmm.....interesting thread. As a fan of both ESB and ROTS (I tend to like the darker storylines), it is tough to say which of the two is the darkest. In ROTS, we see evil evolving in the birth of a new Sith Lord, the galaxy is left in peril, the primary defenders...the peacekeepers, are defeated and destroyed. The galaxy is now ruled by pure evil, with little hope, shrouded in darkness. But the movie starts ominously, there is a steady downward spiral.
Now, in ESB, the movie starts with the hope that was ignited in ANH. Then a defeat, but then the hero survives to obtain the training he is seeking. Then, a quick change of events and suddenly the hero seems to have been lost. The hope of freedom has been dashed, the hero hanging precariously by a thread of his life and learning a horrible truth. While the end shot is hopeful, it is clouded with uncertainty.
I know GL has stated that ROTS is the darkest SW movie...and it is dark indeed, but the revelation and the defeat of Luke in ESB is, imo, the same level of darkness....

I loved both movies, ESB is my favorite but very closely followed by ROTS. It's hard to make a choice.

 

Who is worth Palps or Adolf

While they both share similarities, I'd have to go with Palpatine, in terms of "worth." He is, after all, only a fictious figure, and the people he killed in the film are fictious as well, so he gets the nod on the "worth" scale. On the other hand our little German friend Adolf Hitler was quite real, and was really responsible for the deaths of millions of real people. So you see, its a pretty simple formula when trying to determine "worth" between two characters like these. A fictious piece of **** is always better than a real piece of ****.

 

well Palpatine is a fictional character and Hitler was real so Hitler.

 

Lets resurrect this old demon...

For so many reasons, I not only find that ROTS crushes TESB, I also think every single movie in the PT, and the throne room scens in ROTJ (given even more weight thanks to the PT), do as well.

I find the "darkness" in TESB to be quite overrated, a feeling attached to a very specific generation, at a very specific time in this series' history. TESB seemed so dark in contrast to the light that ANH represented, not just from a film stand point, but as a cultural and artistic phenom. I don't believe anyone who experienced the OT after its initial run can completely gage why so many people considered this movie so "dark". But as a film over all, sans the huge nostalgia surrounding it, and especially compared to ROTS, can TESB ever be considered a "dark" film? Perhaps when compared to ANH it can be, but in an overall movie sense, I'm inclined to say no.

Now ROTS stands a dark film, SW or not, and I find it to be the only geniune tragedy in the entire saga. But when you consider the PT, having known the ending before the beginning, how can anyone call TPM and AOTC light movies? Nearly every single major action taken in those movies, including almost every single "victory" from our good guys, inches the galaxy closer and closer to perhaps the most tragic, horrifing condition its ever experienced. TPM particuarly comes across extremely dark, simply for the ugliness, the insanity, brewing just below its veneer of innocence and heoric idealism. Every major good guy serves as a mere instrument for evil, niave puppets who, despite their good intentions, have become complete servants to the most vile entity to ever threaten the Republic. It can truly all be summed up with Qui-Gon's best line "There's always a bigger fish." With nearly each scene in the PT a nail is pounded into the heart of goodness and morality, made all the more tragic by our heroes' near complete ignorance of their soon coming demise.

 

It think EST the happiest movie of them all. Luke gets to finally figure out who his father is!! ROTS is defantly the darkest movie of them all because if you tried to watch it in the middle of the mornning (at your house)you wouldn't be able to see anything because of the glare and because it is so DARK!!!

 

First sentence should read:

For so many reasons, I not only find that ROTS crushes TESB in the darkness department, I also think every single movie in the PT, and the throne room scens in ROTJ (given even more weight thanks to the PT), do as well.

 

There were no (face-visible) beheadings in others, there were no legs chopped up in others, there was nobody who lied on the groung burning helplessly in others, and the overall kill rate was much more vicious and evil. And that's not even the emotional stuff!

I think ROTS = MOST darkness

 

If we are measuring darkness strictly by body count, then ANH hope takes the title.
What's the current population of Alderaan? 0. Emigres don't count.

ESB was dark because of it's uncertainty: is Darth Vader really Luke's father?
Who is this "another". Will Han Solo be rescued? How will Luke respond to
everything?

ROTS is dark because of it's certainty: Anakin is evil. Anakin has slain innocent
children. Palpatine wins by deceit. Most of the Jedi are dead. Padme is dead.

It's not just the events of what you are seeing, it's the emotional impact
of knowing and not knowing, playing with reality to build suspense in
different manners.

By this standard, I actually agree that ESB is darker. I was a child and
when ESB came out. Even saw it first run in a theater. I was horrified.

ROTS was sad, definetly more tragic, but I agree that the darkness point goes
to Empire strikes back.

On a personal note, this is one of the most interesting threads I've seen
on here in a long time. What a fabulous debate.

 

It is indeed an awesome topic, one made all the better if we can manage to avoid the "basher" and "gusher" mentalities that often choke out good debate.

One things certain though, I am consistentl floored to hear people call TESB a darker film than ROTS. But thus far most of done it in an intelligent manner, making points where I'd not considered them, which I personally appreciate. Hope this thread will keep growing.

 

"Do we ever get an idea that people are being oppressed by palpatine or the Sith? Is he making anyone suffer? All of the politicians are cheering him on! They are happily making him Emperor. The film does not provide any scope on what the problem really is. There ar even threads in this forum asking is the empire even bad?" which in light of the lack of presentation of any evil activity on behalf of the empire is a valid question."

Well he creates the Empire towards the end of the movie, not really long enough for us to see anything really (maybe a shot of clonetroopers murdering or enslaving wookies would do it), but we do see, his betrayal of the Jedi, and we do see Utupans being arrested. Palps isn't all of a sudden going to just crack down. It has to be slow and over time as to not upset that many people. We see how evil he is in the first two movies. You have to know that his rule isn't going to be a good one. It's not RotS's job to show just how evil the Empire is. We can tell that it will be evil. It's ANH's job to show what the Empire has become in the last 20 years. And those threads talking about if the Empire is evil or not, aren't just talking about it in the case of ROTS but the OT as well. They try to pass off blowing up of Alderaan and other actions of the Empire. But even if we don't know how evil the Empire is RotS is still darker because the main character of the PT, the hero suddenly becomes evil and betrays everyone. His fall alone makes it the darkest.

"The only people who seem to get screwed in ROTS are the Jedi and Padme."

Aren't those the main characters in the PT though. One of the main arguments made for ESB is that the Empire kicks the Rebels' butt. If you say it's dark that the Rebellion gets pushed out of their base with all of their main equipment and major personell intact isn't it even darker that the guiding light for the galaxy is all but snuffed out?

 

We don't need to see "Check points" and the oppression of the masses to understand that the Empire is evil. The evil is apparent in the deeds of it's leaders. Palpatine schemed and lied and murdered his way to becoming Emperor. The very foundation of his rule lays upon the blood of the Jedi. Anything founded in evil can only be evil. The audience understands this through the corruption of Anakin (himself a symbol of the Rebpublic) and the death of the Republic as exemplified in the deaths of the Jedi Order (Peace and Justice) and Padme (Uncorrupted Democracy).

And technically speaking we did see facist "Check points" when Bail was stopped from entering the Jedi Temple by Clonetroopers. We did see the corruption when innocent Utaupauns were taken into custody. We did see lost compassion with the deaths of the Younglings, the murder of Zet Juckasa, and the betrayal of the Clonetroopers. It is clear by the end of the film that all is lost. That the Republic has fallen and there are only two Jedi and two babies left to stand against the Sith.

 

Nuff said.

 

Reason ESB i think is more dark is because almost everyone but the good side won. The Empire wiped out the renmants of the rebel base and the rebels were forced to retreat onto ships. Jabba got his long awaited Han Solo Trophy. Vader "defeated" his son. List goes on and on about successes about everyone except for the rebellion or the light side. In ROTS, just because of the OT, you would expect most of the events that happened. Back in 1980, would you have expected Vader to be the father of the OT's hero? Back to ROTS, sure we didn't expect younglings being slaughtered, but we did expect a jedi holocaust.

 

Compared to ROTS,
TESB is about as dark as an albino polar bear.
Sat in the snow at the north pole.
Playing with cotton wool.

Of course I hyperbolise, but you get the point.


-JR

 

ROTS is definatly the darkest ... It's the creation of the greatest evil's in the galaxy....

1.) The rising of the Empire.

2.) The unveiling of a monster... Palpatine as a Sith Lord.

3.) The falling of a Hero to darkness... not to mention his actions in doing so...

4.) The destroying of The Jedi Order...

5.) AND YODA IS DEFEATED!!!!!!!!!!!

To me ESB is the unveiling of a terrible truth... it's really not that dark to me.

 

Reason ESB i think is more dark is because almost everyone but the good side won. The Empire wiped out the renmants of the rebel base and the rebels were forced to retreat onto ships. Jabba got his long awaited Han Solo Trophy. Vader "defeated" his son. List goes on and on about successes about everyone except for the rebellion or the light side.

But the Rebels escape and live to fight on another day. The Empire failed to wipe them out completely. Also none of the main characters died. Whereas in ROTS, the Republic is completly and utterly destroyed, the majority of the Jedi are exterminated, several of the main characters are killed, and the Chosen One is corrupted by the dark side and horribly maimed.

 

well realistically, ROTS is the darkest just because it got a PG:13 rating and thats saying alot because star wars has always gotten away with limbs being chopped off in the films over the past 20 years or so. But the story i think is darker than ESB. Thats not to take away from its darkness because it was brilliant. They are both dark but ROTS has a slight edge. More things were happening. I think people are a little biased towards the OT and PT. If they like the OT better then of course they would say ESB was darker. I like both equally the same since they are all one big movie but i still believe ROTS was darker.

 

I hate to break out the old dictionary, but it is clear to me that ROTS is not so much of a dark movie, as it is a tradegy. A tradegy is best described as "a drama or literary work in which the main character is brought to ruin or suffers extreme sorrow, especially as a consequence of a tragic flaw, moral weakness, or inability to cope with unfavorable circumstances."
Alot of people say that a tradegy, by all accounts is a dark movie. I think this is true but only to an extent. Of course a tradegy is rooted from darkness; the mere fact that the protagonists are losing is not a happy theme, it's dark alright. I think a truely dark film however, is a film that surrounds everything in mystery and question. In the ESB, yes, we know that Darth Vader is Luke's father and it is no longer a shocking revelation as it was back when there was only the OT. However, as veiwers we are still following the plight of our hero Luke Skywalker, and experiencing the painful revelations through him.
Darkness is defined as "Difficult to understand; obscure: stories that are large in scope and dark in substance. Concealed or secret; mysterious." Again, we are watching the movies with dramatic irony, knowing these things before they are revealed to our hero, BUT, we are experiencing them as he does. In that regard, I think the ESB is more appropiately defined as the "darker" of the two movies.