For the most part I completely agree. Luke's training is unexplained, but I think he learned a lot from Yoda, 'save you, it will.' But Luke must have been able to complete his training on his own, constructing his own Lightsaber, for instance. Where did he get the crystal for the saber anyway?

 

True, but I want to point out that this is a rehash writing, too. Didn't we already see the main protagonist destroy a Death Star, Death Star II and now the Droid Command ship to save the day. The diversion of the Gungans is exactly the same thing we see in ROTJ. Some theme and motif, but not as well told. SW writers need to think out of the box for these next movies.

 

The characterizations in the film are dreadful. Spot on. Bravo!

 

I love Ewoks, but they can't destroy Stormtroopers.

 

Totally agree with this. Love the critique on the uselessness of the Rebellion. Also, the Han/Lando thing. Good stuff.

 

What happened?

 

He lost the money before he could pay off Jabba. He was able to pay off Jabba later but did something (not sure off top of my head) that caused Jabba to put the price back on Han's head.

 

I fail to see the logic behind this. If Return of the Jedi shared Empire's admirable qualities--apart from the bleak tone of course--there wouldn't be controversy.

Genre fans often refer to a "third-movie curse", as if artistic failure is preordained. But the fact is, trilogy-cappers often disappoint because they're not particularly good. When they are (e.g., The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, Return of the King, Toy Story 3), the reasons are self-evident...

Good script + Competent direction + Committed performances = Successful Movie

Mediocre script + Barely serviceable direction + Coasting performances = Unsuccessful Movie

 

I don't know if it's intentional, but I find the implication here that a bleak tone is an "admirable quality"... dubious, at best.

 

Empire is a chronicle of a cadre of war heroes being brought to their knees. As such, the proceedings demanded a comparatively bleak tone, and Lucas and Kershner should be commended for fighting audience expectations in service to ambition.

At no point did I suggest that darkness in and of itself is an admirable quality. (Return of the Jedi, for instance, is not a weak follow-up due to contrasting tone but because of its diluted characters.)

 

I really enjoyed the rescue of Han from Jabba's palace. I don't feel it took too long. You could shave a few minutes off, but since Han was captured and you knew Bobo Fett was taking him to Jabba I don't understand how some could think this doesn't fit in with the overrall Story. I think it would have been a huge mistake to have it done off screen, or have it be super easy.

 

Although, I still feel like the plan was awful and it ended up being too easy, especially with the way Boba Fett met his end. Was Luke in contact with the others just prior? Were they all in sync with plans? Obviously Leia and Lando were not. Furthermore, the dialogue is awful and Luke swings his LS around like there is no skill...hacking away at Weequay. I did like the swashbuckling, with the swing from barges. That's always great.

 

Maybe a fly was bugging him and he was trying to swat at it lol. I guess the main reason I really like it is cause I really like Jabba, and it was nice to see the heros taking on someone other than stormtroopers and Darth Vader for a bit.

 

ROTJ has always been my favorite film of the saga..since I first saw it at 9 years old and even after seeing ESB and the PT. I love everything about it and especially the scenes with Luke and Vader and I think it wraps up the trilogy nicely.

 

I've never felt that Jedi was any less of a film than the other two. Actually, it's my sentimental favorite. Partly because it was the very first film I ever saw in a theater, partly because it's the climax to the story begun in ANH. It's just spectacular from start to finish as well as the emotional highlight of the OT.

I can see where many people come from in their comments, but most of these are just matters of taste (the Ewoks in particular). If you consider IMDb, you will see that Jedi is also among the Top 250 most highly-rated films of all time. That alone indicates that differences in quality between the three films is generally considered to be marginal.

 

Ep6 is my fifth favorite Star Wars film. The only film it beats, in my opinion, is Ep2 (I love all six of them, though).

I really love the final lightsaber fight between Vader and Luke, though. The music that plays is spectacular. They actually used that same music when you build your lightsaber in one of the The Old Republic scenarios. Really cool.

 

Why is ROTJ the weakest of the originals?

Here's 50 reasons.

In fairness, 10 reasons it doesn't suck.

 

Probably because Lucas interfered a lot more in ROTJ than he did with ESB. There were a lot of good ideas people working on the film had for it but Lucas dismissed all of them.

 

The characterizations in the film are dreadful. Spot on. Bravo![/quote]
Probably because Lucas interfered a lot more in ROTJ than he did with ESB. There were a lot of good ideas people working on the film had for it but Lucas dismissed all of them.[/quote]

The reasons for this are quite understandable, too. Making these films nearly killed him. It was nearly impossible to make SW with the budget restraints of FOX. Empire went way over budget, the bank called in the loan and Lucas had to get another line of credit from another bank...if the film had failed it would have sunk him. He was going through a divorce. He decided to keep production local and the budget low and he would have complete control over someone like Marquand instead of having to deal with Kershner or even Kurtz. In short, he wanted to be done. IMO.

 

I think ROTJ - and to a lesser extent some of the unfortunate decisions in the PT - arises somewhat from, as Steve Tyler from Aerosmith once said "having enough money to afford all your vices". On ANH and ESB, George Lucas was forced to contend with, respectively, being a new director, and with the fact that the director's vision for a film is ultimately the controlling one. In ANH, it's well-known or at least heavily rumoured that Harrison Ford had a lot to do with at least his character's dialogue being extensively rewritten on the fly. Ford had worked with Lucas on American Graffiti and the two were contemporaries and friends, and Ford was, shall we say, blunt when Lucas gave him lines that sucked on paper. The simplest demonstration of this is the scene where Han Solo vainly tries to convince the Control Room on the Death Star that everything's fine: Ford deliberately did not memorise his lines for that part so his ad libbing would come across as authentic. There's a fair bit of ad lib by Ford in the movie that has gone unsaid, and ANH sparkles as a result. ANH also had Lucas on a tight budget, and for some directors, Lucas being one, they get better on small budgets or being forced to come up with magic.

On ESB, Kershner directed - an experienced set of hands who was determined to bring in a science fiction film that didn't suck. Lucas could've grumbled with him all he liked, but the fact is that though ANH allowed ESB to be made, it was ESB that allowed every other Star Wars film to be made - because, simply put, it's one of the finest science fiction films yet made.

On ROTJ, Lucas was firmly at the helm - as indicated, Marquand was far more under Lucas's thumb, and it shows. ROTJ is a lot like most of the PT, right down to really, really cringingly bad humour and sidelining the "fringe" of the galaxy, i.e. Han Solo, which deprives a lot of the film of its humanity. The PT, particularly TPM, is an exercise in a director who is now an eight hundred pound gorilla - able to sit where the hell he chooses to and with nobody around with either sufficient clout or expertise to tell him when a piece or story element does not work.

 

Probably because Lucas interfered a lot more in ROTJ than he did with ESB. There were a lot of good ideas people working on the film had for it but Lucas dismissed all of them.[/quote]

The reasons for this are quite understandable, too. Making these films nearly killed him. It was nearly impossible to make SW with the budget restraints of FOX. Empire went way over budget, the bank called in the loan and Lucas had to get another line of credit from another bank...if the film had failed it would have sunk him. He was going through a divorce. He decided to keep production local and the budget low and he would have complete control over someone like Marquand instead of having to deal with Kershner or even Kurtz. In short, he wanted to be done. IMO.[/quote]

Probably because Lucas interfered a lot more in ROTJ than he did with ESB. There were a lot of good ideas people working on the film had for it but Lucas dismissed all of them.[/quote]

The reasons for this are quite understandable, too. Making these films nearly killed him. It was nearly impossible to make SW with the budget restraints of FOX. Empire went way over budget, the bank called in the loan and Lucas had to get another line of credit from another bank...if the film had failed it would have sunk him. He was going through a divorce. He decided to keep production local and the budget low and he would have complete control over someone like Marquand instead of having to deal with Kershner or even Kurtz. In short, he wanted to be done. IMO.[/quote]

I disagree with that, many reports about the filming of the PT films showed Lucas was still quite open to input from other people, not some bully who pushed his crew around and made them scared to say anything to him, that is just RLM BS. Heck, Mace wasn't even going to be Human, but Jackson wanted to be in the films so bad Lucas changed the character to cast Jackson. Lucas even let him have a purple lightsaber since that is Jackson's favorite color. There are a lot of examples of this.

As for the filming of TESB, it is well known that Katz disagreed with Lucas about hiring Kershner, Katz wanted someone else to direct. Later Katz's job as producer was to keep the filming on time and on budget, but he let Kershner go well over budget and over time to the point that the production was in danger of failing. So after Lucas begged for more money to complete the film, he had to fly out and fix Katz's mess and get the film back on budget. This required deleting several scenes that were intended to be filmed.

 

Until I joined this forum, I had never heard of people disliking ROTJ. I still like it. It fits well as the third act in the trilogy, despite it's flaws.

 

The reasons for this are quite understandable, too. Making these films nearly killed him. It was nearly impossible to make SW with the budget restraints of FOX. Empire went way over budget, the bank called in the loan and Lucas had to get another line of credit from another bank...if the film had failed it would have sunk him. He was going through a divorce. He decided to keep production local and the budget low and he would have complete control over someone like Marquand instead of having to deal with Kershner or even Kurtz. In short, he wanted to be done. IMO.[/quote]

Probably because Lucas interfered a lot more in ROTJ than he did with ESB. There were a lot of good ideas people working on the film had for it but Lucas dismissed all of them.[/quote]

The reasons for this are quite understandable, too. Making these films nearly killed him. It was nearly impossible to make SW with the budget restraints of FOX. Empire went way over budget, the bank called in the loan and Lucas had to get another line of credit from another bank...if the film had failed it would have sunk him. He was going through a divorce. He decided to keep production local and the budget low and he would have complete control over someone like Marquand instead of having to deal with Kershner or even Kurtz. In short, he wanted to be done. IMO.[/quote]

I disagree with that, many reports about the filming of the PT films showed Lucas was still quite open to input from other people, not some bully who pushed his crew around and made them scared to say anything to him, that is just RLM BS. Heck, Mace wasn't even going to be Human, but Jackson wanted to be in the films so bad Lucas changed the character to cast Jackson. Lucas even let him have a purple lightsaber since that is Jackson's favorite color. There are a lot of examples of this.

As for the filming of TESB, it is well known that Katz disagreed with Lucas about hiring Kershner, Katz wanted someone else to direct. Later Katz's job as producer was to keep the filming on time and on budget, but he let Kershner go well over budget and over time to the point that the production was in danger of failing. So after Lucas begged for more money to complete the film, he had to fly out and fix Katz's mess and get the film back on budget. This required deleting several scenes that were intended to be filmed. [/quote]
Despite all the problems you mention, ESB didnt turn out too bad did it? (Best of the entire saga IMO) as for Jackson being in the PT. he didnt fit Star Wars. Don't get me wrong i absolutely love Sam J as an actor. Pulp Fiction is one of my faves and he was brilliant in that as he was in various other films. But playing the part of a stoic Jedi just wasn't his thing. The gloves didnt fit. Having a purple lightsabre and all that BS. It was like Windu was written purposely with him in mind. Rubbish.

 

From decades of this topic cropping up it has occurred to me that "weakest" has come to mean "weak" or "terrible" to trolls the world over. Ignore them. The PT are three of the best movies ever, but depending on the troll any one of them suck to high heaven.

 

Oh here we go, the whole your a troll blah blah blah! Go somewhere else mate your boring.