Saga Darkest to most lighthearted star wars film.

The Empire Strikes Back
The Force Awakens
A New Hope
Return of the Jedi

In all seriousness though, ROTS is easily the darkest because it's the one that's trying the hardest to be dark.

 

Off the cuff I guess...

Revenge of the Sith
The Empire Strikes Back
Attack of the Clones
A New Hope/The Force Awakens (still deciding between these two)
Return of the Jedi
The Phantom Menace


EDIT: Whoa, I just actually read the original post and now realize it is the exact same list sans TFA being included.

 

Hm. Something like this, maybe:

ROTS
TFA
ANH/AOTC/TESB
ROTJ
TPM

 

-Revenge Of The Sith
-The Force Awakens
-Attack Of The Clones
-The Empire Strikes Back
-The Phantom Menace
-A New Hope
-Return Of The Jedi

 

ROTS
AOTC
TPM
ESB
TFA
ROTJ
ANH
Clone Wars

 

Off topic, but I love that quote of yours from Chorus.

 

Revenge of the Sith (goes for the whole Greek tragedy thing)
The Empire Strikes Back (more moody than dark, really, although the whole film is pretty mean to our characters)
Attack of the Clones (same, more or less, since it goes for a noir feel at times and there's a vaguely conspiratorial tone. OH, and the sand people massacre)
The Force Awakens (a return to a lighthearted sense of adventure, but with an undercurrent of melancholy and wistfulness)
A New Hope (pretty light; a couple of dark moments, but the film doesn't linger on them)
Return of the Jedi (the whole point of the film is to be uplifting. Some moments of sadness, but not very dark)
The Phantom Menace (Jar Jar steps in **** and an animal farts in his face)

 

ROTS
TFA(Hosnian destruction, Hans Death,Rey's Flashback, Kylos Liaresque scene calling Finn A Traitor and duel.)
ATOC
ROTJ
TPM-ESPB TIE
ANH

 

Revenge of the Sith: Virtually nothing good happens, Anakin turns to the dark side, Mace and Padme die, the Republic and Jedi fall. Vader even slaughters children! Reminds me of ISIS.
Rogue One: All the main characters die, Darth Vader slaughters a bunch of rebels personally. But, it is hard to compare to the collapse of a society that happens in Revenge of the Sith.
The Empire Strikes Back: The Empire goes around, scatters the rebels, and keeps on winning.
The Force Awakens: The entire New Republic is blown up, Han Solo dies.
A New Hope: Luke's caregivers are murdered, Aldeeran is blown to bits.
Attack of the Clones: Doomed marriage, a war starts, mass Jedi slaughter.
This is where the mood transitions from dark to light-hearted.
Return of the Jedi: Besides a gloomy throne room and palace, this film is light-hearted, with Ewoks and countless rebel victories.
The Phantom Menace: Jar Jar is a major character = kids movie.

 

ROTS
(RO)
TESB
AOTC
TFA (balance)
TPM
ROTJ
ANH

 

ANH because of the warm character moments? Just curious.

 

Mostly. Whenever I think of ANH, the first thing that comes to mind is the celebration at the end so that as well. In retrospect, I probably should've switched ROTJ and ANH around as ANH has the homestead burning and the destruction of Alderaan...

 

Yeah, Owen and Beru's fates freaked me out a little when I first saw it.
The ANH ending is so happy and enthusiastic on the part of the big 3 though, it is such a relief after ROTS spirals into a trough.

 

ROTS
R1
TESB
TFA
ANH
AOTC
ROTJ
TPM

 

1. Revenge of the Sith - Order 66, Anakin cooked, and Mace getting tossed out the window make this easily #1.

2. Empire - Luke getting his hand lopped off and Han getting frozen were pretty tough to deal with back in the day. And the good guys always lose.

3. Rogue One - Uhh spoiler... There's a reason why you don't see most of these characters in IV. I almost put this at #2 but it had a more hopeful ending and some comedy.

4. Force Awakens - It's dark for me for how much it disappointed me. But besides that Han dying and all the good that came from the ROTJ ending being undone is pretty dark.

5. Attack of the Clones - Dooku beating up Obi-Wan and Anakin was pretty dark. And a bunch of jedi are killed.

6. A New Hope - Poor Alderran, poor Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru. However, we don't have much emotionally invested in them when they go. And it's a nice happy ending.

7. Phantom Menace - Qui Gon dying was kinda dark but overall the movie seemed pretty light hearted and kiddie with Ani and Jar Jar.

8. Return of the Jedi - Teddy bears and the good guys always winning. It doesn't get much lighter than that.

 

ROTS: Darth Vader burning alive, Darth Vader slaughtering children, Mace-Windu being electrocuted to death, Grievous catching on fire, Dooku being decapitated while defenseless, Vader choking Padme, The Old Republic falls
TFA/R1: I can't decide between the two as far as darkness. TFA had an entire Star System blown up, and a main character killed by his own son on screen. On the other hand, Rogue One is more consistently dark. Well, you all know how it ends.
ESB: The heroes lose the battles, Han gets frozen, Luke gets his hand chopped off
AOTC: Anakin slaughtering an entire tribe of Tusken Raiders (mostly offscreen), Jango getting decapitated (Boba sees it happen), Jedi getting slaughtered in the arena, assassination plot
ANH: A planet getting blown up, Luke loses his aunt and uncle (who die brutal deaths)
ROTJ: Really the only darkness here is that Luke almost turns to the Dark Side.
TPM: I can't think of anything dark here. Qui-Gon's death is unpleasant, but not insanely dark.

 

RotS and TESB - darkest and best
Love all 8, though.

 

1. ROTS- Anakin kills a defenseless Dooku, an entire classroom of younglings, the entire trade federation; Sidious wipes out a bunch of Jedi including shocking Mace Windu into the ether; order 66; Padame dies of a broken heart after being force choked by her psychopathic husband; Anakin gets butchered and fried; a fascist regime run by a psychic magician who shoots lightning bolts out of his hands takes over an entire freaking galaxy
2. ESTB- The good guys lose; one hero gets frozen in carbonite and the other one gets his butt kicked, his hard chopped off and learns that the (other) evil psychopathic magical serial killer is his dad
3. Rogue One- Everyone dies. But then again, who did you love?
4. AOTC- The audience is forced to watch the development of an abusive relationship; Anakin's mom seems to have been turned into a sex slave for Tuskin Raiders and then dies her son's hands; Anakin butchers a bunch of Tuskin Raiders, even the women and children and faces no consequence; Boba Fett watches his dad get decapitated in front of him and then picks up his dad's decapitated head
5. TFA- Hella planets get blown up, hella civilians get slaughtered in a circle, a movie icon gets filleted by his son and tossed down a shaft
6. ANH- A kid watches his aunt and uncle roast, but he doesn't seem to care, so why should we? A planet gets blown up, but the princess of that planet gets over it pretty quickly; a massive space station gets blown up with thousands of people inside, but they were bad, so who cares?
7. RotJ- All our favorite villains get killed in really easy ways; one whole Ewok dies in a battle against the most advanced military in the galaxy; Sidious gets thrown down a shaft and Vader gets fried to death.
8. TPM- A boy and his gungan go around the galaxy and blow up a space station no one cared about; the hero and villain both die too soon; Micky Mouse shows up in the background in the senate scene #starwarsisforkids

 

Darkest
- Revenge of the Sith
- The Empire Strikes Back
- Rogue One
- The Force Awakens
- Return of the Jedi
- The Phantom Menace
- Attack of the Clones
- A New Hope
Lightest

 

My self..

Star Wars: Revenge Of The Sith
Rogue One: A Star Wars Story
Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back
Star Wars: The Force Awakens
Star Wars: Return Of The Jedi
Star Wars: Attack Of The Clones
Star Wars: The Phantom Menace
Star Wars: A New Hope

 

Revenge of the Sith: Anakin turns into Darth Vader, kills a munch of kids. The Jedi are destroyed, Padme dies when giving birth to Luke and Liea, and the empire is now a thing. Pretty much zero happiness here, bit of a downer ending.
Rogue One: All of the main characters died along with plenty of other rebels too and two cities are destroyed. Also some of the good guys was a little more shady compare to some of the heroes in the other movies. That being said unlike Revenge of the Sith there is a real strong sense of hope through out the movie. Like even though all this bad stuff happens the good guys still accomplish what they went out to do, get the Death Star plans.
The Force Awakens: Kylo Ren kills his own father. And the Starkiller is a stronger version of the Death Star.
Attack of the Clones: Anakin kills a whole village of people who was responsible for his mom's death, and is a step closer to the dark side. He also loses an arm too.
Empire Strikes Back: The good guys pretty much loss in this one. Luke loss a hand, and finds out that Darth Vader is his dad. And Han Solo is capture and is frozen and the rebels got chased off of the ice planet.
A New Hope: I wouldn't really call the movie dark but seeing Luke's aunt and uncle's dead bodies was a little rough.
The Phantom Menace: The same with A New Hope I wouldn't call this a dark movie. Sure Qui-Gon Jinn died and that's sad but other then that I can't really think of a "dark" thing that happens in this movie.
Return of the Jedi: I can't think of anything that was really dark about this one. The good guys win and Darth Vader redeemed himself. The movie is pretty light-hearted, and that's not a bad thing.

 

Revenge of the Sith, Attack of the Clones, The Empire Strikes Back, Rogue One, Return of the Jedi, The Force Awakens, A New Hope, The Phantom Menace.
It's strange that the original Star Wars isn't darker, since a whole planet is destroyed. Just my opinion m.

 

1. ROTS
2. AOTC
3. ESB
4. TFA
5. R1
6. ROTJ
7. ANH
8. TPM

TPM should probably be higher up in the scale, what with the sealing of the fate of impending doom by introducing Anakin to Obi Wan, the return of the Sith, and the death of Qui Gon... it's overall theme and feel of lighthearted childish fun kinda overshadows the darkness. Oh, what TPM could've been...

 

III
RO
V
VI
IV
II
I
VII