Review of EP2!

Darth Aussie

Australian Sith Lord
Well having just sat through two and a half hours of EP2 , i must say it was finally worth the wait. Being the first to see this long waited film , Australia and New Zealand was lucky enough to get it before other countries . Over 450 fellow fans and myself piled into three local cinemas at 12.01 midnight (AEST) to view the next instalment of our beloved saga. From start to finish the epic promised by George Lucas that would kickstart the SW universe going again has arrived. The movie starts a little slow to begin with but after gazing at all the SFX abound on the screen it starts to rock in a big way all the way to a huge dramatic ending

I promised my colleagues here at Bothanspy that this special report would be spoiler free. Well i can tell you one thing, everything you have expected from this movie will deliver and how. I won't go into detail much further on the whole evening but i will say one thing..... YODA .... you will enjoy this film i promise it. It has everything and more to enjoy. Makes me want to go and see it again tomorrow. What the hell i just might do that!
 
I usually sit down to one of the episodes every weekend. Now that the hype is over and the DVD is here on my shelf I reflect on memories of AOTC and feel it was good - not the best.

There love seen was too long and the story lacked enough depth to help connect episode III to the OT. Mind you the special effects are unsurpassed by any other Star Wars movie and the ending rocked.

A bit late for a reply to this thread but now that the "hype" is gone, do you share the same feelings as you did Darth Aussie?
 

AmShak

Senior Moderator
Staff member
The one thing i recall being said by many before aotc came out was that ep2 would make ep1 a better movie. I fail to see how ep2 made ep1 "better". I'm a sw fan, so i'll like what ever lucas puts up on the screen, but as with everything, it's fun to think how about it could be different.
I still think that aotc feels rushed, like they were try to cover too much ground and taking short cuts in the story. Perhaps that was intentional. The love scenes were long or seemed that way. The entire roll in the grass ride the giant tick scene could have been ditched. the dialogue exchange betwwen anakin and padme just didn't work for me. the didn't seem to have anything going on. hayden seemed to pause and struggle with his character ("act...act") while natalie seemed to just be waiting for hayden to spit out his lines so she could say hers. I point to the scene where they debate if he's a jedi and who's in charge of security on naboo.
I think i could have done without the "anakin killing the tuskens" scene" and the confession to padme that followed. I know a lot of people liked that, but it was lost on me.
the only other sequence that didn't really make much sense to me and could have been left out or shortened was the droid factory sequence. From the moment that i saw it, the only thought that really ran through my head, was "i'm really going to hate this part of the video game whenever it comes out."
Other than that, i couldn't be happier with everything that went on around the jedi temple, palpatine's office, kamino or the beginning of the clone wars. i would have liked to get a better look around the Outlander Club.
 

Darth Aussie

Australian Sith Lord
Yes it could have been better. I guess the hype of the night may have caught me up in the report i did. Now having the DVD and watching it again i do agree more should have been added and other scenes not as needed.
I did totally enjoy the Yoda v Dooku. I feel a lot more was put into that plus the Clone war scenes. The ending was yes a lot better and more watchable over again....
It does feel rushed however agreeing with Shak. They have a awful lot to cover in EP3 then......
 

Zepp

Interstellar Buccaneer
if you have the DVD look at the circle in the Arena battle Jedi roundup, note the positions of Mace and Obi and the jedi that are behind them, when it flashes to the closeup you will notice a complete transformation of the Human Jedi to Aayla Secura... Lucas replaced him in the closeup but not in the wideshot, kinda irritating when you get down to it. But the big thing that bothered me was Yoda. The only scene that they legitimately needed a digital Yoda was the fight scene, to use him throughout the movie really took away from his character. The puppet Yoda came to life in a way the digital Yoda never could. Also the gratuitous use of blue/green screens annoyed me too. It didn't have the feel of being there that you got in the old trilogy.

Edit: To be fair to Portman, I feel she did the best with what was given her. She was given bad lines and cardboard partner and she made due. But not that I think of it, I think the Tusken slaughter takes away from her character, she couldn't have married him after that is my reaction. She is the only decent politician, other than Humperdink Organa, and an all out idealist and she marries a guy that slaughters and de'humanizes' aliens while supporting dictatorship over democracy if 'it works...' It doesn't fit her character.
 

Borsk

Administrator
Staff member
It's more important to have a consistant looking character. I don't know that switching back and forth between puppet Yoda and CG Yoda would have necessarily been a good thing. Maybe using the puppet Yoda in the scenes, rotoscoping him out, and replacing him with the digital Yoda would have helped the performance (similar to what Weta did with Gollum in LOTR:TTT). In any case, CG Yoda is way, way down there on my list of things that could have been better in AoTC.

I agree that having an actual set versus the blue screen helps the actors (much like in LOTR - nice extras on the extended DVD, btw).

Basically, the new SW movies give us a couple of cool "scenes", but not complete movies on the level of the OT.
 
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