I want to put into perspective the criticism that "The Last Jedi" is receiving. It was fine. There was a lot of nonsense in it, but, ultimately, it was fine.
So, I'm going to re-watch and do my best to comment on every stupid moment of the Star Wars prequels. There might be some overlap with the RedLetterMedia Plinkett reviews, but I'll do my best to be as independent and thorough as possible. I am sure that I'll miss a lot but this is, again, just to put into perspective exactly how bad these movies can get.
Part 2 is here: https://steemit.com/movies/@murdermystery/itt-i-comment-on-every-stupid-moment-of-the-star-wars-prequels-the-phantom-menace-part-2
Let's begin with the opening scroll:
A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away...
STAR WARS
Episode I
THE PHANTOM MENACE
Turmoil has engulfed the
Galactic Republic. The taxation
of trade routes to outlying star
systems is in dispute.
Hoping to resolve the matter
with a blockade of deadly
battleships, the greedy Trade
Federation has stopped all
shipping to the small planet
of Naboo.
While the Congress of the
Republic endlessly debates
this alarming chain of events,
the Supreme Chancellor has
secretly dispatched two Jedi
Knights, the guardians of
peace and justice in the
galaxy, to settle the conflict...
This is basically CSPAN in space. How exciting! And with the opening scroll, we're already presented with an utter stupidity: what the fuck is a Trade Federation, and why are they taxing Naboo?
Later in the movie provides a couple facts that I'll bring to the fore now: Naboo is part of the Republic, because it has a senator, Palpatine. And the Trade Federation must be part of the Republic as well, because it also has a representative in the Congress. Which means that if both of these elements are in the Republic, then:
a) The Republic should know exactly what's going on, and
b) The Republic should be immediately ready to kick the asses of either Naboo, for not paying their taxes or whatever, or the Trade Federation for being douchebags.
But no. In this case it seems more like, I dunno, Nebraska declares war on South Dakota, and the rest of the United States is on fucking Mars and has no contact or input on the operation of those two states.
ughhhh it's such a stupid premise.
The Blockade
Okay, what the fuck is this? You have a "blockade" around the planet that consists of a narrow band around it?
What kind of blockade is that? That little red ship could effortlessly go over the blockade, or under it, or around it. That's not blocking anything. It's like standing in the middle of a huge open room, by yourself, and saying you're blocking traffic.
The Droid Ships
Those big walking... things in the background are, I think, little interceptor ships. So why are they walking on their wingtips? How is that at all a valuable design? They don't have arms, they can't possibly do anything useful except shoot things. So why are they lumbering around, shooting the breeze, in the hangar? They're ROBOTS. They should be idling, stacked on top of each other in massive racks, waiting for deployment, not lounging around like morons from Police Academy.
Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan
This probably the only point in all NINE movies where the Jedi actually function as peacekeepers.
The Federation
These clowns are ridiculous. With the nonsense pan-Asian[?] accent and the terrible makeup (er, sorry, model), the Federation guys are probably the worst thing to happen to the prequels. Yes, worse than Jar-Jar, because these butt nuggets actually provide conflict, and they're fucking worthless.
So the robot tells them that the ambassadors are Jedi, and the Federation immediately freak out and contact their leader. Why does it matter if they're Jedi or not? Anyone the Chancellor would have sent would try to force a settlement, it's common sense, they should have been expecting it. It's not like the Jedi would have just murdered them both for disagreeing, since again, they're Jedi.
It's a stupid point of conflict, but whatever, that's par for the course for these films. Strap in, idiots.
Lord Sidious
So the Federation chumps contact Lord Sidious (and anyone with a brain in the audience already fucking knows who he is, thanks Lucas) and immediately start whining about how "the blockade is finished!" Sidious isn't worried, though, he comes up with a genius plan: accelerate their plans for Naboo (which we don't know and frankly don't care about) and kill the Jedi. Yeah, send these incompetents to kill two Jedi, cause that will work.
A side note: the holograms are transparent, 3d shapes. Why can't we see the other side?
Talking to the Droids
What the fuck, why is this happening? Why don't the droids have radios in them? And then later in the scene you see some droids issuing orders to others. WHY?! One would think the robots would function as a hive mind, every one of them automatically knowing exactly what they're doing, what all the other robots are doing, and exactly what their objective is at all times.
The droids are so laughably terrible and nonthreatening, and when you see some of the other robots (that can actually do shit), it's a wonder why these guys are used for so much.
Blast Doors
Qui-Gon is using his lightsaber to cut through the doors and enter the bridge. Brilliant strategy, right?
So why the fuck doesn't it work? Lightsabers are not solid objects, they're lasers that can apparently cut through just about everything with ease. Qui-Gon has no trouble plunging the sword in to the hilt into the door, so why can't he just sweep the sword around in a circle once and cut the damn thing open? Once the blast doors are dropped to make the bridge super-sealed, Qui-Gon is stumped. It makes no sense whatsoever. I'm not a scientist, but that's just flat-out wrong.
Destroyer Droids
These badasses are too tough for the Jedi to beat, because of that one simple and obvious addition: SHIELDING. Plus, you know, aggression, accuracy, and decent weaponry. Two of them force the Jedi to flee.
So why the fuck aren't these guys everywhere? They seem to completely rape infantry because their shields reflect small arms fire. If the Federation had sent four or five of these guys to kill the Jedi back when they were in the little office rather than a squad of the worthless chicken-bots, the Jedi would have already been screwed over.
Amidala and the Federation
Amidala phones in and her and the Federation guys have a completely meaningless talk about nothing. It's a pointless bit of posturing between the two that has no business being in this video, but it's a good sign of things to come: a mountain of political conflict that goes absolutely nowhere.
The Throne
I can even bitch about mundane details like this ridiculous chair. Look at that! You could fit four people on that seat. That must be the most uncomfortable chair ever, especially since it seems Amidala has to have her hands on the armrests all the time. Aghhhh.
Amidala's Small Council Or Whatever
This scene is awful.
It first begins with Senator Palpatine talking to Amidala about how he's surprised the Jedi haven't made contact with the Feds. Anyone with a brain in the audience knows that's bullshit, but that's not the point.
The problem is that we plainly see the Naboo people communicating with people on other planets (Palpatine is in the capital planet, Coruscant). Which means that there should be none of this nonsense of the Chancellor "investigating" the situation -- you already know what's going on! The fact that the people are pleading for some kind of assistance, and the Republic already knows the Feds are there, would suggest that maybe the Republic should have sent more than two guys to "investigate" what's going on.
Then they talk about how the Federation wouldn't dare to be so aggressive. Uh... yes they would. They are. Right now. They just cut off your communication. You fuckers are just sitting there being surprised at every single hostile move the Federation has made, and you pretty much invite them into your city ten minutes later.
Amidala says she won't condone a course of action that would lead them to war.
Uh, you bozo, war is upon you. The bad guys have tanks IN YOUR FRONT YARD. You have no choice except immediate and full surrender, and it doesn't take a genius to see why that is bad.
Robot Unicycles
Why, exactly?
Jar-Jar Binks
I'm not going to talk about how he's a horrible character.
I'm not going to talk about how he's one of the most hated fictional characters of all time.
I am going to talk about how he's bad comic relief that becomes a main character, despite the fact that he has virtually no role in the movies, the Gungans only do something once (lose in battle), and that he exists as an easy shortcut for the two Jedi to get to the Naboo people rather than having them actually struggle to evade the Federation army. He's a plot cop-out, and that's what's bad about him.
Oh, and he's horrible.
The Gungan City
This is the so-called "secret" Gungan city.
You know, the secret that's like 10 feet underneath the surface of a lake and is lit up like a Christmas tree. Yeah, that's real secret, good going.
One gripe with this scene though: the Jedi have on hand little mechanical breathing devices that let them swim underwater. I can buy that, except -- why do they have them? Why didn't they use them before, on the Federation ship, when the room was gassed? This isn't the first time that the Jedi pull out a little machine that seems to have one exclusive purpose, and it's really annoying. These fuckers have more odds and ends on them than Batman.
Also, they opt to continue wearing their huge thick wool cloaks when they go swimming, despite the fact that it would make swimming probably ten times more difficult, and they'd be soaked for days, keeping the Jedi uncomfortable and cold long after they're done swimming. Yet, of course, the robes are totally dry in the next scene, so who cares.
Except the entire cast is totally bone-dry.
And I refuse to believe that the bubble things dry them off when they pass through them. Humans are like 80% water, I'd be frightened of a machine that instantaneously removes "excess moisture" from me.
The Gungan Council
The big guy in the middle, Boss Nass, is voiced by Brian Blessed. Brian Blessed has made a career of being such an enormously large ham in everything that I can't help but love him. And of course, he nails the part of being the huge, corpulent Gungan leader that flaps his jowls around.
But I hate this scene. The Gungans are hostile to the Naboo because the Naboo "tink dey brains so beeg." And really, Amidala and her folk might be stupid, but compared to these guys they're pretty enlightened. But it's such a stupid conflict, ugh.
The Boat Thing
So our heroes are given a submersible of some kind and directed through the planet's core to reach the Naboo.
The planet's core.
THE FUCKING PLANET'S CORE. They're going to drive a SUBMARINE THROUGH THE PLANET'S CORE. The core that's evidently filled WITH FUCKING WATER.
ffffffFFFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUUCK
Liam Neeson frees Jar-Jar from Boss Nass because, according to him, the Jedi need a "navigator" to help them through the planet's core. How is Jar-Jar supposed to know anything about that? How could he possibly be of help? And it's not like Qui-Gon just did it out of the goodness of his heart, given how callously he is willing to abandon the slaves on Tatooine later in the movie (until he realizes that Anakin is a Jedi).
Journey to the "Planet's Core"
This is one of the worst scenes in the entire prequel trilogy.
So, okay, it's supposed to be an action scene, as our heroes must bravely outmaneuver the terrible monsters and threatening environment of, you know, the center of a fucking planet. One would imagine the gravity would crush that ship, but whatever.
The source of tension in this scene comes from two giant fish attacks. Which is pretty awful, because Lucas here uses the same arbitrary, meaningless threat twice to try and make the scene exciting, and considering the first fish is dispatched in like 10 seconds, and the second fish takes no longer to avoid, why do we care? The ship "loses power" for some reason, but Obi-Wan fixes that up in like 15 seconds before anything serious happens -- except for a lame gotcha with a bigger fish.
The whole time, Liam and Ewan are making no effort whatsoever to sell this as an exciting, dangerous scene. They're sitting there, idly looking out the windows as if it's a drive to the fucking bank. They could be chatting about the baseball game or something. Nothing happens in this scene, but it's so long you would expect it to be that "first act action sequence" that keeps the audience interested. I, of course, am bored.
The Invasion, I think?
Alright, I'm now a bit confused about timelines.
In the scene with the stupid dress above, troops are just marching into the city, and Amidala is watching forlornly out of the windows. (Or, she would, if the bottom of the window didn't come up to her chin.)
Now she's been captured by the Feds. This can't be more than like 10 minutes later, considering the Naboo didn't put up any form of resistance and Amidala made no effort to hide or flee. So how the fuck is she wearing a new outfit? There is no way in hell she could have changed out from one ridiculously gaudy and gratuitous outfit into another one on such short notice.
Also, the Jedi managed to travel through the planet's core -- by submarine -- in what can't account for more than half an hour of time. While you're figuring out the logistics of that, I'll just go ahead and call bullshit on the entire fucking planet's core disaster and call it a day.
The Ambush
The Jedi rescue Amidala and her court from a patrol of those worthless clown robots.
But riddle me this: what kind of escort would go on foot? I'm sure if you had prisoners to transport, you would do it in a truck to get both the troops and the prisoners to the camp quickly and securely so you can't, you know, get ambushed like this.
Smartassed Robot
What follows is one of the silliest scenes in the movie.
The Jedi, the Queen and her court march into the town's main hangar to escape the planet. The hangar has "too many" battle droids, according to the security leader. In reality, there's only like a dozen battle droids and because they're so fucking useless it's hardly a threat.
How useless? Well, the escaping Jedi walks right up to the captain and tries to bluff his way onto the ship. The exchange here is just so idiotic it can't go unnoticed.
"Halt."
"We are ambassadors of the Republic, and we are taking these people to Coruscant."
"Where are you taking them?"
"To Coruscant."
"Coruscant... uh, that doesn't compute... uh, wait... uh, you're under arrest!"
what. the. fuck.
Were they actually programmed with a smart mouth or did they just develop that on their own? Either way, what the fuck, I can't even properly express how idiotic the whole thing is. Anyway, the Jedi effortlessly dispatch the robots and our heroes escape Naboo.
The Return of the Blockade
Our moronic heroes have to pass through the blockade to get far enough away from the planet to go into hyperspace.
Wait, no they don't. They can just fucking go above the blockade. Or below it.
I've made this point already but it has to be said again: the ship is in danger just because. No one could possibly be this stupid in real life.
And it's not like the Federation are guilt-free in this transaction either, because they AREN'T BLOCKING THE PLANET. And only one battleship opens fire on the Naboo ship, without sending out any of those shitty little interceptor bots or anything. The ship just literally heads straight through the enemy lines, and the one ship that fires on them misses.
Fucking classic.
Darth Maul
The Feds contact Darth Sidious and break the news that the Jedi and the Queen escaped.
For a guy like The Emperor, whose characteristic is that he is EVIL without compare, he doesn't really seem too annoyed by the Feds' complete and utter inability to do anything. Instead he just introduces his apprentice and has him track the Jedi down.
I have problems with Darth Maul, mostly because while he is a very cool-looking and menacing enemy that actually does threaten our heroes, he has one line of dialogue and gets pretty unceremoniously disposed of at the end. He could have been an excellent recurring enemy throughout the prequels, but no, he gets dropped like a bad habit.
His role is to be this movie's villain because the actual villain that has any important role in the saga's development (that is, Sidious) just sits in the background and yells at people. It's shitty.
R2D2
R2D2 is responsible for repairing the ship while it's being shot at and saves our heroes' lives.
But he's a robot. So why the fuck is he being commended by the Queen? He's a ROBOT. What a stupid scene.
You Fail Biology Forever
Again, I'm not a scientist and I am not going to pretend like I know everything about what kind of creature Jar-Jar is, but he looks like an amphibian to me. He lives an amphibian lifestyle. His city is underwater, he can swim with ease, he spends his above-water time in a swamp. He's an amphibian by all but name, for sure.
So how the fuck does he not, like, melt in the arid Tatooine desert? There's hardly any moisture on the planet. There are moisture farmers that exist just to collect water for Tatooine people. There is no way Uncle Remus here could possibly survive for more than about 10 minutes out here.
Also,
You think you fuckers parked the ship far enough away from the city? Holy smokes.
Anakin Skywalker
sucks.
One could write an entire novel about how badly Lucas dropped the ball when it comes to Anakin's characterization, but I'll try to keep it brief.
In the original trilogy, Darth Vader was the meanest son of a bitch ever, and even when it turned out that the Emperor was pulling the strings, Vader was still the supreme badass of the galaxy ready to take the Emperor down. He was a fierce warrior that, before his fall to the Dark Side, was noble and beloved by Obi-Wan and probably his other contemporaries. This kid should be pretty much made of charisma and talent.
But no. He's just an ordinary 9-year-old kid that no one wants to be around because he's an irritating brat. Oh, except for the fact that he's good at everything. But whatever.
The interesting inconsistency here is that in this movie, the script makes it very clear that Anakin is of the purest heart. He wants to save his mom and the other slaves from slavery, he wants to explore and visit the galaxy. He's willing to devote everything to save Qui-Gon and his cadre from his troubles, despite the fact that Qui-Gon flatly tells Anakin that he's not there to save him and intends not to. Anakin is a good person.
So what the fuck turned him into the bitchy little weenie in Episodes 2 and 3?
Well, whatever, we'll get to that later. For now, we just have the most awkward conversation ever when young Anakin asks Padme if she's an angel. It's the humble beginning to what is the worst and least convincing romance possible.
The Hyperdrive
So the ship's hyperdrive is damaged and they're here to buy a new one or fix the one they've got. The premise here, and the scenes that result from this conflict, are so contrived and ridiculous that it's obvious this "conflict" was only established to get the little punk kid on board.
Here are a few of the many, many ridiculous hardships Qui-Gon and his cadre face:
On Tatooine, Republic money is worthless. Uh, why? They might not be a part of the Republic, sure, but why isn't there an exchange service? Considering the primary export of Tatooine is... uh, nothing, one would imagine Tatooine would desperately want foreign business. And it's not like Tatooine is a barter-based economy, because they have money -- Anakin gets his winnings from the podrace in cash. So why the fuck won't Watto take the money? You would think all that cash would be enough to get Watto off that little shithole planet and let him live comfortably for the rest of his life.
There is really only one part for one hyperdrive that will work on all of Tatooine? There isn't any sort of standard for production to prevent exactly this from happening? I understand that some engines are different from others, but come on, this is really far-fetched.
Why didn't Qui-Gon and company just charter a flight out of Tatooine? Fuck the little Naboo ship, it's broken, it doesn't work. For freighter pilots and visitors, Republic money would be of value, considering everywhere else in the galaxy will accept it.
Did Qui-Gon really just abandon Obi-Wan, Amidala, and everyone else on the ship for like three days while he goes through all this bullshit?
Mom
So a sandstorm comes up, and Anakin invites Qui-Gon and team over to his mom's house to wait it out.
I'm just going to lift a quote directly from the Rifftrax version.
Anakin: "These are my friends, mom."
Mike Nelson: "I found them on the street."
Sidious and Maul
There's a brief cutaway to a discussion between Darths Sidious and Maul on Coruscant.
My question is, why? Nothing -- NOTHING -- is established here. Maul says he tracked the Jedi to Tatooine -- a revelation that doesn't merit its own scene -- and says something about "at last we will have our revenge." But revenge for what? This is the kind of scene that would be a fabulous bit of characterization and motivation for both Sidious and Maul if, you know, Maul didn't get killed at the end of the movie.
And if Maul said anything else, ever.
Dinner
So there's a dialogue scene between Qui-Gon's cadre and the Skywalkers that goes on for like five minutes. It's used mostly to characterize Anakin and to set up for the lame podracing scene a little bit later.
This is an action movie, right? The fuck is this scene for? It suffers from the problem I mentioned earlier about dialogue in this movie: characters just sit there and say things. There's not much emotion in their voices, but more than that there is no emotion in their actions or body language. It's like if my history teacher rattled off the script.
Yeah, there is a need to establish the fact that Anakin is the noblest kid to ever exist, and that's what this scene does, but it could be handled much more elegantly than this. Or it could not be handled at all considering how much of a selfish shit Anakin turns out to be just a few years later.
Bullshit
Virgin birth.
Virgin fucking birth. Lucas actually had the balls to compare Anakin Skywalker to Jesus Fucking Christ.
Where do you even GO with that?! Like... it's so stupefying. Why would you, as a writer and director, ever drag that in? Besides being one of the biggest cliches of all time, there is no good reason to suggest that Anakin was conceived by the midichlorians. Oh. My. Fuck.
Pre-Race Foreshadowing
Because Lucas isn't done farming every lame story cliche yet, now we have to put up with the underdog kid OVERCOMING ALL ODDS and saving the day at the stupid shitty podrace. Even the setup is from a formula we've seen a hundred times before: the kid is building his own racer that no one thinks will even work; everyone he knows is betting on his rival, the obviously-villainous champion; and Anakin has yet to win or even finish a race to this point. So of course he's going to win today. We don't even need to watch the race to know that.
It's a fucking sports movie repackaged into Star Wars.
Midichlorians
Qui-Gon busts out another impossibly specific machine that just happens to be useful: a blood-testing machine that can transmit results by radio.
Anyway, we're now introduced to the midichlorians. We don't know what they are, only that Anakin has so many it's ridiculous. Many fans were completely outraged by the invention of the midichlorian, and it's fair to see why: it's IDIOTIC. It adds a stupid science bent to what was essentially magic.
Cheating
Here's something I don't get about Qui-Gon.
He's trying to finagle the freedom of the Skywalkers, and Watto wants to put it to the roll of the dice. Qui-Gon uses the force to cheat the roll for his own ends.
What a prick. What sort of standards do the Jedi uphold, exactly? Why doesn't Qui-Gon use the Force to help Anakin in the podrace?
And it goes further. He tries to use the Force to essentially swindle Watto out of the hyperdrive parts by convincing him to take the Republic money, even though it's worthless. It might as well have been theft. So what's the difference between that and just outright saying "gimme the goddamned parts you floating ethnic stereotype before I julienne you"
It's actually an interesting level of characterization to Qui-Gon -- that is, he's not really that good of a person -- but Lucas doesn't let him actually be an anti-hero, so every time he tries to do something underhanded like that it just seems kind of dickish.
Ok so that's enough for now, we'll pick it up with the dumb podrace next.