REVIEW #31 Star Wars Episode 1, 2 and 3 (1999-2005)

This review is on the prequel Trilogy which consists of Star Wars: The Phantom Menace, Star Wars: Attack of the Clones and Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith. This trilogy follows Anakin Skywalker and his journey from a young boy found on Tatooine to eventually becoming the Sith Lord Darth Vader. We also see his mentor ship under Obi-Wan Kenobi and relationship with Padmé. 

CAST & THE ACTING (7.5/10)

I actually think the casting of these characters was great, Hayden Christensen was fantastic at playing a conflicted Anakin Skywalker and Ewan McGregor as Obi-Wan fit perfectly. There were other big names cast throughout the 3 films such as Liam Neeson as Qui-Gon, Samuel L Jackson as Mace Windu, Natalie Portman as Padmé and Christopher Lee as Count Dooku. The reason I haven’t given a higher score here is because I think at times the acting was a little cringeworthy but I believe that was probably down to the screenplay and writing rather then the acting itself. However combined with a great cast I think an 7.5 is fair.

PLOT & THE STORYLINE (8/10)

The storyline was obviously to show the transition from Anakin to Darth Vader and that I love. It was also nice to see a lot more Jedi knights, the lightsaber battles are great, especially that final battle between Anakin and Obi-Wan on Mustafar! I think this plot is actually better then the other Star Wars trilogies, for one reason... The others seem to just always come back to blowing up the latest edition of the Death Star which is so overused and here we actually see a lot of depth in the storyline beyond just aiming to blow something up! However ultimately, as I mentioned earlier, these set of films were let down by the cringey screenplay so I can only give as high as an 8 here.

CINEMATOGRAPHY & SPECIAL EFFECTS (8.3/10)

Right hear me out, watching this trilogy back now I think we can all agree the CGI and special effects were pretty poor. At times it looked more like a cartoon then a film, however I have considered that episode one was released in 1999! So this heavily CGI based film was actually ahead of its time so I do think that the score here is fair. I must say I do prefer the old school effects in the original trilogy more but I have tried to not let that effect this score. The cinematography as a whole was pretty good, capturing some nice shots but it’s the special effects that are the main talking point here.

OVERALL (7.9/10)

Look the prequel trilogy has received a lot of hate over the years but it was this set of Star Wars films I grew up on, it came out when I was just one years old so I have a sense of nostalgia when I watch these films. Considering the great cast, some of the acting was questionable but the screenplay I believe let down these actors because it had a lot of cringeworthy moments in the three films. The plot I believe had more depth then the other Star Wars trilogies, as I mentioned above it wasn’t just based on trying to blow up the latest edition of the Death Star which was refreshing! However they aren’t the best out of all the Star Wars films so I believe a score of 7.9 is justifiable.

Thanks for reading, leave a comment and let me know your opinions of this trilogy!

Callan