Full volley. Attaaaaaaaaack!
OFFICIAL REVIEW OF STAR WARS: EPISODE THREE
--by The Part of Austin That's Five Years Old







OFFICIAL REVIEW OF STAR WARS: EPISODE THREE
--by The Part of Austin That's Annoyed by Lousy Dialogue, Ludicrous Plot Holes, Lazy Scripting, and Bad Acting





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I really hope that George adequately reimbursed the eleven-year-old girl who wrote all of Anakin and Padme's dialogue; I'm thinking though that he probably just paid her off with a case of scented glitter pens and Hello Kitty stationery. Here's a representative sample of her work:

Anakin: You are SO beautiful.
Padme: It's only because I'm SO in love.
Anakin: No, it's because I'm SO in love with YOU.
Me: I just SO threw up in my mouth.
Padme: So...does that mean that love has blinded you?
Me: WHO TALKS LIKE THIS?


Don't get me wrong: I'm glad I went, and I had fun.

But...

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Make your own Star Wars Episode!

A three-second establishing shot featuring a ship flying by.
Stupid-ass screenwipe.
Artoo doing deploying yet another swiss army gadget arm.
Stupid-ass screenwipe.
Anakin scowling.
Stupid-ass screenwipe.
Something blowing up.
Lighsabers flashing. Someone loses an arm.
Droids, dinosaurs, clones and a race of things that are furry all fight each other.
Threepio does something gayer than gay.
Stupid-ass screenwipe.
Palpatine hissing.
Stupid-ass screenwipe.

Repeat as necessary until you're embarassingly rich.

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I think we can all agree that if we were an intergalactic senator trying to keep secret her illicit marriage to someone who'd been incommunicado for 6+ months while off fighting in a war, the last thing we'd want to do is contract a raging case of the preggers..right?

Then WHY in the HELL--in a galaxy with sentient robots, interstellar travel, bionic limbs, laser blasters, and jet packs--can't she get some friggin' birth control?

Maybe the Republic was run by Catholics; I'd always thought the name 'Palpatine' seemed oddly papal. And the Imperial Guards DO dress in the traditional cardinal red...

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And how did she not know she was having twins? They can build lightsabers, but not sonograms? Lame.

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...And then there's General Grievous, leader of the droid army.

Oh God, where to begin?

Howsabout with the EMPHYSEMA? Why does the leader of the droid army cough and wheeze like he smokes three packs of cigs a day? Okay, so he's not totally a droid, I get that--although they never bother to explain that little bit (And I don't know why not. A few lines like... "We need to find General Grievous!" "You mean the brilliant strategist from the planet Gargleblargle who had his brain, eyes, heart, and a few other key organs transferred into a robotic exoskeleton and now leads the droid army while making the bold fashion decision to sport a billowy cape?" "Yes. Him." ...would have fit right in with all the other clunky expository dialogue). But come ON. If I was gonna convert 97% of my body tissue into droid parts, I sure as shit wouldn't get sentimental and decide to keep my blackened miner lungs. Jeezus.

And if I DID decide to keep organs that were so totally crap (and so highly flammable, apparently), I'd make DAMN sure that my protective chest cavity was a bit harder to open than a tupperware container. Christ.

Hey! If he has eyes and a heart and stuff, why the hell didn't his heart pop and eyes freeze when he was frolicking in the vaccuum of space? Have these people not invented cellular death yet? On a crutch.

Have I mentioned that he has the posture of Quasimodo's and walks like he's got Palsy?

Maul...Sidius...Grievous. George just keeps getting lazier and lazier with the names, doesn't he? If--God forbid--he does any more projects, I predict the emergence of a Grand Moff Evil Dude. Or Darth Bad.

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For future reference, it'd probably be best for Christopher Lee's characters if he cut and run before the third installment of any more trilogies.

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So we saw that they had the plans for the Death Star by the end of Ep. II, right? And by the end of Ep. III, three years or so later, we see that construction is already well underway, right? So why does it take them OVER TWENTY YEARS to get around to finishing the damn thing? Did the funding get held up in committee? Did they have to use government contracters? It's seems to be spectacularly bad timing to not bother completing it until the Rebellion has formed and gained enough momentum to be a serious threat.

Maybe the Empire was just being sporting; they do seem to be such playful little scamps.

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Re: Mace Windu vs. Palpatine

When lightsabers come into contact with flesh, they cut right through it cleanly. When lightsabers come into contact with METAL, they cut right through it cleanly. So why, when they came into contact with glass, did the glass shatter explosively like someone just bricked it?

Oh that's right--so that someone could get dramatically kicked out of said window. Silly me.

So ridiculously contrived. Oy.

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So a pair of armored battle droids can be totally destroyed in seconds by...fire?
Um...yes.
So they're less durable than a wok?
Um...well...
That's totally retarded.
Uh...er...yeah.

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Why was the forest planet Kashyyyk important enough to warrant Yoda personally leading a battalion of clones to defend it? Did the Republic really need lumber that badly?

I'm thinking it was less about the loyalty of the wookies than it was about the loyalty of the fanboys.

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Yes, there's a scene where Anakin awakens from a nightmare all sweaty and shirtless; you could practically sense the collective dampening of fangirls everywhere. But what disturbed me is the fact that you see his mechanical arm as just metal and circuitry. No attempt to make cover it with anything resembling skin. How creepy is that? If I was Padme, I wouldn't want to be lovingly caressed with what's basically an advanced toaster.

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And speaking of creepy...holy SHIT, the delivery of the babies is seriously disturbing. Babies are delivered by a droid with a cereal scoop? I found that to be far more horrifying than Anakin killing all the Jedi kiddies.

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Dear George,

If there is any gravity on a ship, it must be artificially generated; there is no 'down' in space. Therefore, a ship listing to the side will not result in everything sliding down across the floor.

Suggest reading: ANY PHYSICS BOOK, EVER.

--Austin