Retro Cheese Round-Up

The past couple of weeks I’ve been in the mood for cheese, and so I’ve been watching (or rewatching) bad 80s movies to see if they’re still bad. Spoiler alert: They are.

Heartbeeps (1981)

I actually saw this movie in the theater. I loved it at the time, but I was 8, and I loved anything with a robot in it. I do remember my parents said the movie was stupid. This week’s viewing was my first time seeing it since 1981, and… wow, what a pointless movie. Seriously, I probably could have written a better script myself, when I was 8. The whole thing feels like an excuse to show off the makeup effects, which admittedly weren’t bad for the time.

A trio of defective robots escapes from a warehouse. Well, I say “escape”, but they don’t really know they’re on the run. One of them mistakenly thinks it’s programmed to gather data about nature, and the other two have nothing better to do. Along the way they build a baby robot that’s supposed to be cute, except this was four years after Star Wars and we’d already seen cuter robots. In order for there to be some conflict, a crimefighting murderbot also malfunctions and escapes to hunt them down. Convenient!

Anyway, the script feels more like an outline than a finished story. It feels like it has placeholder lines and jokes, just waiting for the actual writers to come in and finish the job. If this movie were software, I’d think that this was the alpha build, and it was released early to hit the shelves before Christmas. Nothing specific is missing from the story - it has a definite beginning, middle, and end, it’s just that every single aspect feels unfinished.

It’s also a waste of a great cast. Don’t waste your time on this one, it’s not even worth watching to make fun of. Rewatch Short Circuit (1986) instead. Parts of it haven’t aged well (like Fisher Stevens in brownface), but overall it has a lot more charm.

Ice Pirates (1984)

This is one of those I only half remembered from when I was a kid. Did I even actually even see it, or am I just remembering the trailers? But some of the bits I remembered were too long for a trailer. All I can say is that when I rewatched it, I only got déjà vu in the first half. I’m thinking maybe I fell asleep halfway through, or my parents made me leave the theater.

Anyway, Ice Pirates makes Flash Gordon look like 2001: A Space Odyssey. The script is full of vaguely dirty jokes that don’t really land, and none of the characters really made much of an impact. Some jokes are worth a chuckle, but the funniest bits feel like they were stolen from other movies.

It’s one of those movies that feels like things just sort of happen because they happen. The heroes (if you want to call them that) just sort of “right place at the right time” their way through the plot, then there’s a gimmicky climax, and a sort of abrupt ending. The tone and special effects remind me of Barbarella (1968), which came out 16 years earlier and somehow aged better.

Anyway, even if you have fond memories of seeing this as a child, it’s probably not as good as you remember.

Krull (1983)

I did not see Krull as a kid. I wanted to, but I missed it. I played the arcade game, and I really liked that cool “glaive” weapon. Of the three movies in this blog, Krull is undoubtedly the best, but that’s not saying a whole lot, is it? It’s hard to explain why, but to me, Krull feels like it would have actually been better with a smaller budget. Not that the special effects are good, they’re pretty bad. It came out the same year as Return of the Jedi, but somehow Krull looks ten years older.

Wild tangent – comparing all these movies to the Star Wars films that came out around the same time, just makes me realize how much love certain filmmakers put into their movies. Krull had a budget of $27-30 million, and Return of the Jedi had a budget of $32-47 million. Not a huge difference in budget, but the special effects are as different as night and day. I feel the same way about Jurassic Park and Terminator 2 – they’re all films that look ten years newer than they were, when you compare them to other movies that came out the same year. Sure, they had bigger budgets, but a lot of it’s about the amount of elbow grease they put into polishing it.

Anyway, Krull feels like if Hawk the Slayer had a bigger budget. But since that bigger budget was spent on crappy visuals instead of any real polish, the movie suffers greatly.

It’s a bad movie, but this is not a bad review. The movie is actually kind of fun, despite its shortcomings. I like the concept, pitting swords-and-sorcery heroes against a sci-fi villain. It’s almost like a proto-version of Cowboys & Aliens. It might even be a good candidate for a remake. But it’s definitely something you watch to laugh at. If I were in that kind of mood, I’d probably rewatch The Beastmaster instead.

Flash Gordon

I just watched the 1980 version of Flash Gordon for the first time since I was a kid.  I didn't think it would hold up, but I enjoyed every minute of it.  It's cheesy and campy and all-around dumb, but it definitely fits in the "so bad it's good" category.  

I've said it before, but I like bad movies as much as good movies, as long as they aren't boring.  Flash Gordon "fails" in almost every category across the board - bad dialogue, bad acting, bad script, bad science, bad special effects, and so on.  It leans so close to self-parody that I can't decide if it's supposed to be a comedy.  

Special shout-out to BRIAN BLESSED for stealing every scene he's in with his hammy bellowing.  Also, I noticed Rocky Horror's Richard O'Brien was in it, so that's kind of cool.  The soundtrack, while repetitive, is as awesome as ever.

I was amazed at how much I remembered, but I had also forgotten a large amount of it.  I was surprised at how quickly Dale Arden fell for Flash; I had thought their relationship was more of a Han/Leia "snark until they kiss" kind of thing.  Also, not having seen the movie since I was 7, I caught a lot of innuendo I didn't catch before.  

But I remembered most of the important scenes, like Flash sticking his hand in a stump as part of a ritual, the fight to the death on a tilting platform, and the teaser at the end where someone grabs Ming's ring.  

Anyway, if you like having a "bad movie night" now and then, this is an excellent candidate.

Star Wars Anticipation

I just wanted to throw out some thoughts before I see “The Rise of Skywalker” this weekend.

I’m sure I’ve told this story before on this blog, but I’m using it to drive home a different point this time.  In 2005 I attended the “Star Wars Celebration III” convention in Indianapolis.  George Lucas was there for a special interview and Q&A session, but we weren’t planning to see it.  Not that we didn’t want to, it’s just that we didn’t want to try to compete with the more hardcore fans.  See, the line to see Lucas started the day before the convention.  Hundreds of fans stayed up overnight, standing outside in the freezing rain, just to make sure they got seats for the show.  We weren’t that crazy.

The morning of the convention, we got there early, and got in line.  If you’ve never been to the Indiana Convention Center, it’s connected to some of the surrounding buildings by skywalks.  Which means there are multiple ways to get into the building, and we picked the wrong one.  Or, as it turns out, the right one.  We were standing in a crowd of people in one of the skywalks, waiting for the gates to open, when the convention employees started shouting, “This way, people!”  Totally confused, we were herded like cattle through the skywalk, into the upper floor of the convention center, and into an auditorium. 

When we realized that this was the auditorium for the Lucas interview, we were just giddy.  We hadn’t even bought our tickets yet.  We could have walked in from the street, with no intention of going to the convention, and seen George Lucas for free.  It was amazing.

The interview with Lucas was interesting, but I don’t remember much about it.  I remember more about the Q&A afterward.  It was just a few weeks before “Revenge of the Sith” came out, so lots of people asked questions about it.  There was this one kid who rather boldly asked if Episode III was going to be exciting like Episode II, or if it was going to be boring like Episode I.  Actually, I think the phrase he used was “in depth”, but the rest of the audience let out a sort of gasp/groan that indicated they knew exactly what the kid was really trying to ask.  Basically, was Episode III going to be as bad as Episode I?

Lucas took it in stride, and he said something I’ll never forget.  He said that for years, he’d always imagined that it would take three movies to tell Darth Vader’s origin story.  But when he finally sat down and started planning out the prequels, he realized that the story would only take two movies.  So he decided to make Episode I more of a bonus story, a nice way to introduce audiences to Anakin as a child, and give some background to the universe.  So there you have it, straight from George’s mouth – Episode I is basically just filler. 

But here’s the thing… At least he did sit down to plan them in advance.  Because that’s how you do a trilogy.  Before you start writing the first script, you outline all the major events of the trilogy, so you don’t set anything up you can’t resolve later.  Say what you will about George Lucas, but at least he planned ahead.

I actually enjoyed The Last Jedi.  I loved the visuals, and it had some great moments.  But my biggest complaint was that it just didn’t feel epic.  It felt like a mid-season filler episode from a Star Wars TV series, rather than part of a movie trilogy.  I kept wondering how these events affected the trilogy as a whole.  It just didn’t feel like it moved the trilogy forward.  Even now when people ask me if I liked TLJ, it’s still hard to answer.  Because I’m not even sure how I feel until I see Episode IX.  As a stand-alone Star Wars movie, TLJ is a fun diversion.  As part of a trilogy?  I don’t know…  Surely there’s a point to it?  Surely it was setting up a lot of pins for Episode IX to knock down?

…Except it wasn’t.  So many articles and interviews have since revealed that this trilogy was written one piece at a time.  It’s like that campfire game where you pass the flashlight around, and whoever has the flashlight continues the story where the last person left off.  If you’re going to do that, fine, but don’t call it a trilogy.  That is not how you make a trilogy.  I repeat, THAT IS NOT HOW YOU MAKE A TRILOGY.  You don’t let one director set up challenges for another director to solve.  You don’t casually dismiss plot threads that were carefully set up in the previous movie.  Episodes 7 through 9 are a trilogy in the same way the first three Jurassic Park movies are a trilogy.  Even the Matrix trilogy tells a more cohesive story than the current Star Wars trilogy.

I’ve already read a spoiler-free advance review of The Rise of Skywalker, and it does sound like they managed to wrap things up neatly.  If true, good for them.  But whatever time Rise of Skywalker spends cleaning up TLJ’s messes is time that could have been spent on original content.  I’m going to go into this with an open mind, but I’m still furious that they didn’t plan out the trilogy in advance.

They’re already discussing the next Star Wars trilogy (though I’m sure that depends on how well Episode IX does).  Great.  Good or bad, I’ll take all the Star Wars they want to give me.  I honestly don’t see myself ever giving up on the series.  But please, please, please let them have learned from their mistakes.  Please let them outline this set in advance.  I don’t mind non-numbered Star Wars one-shots, and I hope Disney starts allowing them again.  But numbered Star Wars movies should feel epic.  If you call it a trilogy, please make it a trilogy.

I'm begging you.

(Book) Star Wars: Lost Stars

I love sci-fi, but I'm often annoyed that it's considered a genre rather than a setting.  Whether a sci-fi movie is action, horror or drama, it gets put on the same "Sci Fi" shelf at the video store.  Or it would if there were still video stores.  Genres have been getting more specific in recent years, though.  I've seen bookstores with a section for "teenage paranormal romance", which is pretty specific (if troubling). 

Most Star Wars books I've read were pretty much the same genre, though; a sort of action/adventure/drama blend.  There were a couple of short stories that leaned toward horror, but for the most part Star Wars fiction seems to stick to a formula.  Lost Stars is a first for me, though, as it is primarily a Star Wars romance.  It takes you through the events of the original Star Wars trilogy, but from the perspective of two students at the Imperial Academy. 

The Empire may be evil, but many of the actual Imperials are good people who have been misled about what is best for the universe.  These two students are some of the most noble-hearted characters one can imagine, but they are indoctrinated by the Empire's lies.  Eventually one of them realizes the truth about the Empire, putting them on opposite sides of the war, but still very much in love.  And for the sake of spoilers that's as far as I'll go into the plot.

The characters are fleshed out and believable.  Their rationalizations for following the Empire actually make sense.  If you've ever wondered how evil organizations (both fictional and real) can gain so many followers when they're "clearly" monsters, this book does a good job of showing their point of view.  The Empire tightly controls information, distorts the Rebels' motives, and promises a future where everyone prospers and lives in harmony.  Even when the Empire commits atrocities too big to hide, those actions are explained as being for the greater good.  It's true that the high ranking Imperials are greedy and power mad, but the underlings generally believe that the Empire is a force of good, and that the Rebels are terrorists.  It's so well presented that it makes me worry about my own government.

Being a love story, it's not for everybody.  But don't worry, it's not some shallow Twilight angst-fest, or steamy Harlequin romance.  It's just a decent sci-fi drama that centers on a forbidden relationship.  And it's easily the best Star Wars book I've read.

Random Sci-Fi Thoughts

I have often said, "There is a fundamental difference between a normal person and a sci-fi fan: a normal person actually likes sci-fi".  If I take my mom to see a Star Wars prequel or an odd-numbered Star Trek film, she'll come back saying, "That was a pretty fun space movie."  But if I take a true sci-fi fan - even if it's to a really good movie - for the next few hours I'll be subjected to diatribes about the technical mistakes, followed by rants about how modern science fiction isn't as good as the works of Isaac Asimov or Phillip K. Dick.

There's a reason people like this get ostracized.  It's not because they're smarter than everyone else; there's plenty of popular smart people.  It's because it's just not fun hanging around people who hate everything.  It's a simple rule; when even the nerds want to kick you in the nuts, the problem is you. 

A friend posted this webcomic declaring Star Wars to be fantasy, not sci-fi.  For the most part, I agree. However, he's never going to be able to hold a job at a video store.  To quote his accompanying blog:

Hugo Gernsback, considered by many to be the father of sci-fi (and whose name you can see in, you know, the HUGO Awards) established the criteria a work had to meet to be considered science fiction:

1) The author must know science.
2) The author must be able to play with breakthrough theories and delve into how they would affect society.

So yeah,  I can totally agree there, but it's just a semantic argument.  For one thing, Gernsback actually pushed for the cumbersome term "scientifiction", so clearly he understood science more than marketing.  My personal take?  There's "Science Fiction" and there's "Sci-Fi".  Science fiction" refers to stories that actually speculate about unknown aspects of science, attempt to predict science related things (the future of technology, the biology of alien species, etc), and in general are written by people who know what they are talking about.  Sci-fi refers to stories that happen to take place in space and/or in the future, or deal with futuristic elements like aliens or robots, but that concentrate more on entertaining you than getting their facts right.

Or for a more cynical take:  If they're on a spaceship and it bores you, it's science fiction.  If they're on a spaceship and stuff blows up, it's sci-fi.

There's plenty of room for overlap there.  You can easily be more than one thing.  Star Trek is both science fiction and sci-fi, depending on the episode or the writer.  Star Wars is both fantasy and sci-fi, but rarely really touches science fiction.  Alien is both sci-fi and horror. Aliens is both sci-fi and action. Alien 3 is both sci-fi and garbage.

What bugs me is when people try to shy away from the "sci-fi" stigma. You know, the ones who say, "Don't call my book sci-fi!  Sure, it's set in space and has robots, but it's a love story, dang it!"  Twenty years ago, sure, but today?  Right now there is not a single intelligent person on Earth who doesn't love sci-fi.  Be proud of your work!  Such a tiny percentage of people actually manage to get anything published.  No matter how hard you work, becoming a well-known author or director is still like winning the lottery.  You just sound whiny when your work doesn't get reviewed and categorized exactly the way you wanted.

I do think it's weird that the Sci-Fi channel didn't seem to mind the stigma back when it was considered nerdy, but then changed their name to SyFy after sci-fi became mainstream.  That might not be why they actually changed it, but I still think it's a funny observation.

So anyway, you can rationalize all you want about how Star Wars is technically not science fiction, and I probably won't disagree with your points. But you have to admit when you're browsing Netflix and want to watch Star Wars, you're going to head for the sci-fi section.

Do Transporters Kill You And Copy You?

Every once in a while, I come across a website that talks about the way Star Trek (and some other misc sci-fi) transporters work. They often conclude that transporters actually work by disintegrating you, then making an exact copy at the destination. Which of course brings up a thousand other questions. If it were so easy to copy a person, why would people have to die at all? Why not just backup all your crew members every day like you do with any other data? Even disease, lost limbs, etc, could be cured through transporter use. Why kill the original crew member? Why not just send down a copy, have him complete the mission, then disintegrate him, without ever disintegrating the original on the ship?

Here's my opinion. Mind you, this explanation is silly and unscientific, but no more so than most Star Trek technology. Basically, in the Star Trek universe, they have discovered how to convert matter into energy and vice versa. The reason they aren't killing you is because it's the same energy particles being converted back into matter. So first the transporter changes you into energy particles, atom by atom. Then those particles are shot to another location (much like a phaser shoots a beam of energy), then those same particles are converted back into matter, atom by atom. If someone simply recorded your transporter pattern and made another you using any old energy, that would be a copy. But since it's the same particles being temporarily transformed from one state to another and back, it's still you.

This is supported a little bit by the fact that you can't beam through shields. You can still send data through shields; enemy ships often communicate with each other. If a transporter pattern were just normal data, you could send it to the other ship just like you send a communication signal. You can't shoot phasers through shields either. So, maybe transporters work more like phasers than communicators, in that they fire energy rather than just data.

In a few episodes, the crew members mention experiences they've had during transport. There was an early TNG episode where they did a "near-warp tranpsort", and a crew member mentioned feeling like they were in a nearby wall for a second. A much later episode had Barclay wrestling with monsters in the transporter stream. While these are some of the sillier examples of the way the writers have abused the technology, they do support the idea that the energy particles themselves are still alive and retain some aspect of the matter converted.

Also, they often beam straight to a remote location (rather than another transporter pad). To me, this means that when they start the conversion process, the conversion back is inevitable. Meaning, your body is turned into energy particles that are only meant to stay energy particles for a few seconds before they turn back. So it is your actual pattern being sent across space, not just data waiting to be reconverted from random energy particles at the destination.

Admittedly, one thing that doesn't fit is Thomas Riker. If they'd established that one was "real" and one was a copy, I'd be fine. But they seem to imply that both are 100% Riker. When they boosted the signal that split his pattern, they were adding non-Riker particles to the Riker particles, which means that either one is made from pure non-Riker energy, or each of them is now only x% Riker. Though perhaps, every time someone is transported, a few atoms are lost and replaced with those from random energy. But since your body replaces cells all the time anyway, it's no big loss. So right after the accident, both Rikers were only 50% Riker (more or less) for a while. But ever since then their bodies have been replacing their own skin cells, so the now each of them is closer to being 100% real.

Again, I admit this is all Insane Troll Logic. But to me it makes more sense than the Federation routinely using a system that involves killing people and copying them.

Star Trek Origins: Enterprise

(a.k.a. Lens Flare: The Motion Picture)

This weekend KJ and I saw Star Trek, and we both loved it.

As much as I love nearly all versions of Star Trek, I agree with J. J. Abrams that it was greatly in need of a reboot. But given the nature of Star Trek fans, I was afraid that such an endeavor would be doomed to failure. No, not because it was an odd-numbered Star Trek film (besides, this is zero, not eleven). It's just that sci-fi fanboys love to hate things... I've often said that the difference between a sci-fi fan and a regular person is that the regular person enjoys sci-fi.

The worst is that continuity-obsessed Trekkies insist on incorporating the silliness of the 60's series with the more modern productions. Look, nothing against the original series. It was ground-breaking and ahead of its time. But for me, Star Trek started with Next Gen. When the last TV series, "Enterprise" hit the air, gazillions of fans were livid, because they felt it screwed up the original series continuity. They were wrong, of course, for three reasons:

1. The show made great efforts to explain continuity. Especially in the final season, where they even explained the Klingon head-bumps thing.

2. The Original Series, revolutionary though it was, was full of continuity errors of its own. Not their fault, they just didn't know it was going to take off, so they didn't bother keeping track of everything. But in any event, I prefer to think of the OS as a retelling of events, like a holodeck recreation based on the captain's logs, rather than a perfect video of the story.

3. Enterprise takes place first, so anything it says takes precedence over the original series. It's also 1000 times better, so again it takes precedence over the original series. So if there's any continuity discrepencies between the two, Enterprise automatically wins, and the OS can suck it. My blog, my logic, so there.

I loved Enterprise (well, except for the Xindi season), so it pisses me off to no end that people who consider themselves Trekkies wouldn't even give it a chance. I feel a bit vindicated by the fact that there's an Enterprise reference in the new movie.

So some people will hate the new Star Trek movie no matter what, but I think it will please everyone who is actually capable of being pleased. I'll try to say this without spoilers, but they managed to both break continuity while maintaining continuity, in a way that should please both newcomers and life-long Trekkers. KJ, who knows the Original Series much better than I do, spent the first half of the movie counting the "mistakes" where it didn't agree with the 60's. But thanks to a bit of time-travel and its butterfly effect, every difference is explainable. At the end - okay, I can't avoid spoilers - it's a given that the entire TV series would have been affected in subtle ways... I can't wait to re-watch the DVDs and see if anything's changed. ;)

The casting is spot-on. My favorite was Simon Pegg as Scotty, though I wish he'd had more screen time.

Well, there was a bit of unevenness, IMO, in that some of the players seemed to be trying new takes on their characters, while others were trying to emulate the originals as much as possible, almost to the point of parody. For example, McCoy sometimes seemed like the actor was doing a comedic impression of the original character, while Sulu didn't even attempt to lower his voice. There were a few times when it felt like a bunch of fans playing dress-up for a convention, but most of the time I was able to lose myself in the movie.

I was afraid Kirk would be written as a total badass, someone who can accomplish anything just because he's the goddamn Kirk. But while he does have the "Never give up, never surrender" attitude parodied in Galaxy Quest, he actually gets his ass kicked in most of his fights.

This movie is a bit less family-friendly than previous Treks, but it was time. The squeaky-clean attitude was holding them back, and keeping them from being able to compete with stuff like Battlestar Galactica. To be honest, I've always preferred optimistic futures (like Star Trek) to pessimistic (post-apocalyptic, etc) sci-fi. Mainly because I like to believe that while humankind will always have conflict, overall things will get better and better. Otherwise, what's the point? Shows like the new Battlestar just depress me. But even so, Trek has usually been a little too clean. I think the new movie represents the best balance so far.

I really hope this takes off, and gets lots of sequels. I wish the movie was the pilot for a new TV series, which rewrites the original continuity. But I seriously doubt that's a possibility. Oh well, I'll take this new Trek however I can get it.

Abrams buffs: In addition to the standard Slusho reference, there's also a creature that, while not exactly like the Cloverfield monster, at least looks like it belongs in the same universe. And a question... I've never watched Lost. Is Abrams always so obsessed with lensflare? Every computer, every star, anything with light, makes bright streaks across most of the movie. It's pretty, but it gets a bit distracting after a while.

The Obligatory Star Wars Blog

I figured that if I didn't post at least one "Star Wars"-related blog, they'd revoke my geek license. For the past couple of weeks, KJ and I have been re-watching the Star Wars movies. Even though we didn't make it a one-day marathon, it's still the first time we'd watched the entire series in sequential order. And we hadn't seen any Star Wars movies since Episode III was still in the theaters, well over a year ago. To non-Starwoids, this might not seem like that long a time. But to people like us, going that long without Star Wars is blasphemy.

When each Prequel hit the theater, many die-hard Star Wars fans felt betrayed and angry. Lucas didn't write it exactly the way some fans would have. Lucas left out things that some fans wanted to see. Whine whine whine, gripe gripe gripe. Some fans were so pissed off at Episode I, that they only saw Episode II twice on opening day. It's quite funny to see someone spend all day standing in line, waiting to be the first person to buy a ticket for Episode III, and seeing him pass the time by complaining about how badly Episode II sucked.

I had complaints too, but the damage has been done, and time heals all wounds. This time I was able to watch the Prequel trilogy with fresh eyes, and see them for what they were, not what they weren't. I was able to look at them more objectively, both as Star Wars movies, and as ordinary Sci-Fi/Fantasy movies.

And I've got to say, the Prequels have been judged way too harshly. Just like the original trilogy, the prequels are fun, pretty, imaginative, and action-filled. They aren't serious movies, and they should not be judged as such. The classic trilogy wasn't serious either; it was the rabid fans who made Star Wars out to be more than it really was. Lucas set out to make an homage to the old, campy serials. It was the fans who tried to turn that into serious sci-fi.

It's hard not to take them seriously. Most of us geeks have been watching the original trilogy over and over since we were younglings. Movies like that become a part of you. Not in the trite "I laughed, I cried, it became a part of me" sense, but I mean, movies like that help form and shape your mind. Questioning the perfection of Star Wars is like questioning other aspects of your personality. Do I really enjoy video games? Yes. Do I really like denim jackets? Yes. Did Han shoot Greedo first? Yes.

And that's why we're so resistent to change. Fans have seen Greedo get shot so many times, that the scene has gelled in their heads. It's simply fact now. They're as sure of it as they're sure of gravity, Abraham Lincoln, and microwave burritos. So when George came along with the "Special Editions" that changed facts around a little, it broke many a fan's basic understanding of the universe. But it was good that George did that, because it softened the blow for the Prequels.

When the first Star Wars movie came out in 1977, it was groundbreaking; there just wasn't anything like at the time. It paved the way for mass-market space fantasy. So when "Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace" was released in 1999, fans were ready for the Second Coming of Christ. Would Lucas be able to do it again? Expectations were impossible to live up to, which made the disappointment all the worse. Yeah, Jar Jar was annoying. So? He wasn't the movie, he was the comic relief. If you don't like it, then don't laugh. And sure, Jake Lloyd couldn't act. Got news for ya, most kids his age can't act. Sure there's exceptions (Osmet, Fanning, and those lifelike robots they build for those Welch's commercials), but for the most part, you have to judge kids on a different scale.

You can complain all day about midichlorians, but there's really no reason to. The fact that Lucas rationalized a way to gauge how force-sensitive a Jedi is, in no way lessens the mystical coolness of the Force itself. Really, the worst sin committed by Episode I is that it's a bit boring. With only a couple of really great action scenes, it just doesn't stand up to repeated viewings. No, wait, the worst sin committed by Episode I is that it has a fart joke. I could have done without that.

You know how when you really expect something to be bad, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy? I personally believe that by the time "Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones" hit the theaters, Star Wars fans had already decided that the Prequels were going to suck. That's the only explanation I can come up with. Just like Phantom Menace, I saw it on opening night, and the crowd loved every minute of it. When the final credits rolled, I said, "Thank God, that'll satisfy the critics. Lucas has made up for the first one."

So naturally I was floored when I started visiting Star Wars message boards, and found out that this one was just as unpopular. I could understand the flaws they'd found in Episode I, but this time I knew George had a hit. Which is not to say I don't see the flaws, I just don't think the bad outweighed the good this time.

Okay, fine, Hayden isn't a very good actor. What's worse, he tends to drag down the performances of those around him. Natalie Portman isn't bad, but her scenes with Hayden make her look brain-dead. The love story isn't very well-written, which was a great disappointment to those hoping for another Han/Leia dynamic. And oh, this time the comic relief consists of bad C3P0 puns - not nearly as painful as watching Jar Jar bump into things, in my opinion.

So yeah, there is some stuff to dislike, but where else are you going to see an army of lightsaber-swinging Jedi battle insect people and space robots? And if that sounds cheesy to you, let me remind you that the title of the movie is "Attack of the Clones"... Shakespeare enthusiasts look elsewhere. It's still a delight watching Palpatine play two armies against each other for his own political gain, and watching Yoda kick ass is just plain fun.

Now, "Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith" was exceptionally good. Almost "Classic Trilogy" good, and that's really saying something. Yeah, Hayden still can't act, but we're used to it by this point. And even Palpatine chews up the scenery a little bit, in the scenes right after his face gets melted. That disappointed me - up until that point, he had been the best actor in the trilogy. But for a few minutes in Episode III, he reminds me of the type of villain you'd see in a "Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers" episode. And why did Lucas feel the need to melt Palpatine's face in the first place? I'd always assumed his face got that way through years of channelling the evil of the Dark Side. I really didn't need this explanation.

But a few gripes do not destroy a movie. As much as there was to dislike, there was a lot more to love. And yet, I've still seen a lot of websites that flat-out say, "The Prequels were stupid." Now, let's be serious here. The prequels are very different from each other, and yet share a lot of similarities with the Classic Trilogy. If you can honestly tell me that you hate all three Prequels, but love all three of the Classic Trilogy, then I've got some sad news for you. You don't really like Star Wars at all, and every bit of passion you think you have for the Classic Trilogy, is really just nostalgia. Or maybe it's the other way around, and every bit of hatred you have for the Prequels is just pettyness.

If you had never seen any of the Star Wars movies in your life, then you decided to watch all six in a row right now, I seriously doubt you'd come back saying, "I hated 1-3, but loved 4-6." You might like four of them, or two of them, or one Prequel and two Classics, or some other odd combination. But those of you who think that the Classics are God, and the Prequels are manure - you're just fooling yourselves. My advice? Do what we did. Spend a year or two without Star Wars, then watch all six in a row. Then maybe, just maybe, you'll be able to figure out how you really feel.

Btw, the same goes for those of you who hate the "Special Editions" of 4-6. Yeah, sure, George screwed up your childhood memories a litte. But if you'd just get past that, you'd realize that they really are superior versions of the movies. You can argue all day about whether Han shot Greedo first, but you'd be missing the point. Those are tiny details of an epic legend, the kind of things that change each time the story is retold. The beauty of the Special Edition DVDs is that they look like the Prequel trilogy.

I specify "DVDs" because the Special Editions are much improved now from when they were released in the theaters in the late 90s. In fact, when I saw the Special Editions in the theaters, as much as I liked them, even I thought they were sort of gimmicky, and the new stuff stood out too much from the old stuff. Not so much with the DVD releases. Every frame is bright and colorful, (nearly) every special effect is realistic. When you watch all six in a row, it's much harder to distinguish the older ones from the newer, giving the entire series a uniform look.

The Prequels and Special Editions disappointed a lot of people, but what's done is done. If you let yourself forget the quibbles, and stop obsessing over how you thought the movies should have been written, then you'll find that it's a fun set of movies. I remember after Episode I came out, I saw an online petition where people were trying to get George Lucas not to direct the other two. In fact, fans were trying to get Peter Jackson to direct II and III. Now, I love the "Lord of the Rings" movies nearly as much as Star Wars. But this is the same LOTR Trilogy in which Samwise excretes the line, "I can't carry it for you... but I... can carry... you!" Clearly one of the cheesiest scenes in cinema history, but we love it anyway. Why? Because at that point, we're so sucked into the movie, that cheesiness whizzes right over our heads. Star Wars is no different. If you let yourself get sucked in, you'll have a great time.