Bayouwolf wrote:IMO, had Lucas stuck with that formula and not been hellbent on re-inventing the wheel, the PT would have been better than the OT. The world was hanging on a thread for these movies to come out (Remember that Jake Lloyd poster where his shadow is Vader? That was fucking mass marketing GENIUS!). Instead, we got severely lackluster (but in your face, nonetheless) storytelling, more CGI than you could shake a stick at, and characters that not only did no one care about, but actually hated to the point that it's part was almost completely written out in the last 2 movies...
I definitely know what you're saying. And I feel weird even defending these movies. Honestly, after my 12-year-old self got over "Gee whizness!" of watching Phantom, I truly despised the last two prequels. I think I felt as uncomfortable as anyone watching the cornball hamfisted antics onscreen, but I also really do feel now, after watching them again, that there is a lot of merit in them that I didn't appreciate before. Sure there was a lot of CGI and it didn't look nearly as realistic as it does now (possible blue screen shadows lurking around characters' outlines and what not) but really it was a pretty impressive feat for the time. You could say that George overdid it, let his imagination and his ego run away with him, but once I got over the fact that the prequels were never going to serviceably set up the story we all love, I kind of started to dig the outlandishness of Phantom, Clones, and Sith (I'm declaring a moratorium on acronyms, damn it!)
I used to have a near stroke when my little cousins (who are HUGE star wars fans) told me they preferred the prequels to the originals, but you know what? I kind of respect it a little more. I mean, I still would tell them they have their heads up their asses if I wouldn't get a wicked side eye from my aunts and uncles, but I can see how the Star Wars universe, while somewhat (or entirely) distasteful for those of us who loved the originals first, still had something to love for the younger, stupider generation. And even for the stupid of the older generation, like me.