so this really wasn't a review at all...just commentary on fan rage. I at least wanted to hear about how the 3D added nothing to it as i had expected =/ this should have just been saved for a big picture episode.
Escape to the Movies: The Phantom Menace 13 Years Later
- Thread starter MovieBob
- Start date
I think we can all now agree that this one isn't THAT bad, just kind of stupid.MovieBob said:
Now we can all argue which of the Star Wars films is the worst one now with our fresh perspective.
Actually, I liked Episode 2 more than Episode 1, but Ep1 wasn't terrible. I still watch the Saber fight every now and then, but that's about it. Like the same way I watch 1000 Agent Smiths gang up on Neo before he runs away, and then turn the movie off.
Episode 3 was by far the worst though, and it had the most action out of all of them. That's really saying something for story and acting.
Episode 3 was by far the worst though, and it had the most action out of all of them. That's really saying something for story and acting.
I personally liked the part where he put another plug in for the Avengers at the end of a 6 minute video essentially talking about something that is in large part reviled simply because it didn't live up to many years worth of hype. If Phantom Menace should be the poster child for anything (other than middling sci fi fare), it should be for getting yourself so hyped up over something that nothing could ever live up to what you want it to be.jovack22 said:
I'm really glad you made this video, and I'll tell you why. The main point of your video seems to be that you should take this movie on its own merits, rather than holding it up to the other movies for comparison because it was never going to live up to our starry-eyed memories or our expectations, and trying to say it's a bad movie because of that is unfair. Exactly the same thing happened when Duke Nukem Forever finally came out: after over a decade of waiting, everyone looked at it expecting it to be the best game ever, and collectively said "...is that it?"MovieBob said:
The problem is that the advice you give to us in this video is exactly the advice that you need to start taking yourself. You hold on far too strongly to source material.
For starters, take a look at your review of Star Trek. You went on and on about how it did the fans a disservice by discarding all source material and attempting to change things in a fundamental way, but if you take your own advice and ignore the pre-existing Star Trek Universe, the reboot is an absolutely fantastic movie: the script is solid, it's visually exciting, it has a unique style, the cinematography is great, the characters are interesting and are all played well by their actors (including Karl Urban practically putting on DeForest Kelly as a suit when he says "Unbelievable"), the score is great... everything about this movie screams "I am a fantastic movie that is well made." But because it doesn't live up to your expectations of what a Star Trek movie should be, you say it was insulting.
Let's look at that, shall we? What are the things they could have done with this movie? They couldn't bring back Shatner, because his Kirk is dead and all the actors involved are way too old to to put those particular shoes on again. The Next Gen movies all ran their course, with Nemesis representing a complete breakdown in scriptwriting and cinematic integrity, so they can't bring that crew back. And after the show Enterprise was a colossal failure as anything remotely representing the Star Trek Universe - especially the slap in the face that was the unnecessary series finale - if they'd tried to stick Archer behind the helm there wouldn't have been an audience. And they certainly couldn't introduce a new crew for, say, the Enterprise E, because you can't do that in the Star Trek franchise without having a series first.
All of that means that the only way they could have made a new Star Trek movie and had it be accepted by the fans is to do what they did: use an in-canon event to reset the Universe in a fundamental way, and show how that event changed the development of the characters in the original Star Trek series. So not only was your review of that movie unfair because it was holding up the new movie to the old ones for comparison, it was also unfair because it criticized the movie for being the only thing it could be and still be accepted by the audience.
Let's look at that, shall we? What are the things they could have done with this movie? They couldn't bring back Shatner, because his Kirk is dead and all the actors involved are way too old to to put those particular shoes on again. The Next Gen movies all ran their course, with Nemesis representing a complete breakdown in scriptwriting and cinematic integrity, so they can't bring that crew back. And after the show Enterprise was a colossal failure as anything remotely representing the Star Trek Universe - especially the slap in the face that was the unnecessary series finale - if they'd tried to stick Archer behind the helm there wouldn't have been an audience. And they certainly couldn't introduce a new crew for, say, the Enterprise E, because you can't do that in the Star Trek franchise without having a series first.
All of that means that the only way they could have made a new Star Trek movie and had it be accepted by the fans is to do what they did: use an in-canon event to reset the Universe in a fundamental way, and show how that event changed the development of the characters in the original Star Trek series. So not only was your review of that movie unfair because it was holding up the new movie to the old ones for comparison, it was also unfair because it criticized the movie for being the only thing it could be and still be accepted by the audience.
It's not just that though: movies based on comic books tend to have a hard time staying loyal to canon because some things just don't translate well from a print media to an actively visual media. Same with books - especially The Road. And even when updating from one movie to another, what literally made audiences jump out of their seats and cheer 20 years ago usually doesn't have any effect on them any more at all, because society has changed, and movies have to keep up with it in order to stay relevant.
Just look at the original House on Haunted Hill - in its day, it was terrifying, but today it's comical. The 1999 Geoffrey Rush remake bore almost no resemblance to the original at all, but for the average movie-goer the year it came out, it was a much better movie (having Famke Janssen and Ali Larter didn't hurt things either). Another remake in today's society would have to be drastically different again in order to keep up with the times. Would that make it a bad "House on Haunted Hill" movie? Absolutely not. Because it doesn't matter whether it holds to the source material, all that matters is that it stands tall on its own two feet.
You are absolutely right that Phantom Menace has to be taken on its own merits. But you also need to start applying those same standards to other movies as you review them.
Cheers to Movie Bob! I think some very excellent points were made here. However, I do believe that more has come of the reaction to the prequels than just bitterness and rage. From searching through all the previous replies I couldn't find anyone that had mentioned this - and if you have any strong opinions on the Star Wars movies, it's worth dropping a few bucks to see:
http://www.youtube.com/movie?v=T-8O0Y76rrI&feature=mv_sr
(trailer here)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aoc3roT81nU
The point being - what Lucas has done in his professional career raises some worthy questions about ownership of something that is so fundamental to popular culture.
http://www.youtube.com/movie?v=T-8O0Y76rrI&feature=mv_sr
(trailer here)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aoc3roT81nU
The point being - what Lucas has done in his professional career raises some worthy questions about ownership of something that is so fundamental to popular culture.
I tell you what, though. I won't be happy until star wars goes away completely. Cook up whatever half-baked theory you want about the continuing dislike I may have for the prequels and Return of the Jedi, but I had not been as happy as I was when I heard that Lucas had said he wasn't going to do any more star wars stuff. Good, I thought. That is as it should be.
I agree with this ... I mean yeah, I raved about how bad this movie was for about a week after it came out, and I raved for another week after I heard it was coming out in 3D, but other than that I did basically what I do after seeing any other bad movie: I forgot all about it. It's not hard to do ...
But to be honest, this movie is really bad, imo. Right up there with the Transformers movies and The Expendables and everything. The fact that it has okay visuals is part of why I don't like it so much, because that's the worst kind of bad movie. Because it's just another piece of Hollywood bullshit, I mean at least movies like The Room and Birdemic are interestingly bad, but movies like this that had a bunch of money poured into them specifically to make a profit ... it's not interesting in the least, it's just transparently mechanical, nothing but numbers.
Even so, anyone saying this is the worst movie ever is just wrong. Hell, anyone saying this is the worst Star Wars movie ever ... has obviously never seen the Star Wars Holiday Special ... and I'm probably going to hell just for bringing that one up ... but oh well. The Holiday Special was the only movie ever that was so bad I couldn't finish it. And I watch terrible movies for fun.
But to be honest, this movie is really bad, imo. Right up there with the Transformers movies and The Expendables and everything. The fact that it has okay visuals is part of why I don't like it so much, because that's the worst kind of bad movie. Because it's just another piece of Hollywood bullshit, I mean at least movies like The Room and Birdemic are interestingly bad, but movies like this that had a bunch of money poured into them specifically to make a profit ... it's not interesting in the least, it's just transparently mechanical, nothing but numbers.
Even so, anyone saying this is the worst movie ever is just wrong. Hell, anyone saying this is the worst Star Wars movie ever ... has obviously never seen the Star Wars Holiday Special ... and I'm probably going to hell just for bringing that one up ... but oh well. The Holiday Special was the only movie ever that was so bad I couldn't finish it. And I watch terrible movies for fun.
Phantom Menace came out when I was little.. my movie choices that day were SouthPark the movie.. or phantom menace.. I saw Southpark instead.
Because I hadn't spent 20 years fapping to slave Leigh like most people who love Star Wars, I was relatively indifferent to the who series.. and with that said.. I still mark Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones as some of the worst movies I've ever seen.. right up there with The Last Airbender.
Because I hadn't spent 20 years fapping to slave Leigh like most people who love Star Wars, I was relatively indifferent to the who series.. and with that said.. I still mark Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones as some of the worst movies I've ever seen.. right up there with The Last Airbender.
I think MovieBob's spot on here. Phantom Meneace wasn't any more cataclysmic than we allowed it to be. For my part, I was a kid when it came out. The original Star Wars movies were hands-down my favorites, so I was simply psyched when the first prequel came out. It didn't disappoint me--although I distinctly remember being daunted that it wasn't quite as awesome as the originals--because I didn't expect it to remind time. It was contemporaneous to my enjoyment and idolization of Star Wars rather than subsequent.
With the benefit of hindsight and the odious Episode II I came to decouple the first from my infatuation with the originals, and now I see it only as a not-terribly-good film. However, one thing that I like about the prequels is that much of the visual design, the art, the sound effects, and the soundtrack, were simply excellent. I was so sad when I realized that the awesome designs of the Clone Troopers and their droids opponents and ship designs were forever shackled to the mediocrity of the prequels, but I was uplifted when projects began to come out of them that I could appreciate (e.g., the Clone Wars cartoons, both the Genndy Tartakovsky and 3D versions). Although the movies themselves were ultimately failures, they at least served as wellsprings for better things.
With the benefit of hindsight and the odious Episode II I came to decouple the first from my infatuation with the originals, and now I see it only as a not-terribly-good film. However, one thing that I like about the prequels is that much of the visual design, the art, the sound effects, and the soundtrack, were simply excellent. I was so sad when I realized that the awesome designs of the Clone Troopers and their droids opponents and ship designs were forever shackled to the mediocrity of the prequels, but I was uplifted when projects began to come out of them that I could appreciate (e.g., the Clone Wars cartoons, both the Genndy Tartakovsky and 3D versions). Although the movies themselves were ultimately failures, they at least served as wellsprings for better things.
I think one of the reasons people keep bringing up how very not good the prequals are is because George keeps pulling out more editing bs and changing more of the originals that we love and making them less good. It reminds us of our bitter feelings are refeshes them. I would still buy the prequels. I was waiting for the box set to come out since the announced the prequels, but now I don't know if I want to pay for them because I want the original originals. Stupid special editions.
"Get some distance from it and try to see it with fresh eyes"
How about not seeing it at all? I'm not obsessed with it, nor do I ever really think about the movie, but I don't see any reason to ever watch it again.
It would have been an ok movie if Jar Jar wasn't in it SO MUCH, but with him it reminds me too much of a Barney show or something like that.
Also I'm pretty shocked you said this movie included some of John Williams best work. I found the music in the prequels fairly forgettable compared to the original trilogy, or Indiana Jones, or Jurassic Park. Certainly some of the choir parts were pretty effective, and indeed I can remember them if I try, but some of his best work? Can't agree there.
Anyway, point taken, maybe it's not so bad, but Jar Jar is still something I never want to subject myself to again. He is best used in Robot Chicken spoofs to make fun of himself. "ANNIIIIEEEE! MESA ALL BLUEY AND GLOWY!!!!" lol
PS I really like the image for this on the front page, Darth Maul with 3d glasses haha awesome
How about not seeing it at all? I'm not obsessed with it, nor do I ever really think about the movie, but I don't see any reason to ever watch it again.
It would have been an ok movie if Jar Jar wasn't in it SO MUCH, but with him it reminds me too much of a Barney show or something like that.
Also I'm pretty shocked you said this movie included some of John Williams best work. I found the music in the prequels fairly forgettable compared to the original trilogy, or Indiana Jones, or Jurassic Park. Certainly some of the choir parts were pretty effective, and indeed I can remember them if I try, but some of his best work? Can't agree there.
Anyway, point taken, maybe it's not so bad, but Jar Jar is still something I never want to subject myself to again. He is best used in Robot Chicken spoofs to make fun of himself. "ANNIIIIEEEE! MESA ALL BLUEY AND GLOWY!!!!" lol
PS I really like the image for this on the front page, Darth Maul with 3d glasses haha awesome
The only star wars film That I don't totally hate, only 'cos the big bad looks awesome.
Darth vader looks like batman, which to me isn't a good thing. Darth Maul has a red and black face with horns, that shit looks bad ass ... it goes nicely with the dual bladed red glow stick.
From what I remember he isn't in it much and his fight scene is really short but I am no star wars fan so my memory isn't perfect on the matter.
Darth vader looks like batman, which to me isn't a good thing. Darth Maul has a red and black face with horns, that shit looks bad ass ... it goes nicely with the dual bladed red glow stick.
From what I remember he isn't in it much and his fight scene is really short but I am no star wars fan so my memory isn't perfect on the matter.
You do realize the voice is an act, right? Like he's supposed to be a 119 year old psychopath who murders hookers?NightmareLuna said:I tried too, but just like Jar Jar, I could not stand his fucking voice... oh by spongebob, I could not stand his awful, awful, stereotypical voice.Duffeknol said:I hope even more people watch the Plinkett reviews now thanks to you
I listened to at least 7 minutes, and he made sense... But that could not keep his voice away.
Please do a cover of it, haha. ^^
I really feel bad for you if you're going to miss out on literally the best reviews on the entire internet just because you dislike someone's voice...