Poll: Why do you hate the Star Wars Prequels?

[alrekr]

none of the actors look like they're having fun (with the exception of Ian McDiarmid and occasionally Ewan McGregor). The originals were wonderful because the actors were truly human

You do know that Carrie Fisher (Princess Leia) was snorting cocaine the whole time she was on set filming. Is that your answer to making the prequels more fun? Is it?

YOU WANT MOAR COCAINE DO YOU!

Come to think of it; dopping all the actors might have made the prequels watchable. The only good that came of the prequels was that McGregor's role in Men who stare at goats became far more ironic.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/film-news/8057776/Carrie-Fisher-took-cocaine-on-Star-Wars-set.html

 

[Nouw]

I don't mind Jar Jar Binks. There, I said it!

 

[Assassin Xaero]

When ever there is a worst movies ever thred or movies you wish never exsisted thred or you can unmake X amount of movies thred the Star Wars Prequels are always there. Now I agree completely but nobody ever says why.

For example I hate basicaly every thing about them. I like the lightsaber fights but although they are very quick with lots of flips and twirls they have none of the impact the original lightsaber fights had. This alone is not enough to save them.

The worst things about them are:
1. they ruined Yoda. Yoda was suppost to be so wise and powerful that he was beyond needing a lightsaber but then they go and give him one and it looks stupid.
2. The really, really, really, really bad love story. I was so happy when Anikan went all dark side because it ment I would not have to watch any more bad love story acting.

So what do you think? Have I missed anything out? If you actually liked them explain why?

And about the poll I picked Empire. One of the BEST MOVIES EVER.

Wow, some people need to learn that not everyone thinks the way they do.

First off, I don't hate prequels, they were actually good. Episode III was predictable, but that's obvious since everyone already knew what was going to happen from the original series. Plus half the people that say the prequels suck are just jumping on the bandwagon because they can't for an opinion for themselves.

Episode I was my favorite, and I could care less about the original trilogy. I'll watch them if they are on TV, but besides that I don't care much...

 

[Studs MacKenzie]

I can't really favor any of Episodes IV-VI over one another, but for poll's sake I enjoyed the epic, grand scale of Return of the Jedi. I personally can't see why everyone thinks that Empire Strikes Back is far and away the best, but to each their own.

As for the prequels, I actually really enjoyed Phantom Menace (though Jar Jar could have used some work and the midichlorian thing was unnecessary to explain something that was based purely off faith in the original trilogy). The team Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan was good, the origin of Anakin was adequate, and Darth Maul was a decent Sith... that really could have used a more prominent role (possibly throughout the prequels).

It just went all downhill from Episode I: The overuse of CGI, the atrocious love story, miscast Anakin, shallow character development, nonsensical plot drives...

It is really a shame that the prequels had so much potential, only to be left with us desiring a more serviceable narrative of Anakin's origins. In most cases, I feel Lucas' hit with Star Wars was either merely a fluke or if he's become so egocentric that his shit don't stink.

 

[otakon17]

First, there was Jar-Jar, which in and of itself is a crime.
The tech in the prequels was more advanced than the tech in the original trilogy. I hated how flashy and flippy-twirly the lightsaber battles got, they looked more like gymnastic events than actual fights.
The story and dialogue were god awful, the 'love story' was laughable, and the explanation of the force was fucking idiotic.

What he said. Nailed it on the head with that post. Midichlorians my ass...

 

[PoliceBox63]

To be honest I don't :. I just say I do to be a nerd

 

[Qmonster]

Personal opinions-
Episode 1: All around bad.
Episode 2: Moments of fun superior to Ep. 1, but with stretches of some of the most painful stuff you can see (the romance).
Episode 3: Started dull but ended well, except for emo Vader.

 

[00slash00]

the prequels proved that lucas doesnt understand his own movies. for example: in new hope, obi-one is dressed as a hermit, but in the prequels, all the jedi dress exactly the same way. so essentially kenobi is hiding from the sith by dressing as a jedi?

im also slightly offended that the coolest villain was put in the worst movie. darth maul was so badass. he didnt talk and we knew nothing about him, which made him seem so much more threatening

 

[Amizrael]

Grew up with them, don't hate them, like most of them. Dislike the romance and how quickly Anakin fell. I agree that proliferation of lightsabers (and Jedi) lessens their impact somewhat, but the stark shift in number from III to IV really hammers home how effective the extermination of the Jedi order was. Also the lightsaber duels could have been better but they're more realistic to the description of the weapons in my opinion. After all, the blade wouldn't have any mass. I could go on but I have other things to worry about than other people's disparity of opinion.

 

[Harveypot]

I liked them. I grew up with them rather than 4-6 cos I didn't exist yet. I thought all of the films were good though I haven't seen them for a few years. Also, has anyone read Simon Pegg's autobiography cos in there, he talks about them a lot and says why George Lucas went downhill for most people.

 

[Instinct Blues]

They were literally the most boring movies I have ever seen in my entire life. I expected something at least somewhat entertaining, but all I got was stupid political meetings and lame pod races. Plus the kid who played Anakin was so goddamn annoying I could barely stand him.

 

[Deacon Cole]

The reason for the prequel hate is simple. The Star Wars series was shaping up to be one of the best series in cinematic history, but after two movies, Lucas became the money men he'd tried to avoid by founding his own studio and decided movies didn't need to be good to make money and so the last four Star Wars films have been below the bar. Return of the Jedi fairs marginally well thanks to it's more direct ties to the previous films and the work Gary Kurtz had been doing on the sequel to Empire Strikes Back, which Lucas largely jettisoned, but he'd kept enough that the third movie could not suck completely. All bets were off in the prequels. So they took what was once great and dragged it down to below terrible. If Phantom Menace were the first Star Wars movie made, there would not be a second. Period. This is why people hate the prequels. They took something great and made it awful. And for no good goddamned reason.

 

[Something Amyss]

Episode 3 was by far the worst story-wise, because of how they did Anakin's fall. One moment he's a goody goody who'd sacrifice his life for his friend, the next moment Anakin's trying to kill him. What?

I get the feeling this was mostly done because they shoehorned in a love story into the second prequel. What could have potentially been a developed fall happened pretty quickly. Everything in Revenge seemed rushed.

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

If you were a real fan, you'd know that there never was "A New Hope". That was a later addition

But for the prequels - they're just bad films. They rely purely on the audience's love of CGI for survival. The characters/plot/structure/acting/script/direction/writing/canon/history/pathos/choreography are sub-standard. Taking the prequels purely on their own, you have no knowledge or explanation about the Jedi/Sith or who Yoda and the rest are.

It relies on the SEQUELS to provide the prologue and the epilogue, and even then contradicts both them and itself in the process.

And before anyone jumps in with "It's a children's film, not for adults", your main character slaughters innocent infants while focussing on trade and politics.

The only reason people mark them as their favourite is that they were the first Star Wars films they saw. Child nostalgia if you will.

David Mitchell wrote a valuable column [http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/aug/21/jk-rowling-harry-potter-pottermore] where he compares the prequels to Bree Tanner (Twilight) and Pottermore. What all these things are doing is laying out the thoughts the director/writer had in creating the series. Things they chucked out because they didn't fit. And in putting them back in, they destroy the mystery.

It's like having a Rocky 0 where we see Mickey Goldmill's rise and fall. We don't need it, and it spoils the following film.

 

[DaJoW]

Yoda, Vader and Obi-Wan were ruined. Yoda became as much a soldier as anything else, Vader became angst incarnate and Obi-Wan just seemed inept (plus a lot of his dialogue from IV does not mix with the prequels). The war (singular) named "The Clone Wars" (plural) should not be called that. The name makes no sense. I always thought it was a series of conflicts either between two forces both fighting via clones, or the Republic being repeatedly attacked by an outside force using clones. One war where the protagonists uses clones versus an army of robots being lead by secessionists sounds like it should be called something more along the lines of "Bla-bla War of Secession", "Galactic Civil War", "Republic-Trade Federation War" or something like that. Or, considering the size of the war, "Galactic War 582".

Then you have Jar-Jar, kids, complete lack of coherent plot... the list goes on. Plinkett destroyed the last few bright spots for me by pointing out that it was just shiny crap.

 

[xdiesp]

When The Phantom Menace was released, the Star Wars fandom was in an advanced decadent state not unliked that of Star Trek now (reboot movie aside...): a matter for old geeks, or lovers of campy 70s stuff.

And geeks lovers of 70s stuff we were, since we were kids when Star Wars was released in 77. We went and to this day, I still remember the sinking feeling of desperation when we went out of the cinema. You know that episode of South Park with the kids vomiting at the idea of Lucas raping Indiana Jones? Same damn thing.

We were gasping for any kind of justification to Jar Jar Binks, the midichlorian and the whole absurdity of "kid awesome in space" that was Vader's origin story - Vader, the most threatening villain ever turned into that. It would have been nicer to die on the way to the movies that day.

 

[Fernando Rivera]

three words "jar jar binks"

 

[DAPLR]

three words "jar jar binks"

Three more words, 'For the Win' ^.^

 

[ZeroDotZero]

Politics. The whole political subplot was a huge drag on the action sequences. Clone Wars suffered less from this, which is why it is the best of the prequels.

 

[SamuelT]

I don't hate the prequels. I really like them. I saw the prequel before I saw the original, which I only saw recently, and thought them really cool. They were proper action movies, with really cool lightsabre battles, and even Jar Jar was funny when I saw it at a younger age.

All you old men can take your spite somewhere else you miserable sour lot! /jest