Sabers At The Ready

I found myself embroiled in the un winnable argument yesterday over which movie is actually the best in the Star Wars trilogy. I think the problem here is that I simply can't pick one. Every film is necessary in the context of a trilogy. But each one has it's reasons to be considered the best.

A New Hope

This movie is hands down the most important science fiction movie of all times, but is it the BEST. Well, it is the only one of the trilogy written and directed by George Lucas. My only complaint here is that Luke Skywalker was more of a strong female lead than hero archetype in this film. There are a few moments that make him absolutely slapable in this movie: "But I was going to Toshi Station to pick up some power converters."

But all in all it has more than enough moments to make the argument that this indeed is the best Star Wars movie of all time. There are the Jawas, those little creatures that sell C-3PO and R2-D2 to Luke and his uncle Owen.  (On a side note, Jason Hope is a CEO in Arizona who named his company Jawa, kinda cool.)

Maybe my next post will be about companies with Star Wars-inspired names.

Anyway, back to the topic at hand: Star Wars movies. A New Hope is epic in more ways than you can count.

Empire Strikes Back

I'm not sure if you noticed this, but Darth Vader is shinier in this one. His helmet is buffed to nice gloss and you could probably see yourself in those leather pants. In my book, that ups the bad assitude up a bit. And I like the fact that the whole premise of this movie is Luke and company getting worked by Vader after the whole blowing up the Death Star Thing. Skywalker may have whined more in the first movie, but he had more reason to in Empire.

I like the breaks in the battle scenes here too. During the historic light saber battle when Vader reveals he is indeed Luke's father, the scene cuts to the exploits of Han Solo and Lando Calrissian. It was a different time then and filmmakers didn't feel the need to bombard us with characters flipping through through the air and  slicing up robots. The real tension was where it should have been, the STORY. It is really cool when Luke gets his hand whacked off though.

All in all, Empire is dark and there's not much to celebrate when it's all said and done. Solo is on his way back to Tatooine and Jaba it's square one for Luke, Chewy, Princess Lea and the droids.

Return of the Jedi

Somehow, the Death Star looks much more sinister than it did as a whole in A New Hope. The way the dark unfinished pieces jet out to form an evil face like Jack from a Nightmare Before Christmas. The Death Star in this movie absolutely rules.

The battle scenes are amazing in this one and take place in the sky, on the ground and of course there's more saber-on-saber between father and son.

My complaint here is that those damn Ewoks tend to get a little cutesy. Don't get me wrong, I'm glad they're in the movie, and aren't nearly as nauseating as Jar Jar Binks from those other three movies.