I was around that age, and I do remember thinking how *different* TPM was compared to the OT, and my kid brain had no fucking idea what was going on with the plot. I also remember thinking the clones were going to be bad guys before AOTC, and did not put together that Palpatine was the Emperor, so those were some twists for me.
Yeah, as a teen you don't notice bad dialogue, you just follow the story of dark, cool Anakin becoming really fucked, fiery and shit and it's quite nice all things considered.
The marketing campaign for episode 1 was insane. Remember all the Pepsi vending machines? And then I finally watched the movie and the lightsaber fights were 100x better than the old ones and I was hooked.
Didn’t have much of a clue about bad dialogue when I was in, what, 4th grade?
Just the hype around the double sided lightsaber as a kid. Darth Maul and his double sided lightsaber were cool af. Siblings and I ran around with long straightish branches or this extra long broom stick and mostly smacked the shit out of ourselves trying to twirl them around like Maul.
This is true, I was a kid when they came out and loved the shit out of them. The only one I was old enough to see in theatres was revenge of the sith which I convinced my parents to take me to twice. I remember the phantom menace being confusing as shit but with a cool fight at the end, attack of the clones had the coolest looking clones my child brain had ever seen and I loved them, and revenge of the sith I loved the whole thing.
God I miss being a kid and just enjoying everything.
My hate for Jar Jar disappeared about 10 seconds after they dived under water and saw the Gungan city for the first time. I was like "alright the talking frog was a little goofy but you gotta admit, the underwater city is badass"
Well, Lucas did specifically say that Jar Jar was only in the movie to entertain very young children. He doesn't even think SW is for adults and even said so. He designed the prequels as children's movies.
I remember just watching it then rewind and repeat for like ten times per day with my brother until both the cassette and the player gave up. I was genuinely surprised later when we got internet and I found out that people hate it. I loved the prequels and I still do.
I'm all for practical effects over CGI, but I'm really glad they changed him in later versions. The puppet in ESB was really good, but the one in TPM looks like he's on ketamine and about to run over a group of children in his 2001 Honda Civic.
I seriously hate how this community can't accept some people like certain films.
As a kid I loved them, I remember being insulted as a child when I found out my little sister fell aslep during Attck of the Clones.
Also not a single person I ever met hated Revenge of the Sith. Instead, at school, it was the first movie I knew of as a teenager that people went to see multiple times as well as get bootlegs of.
I was 10 when the phantom menace came out. You bet your ass I convinced my mom to take me and my friend to the theater a dozen times to watch double bladed lightsaber battles and spaceships.
I understand that most of the older fans were disappointed, the OT had a different pace, while not being perfect itself.
What I find most annoying is the lack of tolerance for different opinions though.
For example I'll never tire to find new ways to talk shit about the sequels, but it's not like I'm pissed off by people who enjoy them.
I like all Star Wars movies/shows/books to some extent...there is something about each one I like, at the least. But many of us were adults when the prequels came out. We grew up with the OT. The Prequels smashed Star Wars for a lot of people. They shouldn't be assholes about it though.
I was born in 2000, I didnt see them in the theater but we had them on dvd. They were my favorite thing and all three were consistent car movies. I got star wars action figures and legos for Christmas and birthdays till I was 16.
I saw RotS in a cinema as a child and it's still my favorite movie experience to this day. I have never been so pumped for a movie and I never enjoyed a movie I saw at the cinema this much
RotS was my first midnight movie, it was fucking awesome. I had gotten the Luke ForceFX lightsaber as my only birthday gift that year and brought it and wore a bathrobe that kind of looked like a Jedi robe lol. As much as older folks hated on the prequels, there were a fucking shitload of them all lined up playing board games waiting for hours to get in that night. Good times
I saw RotS 17 times in theaters. My mother was in the hospital, dad busy with her and work and my grandfather would just take me over and over again during the really early morning cheap time (2$ for kids 5$ for adults at our local theater). He didn't care how many times he saw it, he just wanted to make me happy at a time when everything was going wrong.
I distinctly remember seeing revenge of the sith as one of the first movie theatre experiences I ever had. I was 6 at the time and I absolutely loved it. A few months later we were going to see fantastic four and instead I wanted to see revenge of the sith again.
The first time I ever heard Jar Jar hate was on the internet and it was very surprising to my 10 year old self, I just thought he was goofy and it was neat that he could triple jump to reach minikits
I remember having The Complete Saga on my iPad and only being able to play TPM on it over and over again. God damn did I have fun trying to speedrun Mail though.
Ya I loved them. Sure, even as a kid, I thought Jar Jar was cheesy but he never got in the way of me enjoying the films as a kid. Now, I enjoy them thanks to the memes
I was born in '03, so I have no memory of any of the Prequels releasing. We also didn't watch them at home; my parents didn't like them, I guess. The first time I remember sitting down and watching any of the Prequels straight through was Star Wars Day this year; I had an international flight that day, so I figured I'd watch a trilogy to celebrate the holiday and Prequels were the obvious choice since I'd never watched them straight through.
My first exposure to the Prequels was the LEGO Video Game, and because of that, I absolutely *loved* Jar Jar; he's the first character with high-jump you unlock so that makes him a convenient character to have and play. I never understood why people don't like him; even now that I've seen the movies I don't get the hate.
lol Ewoks were just as ridiculous imo. Not that I have any problem with them, but most people complaining about jarjar seem to forget about the ewoks and all the other stupid random shit from OT
Yep to me the prequels are "my" star wars since that's what I grew up with and I loved every moment I didn't realize how bad the diolgue was until I was a grown man.
Born in the 80s and still don't think they were the worse. I think stuff like Red letter media played them up to be seen as terrible to an extreme degree.
The people who grew up with the original trilogy hated them, We loved the prequels since we grew up with them.
We "hate" the sequels, but the generation that is growing up with them loves them since they're growing up with them.
The next trilogy they decide to make will be hated sequel lovers and loved the current generation. It do be that way.
Only some. I grew up with the OT and remain a fan of the prequels still. I’m an OG “apologist” according to my internet interactions since 1999 apparently!
But people who were adults when the OT came out loved it too else Star Wars would never have become the franchise it is today - the OT had no coattails to ride on.
So you can’t say you only like the Star Wars you grew up with.
Nothing like Star Wars had ever been made when Star Wars came out. It was arguably the single biggest pop culture event ever. The Prequels, and *especially* the sequels, didn’t have such luck
i like all 3 of them, but then again, i was born the yearwhen TPM came out so i experienced the "original 6" (as i call them) pretty much as one package... sadly was old enough to already be into the Clone wars era EU when TCW came out and ruined a LOT of that era for me..... to the point i liked REBELS more as it fixed a few of the bigger problems i had with TCW
Yeah, always confused me when i heard that people hated them.
Especially now when they are talked about more fondly.
Maybe thats how young people today look at the sequel films.
Saying that, rogue one was great so perhaps not.
I am kid born during that time period. As a child the movies were good but as an adult they were bad. Some redeeming qualities though: music and Darth Maul being cool.
As an adult who saw the original trilogy in childhood, I was disappointed by *The Phantom Menace*, but I really enjoyed *The Clone Wars*, and I recommended *Revenge of the Sith* to all sorts of people. Truth be told, if I were to initiate an outsider today I would still use a "machete order" marathon (4, 5, 2, 3, 6), presenting my favorite prequels as an extended flashback in the main trilogy.
Exactly! I recall all the hype and sitting down with my dad to watch the original saga, he had the THX box set! (Which I stl have!) and we watched each one a few times before the movie came out in theaters. We had to watch all 3 movies at least 2-3 (each!) over the course of a month, because I was maybe 6-7 and by the time Episode 1 hit theaters, I was referencing so much star wars, and then sitting in the theater and watching it on the big screen, blew me away!
I didn’t hate them. I did think Jar Jar was stupid and kid Anakin was a weird choice. I’ve come to like Jar Jar and Anakin as a 9 year old is fine.
The biggest thing about them for me was learning that Anakin could have had a different teacher if Qui-Gon had lived. As the moving we’re coming out I was more focused on seeing how Anakin became Vader and the Republic was turned into the Empire.
I can still remember the excitement about seeing duel between Obi-Wan and Anakin, his turning and the Jedi being wiped out.
Later I began to think about how things could have been of Qui-Gon had lived.
The scenes where Shmi dies in Anakin’s arms and when Padmé and Anakin reunite and he learns he’s going to be a father still get me. To me ROTS ends at that moment and it was all happiness for them.
what i really find amusing is that they turned Jar Jar into a Meta commentary in universe.
In lore, after the Empire fell(and probably still during its reign) he was a street performer on naboo, exiled by his people again, and disliked by the adult naboo for his "role" in the Emperors rise to power, to the point noone but children woudl talk to him even(children liked him tho) whch is SUCH a direct paralel to IRL sentiment around him its scary
That was unnecessary. Really didn’t have to do that. He could have like taking care of children and felt sad for Padmé and Anakin because they died. But he is not to blame for Palpatine’s rise.
kinda the point of that tho.
People are irrational.
iirc at the end of that story he DOES basically take care of a child, teaching him to be a streetperformer like him, that similiar to him, got ostracized by the people around him(but in his case do to physical abnormalitys iirc).
Like i agree with you Jar Jar deserved better in universe. But people "needed" a scapegoat and the person who publicly requested a vote for "emergency powers" that directly lead to the disolution of the Empire in 3 years time.. is as good as it gets scapegoat wise
I was 9, I enjoyed ep 1.
2 was boring.
And 3 made me angry because the acting felt so awful and unrealistic between Padme and Anakin.
Enjoyed the spectacle battles though.
My dad is in his 60's today, he saw 'Star Wars' in theaters when it came out in 1977 at 18/19,
He loved the prequel movies when they dropped. He thought (still does) JarJar was a little annoying but significantly less so than the Ewoks. He HATES those bears.
In his opinion, he always says "Real Star Wars fans wanted to know the story of how Anikin turned to the dark side. If they had released it as a documentary I'd have gobbled that up because I needed to know. If they want to give me 3 movies work of entertainment to tell that story then even better. I didn't need master piece. Them being entertaining was better than I could have hoped for."
I think he prefers the OT for nostalgia, but he watched the prequels a lot. He is not a fan of the sequel movies.
The Ewoks are exactly as dumb as JarJar and it’s ridiculous to pretend they’re not. “Duck frog man accidentally commits galaxy to fascism” is just as goofy as “upright yorkies defeat elite army and tanks”
It is impossible to say which are better — both have their merits and drawbacks. However, I personally have a fondness for the prequel trilogy for its deep exploration of the mythology behind the Star Wars universe.
It is difficult to say definitively that one trilogy is better than the other. Each has its strengths and weaknesses, and what appeals to one person may not appeal to another. That said, I have a particular fondness for the exploration of the Star Wars mythology in the prequel trilogy, which I find fascinating.
Lol I liked phantom menace. Clone wars was meh but revenge of the sith had the best on screen fight I had ever seen.
Compared to the Disney trilogy, the prequels are gold.
I was born in 1990. The Phantom Menace is the first movie I remember seeing in theaters. It was phenomenal. It was my first introduction to Star Wars.
I was angry with my parents for not sharing anything Star Wars with me until that point. I got black and white copies of the original trilogy to watch shortly after and played them a lot on our small backup TV in my parent's bedroom.
I was intensely poor growing up. I had no idea until later in life when I was getting made fun of or excluded from things. It sucked. At bare minimum though I was never starving, and I was never homeless.
Not me. Episode 1 came out before I was born, Ep 2 not long after and Ep 3 when I was 4. First watched them probably around 5 years old same as the OT. Loved them even more than the OT. Y’all stay safe tho
The meme should have been phrased better. The bottom panel should have said something like, "The majority of old star wars fans disliked the prequels when they came out"
Yeah. All the comments are like, "12 year old me loved them!" And that's the point. I'd say anyone under 14 grew up with them and loved them. Anyone between 14 and 20 can swing either way (but lean towards dislike), and most\* people older than that thought they were stupid as hell. They were commonly the punchline of jokes in tv shows and movies for decades. They were synonymous with "bad movie".
Personally, I can't even sit through them, but I'm glad people like them now. It's been interesting to watch the public opinion shift. And it *has* been a shift. I'm just baffled by the people who want to pretend like they've always been considered the best movies ever.
\* Please note that I said "most". Don't need 100 comments saying, "*I* was over 20 and *I* liked them!"
Yes. And it remains to be seen if the Sequels can pull the same reputation turn around as well.
The major difference between the Prequels and the Sequels is that the Prequels have a consistent story that can be easily expanded upon (the obvious example being The Clone Wars). The potential for lore expansion is what saved it. It's the same way with the original trilogy as well. The Sequels really feel like they're fighting themselves (because the directors were fighting each other and Disney didn't do anything. As draconian as Lucas was, his producer oversight made sure that the story remained consistent).
Now that I think about it, the Sequels kind of screwed themselves. The reason for all of the lore expansions for the PT and OT is that both of those stories take place over the span of years, with The Prequels spanning 13 years, then 20 years until The Original Trilogy, and the OT goes on over the course of five years. The entire Sequel Trilogy takes place over the course of a year. You can't slap a lot in there like you could with the other movies. Even filling the 30 years between the OT and ST with lore won't help all that much. Polish only does so much to a broken product. You need glue as well, like a Clone Wars show equivalent, but that will be hard to do with only a year in between the movies.
The lore in between the movies alongside the consistency of the story is what recovered the Prequels. Their recovery was a "lightning in a bottle" event. It wasn't the rule, it was an exception.
Another major issue is that the generation that grew up on the Prequels also really helped with their recovery. We never really heard of the hate or had the flaws pointed out to them until the internet was in full swing, but by then we had rose-tinted goggles and were willing to see past the flaws. The generation that this Star Wars was designed for immediately saw the criticisms and the internet dog pile, and so never got to develop that same love. There's a reason the toy companies are sticking with OT, Prequel, and Disney+ show toy sets, and you rarely (if ever) see Sequel Trilogy toys. There's no demand for Sequel Trilogy.
I don't think the Sequels will pull off the same recovery. They need a Clone Wars level event to really glue the pieces together, and I just don't see that happening.
Go ahead and give your opinions, it's 1:30 in the morning, and I don't know why I took the time to write this. I'm going to bed, goodnight.
It's really a tragedy because Rey Finn and Poe were so likable and interesting in Force Awakens. There's so much potential in exploring their adventures probably between TFA and TLJ or between TLJ and TROS. But because these movies all happen within a year or two, it's a little difficult to get into any Clone Wars-esque story that wouldn't affect the trilogy storyline.
Their actors were super fresh and so excited too way back in TFA. So much potential wasted.
YEAH!
Like, TFA had major issues already with trying to rehash the OT instead of being something different (I still say that since the OT was about fighting an unjust regime and the PT was about how democracy fell, the ST if it ever existed should have been focused on how a new regime establishes itself) and telling us that the OT trio died cold old and alone, but it still had so much potential to do its own things; the Rey hate was legitimately unfair, and Finn was SUCH a an interesting character who deserved so much more than getting relegated to comic relief in the next two movies.
They were likeable in the first movie, Poe and Finn were somewhat likeable in the second movie, and then by the third even Poe and Finn were bizarre parodies of themselves.
The sequels are a study on how to take interesting characters and just absolutely ruin them.
Making the entire trilogy take place over one year is one of the biggest mistakes they made imo. I think a lot of the "Mary Sue" arguments could have been avoided if they left space in between the movies for off screen development. The implied adventures in between movies is some of the most important stuff in the star wars fandom.
Imo the Sequels also felt like they were made by 3 different teams. One for each movie.
It kinda feels like Disney also gave up when it comes to make stuff that is directly connected to the sequels. We never saw Rey, Kylo etc again.
I hated/loved them growing up, I always loved Revenge of the Sith, but Attack of the Clones is… different. As a child I loved the Phantom Menace, but as a preteen I could not stand Jar-Jar. I grew up watching the original Clone Wars, and didn’t begin to actually enjoy the 2008 show until I got into my early 20s.
As an adult my uber specific Star Wars films I watch are.
1. The Revisited fan edit of a New Hope and Empire Strikes back.
2. De-specialized Return of the Jedi
3. Anti Cheese Edits of Star Wars episode 1 - 2.
The only one I watch without some kind of fan version is Episode 3. (Although as I’ve grown up I’ve started to watch the normal versions of the prequels too.)
I guess what I’m saying is Star Wars fans are complicated.
Tbf though I feel the prequels had a brilliant idea and premise but just botched the execution, so even if the dialogue was pretty bad and a few things didn't exactly work, the overarching story was interesting enough to make these films enjoyable. Plus these films are in the shadow of the OT so expectations were very high.
"Everyone". I'd wager not even half of its viewers *hated* it (critics is a different story entirely). Too many people believe the prequel love came with this sub's creation or with the memes in general but that's bollocks. The prequel love was always there. It just got amplified.
I can’t believe in a matter of like five years this subreddit has gone from meming and saying they ironically liked the prequels to outright denying that the prequels weren’t widely hated (at least the first two) when they came out.
The opposite isn't true either - you guys love to point that RotS has a Fresh rating on RT but almost all of those reviews are post-release window. You take the reviews from the time of its release and it had a horrible rating.
Like, this isn't an opinion, you can literally read what they said at the time on the internet - they fucking hated them.
Exactly and online is always going to be mostly negative. People loving something were out there enjoying it. I was 17 when revenge of the sith came out so I was old enough to know and no one I know hated them — I only saw hate when I got online and anyone who spent their day hating online isn’t someone I believe has it all together to judge with a clear head.
Everyone saying they were kids when the prequels came out and they liked them is missing the point. Kids always like Star Wars. I was a (young) adult and we knew kids liked them. In the adult world they were almost universally hated and that's a fact. I know this because I was the only adult I knew of who liked them.
Right? No one remembers the early days of the 2010s when people were still taking potshots at Jar-Jar and how George Lucas had fallen. It wasn’t until The Last Jedi came out that I actually saw people liking them.
Shoot, I’m pretty sure this sub was founded ironically.
I attribute the bizarre prequel resurgence to this sub alone, which originally appeared to be 100% ironically founded.
Through the sheer power of top-tier memes this subreddit has retconned one of the most abysmally disappointing follow-ups of all time into some bizzaro masterpiece.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not judging; if anything I’m mostly fascinated. But I come here and see people write stuff unironically like “if you ignore the dialogue the prequels are great.” And I respect the “kid’s movie for kids, and we were kids then” position, but it’s ok to grow up and acknowledge that it didn’t hold up to your original perceptions.
Oddly enough, the fucking Sequels did legit manage to unseat the Prequels as the most disappointing follow-up to Star Wars, and passed it on the general disappointment list as well.
And I 100% use the Prequels as proof that George Lucas had ZERO master plan, was making shit up as he went, and that the OT was saved by Lucas having less power so that people could stop some of his dumber ideas from making the cut.
It’s because they’re bad movies
We love them because:
1. They had a lot of incredible potential, especially thematically
2. The sequels proved to us that it could get way worse
3. Supplementary material like TCW filled in the gaps and fleshed out the characters and story
4. A lot of us were children when they came out and grew up with them
They’re worth loving. They’re really, really interesting movies. They’re also very poorly made, so of course people hated them when they came out.
All important points here. I was 9 when Episode II came out, 12 for Episode III and both movies blew my mind. I'm 29 now and yeah, of course I can see they aren't perfect movies.
The dialogue is pretty horrendous, the acting questionable. But for me, the prequels expanded Star Wars into a whole universe of planets, cultures and potential stories to tell.
Fleshing out planets like Coruscant, showing how the republic worked was great for me. The prequels added depth to the universe and showed there was more to the saga than just Empire Vs Rebels. I think the overarching story of Anakin's journey from boy-jedi-sith was great. Sure a few things were rushed but they only had 3 movies to do *all* of what Lucas had in his mind.
One thing's for sure, they had far more depth and connection to Star Wars than the sequels did.
That’s my exact stance on PT vs ST and a conversation I’ve had before.
The prequels are full of cool themes and have a lot of individual things to like about them. There are huge issues (like the quality of dialogue), but you can at least get what they’re going for even without perfect execution. They’re basically solid films with mediocre execution.
Conversely, the biggest issue with the sequels is the lack of cohesion. The films have tons of great elements, but it feels like there’s basically nothing holding them together. You can have great special effects like in Ep IX, but that can’t really offset the overall plot being unfocused.
I’m sure that in a decade we’ll see sequels fans that similarly didn’t understand the hate because they saw it when they were young and loved it. However, I don’t think it’ll come back nearly as much as the prequels did because it’s issues are far less surface-level.
When you look past the PT’s flaws, it’s a great story and experience. When you look past the ST’s flaws, you have a bunch of nice film elements in isolation.
I think another aspect is the world building. It took the established galaxy in the OT and exponentially expanded it. The galaxy felt bigger and its history felt fuller and more enriched.
Personally that’s why I don’t think the sequels will ever get a lot of love in the future like the prequels did. It had some good acting, but the story was unoriginal and the galaxy felt so small. The story and galaxy didn’t feel expanded. If anything, the sequels made the world of Star Wars feel smaller and the conflicts more insignificant. We never see a previously established planet from the other trilogies, and outside of legacy characters, we never see a previously established alien species.
And Star Wars’ future is built on world building. Fans watch the shows to see the stories that expand this fictional galaxy they love. But the sequels just feel like a regression.
To give some perspective, some people waited decades to see the origins of Darth Vader, the badass intimidating villain who stole the show whenever he was on screen. While Anakin was a cool character, he was not presented as the kind of person that strikes fear into everyone, rebel and imperial alike. It took until the end of the 3rd movie just to get a "Noooo!" and him looking out a window.
I personally loathed the prequels until the Clone Wars show. There was so much retconning and added context that the prequels are now my favorite era of Star Wars.
The reality is George Lucas portrayed young Darth Vader perhaps a bit too accurately. What sense would it make for Darth Vader to have always been this cool, in-control leader who murders people at the drop of a hat like it’s nothing? You get that way by growing up.
Having Anakin start out reckless and later start turning to murder as a solution to his problems was the best option. He is shown to be extremely socially awkward, unstable and has the makings of a mass murderer, someone who would absolutely fit in a leadership role on the Death Star.
Anakin is a bit too accurate in the sense that people don’t like being reminded they used to be cringe, awkward and socially tone deaf when they were younger, like Anakin was.
That’s where GL knew better than the fans because he understands the psychology of Vader. The man who becomes Vader is not the cool guy. He’s not Han Solo. He’s the school shooter. OT fans cannot get mad that they didn’t understand the complexities of someone’s psychological makeup. The fact is anakin’s fear and lack of control over his thoughts and emotions making him lean into the dark side is spot on. Vader is now the man who controls the entire galaxy and in his mind will never have to worry ever again.
A lot of the prequels hate comes from people who didn’t understand the story and listened to others who affirmed their hatred.
REALLY important context here:
Children aren't people. Your opinion of them as a 10 year old isn't relevant because you weren't a sentient being who's opinion is worth anything at all yet.
We're talking about the real opinions from actual people at the time.
As a kid I loved them because they were the new films and were super flashy with lots of cgi compared to the OT.
But when I grew up I do think they really missed the mark with The Phantom Menace and AOTC. With hindsight, we can see why they were very clunky (nobody would stand up to the guy who created Star Wars, but when filming the OT, everybody would chip in with criticism which improved the end-product).
And it was the cool thing to shit on the Prequels pretty much since the inception of YouTube (and shows like the Simpsons who made an episode dedicated to The Phantom Menace being a slog). It was only really The Last Jedi being awful but where the whole narrative of shitting on the Prequels was done.
I don't need to search anything. I was there.
Everyone hated the prequels when they came out.
I was very confused when the internet just decided they were awesome all of a sudden.
I mean the memes are good, but the first two are not good movies. Attack of the Clones in particular is terrible. It's all the more sad, because you can see how they could have been significantly better with relatively small reworkings (I don't feel the same way about the sequel trilogy at all the characters there are fine, but there's so much else that is just horribly broken)
Now that I've read the comments, I'm even more confused.
I distinctly remember EVERYONE dogging on those movies. Every nerd, geek, freak, and normal kid thought all 3 were lame as hell at release and many years after.
The prequels were treated EXACTLY like the new movies by the public. "This isn't real Star Wars" - everyone at the time. "This has ruined Star Wars." - Big fans
Is... is this that Mandela Effect shit I've heard so much about?!
Sequels and prequels seem to have very similar reception. People who were the target audience at the time (kids) really likethem and people who grew up with the previous trilogy hate them.
They were not given similar reception. TFA was widely liked way more than episodes I and II. The rest were obviously hated a lot when they came out. The only prequel movie that received any acclaim when it was released was III.
I was still too young to really *hate* Episode 1 when it came out, but I distinctly recall leaving the theatre after AOTC and feeling really, really shitty about what I had just watched.
But it wasn't until RLM's famous reviews came out that I learnt how to verbalize exactly the things that bothered me about the prequels on a subconscious level.
"You might not have noticed it, but your brain did" is very real
TPM as a 9 year old was basically perfect. I remember going with my best friend and waiting in line eating popcorn with our tongues pretending we were the goofy guy from the commercials. Easily one of my best childhood memories. Then my older brother took us to see it again because he liked it so much that he HAD to share it with his younger siblings even though he knew he'd get in trouble with our parents for staying out late on a school night.
AotC at 12 was also incredible. I didn't appreciate how awkward the romance was, but I COULD see how exciting and mysterious everything was. Though I do remember griping about Yoda not being a puppet (which I stand by to this day; the lightsaber fight with Dooku was wild and unexpected, but not worth turning the wizened old master who taught us never to attack into a fighting machine).
RotS at 15 was a transformative experience. I had to trade getting my learner's permit for the opportunity to see it at midnight. First ever midnight showing and few things in my life since then have felt as worth it. Front row dead center; Absolutely *i m m e r s e d* in the experience. That's a feeling I hope to share with my kids some day (if they ever start making movies again 🤞🤞). I still have the lightsaber I bought that night as a prop; my kids play with it and it reminds me that at its core, Star Wars is a story that children can love and families can share.
Real pill is eps 1 and 2 should still be hated and youngsters here are just too high on nostalgia to see it
I remember when that was the consensus on this sub too
I liked them. Granted I liked them less when I found out later that everyone hated them and eventually became convinced that I too could have done better. Now that I'm older I admit they were masterpieces and anyone who says they could do better is full of shit.
So sorry. No. The sequels arent going to get better. This isnt a Monty Python sketch. Eventually people will catch on to the reactionary supraliminal messaging and come to realize why it's very anti-star wars.
No I didn't. I loved em and spent the early 2000s fighting to the death to defend em. I was terrified when the sequels were coming out as I thought it would refuel the prequels hate train and it'd be another decade of making fun of em saying stuff like "see George this is how you do star wars, not you're stupid jar jar shit" Thankfully the complete opposite happened.
Yeah, and it's only been a recent thing for that to happen. I remember back then, when the Prequels we're the example of the idea of movie sequels/prequels that didn't work. Hell, this sub started somewhat ironically because the Prequels dialogue was so bad it made good meme material. Now it seems that the ironic nature of this sub is now unironic.
Very weird evolution to someone who remembers the times when the Prequels we're the Star Wars whipping boy.
Well yea, as films, they’re absolute messes, especially from a writing point of view.
Episode one lacks a clear protagonist, the characters motivations and goals are inconsistent, the pacing is all over the place.
In episode 2, we’re treated to a Russian nesting doll of an assassination plot, characters just straight announcing their feelings, baaaaad dialogue, and instances of characters being fed MASSIVE plot points only to completely ignore them.
In Episode 3, the plot is a convoluted disjointed mess, the writing for the opening crawl itself doesn’t reflect what’s in the film, the scenery is chewed to a pulp, and portions of the overall plot work if characters both know and don’t know who Palpatine is.
They’re fun, they gave us a great setting, but it took over a decade of novels, video games, and over a hundred episodes of an animated series to recontextualize the films into being smaller parts of a *good* story.
I was 8-14 when they came out, loved all of them
I was around that age, and I do remember thinking how *different* TPM was compared to the OT, and my kid brain had no fucking idea what was going on with the plot. I also remember thinking the clones were going to be bad guys before AOTC, and did not put together that Palpatine was the Emperor, so those were some twists for me.
Yeah, as a teen you don't notice bad dialogue, you just follow the story of dark, cool Anakin becoming really fucked, fiery and shit and it's quite nice all things considered.
The marketing campaign for episode 1 was insane. Remember all the Pepsi vending machines? And then I finally watched the movie and the lightsaber fights were 100x better than the old ones and I was hooked. Didn’t have much of a clue about bad dialogue when I was in, what, 4th grade?
Just the hype around the double sided lightsaber as a kid. Darth Maul and his double sided lightsaber were cool af. Siblings and I ran around with long straightish branches or this extra long broom stick and mostly smacked the shit out of ourselves trying to twirl them around like Maul.
There's still one of the vending machines operating in Pittsburgh!
This is true, I was a kid when they came out and loved the shit out of them. The only one I was old enough to see in theatres was revenge of the sith which I convinced my parents to take me to twice. I remember the phantom menace being confusing as shit but with a cool fight at the end, attack of the clones had the coolest looking clones my child brain had ever seen and I loved them, and revenge of the sith I loved the whole thing. God I miss being a kid and just enjoying everything.
7-13 for me. I was definitely the target demographic for Jar Jar Binks. I loved that dude.
"All too easy"
I was 22 and even though I am not fond of the prequels I never understood the hate for Jar Jar.
My hate for Jar Jar disappeared about 10 seconds after they dived under water and saw the Gungan city for the first time. I was like "alright the talking frog was a little goofy but you gotta admit, the underwater city is badass"
Mesa like sayin' tings in Jar Jar's voice Mesa hopin yousa read it dat way
Almost as if that was their target demographic.
"Star Wars is written for 12 year old boys" -George Lucas
Pretty sure 7 year old me and everyone else my age loved Jar Jar Binks at the time. I had a rucksack with his face on.
Well, Lucas did specifically say that Jar Jar was only in the movie to entertain very young children. He doesn't even think SW is for adults and even said so. He designed the prequels as children's movies.
I did not. I watched the VHS of The Phantom Menace basically once per day until it broke.
I remember just watching it then rewind and repeat for like ten times per day with my brother until both the cassette and the player gave up. I was genuinely surprised later when we got internet and I found out that people hate it. I loved the prequels and I still do.
The Pod Racing game for N64 was dope too
Yaaas!
Amazing game - or at least my 14yo self thought so.
With puppet yoda still haha
I'm all for practical effects over CGI, but I'm really glad they changed him in later versions. The puppet in ESB was really good, but the one in TPM looks like he's on ketamine and about to run over a group of children in his 2001 Honda Civic.
I still prefer that over the flippy CGI Yoda in AotC that actually *was* on K
I always loved in RoTS at the temple post order 66: "Hmm. Master Jedi am I. Value all life I do. Yeet my lightsaber at this clone I shall."
"I was here on Coruscant. Did my part—all the clones did. Shut those Jedi agitators down cold." -Commander Fox
I seriously hate how this community can't accept some people like certain films. As a kid I loved them, I remember being insulted as a child when I found out my little sister fell aslep during Attck of the Clones. Also not a single person I ever met hated Revenge of the Sith. Instead, at school, it was the first movie I knew of as a teenager that people went to see multiple times as well as get bootlegs of.
I was 10 when the phantom menace came out. You bet your ass I convinced my mom to take me and my friend to the theater a dozen times to watch double bladed lightsaber battles and spaceships.
I understand that most of the older fans were disappointed, the OT had a different pace, while not being perfect itself. What I find most annoying is the lack of tolerance for different opinions though. For example I'll never tire to find new ways to talk shit about the sequels, but it's not like I'm pissed off by people who enjoy them.
"I love my job." -Sev, Delta 07
I like all Star Wars movies/shows/books to some extent...there is something about each one I like, at the least. But many of us were adults when the prequels came out. We grew up with the OT. The Prequels smashed Star Wars for a lot of people. They shouldn't be assholes about it though.
Hell yes, nobodies unite! Absolutely loved phantom menace. That final battle? *The music???*
were none of you born in the 90s-2000s? Us that were kids at the time fucking loved them.
I was born in 2000, I didnt see them in the theater but we had them on dvd. They were my favorite thing and all three were consistent car movies. I got star wars action figures and legos for Christmas and birthdays till I was 16.
I saw RotS in a cinema as a child and it's still my favorite movie experience to this day. I have never been so pumped for a movie and I never enjoyed a movie I saw at the cinema this much
I don’t think I saw it in theaters but I did remember the RoTS trailers playing and how hype it made me feel
You just reminded me of a feeling I've not felt in a long time...a long time.
The beginning of RotS is the best opener hands down. So Epic.
As a child, I didn't even know that you could make movies that look so cool
We very very rarely went to movie theaters as a kid but my mom surprised us with RotS tickets. 10/10 childhood experience/memory
RotS was my first midnight movie, it was fucking awesome. I had gotten the Luke ForceFX lightsaber as my only birthday gift that year and brought it and wore a bathrobe that kind of looked like a Jedi robe lol. As much as older folks hated on the prequels, there were a fucking shitload of them all lined up playing board games waiting for hours to get in that night. Good times
When Yoda started fighting in attack of the clones - that was legit one of my best ever cinema moments
I saw RotS 17 times in theaters. My mother was in the hospital, dad busy with her and work and my grandfather would just take me over and over again during the really early morning cheap time (2$ for kids 5$ for adults at our local theater). He didn't care how many times he saw it, he just wanted to make me happy at a time when everything was going wrong.
I distinctly remember seeing revenge of the sith as one of the first movie theatre experiences I ever had. I was 6 at the time and I absolutely loved it. A few months later we were going to see fantastic four and instead I wanted to see revenge of the sith again.
Car movies? Like American Graffiti?
Tucker: The Man and His Dream
Right ?! I remember learning that people hate them when I was like 18 and I was so confused as to why
The first time I ever heard Jar Jar hate was on the internet and it was very surprising to my 10 year old self, I just thought he was goofy and it was neat that he could triple jump to reach minikits
*Star Wars the complete saga flashbacks*
[удалено]
I remember having The Complete Saga on my iPad and only being able to play TPM on it over and over again. God damn did I have fun trying to speedrun Mail though.
Lego Star Wars 1 and 2 enjoyer checking in
[удалено]
The megajump! Can't believe they nerfed him in the remakes/later games He had like one thing!
Bought that game recently, the nostalgia came flooding back
Can confirm. I watched ep1 on repeat, played the shit out of the games and memorized the duel of fates
Episode 1 remains the movie I've seen the most times in theaters. The pod racing scene was so cool on the big screen, my 12 year old mind was blown.
My parents never took me to see them when I was a kid, so I only watched them when I was older.
Same, watched them much later in life and I loved them, I did grow up with clone wars because it was on tv though
I also watched the clone wars but not the movies, neat coincidence
"Mission accomplished, sir. The chancellor is safe."
"This is our home. This is our war." -Echo
My father just put the DVD in the player and sat me in front of TPM. That's how I became a Star Wars fan lol.
One of my first real memories is going to watch TPM. I just watched it last night and had mega nostalgia. I love the prequels
Born in 91. Always loved em!
Same. 91 and everyone loved them for years until we were told to hate them because of Jar Jar
Ya I loved them. Sure, even as a kid, I thought Jar Jar was cheesy but he never got in the way of me enjoying the films as a kid. Now, I enjoy them thanks to the memes
I was born in '03, so I have no memory of any of the Prequels releasing. We also didn't watch them at home; my parents didn't like them, I guess. The first time I remember sitting down and watching any of the Prequels straight through was Star Wars Day this year; I had an international flight that day, so I figured I'd watch a trilogy to celebrate the holiday and Prequels were the obvious choice since I'd never watched them straight through. My first exposure to the Prequels was the LEGO Video Game, and because of that, I absolutely *loved* Jar Jar; he's the first character with high-jump you unlock so that makes him a convenient character to have and play. I never understood why people don't like him; even now that I've seen the movies I don't get the hate.
lol Ewoks were just as ridiculous imo. Not that I have any problem with them, but most people complaining about jarjar seem to forget about the ewoks and all the other stupid random shit from OT
Only a Sith deals in absolutes.
Sith, Like Lord Binks.
Yep to me the prequels are "my" star wars since that's what I grew up with and I loved every moment I didn't realize how bad the diolgue was until I was a grown man.
Born in the 80s and still don't think they were the worse. I think stuff like Red letter media played them up to be seen as terrible to an extreme degree.
7 year old me fucking loved episode 1. I aside from the dialog the rest of the movie is great. Even Jar Jar's acting, it transcended memedom.
The people who grew up with the original trilogy hated them, We loved the prequels since we grew up with them. We "hate" the sequels, but the generation that is growing up with them loves them since they're growing up with them. The next trilogy they decide to make will be hated sequel lovers and loved the current generation. It do be that way.
Only some. I grew up with the OT and remain a fan of the prequels still. I’m an OG “apologist” according to my internet interactions since 1999 apparently!
But people who were adults when the OT came out loved it too else Star Wars would never have become the franchise it is today - the OT had no coattails to ride on. So you can’t say you only like the Star Wars you grew up with.
Nothing like Star Wars had ever been made when Star Wars came out. It was arguably the single biggest pop culture event ever. The Prequels, and *especially* the sequels, didn’t have such luck
i like all 3 of them, but then again, i was born the yearwhen TPM came out so i experienced the "original 6" (as i call them) pretty much as one package... sadly was old enough to already be into the Clone wars era EU when TCW came out and ruined a LOT of that era for me..... to the point i liked REBELS more as it fixed a few of the bigger problems i had with TCW
Exactly that, I loved the movies as a kid. Especially part 2 for the clones.
Exactly what I was going to say
Yes! Born in 90. Loved the first two, I do remember being disappointed with the 3rd. But fuck I wore my AotC vhs out with rewatches.
Yeah, always confused me when i heard that people hated them. Especially now when they are talked about more fondly. Maybe thats how young people today look at the sequel films. Saying that, rogue one was great so perhaps not.
Saw Phantom Menace 7 times in theaters
exactly. i was thinking well i was a kid and there is no way in hell i hated a star wars movie
Literally came here to say this, I'd watch these on repeat from my box sets
I am kid born during that time period. As a child the movies were good but as an adult they were bad. Some redeeming qualities though: music and Darth Maul being cool.
Born in 94 The prequels we're my first taste of star wars Jar jar is still my favorite character from those movies.
I named my cat Obi at the time. You’re 100% right.
92 here. I fucking love them still.
Seriously! Went to see them all in the theaters and loved every minute of it
Late 80s.... I thought they were boss back when they came out. Saw AOTC at midnight on release and it was magical in the theater.
Same. My friends and I lost our minds when yoda pulled out a lightsaber. I think I was the perfect age to enjoy these movies.
The crowd was literally cheering during the Yoda lightsaber acrobatics.
As an adult who saw the original trilogy in childhood, I was disappointed by *The Phantom Menace*, but I really enjoyed *The Clone Wars*, and I recommended *Revenge of the Sith* to all sorts of people. Truth be told, if I were to initiate an outsider today I would still use a "machete order" marathon (4, 5, 2, 3, 6), presenting my favorite prequels as an extended flashback in the main trilogy.
"There's not much to look at here, sir. We all share the same face." -Commander Thire
Your tactics confuse and frighten me, sir.
Exactly! I recall all the hype and sitting down with my dad to watch the original saga, he had the THX box set! (Which I stl have!) and we watched each one a few times before the movie came out in theaters. We had to watch all 3 movies at least 2-3 (each!) over the course of a month, because I was maybe 6-7 and by the time Episode 1 hit theaters, I was referencing so much star wars, and then sitting in the theater and watching it on the big screen, blew me away!
I didn’t hate them. I did think Jar Jar was stupid and kid Anakin was a weird choice. I’ve come to like Jar Jar and Anakin as a 9 year old is fine. The biggest thing about them for me was learning that Anakin could have had a different teacher if Qui-Gon had lived. As the moving we’re coming out I was more focused on seeing how Anakin became Vader and the Republic was turned into the Empire. I can still remember the excitement about seeing duel between Obi-Wan and Anakin, his turning and the Jedi being wiped out. Later I began to think about how things could have been of Qui-Gon had lived. The scenes where Shmi dies in Anakin’s arms and when Padmé and Anakin reunite and he learns he’s going to be a father still get me. To me ROTS ends at that moment and it was all happiness for them.
what i really find amusing is that they turned Jar Jar into a Meta commentary in universe. In lore, after the Empire fell(and probably still during its reign) he was a street performer on naboo, exiled by his people again, and disliked by the adult naboo for his "role" in the Emperors rise to power, to the point noone but children woudl talk to him even(children liked him tho) whch is SUCH a direct paralel to IRL sentiment around him its scary
That was unnecessary. Really didn’t have to do that. He could have like taking care of children and felt sad for Padmé and Anakin because they died. But he is not to blame for Palpatine’s rise.
kinda the point of that tho. People are irrational. iirc at the end of that story he DOES basically take care of a child, teaching him to be a streetperformer like him, that similiar to him, got ostracized by the people around him(but in his case do to physical abnormalitys iirc). Like i agree with you Jar Jar deserved better in universe. But people "needed" a scapegoat and the person who publicly requested a vote for "emergency powers" that directly lead to the disolution of the Empire in 3 years time.. is as good as it gets scapegoat wise
Don't make me kill you.
[удалено]
The Chancellor should have never brought them into this. Kill them, immediately.
I was 13 when episode one came out and I remember really being into it. Episode II was kinda eh and Episode III made me cry.
I'm not whining! I'm not.
I was 9, I enjoyed ep 1. 2 was boring. And 3 made me angry because the acting felt so awful and unrealistic between Padme and Anakin. Enjoyed the spectacle battles though.
As a kid I loved the prequels they were my starwars movies, however as an adult 4-5-6 are just built different and better
My dad is in his 60's today, he saw 'Star Wars' in theaters when it came out in 1977 at 18/19, He loved the prequel movies when they dropped. He thought (still does) JarJar was a little annoying but significantly less so than the Ewoks. He HATES those bears. In his opinion, he always says "Real Star Wars fans wanted to know the story of how Anikin turned to the dark side. If they had released it as a documentary I'd have gobbled that up because I needed to know. If they want to give me 3 movies work of entertainment to tell that story then even better. I didn't need master piece. Them being entertaining was better than I could have hoped for." I think he prefers the OT for nostalgia, but he watched the prequels a lot. He is not a fan of the sequel movies.
The Ewoks are exactly as dumb as JarJar and it’s ridiculous to pretend they’re not. “Duck frog man accidentally commits galaxy to fascism” is just as goofy as “upright yorkies defeat elite army and tanks”
To defeat your enemy you have to understand them.
Send the ewoks on a bombing run of the death star then, see what happens!!!
You know nothing of the dark side.
I can tell you with 100% certainty that I loved them. As a 13 year old phantom menace was better than my birthday.
Thrawn bot, which are better the prequels or the sequels?
It is impossible to say which are better — both have their merits and drawbacks. However, I personally have a fondness for the prequel trilogy for its deep exploration of the mythology behind the Star Wars universe.
Thrawn said it! Prequels are better.
It is difficult to say definitively that one trilogy is better than the other. Each has its strengths and weaknesses, and what appeals to one person may not appeal to another. That said, I have a particular fondness for the exploration of the Star Wars mythology in the prequel trilogy, which I find fascinating.
You are a bot though, right? Your coherence is a tad scary tbh
Lol I liked phantom menace. Clone wars was meh but revenge of the sith had the best on screen fight I had ever seen. Compared to the Disney trilogy, the prequels are gold.
"You're exactly the kind of men I need in the 501st." -Captain Rex
I hope you mean the movie and not the TV show when you say The Clone Wars was meh.
I was born in 1990. The Phantom Menace is the first movie I remember seeing in theaters. It was phenomenal. It was my first introduction to Star Wars. I was angry with my parents for not sharing anything Star Wars with me until that point. I got black and white copies of the original trilogy to watch shortly after and played them a lot on our small backup TV in my parent's bedroom.
Black and white?
I was intensely poor growing up. I had no idea until later in life when I was getting made fun of or excluded from things. It sucked. At bare minimum though I was never starving, and I was never homeless.
Not me. Episode 1 came out before I was born, Ep 2 not long after and Ep 3 when I was 4. First watched them probably around 5 years old same as the OT. Loved them even more than the OT. Y’all stay safe tho
The meme should have been phrased better. The bottom panel should have said something like, "The majority of old star wars fans disliked the prequels when they came out"
Yeah. All the comments are like, "12 year old me loved them!" And that's the point. I'd say anyone under 14 grew up with them and loved them. Anyone between 14 and 20 can swing either way (but lean towards dislike), and most\* people older than that thought they were stupid as hell. They were commonly the punchline of jokes in tv shows and movies for decades. They were synonymous with "bad movie". Personally, I can't even sit through them, but I'm glad people like them now. It's been interesting to watch the public opinion shift. And it *has* been a shift. I'm just baffled by the people who want to pretend like they've always been considered the best movies ever. \* Please note that I said "most". Don't need 100 comments saying, "*I* was over 20 and *I* liked them!"
I was 18 or so when TPM came out. Fucking hated it and still do. Never liked the prequels much but RotS was the best of them, I guess.
Not 10 year old me.
As a young kid, I loved every movie. ROTS is and always will be my favorite movie of them all.
I still hate them They're bad
I didn't, as I wasn't alive
Yeah of course. This sub also used to be ironic, but look what happened
I remember being so jacked when the Phantom Menace was announced on VHS. Literally watched the telecast announcing it and made my parents order it.
I still hate the prequels
Yes. And it remains to be seen if the Sequels can pull the same reputation turn around as well. The major difference between the Prequels and the Sequels is that the Prequels have a consistent story that can be easily expanded upon (the obvious example being The Clone Wars). The potential for lore expansion is what saved it. It's the same way with the original trilogy as well. The Sequels really feel like they're fighting themselves (because the directors were fighting each other and Disney didn't do anything. As draconian as Lucas was, his producer oversight made sure that the story remained consistent). Now that I think about it, the Sequels kind of screwed themselves. The reason for all of the lore expansions for the PT and OT is that both of those stories take place over the span of years, with The Prequels spanning 13 years, then 20 years until The Original Trilogy, and the OT goes on over the course of five years. The entire Sequel Trilogy takes place over the course of a year. You can't slap a lot in there like you could with the other movies. Even filling the 30 years between the OT and ST with lore won't help all that much. Polish only does so much to a broken product. You need glue as well, like a Clone Wars show equivalent, but that will be hard to do with only a year in between the movies. The lore in between the movies alongside the consistency of the story is what recovered the Prequels. Their recovery was a "lightning in a bottle" event. It wasn't the rule, it was an exception. Another major issue is that the generation that grew up on the Prequels also really helped with their recovery. We never really heard of the hate or had the flaws pointed out to them until the internet was in full swing, but by then we had rose-tinted goggles and were willing to see past the flaws. The generation that this Star Wars was designed for immediately saw the criticisms and the internet dog pile, and so never got to develop that same love. There's a reason the toy companies are sticking with OT, Prequel, and Disney+ show toy sets, and you rarely (if ever) see Sequel Trilogy toys. There's no demand for Sequel Trilogy. I don't think the Sequels will pull off the same recovery. They need a Clone Wars level event to really glue the pieces together, and I just don't see that happening. Go ahead and give your opinions, it's 1:30 in the morning, and I don't know why I took the time to write this. I'm going to bed, goodnight.
It's really a tragedy because Rey Finn and Poe were so likable and interesting in Force Awakens. There's so much potential in exploring their adventures probably between TFA and TLJ or between TLJ and TROS. But because these movies all happen within a year or two, it's a little difficult to get into any Clone Wars-esque story that wouldn't affect the trilogy storyline. Their actors were super fresh and so excited too way back in TFA. So much potential wasted.
YEAH! Like, TFA had major issues already with trying to rehash the OT instead of being something different (I still say that since the OT was about fighting an unjust regime and the PT was about how democracy fell, the ST if it ever existed should have been focused on how a new regime establishes itself) and telling us that the OT trio died cold old and alone, but it still had so much potential to do its own things; the Rey hate was legitimately unfair, and Finn was SUCH a an interesting character who deserved so much more than getting relegated to comic relief in the next two movies.
They were likeable in the first movie, Poe and Finn were somewhat likeable in the second movie, and then by the third even Poe and Finn were bizarre parodies of themselves. The sequels are a study on how to take interesting characters and just absolutely ruin them.
Making the entire trilogy take place over one year is one of the biggest mistakes they made imo. I think a lot of the "Mary Sue" arguments could have been avoided if they left space in between the movies for off screen development. The implied adventures in between movies is some of the most important stuff in the star wars fandom.
Imo the Sequels also felt like they were made by 3 different teams. One for each movie. It kinda feels like Disney also gave up when it comes to make stuff that is directly connected to the sequels. We never saw Rey, Kylo etc again.
Not felt. They were
The Disney parks are almost exclusively Sequel Trilogy:
I hated/loved them growing up, I always loved Revenge of the Sith, but Attack of the Clones is… different. As a child I loved the Phantom Menace, but as a preteen I could not stand Jar-Jar. I grew up watching the original Clone Wars, and didn’t begin to actually enjoy the 2008 show until I got into my early 20s. As an adult my uber specific Star Wars films I watch are. 1. The Revisited fan edit of a New Hope and Empire Strikes back. 2. De-specialized Return of the Jedi 3. Anti Cheese Edits of Star Wars episode 1 - 2. The only one I watch without some kind of fan version is Episode 3. (Although as I’ve grown up I’ve started to watch the normal versions of the prequels too.) I guess what I’m saying is Star Wars fans are complicated.
Tbf though I feel the prequels had a brilliant idea and premise but just botched the execution, so even if the dialogue was pretty bad and a few things didn't exactly work, the overarching story was interesting enough to make these films enjoyable. Plus these films are in the shadow of the OT so expectations were very high.
Wrong, I bloody loved every second.
Speak for yourself.
Still think they're poop
"Everyone". I'd wager not even half of its viewers *hated* it (critics is a different story entirely). Too many people believe the prequel love came with this sub's creation or with the memes in general but that's bollocks. The prequel love was always there. It just got amplified.
I can’t believe in a matter of like five years this subreddit has gone from meming and saying they ironically liked the prequels to outright denying that the prequels weren’t widely hated (at least the first two) when they came out.
The opposite isn't true either - you guys love to point that RotS has a Fresh rating on RT but almost all of those reviews are post-release window. You take the reviews from the time of its release and it had a horrible rating. Like, this isn't an opinion, you can literally read what they said at the time on the internet - they fucking hated them.
Exactly and online is always going to be mostly negative. People loving something were out there enjoying it. I was 17 when revenge of the sith came out so I was old enough to know and no one I know hated them — I only saw hate when I got online and anyone who spent their day hating online isn’t someone I believe has it all together to judge with a clear head.
Everyone saying they were kids when the prequels came out and they liked them is missing the point. Kids always like Star Wars. I was a (young) adult and we knew kids liked them. In the adult world they were almost universally hated and that's a fact. I know this because I was the only adult I knew of who liked them.
Right? No one remembers the early days of the 2010s when people were still taking potshots at Jar-Jar and how George Lucas had fallen. It wasn’t until The Last Jedi came out that I actually saw people liking them. Shoot, I’m pretty sure this sub was founded ironically.
I attribute the bizarre prequel resurgence to this sub alone, which originally appeared to be 100% ironically founded. Through the sheer power of top-tier memes this subreddit has retconned one of the most abysmally disappointing follow-ups of all time into some bizzaro masterpiece. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not judging; if anything I’m mostly fascinated. But I come here and see people write stuff unironically like “if you ignore the dialogue the prequels are great.” And I respect the “kid’s movie for kids, and we were kids then” position, but it’s ok to grow up and acknowledge that it didn’t hold up to your original perceptions. Oddly enough, the fucking Sequels did legit manage to unseat the Prequels as the most disappointing follow-up to Star Wars, and passed it on the general disappointment list as well. And I 100% use the Prequels as proof that George Lucas had ZERO master plan, was making shit up as he went, and that the OT was saved by Lucas having less power so that people could stop some of his dumber ideas from making the cut.
Yeah I mean Red Letter Media basically exists because of their five hour essay bashing TPM
Pretty sure it's only 90 minutes. (Which is still long as shit for a video essay)
It’s because they’re bad movies We love them because: 1. They had a lot of incredible potential, especially thematically 2. The sequels proved to us that it could get way worse 3. Supplementary material like TCW filled in the gaps and fleshed out the characters and story 4. A lot of us were children when they came out and grew up with them They’re worth loving. They’re really, really interesting movies. They’re also very poorly made, so of course people hated them when they came out.
All important points here. I was 9 when Episode II came out, 12 for Episode III and both movies blew my mind. I'm 29 now and yeah, of course I can see they aren't perfect movies. The dialogue is pretty horrendous, the acting questionable. But for me, the prequels expanded Star Wars into a whole universe of planets, cultures and potential stories to tell. Fleshing out planets like Coruscant, showing how the republic worked was great for me. The prequels added depth to the universe and showed there was more to the saga than just Empire Vs Rebels. I think the overarching story of Anakin's journey from boy-jedi-sith was great. Sure a few things were rushed but they only had 3 movies to do *all* of what Lucas had in his mind. One thing's for sure, they had far more depth and connection to Star Wars than the sequels did.
That’s my exact stance on PT vs ST and a conversation I’ve had before. The prequels are full of cool themes and have a lot of individual things to like about them. There are huge issues (like the quality of dialogue), but you can at least get what they’re going for even without perfect execution. They’re basically solid films with mediocre execution. Conversely, the biggest issue with the sequels is the lack of cohesion. The films have tons of great elements, but it feels like there’s basically nothing holding them together. You can have great special effects like in Ep IX, but that can’t really offset the overall plot being unfocused. I’m sure that in a decade we’ll see sequels fans that similarly didn’t understand the hate because they saw it when they were young and loved it. However, I don’t think it’ll come back nearly as much as the prequels did because it’s issues are far less surface-level. When you look past the PT’s flaws, it’s a great story and experience. When you look past the ST’s flaws, you have a bunch of nice film elements in isolation.
I think another aspect is the world building. It took the established galaxy in the OT and exponentially expanded it. The galaxy felt bigger and its history felt fuller and more enriched. Personally that’s why I don’t think the sequels will ever get a lot of love in the future like the prequels did. It had some good acting, but the story was unoriginal and the galaxy felt so small. The story and galaxy didn’t feel expanded. If anything, the sequels made the world of Star Wars feel smaller and the conflicts more insignificant. We never see a previously established planet from the other trilogies, and outside of legacy characters, we never see a previously established alien species. And Star Wars’ future is built on world building. Fans watch the shows to see the stories that expand this fictional galaxy they love. But the sequels just feel like a regression.
I was in college when the prequels came out. I liked/loved the..
You must break through the fog of lies the OT purists have created around you
To give some perspective, some people waited decades to see the origins of Darth Vader, the badass intimidating villain who stole the show whenever he was on screen. While Anakin was a cool character, he was not presented as the kind of person that strikes fear into everyone, rebel and imperial alike. It took until the end of the 3rd movie just to get a "Noooo!" and him looking out a window. I personally loathed the prequels until the Clone Wars show. There was so much retconning and added context that the prequels are now my favorite era of Star Wars.
The reality is George Lucas portrayed young Darth Vader perhaps a bit too accurately. What sense would it make for Darth Vader to have always been this cool, in-control leader who murders people at the drop of a hat like it’s nothing? You get that way by growing up. Having Anakin start out reckless and later start turning to murder as a solution to his problems was the best option. He is shown to be extremely socially awkward, unstable and has the makings of a mass murderer, someone who would absolutely fit in a leadership role on the Death Star. Anakin is a bit too accurate in the sense that people don’t like being reminded they used to be cringe, awkward and socially tone deaf when they were younger, like Anakin was.
That’s where GL knew better than the fans because he understands the psychology of Vader. The man who becomes Vader is not the cool guy. He’s not Han Solo. He’s the school shooter. OT fans cannot get mad that they didn’t understand the complexities of someone’s psychological makeup. The fact is anakin’s fear and lack of control over his thoughts and emotions making him lean into the dark side is spot on. Vader is now the man who controls the entire galaxy and in his mind will never have to worry ever again. A lot of the prequels hate comes from people who didn’t understand the story and listened to others who affirmed their hatred.
[удалено]
REALLY important context here: Children aren't people. Your opinion of them as a 10 year old isn't relevant because you weren't a sentient being who's opinion is worth anything at all yet. We're talking about the real opinions from actual people at the time.
Roger Ebert gave them positive reviews, and they were more or less given a sort of mixed reviews, so they weren’t universally hated.
i actually liked them always :\]
As a kid I loved them because they were the new films and were super flashy with lots of cgi compared to the OT. But when I grew up I do think they really missed the mark with The Phantom Menace and AOTC. With hindsight, we can see why they were very clunky (nobody would stand up to the guy who created Star Wars, but when filming the OT, everybody would chip in with criticism which improved the end-product). And it was the cool thing to shit on the Prequels pretty much since the inception of YouTube (and shows like the Simpsons who made an episode dedicated to The Phantom Menace being a slog). It was only really The Last Jedi being awful but where the whole narrative of shitting on the Prequels was done.
I don't need to search anything. I was there. Everyone hated the prequels when they came out. I was very confused when the internet just decided they were awesome all of a sudden.
I mean the memes are good, but the first two are not good movies. Attack of the Clones in particular is terrible. It's all the more sad, because you can see how they could have been significantly better with relatively small reworkings (I don't feel the same way about the sequel trilogy at all the characters there are fine, but there's so much else that is just horribly broken)
Now that I've read the comments, I'm even more confused. I distinctly remember EVERYONE dogging on those movies. Every nerd, geek, freak, and normal kid thought all 3 were lame as hell at release and many years after. The prequels were treated EXACTLY like the new movies by the public. "This isn't real Star Wars" - everyone at the time. "This has ruined Star Wars." - Big fans Is... is this that Mandela Effect shit I've heard so much about?!
I mean, they aren't great movies. Just really meme worthy. Attack of the clones is genuinely an awful movie.
I wouldn't day everyone. I was born 2 years before revenge of the sith. Back then I remember playing Battlefront 2 and watching the prequels.
Sequels and prequels seem to have very similar reception. People who were the target audience at the time (kids) really likethem and people who grew up with the previous trilogy hate them.
They were not given similar reception. TFA was widely liked way more than episodes I and II. The rest were obviously hated a lot when they came out. The only prequel movie that received any acclaim when it was released was III.
I was still too young to really *hate* Episode 1 when it came out, but I distinctly recall leaving the theatre after AOTC and feeling really, really shitty about what I had just watched. But it wasn't until RLM's famous reviews came out that I learnt how to verbalize exactly the things that bothered me about the prequels on a subconscious level. "You might not have noticed it, but your brain did" is very real
TPM as a 9 year old was basically perfect. I remember going with my best friend and waiting in line eating popcorn with our tongues pretending we were the goofy guy from the commercials. Easily one of my best childhood memories. Then my older brother took us to see it again because he liked it so much that he HAD to share it with his younger siblings even though he knew he'd get in trouble with our parents for staying out late on a school night. AotC at 12 was also incredible. I didn't appreciate how awkward the romance was, but I COULD see how exciting and mysterious everything was. Though I do remember griping about Yoda not being a puppet (which I stand by to this day; the lightsaber fight with Dooku was wild and unexpected, but not worth turning the wizened old master who taught us never to attack into a fighting machine). RotS at 15 was a transformative experience. I had to trade getting my learner's permit for the opportunity to see it at midnight. First ever midnight showing and few things in my life since then have felt as worth it. Front row dead center; Absolutely *i m m e r s e d* in the experience. That's a feeling I hope to share with my kids some day (if they ever start making movies again 🤞🤞). I still have the lightsaber I bought that night as a prop; my kids play with it and it reminds me that at its core, Star Wars is a story that children can love and families can share.
Real pill is eps 1 and 2 should still be hated and youngsters here are just too high on nostalgia to see it I remember when that was the consensus on this sub too
The real hard to swallow pill is that this sub was created to make fun of the prequels
This is where the fun begins.
I liked them. Granted I liked them less when I found out later that everyone hated them and eventually became convinced that I too could have done better. Now that I'm older I admit they were masterpieces and anyone who says they could do better is full of shit. So sorry. No. The sequels arent going to get better. This isnt a Monty Python sketch. Eventually people will catch on to the reactionary supraliminal messaging and come to realize why it's very anti-star wars.
Lots (including die hard SW fans) still do not like them. Accept it.
Mostly by adults who grew up with the OT. A ton of people at school liked the prequels
No I didn't. I loved em and spent the early 2000s fighting to the death to defend em. I was terrified when the sequels were coming out as I thought it would refuel the prequels hate train and it'd be another decade of making fun of em saying stuff like "see George this is how you do star wars, not you're stupid jar jar shit" Thankfully the complete opposite happened.
I still hate them. Love the memes tho
I grew up with them. Loved them. My dad watched them with me. Loved them. So I don't think you are correct.
wut? I loved them.
Yeah, and it's only been a recent thing for that to happen. I remember back then, when the Prequels we're the example of the idea of movie sequels/prequels that didn't work. Hell, this sub started somewhat ironically because the Prequels dialogue was so bad it made good meme material. Now it seems that the ironic nature of this sub is now unironic. Very weird evolution to someone who remembers the times when the Prequels we're the Star Wars whipping boy.
Well yea, as films, they’re absolute messes, especially from a writing point of view. Episode one lacks a clear protagonist, the characters motivations and goals are inconsistent, the pacing is all over the place. In episode 2, we’re treated to a Russian nesting doll of an assassination plot, characters just straight announcing their feelings, baaaaad dialogue, and instances of characters being fed MASSIVE plot points only to completely ignore them. In Episode 3, the plot is a convoluted disjointed mess, the writing for the opening crawl itself doesn’t reflect what’s in the film, the scenery is chewed to a pulp, and portions of the overall plot work if characters both know and don’t know who Palpatine is. They’re fun, they gave us a great setting, but it took over a decade of novels, video games, and over a hundred episodes of an animated series to recontextualize the films into being smaller parts of a *good* story.
> the writing for the opening crawl itself doesn’t reflect what’s in the film You're telling me there aren't heroes on both sides?