Tag: Star Wars

(Repetitive) Poetry

I sojourned down to Barnes & Noble for my weekly poetry meet up with Stephen Fry (oh how I wish I could actually meet up with Fry to write poetry!). It was a cool, crisp fall morning, just perfect in every way.

Today’s poetry is a continuance of the rigid forms I have been exploring, with repetitions and rhyme schemes and convoluted processes. It sounds burdensome, but when you get into writing within the form, it can be quite fun to see the poem unfold. Today I have two (one is quite long, which is why I only have two): the sestina and the pantoum which my spell check wants to correct into phantom. Anyway, the sestina repeats ending words in a specific pattern at length followed by a three line Envoi that includes all six ending words in a set pattern. There is no official metre, though I have chosen iambic trimeter for my sestina. There isn’t a rhyme scheme, other than the way repeating words might be said to rhyme. As given to me by my friend Bobby Callaway, the theme of my sestina was “double” whatever that may mean to me.

Double

I wash my face and stare
into the frosty mirror.
What I see there scares me,
or is it me I see?
It could be him that looks
at me from out that glass.

I wipe and clean the glass
and start to climb the stairs.
From each picture a look
at me as if a mirror.
Each one is tossed, a sea
of thoughts churning in me.

I want to know: who’s me?
My soul’s fragile, like glass.
The cracks that form, I see,
I lose my gaze, I stare:
each one a hundred mirrors.
I am compelled to look.

Within each crack, a look,
a gaze, another me.
Each one another mirror.
Am I hollow as glass?
Do they, at me, all stare?
All this I can’t un-see.

But now that this I’ve seen,
I’ll take another look.
With new purpose I stare
into the eyes of each me
and find, as clear as glass,
the clear answer in’th mirror.

I’m me and him, mirrored,
each self that I have seen
in every single glass
a different side, new looks
at the same old, same me
at whom each day I stare.

Envoi

Into the mirror I look
And now just see just me
into the glass I stare.

So there you have it: a sestina. By nature, a long poem as it takes time to work through all the ways the end words may be jumbled. It can continue indefinitely, but with each sixth paragraph it starts to repeat the way the lines end.

Onto the next, the pantoum. The pantoum has an endless number of four line stanzas, each line composed of 8 syllables, and ending with a rhyme scheme of ABAB BABA etc. At least, it should rhyme, but it doesn’t have to. Additionally, starting after the first stanza, the second and fourth lines of each stanza are repeated as the first and third lines of the next stanza until the poem ends, in which case the first and third lines of the first stanza become the second and fourth lines of the last stanza. The explanation will perhaps be clearer with my example. The repetition and rhyme often lends itself to solemn themes, so I have chose the Battle of Hoth, from Star Wars: the Empire Strikes Back as my theme.

Invasion: Hoth

It’s a cold, snowy day on Hoth
The battle lines are drawn in snow.
Lord Darth Vader, all black and goth:
fear in the hearts of rebels grows.

The battle lines are drawn in snow,
The Imperials cut a swath.
Fear in the hearts of rebels grows
of troopers, white visigoths.

The Imperials cut a swath
Vader at their head, a black crow,
and troopers, white visigoths,
rebel blood in red icicles flows.

Vader at their head, a black crow,
Lord Darth Vader, all black and goth,
Rebel blood in red icicles flows:
it’s a cold, snowy day on Hoth.

This pantoum is fun, a bit like a villanelle, but to my mind and poetical sensibilities, a bit easier to pull off.

I hope you have enjoyed this week’s poetical musings, with all their repetitions and fun-ness. I certainly have. Until next week, then…

An Ode to Odes

It was cold and rainy as I made my weekly trek to Barnes and Noble, a perfect fall day. On the trees the leaves were changing and in the air there was a crispness. I felt juvenated and alive. I sat down at a large table in the back of B&N and took out my copy of the Ode Less Traveled and began to read and write.

Today’s forms included the many types of odes. These days an ode can refer to any kind of poetry, but there are specific forms that are “proper” odes. Among those I attempted the sapphic ode, the pindaric ode, and the horation ode. A sapphic ode is usually written with three stanzas, and each stanza is composed of four lines, three of iambic tetrameter and one of iambic dimeter. I say usually because there are many variations possible within the form, but as described is the classic form.

An Ode to Stormtrooper Armor

All gleaming white, the armor stands,
the black insidious eyes do stare.
It clothes the Empire’s ruthless bands;
should just be bare.

It takes a hit, a hole appears;
the soldier dies, a flash of light
upon the chest: what poor career
the choice, a blight.

Why wear the armor bright? It yields
no benefit. The man beneath
just groans and dies. Bury him in fields
of green, the heath.

A pindaric ode is written in three stanzas. Each has a function, and while overall the meter is variable, each stanza must be composed identically in form. I chose to write each stanza with four lines of iambic dimiter, trimeter, tetrameter, and pentameter in ascending order. This ode need not rhyme. Actually, no odes need to rhyme as odes are originally a Roman thing, and there isn’t much rhyme outside of English.

An Ode to Stormtroopers

Strophe (Turn)

All hail!
the brave, the few, the true,
an Empire’s legion: stormtroopers.
They fight and die to win the Empire’s day.

Antistrophe (Counter Turn)

But they
cannot take aim or shoot
a straight and forward beam of light
at their targets, through “crack” and “best” they be.

Epode (the Stand)

Perhaps:
secret rebel dreams hold
behind their masks of white and black
to let the heroes live to fight back.

Then there is the Horation ode, which is much like the pindaric ode where the prevailing method of the form is that it remain consistent to each stanza. I chose three lines of iambic trimeter and one line of iambic pentameter. Just because.

An Ode to Barnes & Noble

I love thy smell of books
and coffee commingled in’th’ air
I love thy stacks and rows
of history, humor

of toys and games and Nook
the digital book for all
and desks at which to sit
to read and write a poem

There are a few other odes, some proper, some not, but due to the variability and required subject matter, I skipped them.

Lastly I moved to other forms and attempted a villanelle, which is a fun, favorite form that I love to try. A villanelle has no set meter, but does have a set rhyme scheme in which certain lines repeat. Usually it is A1BA2, ABA1, ABA2, ABA1, ABA2, ABA1A2.

An Villanelle Ode to Baseball

Baseball is a many pleasured thing:
the ball that buzzes, the bat that cracks;
it starts after the anthem rings.

Pitcher fires the ball, batter takes a swing,
he hits a double with a mighty thwack!
Baseball is a many pleasured thing.

The runner’s picked off, a sneaky sting.
He jogs to the dugout, bent back.
It starts after the anthem rings.

The submariner a curveball slings,
the batter whiffs, the ball glove smacks.
Baseball is a many pleasured thing.

The centre fielder to the wall springs,
he leaps and makes the catch at the track:
it starts after the anthem rings.

It all can change with just a swing,
a swift strike or a homer bat crack,
baseball is a many pleasured thing:
it starts after the anthem rings.

As usual, I claim no greatness or mastery, unless it be of fun and adherence to form. I do my best to enjoy the process of writing and sharing poetry, and leave greatness to the eventual tinkering and adjusting that is editing and the time that is the measure of all things. I only hope you enjoy reading my poems as much as I enjoy sharing them.

 

Pop Culture Poesy

This week I did make it to Barnes and Noble, I am merely late in posting about it. I went earlier in the day than I normally do, and perhaps as a result, my normal table was occupied. I was forced to find a table at the local Starbucks-in-a-bookstore that almost all Barnes and Nobles have these days. It wasn’t entirely unconducive to poetry work, though it was a bit louder than I am used to, more idle conversation less quietly browsing of the stacks.

This week’s poetical musings are in the form of the ballad and heroic verse. The ballad is written in a variety of standards, but most popular is one with alternating lines of iambic tetrameter and trimeter and a rhyme scheme of ABAB. Heroic verse is not mostly about Iron Man and Batman, but is in fact a simple iambic pentameter with a rhyme scheme of AABBCCDD.

This week I decided to dedicate my poetical notions to Star Wars.

The Ballad of Luke and Leia

Now gather round and let me tell
the tale of Luke and Leia.
The sandborne son, the Alderaan belle
their love, it’s true, a fluke.

Never had he known love at all
and she was much too busy
He knew only sand and droids tall
She knew politik privy

But she fell in with Imper’al types
and he came to her rescue
then they did kiss, an act most hyped
not knowing they were askew

For he was her long lost brother
and she was his own sister
then they will help discovered the other
still he, yet twice, had kissed her.

 

It won’t light the world on fire, but I find it amusing enough. Of note, my rhyme scheme is ABAC, and in the first stanza it really should “Leia and Luke” but it just sounds better the other way around, to me at least. Now: to my heroic verse.

Obi-Wan’s Confession

Dear Luke, I must confess to you a truth:
a move I made for your fam’ly in youth.
The move’s become a mistake you must now know
Before this ill advised, ill love can grow.
Your knowledge is not complete, I must tell
you things you need to know, this love to quell.
A single child you are not, now nor ever
have been. You have a sibling. If you’re clever
you will know of whom I speak to you…
Yes. True. The one I mean is your new boo,
the one you have now kissed: your sister.
Shall we now chalk it up to this, you missed her?

Again, nothing very profound or even that good, but again, it amuses me. I had trouble with the rhymes in this and the ballad, but I did my best. Some are obvious, some are clunky, but at least all rhyme. I do, however, like this idea of adapting pop culture to old poetical forms. I think I will continue to do so. Until next time, do enjoy!

Offerings

I almost didn’t go to my weekly get away to Barnes and Noble, but I pushed myself to go and I am so glad I did. It was a beautiful evening, one of the last we will have this year most likely, and the drive from my apartment to the bookstore with the windows down and the breeze blowing by was just perfect. I even got an idea for one of my poems on the way there.

Today’s offerings coming in the form of: the rubai, which is at least a twelve line poem with the rhyme scheme AABA, CCDC, EEFE and so on; the Rime Royal which is a seven line poem with the rhyme scheme ABABBCC; and the Ottiva Rima which is an eight line poem with a rhyme scheme of ABABABCC, and which is very similar to the Rime Royal. In that order I give you today’s poems. I written the first two in iambic pentameter, and the last in trochaic pentameter for those of you who know what that means (or remember from a previous posting.) Anyhow, after much ado, the poems. For real now.

Summer

The smell of fries upon the afternoon air,
it makes me hungry for a burger. Fare
with which I fill my summer stomach full
of times without a trouble or a care

The laughing little children remind me
of a simpler, an uncomplicated mead
to down and quench the thirst of adventure
of climbed trees, swum holes, and scraped knees

Oh, Ah! The summer time it tastes so sweet!
A truck rumbles with melody down the street
its back so full of treats and iced creams
the perfect thing to make the even’ complete.

 

Lament for Lars

Stark white stormtroopers swarm the moisture farm
they look for droids of blue and white and gold
the minions of an Empire mean them harm
Alas! for them to whom the droids been sold
Oh Uncle Owen tries the droids withhold
but blaster fire and death is his reward
as Owen, Beru burn in the courtyard.

 

Literary Snob

Night has fallen over rows of bookshelves
Among poets, authors, and the restless
I would say that we have lost ourselves.
At least these books have worth unlike artless
hordes of barbaric souls who pride themselves
having read the crummy soul-less awe-less
pulped fiction that’s all the rage these days
I wish I could burn them all in a blaze!

Ok, so that last one makes with some eye rhymes (words that look like they rhyme when they don’t really) and they all play a bit loose with the meter, but it was the best I could come up with at the time. Remember, these are but practice and folly. I make no claims to poetical greatness. I have fun writing and attempting the forms. I hope you enjoy reading them.

Whiff of Belief

J.J. Abrams needs to make us believe again.

What am I talking about? Star Wars. I am a huge Star Wars fan, ask anyone that knows me, or heck, just ask me. I’ll tell you.

These days I have to qualify that. I am a fan of the Original Trilogy. Capital O, capital T. That is because George Lucas, back in 1999, decided to give the world a horrendous film I’ll call The Phantom Menace. And then in 2002 and 2005 he gave the world two more films, which I will call Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith. Technically these three films are preceded in their titles by the words “Star Wars” but I shudder at the association. The Phantom Menace is just a horrible movie, all by itself, but to be fair half of Attack of the Clones and two thirds of Revenge of the Sith are passable as movies. Where they fail is in the Star Wars-ness. Sure, there are lightsabers and lightspeed, and lightning but there isn’t that magical ingredient that makes a Star Wars film a Star Wars film: belief.

One must believe what one is seeing.

All three prequel trilogy films, Menace Clones and Sith, are too bland and computer graphics heavy to make us believe. I didn’t believe a little eight year old kid was special. I didn’t believe his big, goofy computer generated Gungan friend was funny, I didn’t believe the politics were real, I didn’t believe the Jedi were noble, I didn’t believe Anakin was evil, I didn’t believe Obi-Wan was that naive, I didn’t believe Padme and Anakin were in love, I didn’t believe they were in a real galaxy on real starships fighting a real war in the stars. I didn’t believe any of it.

All three original trilogy films, Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi, make us believe. I believe that Tatooine is real. It feels hot, and sandy, and scratchy under the tunic. The twin sunlight blinds me in the day time and makes me wistful at sunsset. I feel cold on Hoth, feel the icy bite of the wind. I believe that Han and Leia are in love, despite their bickering and protestations. I believe that C-3P0 is funny because I cannot stop laughing at him. I believe that Jabba the Hut is repugnant, I mean, just look at the guy, all slimy and gross. You can practically smell him, and are thankful you cannot. The Millennium Falcon and Luke’s X-Wing feel real. I believe those spaceships actually fly through space. I believe the Rebels are in a desperate war across the stars with an evil Empire. I believe all of it.

And then Lucas sold Star Wars to Disney and Disney hired J.J. Abrams to make another Star Wars movie and I thought: “Here we go again.” I recently told my brother that my expectations were low. How low? I said something like, “it will be better than Phantom Menace but not as good as Attack of the Clones.” Boy, those are low expectations. Lucas did such a good job of destroying my belief that I cannot even feel excited about the prospect of new Star Wars movies. When I was a kid, through 1998 and the spring of 1999 I couldn’t shut up about Star Wars. I was at a fever pitch. They were my three favorite movies of all time, seriously, ask anyone, and here they were making another one!!! and I couldn’t be more excited. I hunted down every photograph, every scrap of pre-vis footage, every concept art drawing, every casting rumor, every set leak, every Bothan spy network intercept – everything I could find. And remember, this was early days of the Internet searching. There was no Facebook, no Twitter, no Instagram, no social media. Star Wars barely had a dot com. Some stuff I read in real print magazines, it was that old school of an info hunt. And then Phantom Menace came out and, oh, sigh, the disappointment. Disappointment that lasted and wasn’t assuaged by Clones or Sith. Disappointment that endures today.

Today I can know anything I want about Star Wars Episode 7. I just don’t bother to look, or to hunt. My disappointment is that bitter.

So what? Why am I going on about this? Because today I caught something, just a taste, just the barest whiff of something. Today I caught the whiff of belief. J.J. Abrams released a video from the set of Star Wars in Abu Dhabi. In this video he talks about the chance to visit the set, meet the cast, and be in Star Wars, all to raise awareness for UNICEF Innovation Labs and Programs. In this video, while he is talking, from stage right emerges a small alien being. The set is that of Tatooine, little huts and run down stalls. The wind blows and sand whirls. This small alien being is some habitant of Tatooine, some denizen of the dessert. He is hunched over, and walks with a slight limp. On his back several crates, two three times as tall as he is. In these crates, lashed together, are belongings and some form of foul. This alien shuffles from behind J.J. Abrams, stops, watches him talk for a second. Suddenly aware that something is behind him, Abrams stops talking, turns, and looks in to the alien’s eyes. For an eternity in a moment, they stare at each other. The alien then turns and shambles off stage left. Abrams continues his spiel.

In that short video, in that brief interaction, I believed that Tatooine was real again. I believed that alien was a real being, some background cast member from the outer rim on his way to set for a second unit shoot or something. For a second, I even believed that Star Wars could be real again.

Look, I know that Star Wars is just three movies. I know they are film fakery and industrial light and magic. But they are also a huge part of my childhood, my life, my cultural upbringing, and my psyche. I love them. They are a part of who I am. And that’s why this is such a big deal to me. George Lucas took something that I loved made something else like it, but trashier and called it the same when it wasn’t. And now J.J. Abrams is at the task, on the brink of doing something similar, and for the first time I felt that maybe he wouldn’t. Maybe Abrams could make something called Star Wars that would appeal to the adult me, be as magical and as life building as the originals were and are and will continue to be.

Maybe J.J. Abrams can make a true Star Wars film. I don’t know, and my expectations remain low, but today I caught something that made me feel young again, as when the Star Wars universe was new: the whiff of belief. And I think…maybe. Just maybe.

May the Force be with you all.

Catch the video here.

SWD: Death and Life

Lucas gets so much wrong, it is helpful to point out what he gets right.

(02:03:32-2:20:00)

This next section of Revenge of the Sith is a beautiful juxtaposition between the death of Anakin and the birth of Luke and Leia, and setting the two against each other is good commentary on what has been gained and lost, and the pointlessness of Anakin’s fall to the Dark Side: his children are born and Padme lives.

Oh, wait, that should have been what happened. Except for no reason at all Padme dies. Like I said earlier, I give up trying to make sense of this. Padme shouldn’t have died. Like Yoda and Obi-Wan, she should have gone into hiding and died later, when Leia was only two or three years old. After all, Leia remembers her mother, which is impossible if Padme dies seconds after giving birth. Lucas clearly wasn’t thinking of continuity or the best way to make a point. I don’t know what he was thinking, but like everything else, this feels like a first draft.

“Medically, she is perfectly healthy. For reasons we can’t explain, we are losing her.” Even the medical droid is confused and when you write dialogue like that, it should be evidence that something is terribly wrong. If it doesn’t make sense in the story, it won’t make sense to those watching.

I do so love the lowering of the Darth Vader mask. It is a chilling moment. Lucas has no problems constructing and shooting great visuals, although the Frankenstein’s monster moment and “Noooooooooo!” at the end is a little too over the top.

In the end, the kids are split up, and Obi-Wan and Yoda go into exile. The movie ends with a shot of the Death Star in construction and Luke looking into the twin suns of Tatooine.

Credits

SWD: To the Pain

Two brawls and a bunch of nonsense comprise the next twenty minutes of Revenge of the Sith.

(01:41:03-02:03:32)

“I will do what I must…” – Obi-Wan Kenobi

Padme unwittingly takes Obi-Wan to Mustafar, where he confronts Darth Vader. After a bit of nonsense from Vader to Padme where he offers to overthrow the Emperor and rule the galaxy, he tries to Force choke his wife and he and Obi-Wan begin their epic lightsaber battle.

Obi-Wan has a little to say, and it is all good. Occasionally, Lucas gets it right with the words he writes.

I know I have long said that lightsaber battles are to be about dialogue and conflict, not spectacle and flash. This is one particular fight that is supposed to break that rule. There is nothing left to say between Obi-Wan and Anakin. This is not a battle between the Light Side and the Dark Side. This is an unleashing of fury and frustration and disappointment and grief. There should only be unrestrained combat as both unleash every bit of emotion they have left on the other for all the perceived slights and wrongs and injustices perpetrated against each other and the galaxy. Whether or not George Lucas understood this is hard to say because every other lightsaber battle in the prequel trilogy has resembled this one, but even if he didn’t consciously decide the method of this fight, he got it right by accident. There is one particular bit where he could have gone even more vicious and it would have amped up the stakes of the fight. At one point, Anakin is choking Kenobi, and Kenobi only manages to get loose by kicking Anakin and both lose their lightsabers. What would have been fantastic is if both had merely continued the fight hand to hand rather than with weapons. The non-lightsaber lightsaber fight as it were in which they don’t need sabers to continue to pound on each other. As it is, both use the Force to grab their sabers and they continue the sword fight.

The backdrop here of the lava planet is perfect. It is violent, angry, explosive, and red hot. I give Lucas full credit for choice of location.

Where this fight is silly is its duration and multiplicity of insane locations where they fight. After a while it all becomes a little much. It should be quick, violent, and race towards its conclusion, not go from one ridiculous set piece to another.

When the climax finally comes, it is over quickly. Obi-Wan’s “you were my brother, Anakin” speech is actually a little heartbreaking. It could be viewed as a bit over the top or melodramatic, but it feels authentic.

Anakin then catches fire, after having been dismembered, and the film earns its PG-13 rating once again. The horror is brutal and I credit Lucas for leaving the camera on Anakin while he burns, both in his own rage and in the lava. This is the price for evil and it is supposed to be difficult to watch.

“I’ve been waiting a long time for this…” – The Emperor

Yoda confronts the evil Darth Sidious. After a bit of banter, both draw sabers and begin to fight. Sigh. Masters don’t fight like this. Both are too powerful to fight like ordinary Jedi or Sith. Even later when they throw the Senate at each other it is too banal for a battle between Masters. Neither one should be able to beat the other with mere sword fighting or Force throwing of objects and they should know that. This should have been a battle of words, of ideologies, of philosophy. A fencing not of sabers but of viewpoints. But such finesse is beyond Lucas and so we get a CGI sword fight and a bunch of CGI nonsense. The only thing Lucas does get right is setting this fight against the backdrop of the Senate, emphasizing what is at stake. While Obi-Wan and Anakin are fighting a personal battle, Yoda and Sidious are fighting for the universe. I just love the visual, despite the fighting, of the Chancellor’s platform rising into the epic arena of the Senate. The only thing I would have done differently, if I were to plot a lightsaber battle, is to have the place full of Senators, to have the galaxy literally watching the battle between titans. That being said, I think Yoda wins this lightsaber battle. He is small and quick and thus should easily be able to get inside of the Emperor’s defenses and strike him down. Eventually the fight ends as pointlessly as it begins with nothing really happening and nothing having been won or lost by either party. In the end, it feels like filler.

After all is fought and done, Yoda is rescued by Senator Organa and a burnt Vader is rescued by Lord Sidious.

(02:03:32)

SWD: Order 66

I will be dealing with two segments here because Order 66 comprises one whole ten minutes in which a few Jedi die and not much else happens. After that, Yoda and Obi-Wan try to retake the galaxy by themselves while Darth Vader murders a whole lot of people.

(01:19:15-01:29:55)

Palpatine’s solution to the Jedi spread across the galaxy is Order 66, a pre-programmed order in the clone troopers to immediately kill any Jedi they come across. The result is we see that most Jedi are rather easily killed, unless they are played by George Lucas’ son or are Yoda or Obi-Wan. I give that a pass because it is a staple of any action film. Main characters don’t die unless it is narratively necessary. Everyone else: poof. I give Lucas a C+ for Order 66. It is overwhelming convenient to have a bunch of clones obey an order that has them killing their Generals, but it is also the only way to have a bunch of Jedi die instantly. It works because it must as long as you don’t think about the fact that clones are bred to think creatively while also somehow being less independent to the point of accepting assassination orders without question. Such things just don’t make any sense, really.

Also in this section is place one of two where Revenge of the Sith earns the only Star Wars PG-13 rating. Darth Vader enters the Jedi Council chambers to find a bunch of kids hiding from his assault. “Master Skywalker…what are we going to do?” one kid asks. Vader responds by igniting his lightsaber.

No. I just cannot accept that Anakin feels the need to kill kids. But he does. Because he is evil now. For almost no reason at all.

Meanwhile, on Kashyyyk, Yoda survives his assassination, as does Obi-Wan on Utapau. Both are rescued by Senator Organa.

(01:29:55-01:36:38)

Aboard the Tantive IV, Obi-Wan and Yoda agree to return to the Jedi Temple to turn off a retreat beacon in an effort to save any surviving Jedi. Meanwhile, on Mustafar, Darth Vader shows up and murders the entire Separatist leadership. At the same time, in the Senate, Chancellor Palpatine elaborates on the “plot” by the Jedi to overthrow the Republic which, for some reason, must now be reorganized into an Empire and “liberty dies…with thunderous applause”. There is very little reason why a Galactic Senate unanimously cheers for a sweeping reorganization of the government. Senates don’t unanimously cheer for anything. But, as I said earlier, I give up trying to make sense of what is happening here. It occurs because it must and for no other reason.

(01:36:39-01:41:03)

Obi-Wan and Yoda are at the Jedi Temple. Having recalibrated the retreat signal into a stay away signal, they watch footage of Darth Vader killing Jedi. They decide to move against the Emperor and Vader, but Obi-Wan pleads to be given the task of confronting the Emperor. It is like the Jedi have never heard of strength in numbers. Why don’t they both go after Vader or the Emperor? I honestly don’t know. They divide and conquer themselves. Also of note: for some reason, Ewan McGregor shows almost no emotion at all. “I can’t watch any more” he says, but it sounds like he has ordered lunch and “I can’t eat anymore”. There is no emotion on his face. I don’t know why a good actor is emoting almost nothing in what is supposed to be a highly emotional scene. I must assume it is bad directing.

Obi-Wan goes to talk to Padme, the one surefire way to Anakin, and again, relating the horrible news that Anakin has turned to the Dark Side, he shows and emotes almost zero emotion. He should be weeping over the fact that his best friend has become the epitome of evil. But he doesn’t. To be charitable, I suppose Obi-Wan could be in shock, but if he is, it is the wrong direction. More emotion is better than no emotion in scenes like this, in my opinion.

Padme, for her part, insists on disbelieving Obi-Wan despite having heard Anakin admit to slaughtering Sandpeople in the last movie and after hearing a trusted friend deliver the truth in this one. But, I wouldn’t want to believe my spouse had become the epitome of evil either. To make things worse, she shows little emotion, too. This is what people mean when they describe the acting in these movies as “wooden”. Very little emotion and very little acting is going on. Ewan McGregor and Natalie Portman are simply moving around and reciting dialogue. There is little to no heart or depth to their performances, and as both are good actors, I again move to blame poor direction from Lucas.

Contrast that with the very next scene which shows Darth Vader, having murdered everyone on Mustafar, standing on a balcony crying. Why is he crying and no one else is? Why is he crying at all? He should be darkly elated, not crying. He is pure evil at this point. Pure evil doesn’t cry. I just don’t understand what Lucas is doing with this film anymore.

Twenty or so minutes have passed and we are about to get a whole lot of fighting. The movie is swiftly coming to a close with loud clamor and noise but almost no soul.

SWD: Fall from Grace

When the Jedi fail to arrest Chancellor Palpatine, Anakin arrives in time to fall from grace. Strangely, the acting of all involved falls from passable to execrable at the same time. As a writer, George Lucas sometimes goes off the rails but sometimes manages to get it right. As a director, however, I seriously believe he doesn’t know a good performance from a bad one. That is never more clear than in this next section of Episode III.

(01:09:05-01:19:14)

The fall of Anakin begins with a great little scene. Anakin is in the Jedi Temple, awaiting the outcome of the Chancellor’s arrest, while Padme is in her apartment. Both are looking out across the sunset lit landscape of Coruscant, looking towards the other. Padme has no idea what is happening, but she feels, perhaps through the Force, the weight of the moment. Anakin is struggling with his desire to save Padme using Palpatine’s dark knowledge while trying to do the right thing as a Jedi in defeating the Sith personified in Palpatine. This is one scene that Lucas absolutely nails. As a director, George Lucas excels at the emotional art side of cinematography. Back in film school, he was great at making little poetry films that were all mood and emotion. Here we see a little of that brilliance. When a director is able to work in their wheelhouse, the movie excels, and this scene is a little piece of that. The sunset of the day is also the sunset of Anakin’s life as Jedi, the voiceover from Palpatine and the look across to Padme’s apartment is his choice between two ends and his solitary vigil in the Jedi Council chambers signals how alone he is, without his mentor Obi-Wan or anyone else to show him the way. I love this little scene.

Anakin ultimately chooses to go to the aid of the Chancellor, unable to reconcile the evil of the Sith with the mentor he knows, especially with Padme’s life, as he sees it, in the balance.

Meanwhile, Mace Windu and three other Jedi we hardly know arrive to arrest Chancellor Palpatine, Sith Lord. One must note that here, at the beginning of the confrontation, Mace Windu says “The Senate will decide your fate” and when Palpatine responds with “I am the Senate” Windu retorts “Not yet” (01:11:24). I’ll come back to this later, but clearly Windu is hoping to arrest the Chancellor and have him stand trial for his war crimes.

Palpatine attacks and somehow manages to kill three Jedi without pause. No. Just no. Pause your copy of Revenge of the Sith at 01:11:34 or 01:11:38 or 01:11:40. In all three spots, while fighting one Jedi, Palpatine has his back to at least one other Jedi who could easily strike him down. There is a reason one man doesn’t take on four in a sword fight: there is no way to watch your own back. Palpatine would be dead, dead, dead. Having actually been a part of sword fighting choreography, I know how much work goes into making sure you don’t accidentally hurt the person you are fighting. From that standpoint alone I know how easy it is to accidentally give your opponent a good shot at your back or head or legs. Given that Lucas is making this fight up with the help of stunt choreographers either Lucas overruled them or his stunt guys aren’t worth much because this fight has obvious flaws. Meanwhile, this farce of a fight continues with one old guy fighting another old guy with obvious CGI spinning and flipping. This fight just looks dumb in addition to making no sense at all from a combat viewpoint.

I will also point out, once more, that fighting to fight is not what happens ever in the real Star Wars films. All the lightsaber fights in the original trilogy are about the dialogue and the conflict between characters, not the fighting with lightsabers. This one again misses the mark.

CGI Palpatine bounces around and old Sam Jackson parries until they are backed up against a window and fight reaches a climax. (Seriously, if your actors are this old, please make the fight more talk and less fight. It will automatically be better than geriatric actors trying to pretend to be the best fighters ever.) Anakin arrives, walking past the bodies of three dead Jedi to find Windu has won the fight with a “You are under arrest, my Lord”. At this point everything suddenly switches to melodrama. Ian McDiarmid, for no discernible reason, starts hamming it up. The “no, no, you will die” line is just horribly delivered. What is going on here? George Lucas has no idea how to direct actors. Pure and simple. McDiarmid is relying on what Lucas says he wants which is probably “faster, more intense” and this is what we get. I mean, how bad is this? This is as bad as kids trying to be dramatic without any idea of how to create real drama in a scene bad. By the way, Samuel L. Jackson is just as bad in this scene.

While Palpatine, for whatever reason, is trying to electrocute Windu and succeeding in only electrocuting himself, both try to convince Anakin that each is a traitor. Palpatine says “I have the power to save the one you love” while melting his own face. This is beyond silly. If this were actually happening I wouldn’t believe him because hello, face melting. And then Windu suddenly changes his mind. Remember back a few paragraphs “The Senate will decide your fate”? Well he suddenly decides to kill Palpatine. What? What happened to putting him on trial? Nothing changed, he easily beat the Chancellor in a lightsaber battle and then easily deflected all the lighting back onto the Chancellor’s face. Where is the immediate need to kill him? Even Anakin interrupts with a “he must stand trial” and Windu now claims “he has control of the Senate and the Courts, he’s too dangerous to be left alive”. Huh? Since when? The inconsistencies here are overwhelming.

Windu moves to strike, and Anakin cuts off his hand. What? Why not block the lightsaber? This is a perfect opportunity for a real, original trilogy style lightsaber fight, with the Chancellor goading Anakin on, Windu arguing with Anakin and a few slashes thrown in for punctuation. Lucas continues to miss every real opportunity while enhancing all the wrong bits. And Windu dies.

We come to the really bad bit. Anakin stops Windu from killing Palpatine because Palpatine might have knowledge that could save Padme. Ok. I get that. But, he watches Palpatine murder Windu, and then decides to become Palpatine’s Sith apprentice to gain knowledge to save Padme. Ok, with you so far. And then “every single Jedi is now an enemy of the Republic”. WHAT? Even the librarian Jedi? Even the innocent Jedi children? Even “your friend, Obi-Wan Kenobi”? How does Anakin agree in the space of seconds that Windu had to be stopped from killing the Chancellor to save Padme to every single Jedi must be murdered to save Padme and he is ok with that? This makes no sense at all. This is where I throw in the towel on trying to justify what happens. This just is too dumb.

The newly christened Lord Vader is about to show no mercy to grow in the Dark Side to save Padme. Luke couldn’t even justify killing his own dad to save the Rebellion and the Galaxy. How does Anakin justify slaughtering children to save Padme? Oh, wait, he is eeeeviiilll. Then again, this is the guy who slaughtered an entire village of Sandpeople because his mother died. I guess maybe the facade is that Anakin is a nice guy, but that doesn’t jive with much else we have been shown thus far. We are still supposed to have been believing that Anakin is basically good. He was crying a few minutes ago, about to do the right thing. Now he jumps to the worst possible thing ever? Nope. Not buying it. This is bad writing: a good character suddenly becomes evil incarnate because it is that time of the script. Yeah, I give up.

Tune in next time for the darkest moments of any Star Wars film ever.

SWD: The Man Behind the Curtain

After having receive the news that Obi-Wan Kenobi has engaged General Grievous, Anakin brings the news to Chancellor Palpatine. What happens next is supposed to be the second biggest reveal in Star Wars history. It is not.

Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith (01:01:56-01:09:05)

After Anakin delivers his news about the war, and Palpatine counters with a bit of cold water about Kenobi being “up to the challenge” the conversation shifts to again letting Anakin complain about his lack of status on the Jedi Council and the fact that the Jedi don’t trust him.

Let me say that these are valid complaints, but hashing and rehashing them makes Anakin just seem like the same whiny teenager that he was in Episode II. He is supposed to be mature and wise, but instead he just keeps whining about the same old things. Thus, he doesn’t seem to be growing into the incarnation of evil that is Darth Vader. This is supposed to be the tragic fall of a good Jedi and instead it feels like a brat throwing a temper tantrum.

Palpatine is supposed to be seducing Anakin with the Dark Side, but it feels more like he is offering him the candy the Jedi won’t let him have before supper. Palpatine mentions that he knows the force, both dark and light, and says that only through the Dark Side can Anakin save Padme from certain death. I don’t recall Anakin having ever told Palpatine about his vision or fear that Padme will die in childbirth. Palpatine is using knowledge he doesn’t explicitly have. It is subtle, but this is bad writing. You can’t have characters know things they can’t know outside of having read the movie script beforehand. A single mention from Anakin to Palpatine “I’m worried about Padme” and problem solved. Perhaps George Lucas forgot when he was writing, but someone should have picked up on it and mentioned it, because Palpatine mentioning it seems very out of the blue. How does he know?

At the same time, this scene illustrates the brilliance of Palpatine’s seduction. Overall, since Anakin was a little boy, Palpatine has been playing father and mentor. He has been building a relationship and investing time and energy into Anakin’s life. He has been building himself up to be the one person who couldn’t possibly be evil. Thus, when he reveals that he is, in fact, a practitioner of the Dark Side, Anakin is confused. Palpatine does not (yet) resemble the cackling, over the top evil that he expects is what a Dark Lord looks like. So what is he to do? His training says to strike without remorse or emotion. His experience tells him that Palpatine is a friend. His desire is being conflicted by Palpatine’s offer of power. Anakin has become a perfect whirlwind of uncertainty. If only this part of the seduction wasn’t hampered by whining and bad writing.

The rest of the scene is straightforward. Anakin draws his lightsaber to threaten Palpatine. Lucas tries to mirror parts of Return of the Jedi and fails: the dialogue is supposed to mirror dialogue between the Emperor and Luke Skywalker, but it feels like the actors walk into it and back out. It doesn’t feel natural for the scene at hand. Eventually Anakin decides to inform the Jedi council and not act himself, the first truly wise thing he has ever done. Palpatine continues to act just like a father. This scene is so good and so bad, all at the same time. I think George Lucas, by himself, is a fair writer. But he needs help and he needs revising. So much of this feels like it could have been so much better, or merely consistent, had someone else took the rough draft that was Lucas’ and smoothed it out.

The scene shifts back to Obi-Wan fighting Grievous, and the only important thing that happens is that Obi-Wan kills the General. The General burns up, foreshadowing what will happen to Anakin. I love that General Grievous is an avatar of Darth Vader: metallic, harsh breathing, lightsaber wielding, dispassionately evil. I hate that he gets so little development and screen time. I think George Lucas was searching for this villain since Episode I and finally nailed him down by Episode III. What would have made the prequels so much better is a consistent villain, and one that consistently mirrored Darth Vader without recreating him. Put together Darth Maul and General Grievous and you have that villain. Introduce him in Episode I, develop him in Episode II, and destroy him in Episode III replacing him with Darth Vader and you have a perfect villain arc. Sadly, this was an opportunity that Lucas completely missed.

The scene shifts back to Anakin informing Mace Windu that Chancellor Palpatine is a Sith Lord. Somehow, instead of merely saying “he told me so himself” there is a little back and forth and “I think” going on. This scene feels like it was written to go before the previous two and was moved around. Call this bad editing or bad writing, but it is awkward. It accomplishes what it is meant to, however. The Jedi go to ensure the Chancellor relinquishes his “emergency” power, and Anakin awaits the result of the confrontation.

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