wars – Page 2 – a simple man

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.

(01:09:05)

SWD: Wars and Rumors of Wars

After spending an entire day following Anakin around, the action and point of view of Episode III splits to follow Anakin and Obi-Wan’s separate plot arcs. Also the action portion of Revenge of the Sith starts to get going again, which means we are treated to more CGI battles and computer wizardry.

Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith (00.48.00-01:01:56)

I start first with Obi-Wan Kenobi’s journey. The Jedi Council meets via hologram and real time from Coruscant to Kashyyyk. Yoda is operational with the Wookiees (and hey! look, Chewbacca in a totally pointless cameo). Anakin presents the news he learned last night, one wonders why he didn’t inform the Jedi immediately, it isn’t like the war sleeps, and the Jedi decide that Obi-Wan should be the one to hunt down General Grievous.

I give Hayden Christensen props for this scene. He conveys the hope and enthusiasm that his character feels when he gives Palpatine’s recommendation that Anakin be sent to find the droid general and the disappointment when the suggestion is shot down. Anakin really is hoping for a relief from this infighting and political scheming, something for which he has no patience. Christensen gives us that with just his eyes and a few small gestures. Good acting is so rare in the Star Wars prequel trilogy that I like to point it out whenever possible.

Back to Chewie. Other than fan service, why is he here? I really can’t figure out a valid reason. Nothing in the original trilogy suggests he is anything other than a smuggler who partnered with Han Solo. Bringing Boba Fett in as the clones was also semi-pointless, but at least that served a bad plot reason. Here Chewie exists merely to exist.

Anyway, Anakin and Obi-Wan say goodbye in a scene that accomplishes nothing except to show Obi-Wan to be a massive idiot. He praises Anakin and his abilities mere minutes after Kenobi, Yoda, and Windu had a conversation about how unpredictable and immature Anakin is. Sure, Obi-Wan was defending Anakin in that scene, but it is clear that what the other Jedi are discussing is common knowledge for the Jedi council. If nothing else, it is an informative conversation for Kenobi. The point is: Anakin isn’t what Obi-Wan says he is, and the audience knows it. Thus, this scene simply shows that Obi-Wan is either a moron or woefully naive. Either are bad qualities for your main supporting character who is supposed to be wise. I’ll grant that this is probably supposed to be foreshadowing Obi-Wan’s big failure training Anakin, but at this point, Anakin is trained. Master is splitting from apprentice. There is no reason for Obi-Wan not to be realizing that he completely messed up with Anakin. And if he secretly does, why all the praise? Why not a last ditch effort to train? This scene is just badly written.

After this, all of Obi-Wan’s scenes are traveling to Utupau and finding General Grievous and starting to fight him. The action is mostly empty CGI and a stupid lightsaber battle in which the general has four lightsabers because Anakin fought with two in Clones because Darth Maul had a double lightsaber in Phantom. Seriously, lightsaber battles are not about spectacle but conflict. The number of blades and the flashy flashy lights might wow a kid (probably the real point) but none of the lightsaber battles in the original trilogy were meant to be flashy first. They were to accentuate the conflict between characters. Here the conflict is almost nonexistent and the flash is everything. The dialogue is stupid and there is no build up of what it means for Kenobi to fight the General and vice versa. Also with droid reflexes and four lightsabers, I don’t care how good Kenobi’s Jedi defense is, the General wins.

Back to Anakin. He has another vision of Padme in pain, this time with Obi-Wan in the picture. This leads to a very awkward conversation between Anakin and Padme about the stress that Anakin is under and something about Anakin feeling lost which because of bad writing and lame acting just sounds like whining. Seriously, if you as a director cannot give direction to your actors, hire someone else. Hayden Christensen isn’t a bad actor, but he was badly directed.

I want to mention to that this subplot about Padme dying in childbirth is a stupid one. I think I already mentioned back with Anakin’s first vision, but no, women do not die in childbirth on Coruscant in the Star Wars universe. If she had been shown being killed in battle or something, yes, that is a valid threat, but in childbirth? I doubt anyone really took the threat seriously. This exists as one more example of bad writing.

Lastly, Anakin is shown being given an assignment: give Palpatine news that Obi-Wan has engaged Grievous and judge his reaction. After he leaves, Mace Windu finally gets the idea that the Chancellor is evil and might not step down as Chancellor after the war is over (because apparently he is only in power for the duration of the war). This leaves the Jedi with the choice to remove him from office or not by force.

What? Why not allow the good senators to at least try to make a motion for the Chancellor’s dismissal? Even if all the rest of the Senate is evil and under the Chancellor’s sway, are there not those that stand by rule of law? Make him make a move to stay in power before just summarily removing him. Make him justify the use of force. The point here is that once again, the threat is not real or immediate. There is so much that could happen instead. When you have this big of a plot hole, or more correctly, this many loose threads, the plot unravels rather quickly. Nothing that follows necessarily needs to happen. I find it, as an audience member, frustrating when lazy writing leads to stupid actions on the part of supposedly very wise and knowledgable characters. Nothing adds up and it all feels dumb.

Anyway, Anakin is off to get a reaction out of the Chancellor while Obi-Wan is chasing down Grievous. Another day has ended on Coruscant.

SWD: Operatic Considerations

It has been nearly three years since I last delved into the world of Star Wars and my deconstruction of the prequel trilogy. Since that time much has happened in my life, but my love of Star Wars remains undimmed. I return to Star Wars Deconstructed and pick up where I left off: in the early part of Episode III, Revenge of the Sith.

To recap briefly, the galaxy is at war, and young Jedi Anakin Skywalker is at the centre of all the conflict, both professionally and personally. Currently, Anakin is enduring a very long day, filled with people in his life pulling him in separate, often conflicting, directions. The night prior he had a prophetic dream in which his wife died in childbirth, and the next morning Yoda could only tell him to “let go of everything you fear to lose”. At a morning briefing on the Clone Wars, he was informed that Chancellor Palpatine wanted to meet with him. The Jedi are not happy with Anakin’s close relationship with the Chancellor. Palpatine wants Anakin to sit on the Jedi Council as his personal representative. The Council allows the appointment, but only if Anakin will spy on the Chancellor for them. Later in the day, Master Windu and Yoda express distrust of Anakin while Anakin faces pressure from his wife, Padme Amidala, to use his influence with the Chancellor and the Jedi Council to foster her push for peace talks. Anakin responds with frustration at being used as everyone’s pawn.

That evening, he receives an invite to the opera, and meets with Chancellor Palpatine for a second time, and things get even more confused for the frustrated young Jedi.

Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith (00.42.40-00.48.00)

As Anakin arrives at the opera house there is a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo of Star Wars director George Lucas. He is dressed in fancy robes and is painted blue, so don’t worry if you miss him the first time around.

Anakin is drawn into a what will prove to be the first of several seductions from Chancellor Palpatine, also known as but not yet revealed to be Darth Sidious, Dark Lord of the Sith. In fact, this is his second seductive meeting of the day, the first was earlier when the Chancellor placed Anakin on the Jedi Council. Slowly, gently, and yes, seductively, Palpatine is giving Anakin what he wants while playing on his fears, his frustrations, and his failures.

Despite some stiff acting from Hayden Christensen as Anakin Skywalker, next to some somewhat subtle acting from Ian McDiarmid as Chancellor Palpatine, this scene works very well. The mood is sombre and underscored by the deep operatic singing of the Mon Calamiri who form the backdrop of the conversation. If only the acting were on par with the setting, this scene could give chills.

This time, the bait Palpatine offers is that the Chancellor, through “clone intelligence”, has discovered where General Grievous is hiding. This is what Anakin most wants as a Jedi warrior, his enemy where he can destroy him and he swallows the bait. Earlier, the Jedi council had admitted that the couldn’t find Grievous, and in his eagerness to find him and his blind trust in Palpatine, Anakin does not question how the Chancellor knows Grievous’ whereabouts. I give Anakin a pass for not calling Palpatine on this. His head is no doubt spinning from his back and forth day, and he has a lot on his mind as a result.

Palpatine dismisses his aides and invites Anakin to relax, and begins stage two of the evening’s seduction games. Palpatine admits that he doesn’t trust the Jedi council, and this prompts Anakin to confide the same. Anakin considers Palpatine to be a father-figure, and is taken aback when Palpatine somehow knows that the Jedi Council wants Anakin to spy on the Chancellor. I think Anakin should be slightly more suspicious of how precisely the Chancellor is guessing here, but again, I give him a pass.

This leads to a discussion of Jedi versus Sith, how they are similar, how they are different, and how all who seek to gain power are afraid to lose it. The dialogue transcends McDiarmid’s delivery of it, and his assertion that “good is a point of view” is spot on. I wonder if Lucas actually did write this part of the script because of how well it is written. I guess even a bad writer can occasionally get it right. However, right about the time when Palpatine offers up, sort of from nowhere, a Sith parable, Anakin should be getting alarm bells in his head. Trusted mentor or not, he has been trained his whole life to be wary of Sith philosophy, and to be on the alert for the Sith to return to prominence in the galaxy. How Palpatine knows this “story the Jedi would [not] tell you” is a question he should ask. Sith legends that promise exactly what you really, really want shouldn’t go unquestioned. As a former slave child, Anakin should have a defensive mechanism against things which sound too good to be true, especially from questionable sources, that is the Sith more than Palpatine from Anakin’s perspective. That he doesn’t question Palpatine and this story is an unforgivable logical lapse in the plotting. Even if Anakin eventually decides to side with Palpatine, he shouldn’t be so trusting at this point. At the very least Palpatine should have been forced to come up with a bad excuse for being so familiar with Sith philosophy and old Sith legends.

Also troubling here is the other side of this talk which rather directly implies that the legendary Darth Plagueis created Anakin Skywalker. This is a dangling plot point, not to mention a gaping plot hole. Why would a Dark Lord of Sith create a child and then abandon him to be potentially found and trained by the Jedi? Why not raise and train him yourself as the ultimate Jedi killer? This whole midichlorians-are-the-Force thing is something I wrote about in my deconstruction of the Phantom Menace, but here I will say again that a biological underpinning to a mystical power is dumb and unnecessary. The Force operates just fine without a biological source, and such a source only raises questions about Jedi and Sith and the entire “ancient religion” that they both adhere to. Furthermore, if a Sith lord can create life, why hasn’t he created an army of Sith and ruled the galaxy already. Why rely on his apprentice and a long con war to give the Sith a galaxy wide victory? None of this life-creating death-delaying makes any sense as presented. Even Yoda wasn’t powerful enough to forestall his own death in Return of the Jedi, so this super powerful Sith definitely shouldn’t have stopped with one Sith-Force-rape kid he then abandoned to the deserts of Tatooine.

Still, if you choose not to think of any of that while watching this scene, the Sith legend thing kinda sorta works. Anakin at least is thinking about it, and wonders if it is possible to learn this power and discovers that he can, just “not from a Jedi”. Seduction: underway. Who exactly does Palpatine know that can teach him? Anakin never thinks to ask and that is yet another example of why the Star Wars prequels are examples of bad writing: an incurious hero is a dumb, shallow hero.

Anyway, the action in Revenge of the Sith is about to pick up, which means so will the pace of my writing about it as I move through the rest of the film. I promise not to wait another three years before the next installment of the series!

To read other Star Wars: Deconstructed posts, search my blog for “SWD” or click “Star Wars” at the top.