The Revenge of the Sith is considered the good prequel, or the
least bad. This reputation is roughly correct. The film is better paced than
the other two but suffers from most of the same flaws.
Revenge of the Sith begins with a battle over Coruscant. Obiwan
and Anakin Skywalker lead a Starfighter attack in an attempt to rescue the
kidnapped chancellor aboard general Grievous’s flag ship. Flying through the
battle the forcibly land on the battleship and fight their way to the
chancellor where they are confronted by count Dooku. After a lightsaber battle
Obiwan is knocked out but Anakin defeats Dooku and at Palpatine’s urging cuts
off his head. They try to escape but are stopped by the cyborg general Grievous.
They fight and force the confederates to abandon ship. However the massive
space battle has heavily damaged the battleship, and with the escape pods
already jettisoned the heroes have no option but to crash land. Using his
skills Anakin manages to land the heavily damaged ship.
Returning to Coruscant Anakin learns his wife Padme is
pregnant. He is haunted by dreams of her death, similar to what he experienced
with his mother. Going to master Yoda he discretely asks what to do about these
kinds of visions and the grandmaster tells him not let go of what he is afraid
to lose.
Palpatine summons Anakin to make him his representative on
the Jedi council. The Jedi reluctantly agree to this but refuse to grant him
the rank of Jedi master. This infuriates Anakin who is further asked to spy on
the chancellor on behalf of the council, which Anakin sees as a violation of
the Jedi code and the betrayal of a longtime friend.
Anakin is summoned again by Palpatine who informs him the
republic has tracked Grievous to the planet of Utapua. He assumes the council
wants Anakin to spy on him and begins planting doubts in Anakin’s mind about
the Jedi. He also casually mentions the story of Darth Plaugus the wise: a Sith
lord who could allegedly prevent people from dying.
Obiwan tracks down Grievous on Utapau were the two fight one
on one. Trained by Dooku, Grevious wields four lightsabers at once. However
Obiwan easily holds his own and Grevious is forced to flee. Tracking him down
they fight again and Obiwan kills Grievous with a blaster.
Anakin informs Palpatine of Obiwan’s progress. In the
ensuing conversation Palpatine suggests Anakin go beyond the Jedi training he
received and allow Palpatine to teach him what he knows, including the dark
side. Anakin identifies Palpatine as the Sith lord the Jedi have been looking
for but is too conflicted to challenge him. Instead he goes to the temple and
informs Mace Windu. Windu. Mace Orders Anakin to stay at the temple while Mace
deals with Palpatine.
Mace and several other Jedi attempt to arrest Palpatine. Anakin,
unable to wait for the fight to end comes in to see Mace attempting to kill him.
Palpatine begs for Anakin’s help. Yelling that he needs Palpatine Anakin cuts
of Mace’s arm and Sidious uses force lighting to throw Mace out the window.
Horrified by his betrayal of the Jedi and desiring Palpatine’s knowledge of
cheating death, Anakin agrees to become his apprentice and is given the Sith
name Darth Vader. Sidious sends Vader to raid the Jedi temple while he orders
the clone army to turn on the Jedi. Taken by surprise the Jedi are easily
slaughtered. However Obiwan and Yoda manage to survive
The two Jedi reunite and raid the temple. Learning of Darth
Vader they split up Yoda goes to face the newly declared emperor and Obiwan
goes to track down Anakin. Going to Padme Obiwan reveals Anakin’s deeds and
follows her to Mustafar, where Anakin has killed the Separatist council. Anakin
argues with Padme and chokes her out, then fights Obiwan. At the same time Yoda
duels Emperor Palpatine. He fights the Sith to a draw but is forced to retreat.
As the duel between Obiwan and Anakin continues Obiwan takes the high ground on
a lava bank and cuts Vader down as he attempts a jumping attack. Obiwan takes
Padme to a medical facility where she gives birth to twins but dies soon after.
The Twins Luke and Leia are split up while Obiwan and Yoda go into hiding
unitll the time is right to strike back
This movie is better paced than the first two prequels and
to some extent better written. The exposition has been spread out with action
scenes and often comes off as more natural but not quite as natural as it
should be. The love story of Anakin and Padme still comes off as poorly
written, and Anakin often behaves more like an angry child than a Jedi general
charged with leading thousands of men into life or death situations. The ending
of the movie is also week, having more to do with putting everyone in the
proper place for the next movie rather than ending the movie properly as a standalone
piece.
The action in this movie is perhaps the most jam packed of
any Star wars Movie thus far. Staring off with the battle of Coruscant we see
warships blasting each other with turbo lasers and mass dogfights, however the
dogfights are somewhat weaker than in the original trilogy and the sequels,
which focused on tension filled dogfighting. But the highlight of the action is
the lightsaber fights, Anakin vs Dooku, Mace vs Sidious Obiwan vs Grievous and
Yoda vs Sidious are all great fights.
Perhaps the best part of the movie is Palpatine. While some
have called his performance over the top, I enjoyed the wide range of emotion
and the characters subtle manipulation of everyone on his road to seizing power
While Revenge of the Sith does not quite hold up to the
original trilogy but it does hold up. Its not a great movie but it can
hesitantly be called a good movie. It’s at least worth watching in full.
7 out of 10
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