This is the correct answer. A New Hope and Return of the Jedi are quite good as well and Rogue One is amazing, but Empire stands alone at the top and it’s not close.
Could be either depending on the order you watch them, but I’m really getting the giggles thinking about Rogue One ending with a record scratch and “I bet you are wondering how I got here!”
Could be either depending on the order you watch them, but I’m really getting the giggles thinking about Rogue One ending with a record scratch and “I bet you are wondering how I got here!”
Watching through them all with my daughter, started at 1, just finished 5. It's full of errors, like Obi Wan saying that Yoda had trained him and that he (Obi Wan) was as rash and impatient as Luke was. If I didn't know any better, I'd say that the people making episode 5 hadn't even seen episodes 1 or 2 and barely paid attention to episode 3!
Yeah, I can only imagine gen Z who didn't see the originals first and instead saw the prequels in theaters would put 3 over 5. For me the gap between 5 and the others is just massive, but I also love Star Wars and to me no movie has lacked that specific magic. Even if I need to turn my brain completely off for 2, 7 and 9 to be able to enjoy them...
Don't forget Mace Windu's fight with Palpatine, the only person who could outright beat him 1 on 1 (other than maybe Vader if he had the guts to actually try). Though I don't know why he had to wind up for that killing blow; that seems like a big writing/directing error. It's a lightsaber, just dip it down inside his face briefly and then scold Anakin for leaving the council chambers.
My personal order from best to worst Saga movies would be:
5, 4, 6, 3, 2, 1, 7, 8, 9
1 and 7 are kind of on equal footing for me (ranking is almost interchangeable), but overall I think TPM was just kind of a bad start to the Prequels (though they got better), whereas TFA was actually a somewhat strong start to the Sequels that got exponentially worse.
TLJ is flawed but great and would be higher if TROS weren’t such a cowardly backtracking shitshow of a movie.
ROTS is very nearly as hard to watch as AOTC, though it has some higher highs. I will personally never forgive it for forcing the most brain-twisting mental gymnastics ever to retcon ROTJ’s Luke-Leia “real mother” scene in the Ewok village.
Imagine thinking 3 is worse than whatever fucking mess phantom menace was.
Want to know why Qui Gon dies from a stab when no one else ever does? The man was fucking exhausted from carrying the entire film. Liam Neeson single-handedly elevates TPM above the other two prequels.
R1 and 4 is really hard to decide so both can swap positions, 1 is better than 2 because of maul, Solo could be a great movie if they didn't make the whole Han background happen in a few days, 8 and 9 sucks.
Here's the controversial take: that scale starts at 7/10 and goes down from there. Because Star Wars is a mediocre series overall. And I like the stories, but making a great star wars movies seems to be out of reach for Hollywood writers and directors.
I think a general sense of hatred of the prequels prevents folks from giving Revenge of the Sith its due. Lucas writing and direction improved greatly from Eps 1 and 2, and 3 is really a fantastic movie.
For the sequels, however, 8 and 9 are on equal grounds of suckage. I still say that 8 ruined any hope that the sequels had and 9 was just a dumpster fire of trilogy ending.
I'll watch 3 again on Friday just to prove you wrong
Edit: turns out I had just enough time between meetings this afternoon. Still pretty meh. It's no 2, but it still doesn't hold a candle to the original.
Empire is the best. It has solid writing, a clear vision, and is surprisingly tight in its execution. Just look at the duel between Luke and Vader, where every action they take communicates something about the character, it's not just mindless action filler. Hell, they even avoid the incompetent stormtroopers problem, as they only miss shots that are actually difficult.
RotJ has some silliness and the emperor's plan is idiotic, but it's still a satisfying end to the trilogy, even with the damn ewoks.
3 is improved over 1 and 2 but still has weak writing, spotty acting, pacing problems, and a lot of little issues that add up.
Rogue 1 is a mess. The droid is mildly amusing, Donnie Yen is full of wasted potential, and Grand moff Shrek is jarring, but everyone else is bland and forgettable. It's only saving grace is a cool fight at the end, but that doesn't excuse the boredom leading up to it. At least AotC was interesting in its incompetence.
7 is an empty husk. It wants to echo a new hope, but it doesn't know how to do that without just undoing the original trilogy. It's Star Wars designed by committee and sanitized by the marketing dept.
Bad mouthing TPM is beating a dead horse. Darth Maul is cool. Episode 1 pinball was fucking awesome. And everything else sucks.
The best thing I can say about Solo is that it was forgettable.
Last Jedi thought it was brave for giving us unsatisfying answers to the questions that TFA probably shouldn't have asked. Too bad it wasn't brave enough to do anything interesting or different with the actual plot, like having Kylo or Rey actually switch sides during the cliche "join me" scene. Wouldn't want a scene of him coming back to his mom looking for redemption and her needing to deal with the conflicting emotions that come from wanting her son back, but knowing that he killed his father. No, we couldn't do that, it would be too unexpected and different. And it wouldn't leave time for angry milking, the pointless casino quest, and unjustified paranoia driving a conflict that in no way serves the plot, and all the other time wasters that make up this piece of shit.
Yes, the Star Wars Holiday Special is better than RoS.
RoS barely qualifies as a movie. It's like someone took random pages from ten different scripts for possible sequels and shuffled them together. The Room, Troll 2, and Plan 9 From Outer Space are all smarter movies with better stories. The only things separating this shit from those movies are a huge budget and the Star Wars IP.
RotS has a special place in my heart since I grew up with the prequels. Getting to watch Anakin's fall into becoming Darth Vader was incredible. It really felt like the whole series had been building up to that one moment.
Solo is my favorite of the Disney offerings since it recaptured the fun of Star Wars. It's stupid and schlocky and I love every minute of it. Really wish it hadn't bombed and I blame TLJ entirely. We could be in a golden age of standalone Star Wars movies like Solo and Rogue One if not for TLJ and ROS ruining everything.
I'm surprised to see Solo so high. It was definitely way better than 8 or 9 and I 100% agree with you that the movie was punished for the sins of 8. Han meeting Chewbacca and getting the Falcon was great. The Parsec Run was made well and I'm glad they included it.
For me, the movie just has too much fan service. Han getting his gun, his vest AND his name in the movie was too much for me. Maybe it sounds nitpicky, but it was so much fan service that I felt disrespected as a viewer. It is almost like they wanted to bribe me with nostalgia so I like the movie, and that backfired. The overall pacing of the movie was alright, but every 10 minutes they had to add a "oh remember this from Star Wars?" moment and that was too forced for me.
"Fun" means something different to everyone. In general, I would say that if Star Wars ever had a consistent tone, "fun" isn't it. The OG trilogy is "fun" in the sense that there are brief moments of comic relief, but some may say the inventiveness and the world-building made it fun. The prequel trilogy is "fun" because it has rad lightsaber battles, but otherwise, they're terribly dull films.
I don't disagree that experiencing SW is fun, but the movies aren't really fun in my opinion. At the films' best, they're thrilling adventures, but incredibly dark in tone. A swashbuckling heist movie sounds like great fun and that it could fit inside the SW universe, but it doesn't seem like it has any of the hallmarks of any of the films.
When I think of Star Wars I think of a fantasy adventure in SPACE!
Luke swinging across a pit to escape the Stormtroopers and save the princess. The ear candy that is Jango Fett's seismic charges. R2 firing a lightsaber out of his head from Jabba's yacht. Yoda lifting the X-wing out of the swamp. Podracing.
These were the things George Lucas was really good at. Quotable, cheesy dialogue. Intense action scenes. Over the top drama. Eye candy.
I don't think of it as dark or complicated. It can tell dark stories, and I love what the EU has done in that space, but it's ultimately an optimistic setting where light triumphs over darkness.
That's probably where Solo belongs in terms of quality.
It just scratched an itch for me. Like they went out of their way to make a movie that catered specifically to my tastes and the things I enjoy in Star Wars.
The Battle of Endor is definitely the best space battle in a Star Wars movie. People give ROTJ crap because of the Ewoks, but to me they’re a non-issue, especially by prequel/sequel standards.