Star Wars the Review Wars

Between Anakin and the slapstick/toilet humor around Jar-Jar, there seems to have been an intent to capture kid appeal. There was a HUGE toy tie-in campaign, so that's a given, right?

...but then the plot is about trade embargoes and political theater.

Those two things (kid appeal and politics) DO NOT go together. And I think that thematic disconnect sums up the majority of the criticism toward the film and its poor reception.

Its also worth noting that Ewan McGregor has been straight up savage about the prequel directors and how they were not doing anything to help the less experienced crew.

Under Foot said:

Those two things (kid appeal and politics) DO NOT go together. And I think that thematic disconnect sums up the majority of the criticism toward the film and its poor reception

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What’s more fascinating to me is that “politics doesn’t belong in Star Wars,” which is a common complaint I’ve seen with this movie; particularly because of the reason you listed, this was a movie heavily marketed towards kids. George himself even said so.

What’s fascinating is that politics has always been in Star Wars. It wasn’t in your face, but it’s there. We only hear of the intrigue side of things in passing in the Original Trilogy, the most prominent scene being the Death Star conference room scene. But we DO see the literal conflict side of politics. That being: a rebellion against an oppressive government. The very conflict of Rebel vs Empire is a symptom of the political side of things.

Honestly if George wasn’t afraid of letting Episode I be mature, it could’ve been a very interesting spy-thriller type movie. But “Star Wars is for kids”.

Okay George, get back to me when Anakin isn’t committing a war crime during The Clone Wars.

Oh, there are certainly plenty of political elements in Star Wars. I think Rogue One and Andor cement how to do it right, but those weren't marketed to the younger audience. I think they learned from these stumbles and do a much better job now of knowing who their intended audience is. Young Jedi Adventures vs. The Acolyte, for example, which both take place in the same point in the timeline.

Phantom was just a collection of ideas with poor writing trying to make it stick, with directing bad enough that Liam Neeson had said he'd never do another one.

If you watch the behind the scenes footage from the making of this film it becomes painfully obvious that virtually everyone involved was afraid to question Lucas' creative decisions. Not because he was a tyrant, but because by that point the majority of the crew members were people who had grown up on his movies. For many of them he was probably their main inspiration for wanting to go into the industry in the first place. That veneration of him created a weird nervous atmosphere on set, with starry-eyed people ignoring their gut feelings because they figured ol' George could do no wrong. No one wanted to speak out against the ideas of a man they had idolized since childhood.

You see the cracks finally start to show after the first screening of the movie. Even Lucas was shocked at how bad it was, uttering that infamous quote "I may have gone too far in a few places". They try to blame it on there being too much going on, four different plot threads coming together at the end rather than two or three, etc. But I definitely think the failure of the prequels as a whole can be traced back to the unfortunate fact that Lucas was given too much freedom without anyone to challenge him. His ideas were sound for the most part, but the execution was fumbled.

Aside from that, I agree with almost everything you and the furry said as far as the flaws of the film, with a few exceptions. The Phantom Menace was one of the most hyped films in history, which makes it all the more disappointing that the movie itself is a bloated, boring mess with a disjointed tone, flat characters, and weak, uneven writing.