Okay, I’ll admit it: I’ve never seen Star Wars. I know, I know, “sacrilege” or whatever, but I just wasn’t a fan of (non-animated) movies as a child. To be honest, that led to me not having seen many popular films. Now, I have come to realize that maybe I should finally watch the countless movies I keep seeing the memes, references, and allusions to in my daily life. After careful deliberation, I decided to start with Star Wars (simply because the other option was Harry Potter). Additionally, I chose to watch the Star Wars franchise in the order they were released, so starting with 4, 5, and 6, then going back to 1, 2, 3. I will not be watching/reviewing the sequels or prequels in this article because a) I don’t have time to watch nor word count to include them, and b) I heard the sequels aren’t that great. With that, I cozied up on the couch with a bowl of pretzel sticks each night of break to get through the ~7 hours of Star Wars ahead of me.
Episode IV – A New Hope
Starting off pretty strong, I liked this movie. Before watching, I knew the characters Luke, Leia, R2-D2, and C-3PO, but Hans Solo was a surprise to me. First impressions on the characters? I don’t mind Luke, but he’s a bit too…angsty teenager. He stomps away and whines too much. As for Leia,—I believe (writing this after watching IV and V) she’s Luke’s sister?—I really like her. She’s a great representation of “girlbossing” and I appreciate her command position. I’m also incredibly impressed on how her hair manages to stay perfect after she runs and fights. R2-D2, my man; he’s my favorite. His robot sass and witty comebacks are amazing, and the subtitles of “[Beep, Blip, Blip]” were so helpful—thanks Disney+! C-3PO on the other hand; dude is a yapper big time. He really needs to learn how to not say every thought that comes to that little robotic mind.
As for the storyline, I was surprised to see how short the Death Star lasted. I originally thought that since there’s a giant LEGO set and everyone makes such a big deal about it, it would be an at least two movie thing, but evidently not. To add, I was a little confused towards the end when Leia knows they’re being tracked, yet they continue to fly back to their base and then lead Darth Vader there—it seemed a bit out-of-character for her to give up to Hans Solo so easily. In other thoughts, I enjoyed Jabba the Hutt’s use of “bookie” (although that could just be my bad hearing) and was pleasantly startled when I learned storm troopers can, in fact, talk.
Episode V – The Empire Strikes Back
Any critiques I could have of this movie are trumped by my learning that none of it is CGI. The fact that all the scenes of the ships flying, maneuvering the asteroids, and blowing up is all model work is mind-boggling. The transitions between scenes is a little, well, iMovie-esk, but I suppose since it was made so long ago it’s acceptable.
The character arc with Hans and Leia is…not my favorite, however I much prefer it to Leia and Luke (I can’t root for a sibling couple). I would’ve loved to see her not have a romantic interest and just be a powerful woman leader. I recognized the snow scenes from my short-lived and impressively bad playtime on the PS4 Battlefront game (although I could’ve sworn they lasted longer) and we also meet Yoda! Yoda’s scenes are where I am heavily thankful for captions, as I could barely understand a word the little creature uttered. Happily, I now know where the “Seagulls” Bad Lip Reading video came from! Otherwise, not much to say, but probably my favorite of the two so far. I wish the action scenes were a bit more dramatic; I think a higher pressure soundtrack would help. Overall, it definitely made me excited to watch the last film.
Episode VI – Return of the Jedi
Words cannot describe my pain as Yoda died. Yoda’s death is one of the main reasons this movie cannot surpass the previous; he didn’t deserve his death :(. It should be noted however that the Ewoks make this a close second, because oh my goodness, they are just so cute! Their cute furry faces make this film 10000 times more enjoyable and I’m highly impressed with the work put into the costumes. Anyways, I think this movie was a great conclusion to the main trilogy. Honestly, I can see how the sequels wouldn’t be very good when compared to the ending of Luke defeating both the main villains and discovering Leia is his sister.
Additionally, I can tell the production and technology improved greatly since the last episodes, but maybe they should’ve spent a little more time making the greenscreens less obvious. Some scenes were pretty rough with the editing and effects added in post. Aurally, the soundtrack fixed the problems I had in The Empire Strikes Back with tension—I felt much more immersed with music behind the fight scenes. Finally, the ending of Darth Vader was done really well, and I think the message behind his not killing Luke is great: no matter how evil someone may seem, they have kindness inside them.
On the whole, these movies were really good and I’m pretty annoyed with myself for not watching them earlier. Episode V – The Empire Strikes Back is definitely my favorite, but I don’t think any of them are bad. I am now quite pumped to watch the prequels (and maybe if someone can convince me enough, the sequels) and further immerse myself in the Star Wars cinematic world!