Much Better The Second Time Around

With a saga like Star Wars, there's always going to be some debate when a new movie comes out over how good it is compared to the others. I've heard Attack Of The Clones called the best Star Wars movie ever, and I've heard it called utter nonsense. For me, its somewhere in the middle.

THE BASIC PLOT

There's actually not a basic plot here. Its rather complicated, even more so if you're not a fan. In a nutshell, Attack Of The Clones is set 10 years after The Phantom Menace. There's some kind of political trouble, which may well be important to the third installment, so pay attention when you watch Attack Of The Clones.

Anakin is given his first assignment, which is to keep an eye on Padme after an assassination attempt. They spend the rest of the movie falling in love.

Meanwhile, Obi-Wan is on the hunt for the person behind the assassination attempt.

WHAT I LIKED

Straight after the aforementioned assassination attempt, there is a chase scene involving Anakin and Obi-Wan, who are trying to find out who tried to kill Padme. They already know why – someone’s trying to stop her casting a very important vote.

This scene has possibly the best special effects in the whole movie.

It also is the starting point for Anakin’s anger. It’s here that we see him start to break out and act on his own, rather than as Obi-Wan’s Padawan.

For the most part, Anakin is played brilliantly by Hayden Christensen. The parts where its not so brilliant are the scenes with Padme, but I’ll get to those soon.

Anakin should become Darth Vader in Episode III, so Episode II is the right time for him to start expressing his anger. Christensen pulls this off brilliantly.

Ewen McGregor returns as Obi-Wan Kenobi, and he’s starting to show signs of the old and wise Kenobi we knew back in the original trilogy as Old Ben.
In The Phantom Menace we saw McGregor portray Kenobi merely as Qui-Gon Jinn’s Padawan for the majority – until Qui-Gon died and Kenobi had to start acting a bit more mature for Anakin’s sake.

”Why do I get the feeling you’ll be the death of me?”

Uttered by Kenobi to Anakin during the sky chase, this seems to sum up Kenobi’s feelings towards Anakin for the parts of the film they’re together. I get the feeling Kenobi doesn’t want Anakin as his Padawan, but is doing it merely to honour Qui-Gon’s dying wish.

Very noble really, but not exactly helpful to Anakin’s development. However, McGregor pulls it off.

Natalie Portman returns as Padme Amidala. She is no longer Queen of Naboo, a fact many reviews I read soon after the film’s release got wrong. Nowadays she’s known as Senator Amidala. However, Amidala is still just as important as she was in The Phantom Menace. I didn’t fully grasp the politics of it, but I think if she casts that vote the wrong way then all hell will break loose – which is what some want.

So how does Portman pull off being a Senator with a bounty on her head? A lot better than she pulls of being lovestruck by Anakin.

I can tell she’s a great actor, but it’s a shame she doesn’t have some better material to work with.

This is the most active I’ve ever seen Yoda. This is probably because he’s a computer generated image (CGI) now instead of a puppet. It gives him the ability to battle just as well as any of the other Jedi. It also makes him look younger than he did in the original trilogy – which of course everyone is.

Yoda’s personality hasn’t changed either. He’s still a wise old Jedi master. This time, instead of focusing on merely one Padawan, like he did with Luke Skywalker, we find Yoda teaching a class of younglings at one part. When I say younglings, I mean YOUNG. There’s no way they could be more than five or six. Showing Yoda as a teacher shows his wisdom, showing him with a cane shows his age.

Could we really get out of this section without going into the special effects? Nah, I didn’t think so either.

Yes, they’re amazing and spectacular and yada yada yada. You don’t need me to tell you that. But, for the amount of money spent on them, they surely deserve a mention

The scenery is amazing. Tatooine you’ve seen. It hasn’t changed a lot. However, we do get to see a couple of new planets, Geonosis being one of them. It’s a rocky planet by nature, which probably didn’t take long to think up, but it works well.

WHAT I DIDN’T LIKE

This section will be considerably shorter, because after watching the film for a second time I enjoyed it a lot more than the first. After watching it for the first time, I wrote a scathing review and gave it three stars. I could only come up with one good thing about it at that stage, which was that if you didn’t watch it you’d probably have no idea what was going on in the Episode III. If I could find that review, I’d put it here for comparison, but it was written in the days before I discovered Epinions.

Why did I hate it so much the first time? Well, there was a rumour going around that Episode II was going to be the one where Anakin became Darth Vader. According to the local rag, George Lucas knew about this rumour and simply let it continue, not saying whether it was true or not. Everyone I knew took this to mean it was true, so I left the cinema with a very bitter taste in my mouth when it didn’t happen.

So after getting over that disappointment, I could watch it again with a bit less prejudice.

What didn’t I like? For a start, Jar Jar Binks is still here. Why? He adds nothing to the story at all. There is no need to bring back a character that so many people hate. Its really not smart. Granted, there’s a lot less of him, but he’s still here.

Yoda somehow manages to use a cane for part of the movie, then take on Count Dooku in a lightsaber battle which involves running, jumping and flipping. I know he’s well skilled in The Force, but that’s just not quite right. However, its still one of my favourite scenes. I’ve watched it over and over and I always sit there cheering Yoda on.

The love scenes between Anakin and Padme. Oh, what pain! On the video, if you look at the deleted scenes part, you’ll see that they filmed a scene where Padme took Anakin home to meet the family. I’m glad they deleted it, but I wish they’d deleted more of those scenes. There’s way more than are necessary.

I know we need to see some background into the love between them – Luke and Leia have to come from somewhere after all – but why is it shown to the extent of scenes that belong in a chick flick? Star Wars fans don’t want to see that.

Then there’s the aliens. For a movie that was made in the days of CGI – they use it for Yoda – some of the aliens are just too humanoid. Let’s have a bit more imagination for Episode III thanks.

It’s hard to believe I’ve come this far without mentioning two of the oldest characters. (Actually, it’s hard to believe I’ve come this far. This word here is number 1265 which doesn’t count the pros & cons or the bottom line, making it my longest review to date, so if you’ve stayed with me this far, thanks.) R2D2 and C3PO (referred to from now on as Artoo & Threepio) are still here & apparently they’ll be around for Episode III as well. They’re in the cons section because as much as we all love them, sometimes Threepio just gets on my nerves with his prissiness and overall I just want to shut him down to shut him up. (I think Han Solo said the same sort of thing somewhere in the original trilogy).

As for Artoo, all he speaks in is beeps. Yet somehow, people manage to understand him. Threepio can speak six million languages (or something like that), fine. But how does anyone else know what Artoo’s on about when Threepio’s not there to translate? Plus he’s a stubborn little machine. Sometimes I think if he were a kid he’d be about eight years old, other times he’d be grown up. There’s just not enough consistency.

IN CLOSING

Seeing this on the big screen was a great experience. It’s the first Star Wars film I’ve seen in the cinema, so that bit was new and thrilling. There were parts I laughed at and parts I cringed at. Of course, you could say that about any movie nowadays.

Star Wars Episode II: Attack Of The Clones is possibly one of the weaker movies in the series, but its worth the price. Fans will enjoy themselves, whereas I’d guess if you’re not a fan, you’re not watching this by choice.