Episode II

[The Great Quail]

So, I saw "Attack of the Clones" a few days ago, and I have to say, I 
thought it wasn't that bad! It was *certainly* better than the 
Phantom Menace, that's for sure.

I have to admit, I was really worried about it, primarily because I 
thought that the kid playing Anakin Skywalker (Hayden Christensen) 
would be lame -- which is reasonable, based on what I saw of him in 
the previews. I was very pleasantly surprised to discover that in 
context of the whole movie, he did a good job. I thought he'd be 
played as a Dawson-Creek style teenager who is basically good but 
vacuous, until a catastrophic event places him on the path of evil. 
But from the very beginning, his character was a lot darker than I 
was expecting -- he does some rather surprising things, and he 
actually espouses the political viewpoints I would expect from a 
young Darth Vader. (Or Brock Vond!) (I though the politics overall 
were fascinating, and I have to admit, at times I was geekishly 
thrilled to be seeing the development of the Empire!) And the tension 
between Anakin and Obi Wan was well played (more thanks to the actors 
themselves than the dialogue, which while better than Episode I, 
still had many cringe-worthy elements.) Ewan McGregor has grown into 
the role, his Obi Wan obviously having difficulty balancing his own 
rebellious tendencies with his responsibilities to train his even 
more extreme disciple. Their relationship had both genuine warmth and 
believable tension, two things missing from "Phantom Menace."

Even the romance wasn't as cheesy as I thought it would be, although 
the dialogue again was pretty cliched. And a greater attention to 
humanity was brought to secondary characters as well -- Jango and 
Boba Fett were actually sympathetic, and Christopher Lee's Count 
Saruman (Oops, "Dooku") was a much better bad guy than the 
underdeveloped Darth Maul. And, yeah, Jar Jar is in it again, but his 
screen time is mercifully short, and his idiocy is actually exploited 
by the bad guys. And Watto is also present, looking even more like a 
distasteful Semitic stereotype. (But at least there were Jawas! More 
Jawas!!! I want Episoide III to be called "The Jawa Jubilee.")

Needless to say, the special effects were fantastic, and there's a 
chase scene through the cities of Coruscant that just blew me away -- 
it took "The Fifth Element" and crossed it with the planet Trantor 
from Asimov's "Foundation" series, and then raised it to the power of 
Indiana Jones. And the final battle -- heh heh. The CGI characters 
were a bit uneven, however, with some faring better than others. I 
wish that Yoda would remain a muppet, though -- the CGI Yoda doesn't 
seem quite real enough, although later he gets to do some pretty cool 
stuff. I just think the muppet Yoda has more personality and warmth.

So overall, while it was still a bit stilted and corny at times, I 
found it more mature, darker, exciting, and simply cooler than the 
last one. John Williams even managed to show some renewed interest in 
the score. Anyway, I plan on seeing it again while it's in the 
theaters....

--Q