Fun with Franchises: Star Wars Episode II – Attack of the Clones (2002), Part I — “This Movie Is an Ouroboros of Awful”
Today we continue with another entry in our Fun with Franchises series, Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones. If you thought last week was bad, you have no idea.
In case you don’t know how this works — a while back, I decided to rank my favorite Disney movies and rank my favorite James Bond movies. And the Disney ones were mostly straight synopses and not too much fun, but when I got to Bond, I enlisted the help of my friend Colin (whose blog is TokyoRemix.com. Fuck yeah, promotion!), who knows everything about the Bond franchise that I do not, for those articles, and along the way, learned how to have fun with it. And, by the end of the Bond articles, we were having so much fun that I said, “Man, we have to do this again with other stuff.” Because I spent about a straight month and a half putting together those articles. That’s how much time and effort actually goes into something like that. And not once did it feel like work. It was so much fun that I knew, as long as we were doing it for comedy purposes and able to riff off of each other — we could do pretty much any film and it would work.
And very quickly, the first ones you come up with are the major franchises, because those are not only the most fun, but also the most universally known. Everyone’s gonna understand all the jokes we make (well… most of them. Some of them might be limited to three people) about them. So that’s what we’re doing. And if you’re gonna have fun with franchises, it wouldn’t be right if you didn’t franchise it. Also, just so we’re clear, this is all for parody. We’re just messing with them because we love them.
And that’s Fun with Franchises. Right now, we’re doing the Star Wars franchise, and today is the first part of Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones.
Yup.
Colin:
I’ll tell you all right now – going into this, this is the film that I’ve always been most upset about. For a number of reasons. But it’s really neck and neck with Phantom Menace, so this is going to be a chance for Episode II to redeem itself a tiny bit. Not holding my breath, though.
Let’s analyze that title scroll:
“There is unrest in the Galactic Senate. Several thousand solar systems have declared their intentions to leave the Republic.”
Because that’s what we want to hear about? POLITICAL STUFF! Because what is the crux of this movie? Political maneuverings. Finding out which systems are going to secede is really what I’m here for.
What the fuck, George?
Colin:
I like the word “unrest,” since it kinda makes you thi—oh. Never mind, they were referring to unrest in the Galactic Senate. Anything I was about to say is now useless.
So we have systems threatening to leave the Republic. Did George catch Ken Burns’ The Civil War or something? Secession! Boo taxes! Let us keep our slaves droids! (Can Daniel Day Lewis PLEASE play Palpatine in any future Star Wars films that he appears in?)
Ralph Fiennes. Just have him do it. Just so he can yell “NYAHHH!!!” more.
But you know what — it’s not awful. It’s only okay if you follow it up with something worthwhile. Since that is where we’re supposed to be. The Republic is falling apart. So let’s give them the benefit of the doubt as we move to…
“This separatist movement, under the leadership of the mysterious Count Dooku, has made it difficult for the limited number of Jedi Knights to maintain peace and order in the galaxy.”
Colin:
Heh. Dooku. Dooku cloud. That’s coming up.
Yeah, you lost me. Big political shit — oh, but that doesn’t matter, because it’s really the Jedi who are keeping things in order. Because without them, everyone would be fucked. Because apparently intergalactic democracy just doesn’t work. Why did you waste two paragraphs on this? This could have been a single paragraph. But I’ll get to why that can’t be in a second.
Colin;
What’s this about Jedi Knights maintaining peace and order in the galaxy? First of all, there’s not NEARLY enough of them to have one stationed on every planet in the galaxy, let alone maintain peace and order. Why isn’t there a Galactic Army or police force already in place? The problem is that this whole galaxy is knit together like, for example, the United States of America – but we don’t hear about threats from outside the galaxy, so there’s never a need for a fighting force. Until after the original films, when an invasion from another galaxy happens.
But at any rate, it doesn’t make sense to me that the Jedi play such an enormous role in running shit. They aren’t elected or appointed, they seem to make their own decisions, they’re far too few in number to do the job, and it seems like they just sit around most of the time anyway! What kind of strain are they under? Does Mace Windu get cramps from sitting too long?
“Senator Amidala, the former Queen of Naboo, is returning to the Galactic Senate to vote on the critical issue of creating an ARMY OF THE REPUBLIC to assist the overwhelmed Jedi…”
Colin:
Oh, she’s a senator now! You can bang a senator. It’s even encouraged sometimes.
All right… let’s go one at a time…
You didn’t mention Obi-Wan OR Anakin in the synopsis. And, last I checked… these prequels were ABOUT the two of them!
But they’re not. Are they? These prequels are really about the fall of the Republic and birth of the Empire. They just happen to also be about the tragedy of Anakin Skywalker. Lucas is sending mixed messages. You can’t introduce Anakin as a major player in the first movie and then not mention him to start movie #2. You can’t do it. Either don’t give him so much screen time (CUT OUT THAT FUCKING POD RACE!), or maybe mention what he’s been doing in one of the paragraphs. We don’t care about a separatist movement. We care about what the people we know are doing.
So that’s one.
Colin:
Also, note that there’s no mention of Anakin. Or Obi-Wan. Or Palpatine. I guess that makes sense cause we still don’t know about him. So whatever. But Anakin and Obi-Wan? Who is this movie about? Is Padme our main character?
(DRINK!)
And two — is that really our big hook for the movie — Padme is going to vote on creating an army? Remember when the entire galaxy was in the balance? Now we’re talking about a fucking SENATE VOTE!
No idea what the dude who is supposed to “bring balance to the Force” is up to, but goddamnit, we got a senate vote!
Colin:
It says she’s going to the Galactic Senate to vote on the act to create an ARMY OF THE REPUBLIC to assist the overwhelmed Jedi. First, why is she not there to begin with? Is she on vacation? And then, it doesn’t tell you how she plans to vote. As we find out later…well, we’ll burn that bridge when we come to it.
I don’t want to go too crazy on this, because you know what? It’s impossible to make this better. Because Lucas doesn’t know what he wants. He doesn’t know what story he wants to tell, and he ends up not telling any story. That’s what the problem is. He doesn’t know what the main plot is supposed to be, and because of that, there are no stakes. So the title scrolls can’t be better, because there is no story.
Think about all the films in this franchise. All six of them. If I ask you to tell me what the first three are about, you can do that. These three? You wouldn’t know where to begin. Except the third one, which is the closest one to resembling a real movie.
So you can’t really do anything with this title scroll. Let’s just move onto the movie itself. Since we have lots to talk about there…
We open with an awful first shot:
These first shots are getting worse by the film.
Colin:
Why such a complicated opening shot? One ship does it. That’s all you need. I like the Naboo ships a lot, but this was a bit much.
And he clearly cannot resist throwing shit in front of the frame.
And we see he loves these World War II style bombers.
Colin:
This is one of my pet peeves. Maybe it’s only because I’m a plane nerd, but it bugs me how movies referencing WWII-era aircraft always do flying wings. Like in Raiders of the Lost Ark, that plane was complete bullshit. It was 1936! Nothing even remotely resembling that plane was flyable, let alone in production at that time. There were concepts and stuff, but nothing that really worked even a little bit until the end of the war, and nothing ever got USED.
In fact, there wasn’t a flying wing in production until the B-2, which entered service in 1997. So why the fixation on flying wings? That one in Captain America was complete bullshit, along with the rest of the film. All the other vehicles in these movies are period-appropriate. Never got it.
Colin Hanks is in this?
“Senator, we’re making our final approach to Coruscant.”
This would probably be better if we hadn’t been to Coruscant before. Remember how Empire began on a place we hadn’t seen yet?
You know it’s bad when Sky Captain looks less CGI than your movie.
Colin:
Since when has Coruscant been so cloudy? With the silvery buildings popping out, it’s all very art deco. What’s Lucas going for, The Rocketeer? Oh. I just checked. That was ILM, too. Moving on.
Is this where Neo and Trinity were trying to get to?
Look at this spruce goose.
Colin:
Now THERE was a cool plane. The HERCULES! My, she was yar.
Yar Yar Binks.
I like foggy days. Fog is pretty great as a thing and as a storytelling device.
All computers. It’s disgusting.
Colin:
Where’d the ladder come from?
The same place everything else came from.
Though you know what this reminds me of? The Sims.
Remember when you’d have a Sim go into the pool and sell the ladder while they were in it? What fucking idiots they were. They died because they couldn’t get out of a pool.
I used to think of real fun ways to make my Sims die. Like roping them off in red carpet velvet ropes and having them unable to do anything because they couldn’t figure out how to STEP OVER THEM.
Though my personal favorite is when I’d build them a little four room house thing (basically putting four walls around them as small as they can go), keeping them in there, and giving them only one object — a firework. So they’d light off the firework, and the whole fucking place would burn down.
Man, those were the days.
“We made it.” He says, referring more to his race’s role in the films than the landing.
“I guess I was wrong. There was no danger at all.”
Colin:
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
Who’s this new guy, anyway? Is he the Don Cheadle to The Phantom Menace’s Terrence Howard?
COMPUTERIZED STUNT FALL!
OH MY GOD LOOK AT THAT RUN.
You’d think people would get the idea now that she has doubles. Also – the ship blew up after it landed. Wouldn’t you set the charge or whatever to blow before they land? The assassination attempt makes no sense.
You think there was some Valkyrie shit going on before this happened?
But seriously – why not take them all out? This entire plan seems flawed on every possible level.
Colin:
But seriously, wouldn’t you detonate that bomb in space where it would have a 100 percent chance of killing EVERYONE? Who taught you how to assassinate?
Drive-bys are still always the best method.
Oh please, stop acting so sad. What the fuck did you hire her for in the first place? This is EXACTLY what her purpose is.
(I hope you people have the bottles sitting next to your screens, because…)
Colin:
Failed her? That’s EXACTLY what you were hired to do! Your job was to be a brunette and to get blown up. Done and done.
Wipe yourself off… you’re bleeding.
Oh, wait… wrong franchise.
Colin:
I applaud any reference to that franchise.
And she apologizes as she dies. “I failed you, Senator.”
NO! This is what you were supposed to do! You SUCCEEDED! You were hired because you look like her so if anyone tried to kill her you’d die instead. In no way was that a fail on your part. You have totally succeeded at your job. If you failed, they wouldn’t have tried to kill you because they’d have known you weren’t her.
Remember when Lucas replaced one black sidekick with another black sidekick and nobody noticed?
That’s not the dude who was with her last movie. That dude didn’t die, either. They just replaced him with a different black guy and pretended like nothing happened.
STOP CRYING OVER AGENT SAUNDERS!
“Goddamnit, bitch, that was her JOB! Man, I’m sick of these white women…”
That should be the tagline for everything: Man, I’m Sick of These White Women.
Colin:
Why you think I moved to Tokyo?
Also, she’s now Senator Amidala. They’ve told us this three times already. You’d think maybe they’d explain why she went from monarch to political representative rather than just making it a thing we’re supposed to accept out of nowhere.
Colin:
Nice name drop, you one eyed asshole. Fucking Cyclops. I hope you dieclops.
We never see under the patch, do we? Because the last thing we need is more CG… eye.
Captain Typho:
.(
I like how R2 is just wandering around the wreckage. Why have him in the shot if he has nothing to do?
Ah… the Staples Center.
Nice office, Palpatine.
Palpatine is negotiating with the separatists. He says they “will not fail.”
Colin:
I always forget who we don’t negotiate with. Here I was thinking it was ‘separatists,’ but maybe it was ‘terrorists?’ No, wait. Maybe ‘acupuncturists?’
I don’t negotiate with puppies or kittens. Because you’re putting out deal points, and they’re like, “But I don’t know what puzzles is,” and you’re like, “Aww… how can I argue with you?” And then you get elected for a second term in 2004.
“If they do, you must realize there aren’t enough Jedi to protect the Republic. (Motherfucker.)”
So Jedi are the only measure of peace-keeping in the galaxy? Remember when people had armies and shit? You make like this privatized security force is the only means of safety.
But Nick Fury would say that, wouldn’t he?
Colin:
This dialogue is a bit too tame for Samuel L. Jackson.
“We’re keepers of the peace. (Motherfucker.) Not soldiers.”
Yoda had more personality as a muppet.
Colin:
“The Dark Side clouds everything. Impossible to see, the future is.” Motherfucker! The fuck are we paying you for?!
Who is this motherfucker?
(Also, nice dreads, buddy.)
Colin:
Holy shit! Look in the background, there’s the Imperial Guards! They were there the whole time! So if you hadn’t picked up on it by now, there’s the dead giveaway. Aw man, this ruins one of my observations in the next film, but I’m leaving it in because it amuses me.
DEAD GIVEAWAY!
(So they basically are the Secret Service, then.)
Suspicions. (I think.)
Yoda says some bullshit about Amidala being alive. Whatever, motherfucker. What happened to crazy cooky Yoda? Why is he so solemn?
Is that Rose Byrne? What’s she doing here?
But anyway, Padme wants to know who did it.
“Our intelligence points to disgruntled spice miners on the moons of Naboo. (Motherfucker.”)
Colin:
Those disgruntled spice miners, man. They’re bad news. You know what it’s like being seasoned to death? No, of course not. Cause you’re sitting there reading this, not being delicious.
Padme thinks Count Dooku is behind it.
What kind of motherfucker is named Count Doodoo?
“You know, my lady, that Count Dooku was once a Jedi. (Motherfucker.) He couldn’t assassinate anyone. It’s not in his character. (Motherfucker.)”
So what? Did he stop being a Jedi? How do you stop being a Jedi? Did he lapse in his Force training or something? Gave up the faith? I thought once you were a Jedi, that’s what you were. Also, how does him formerly being a Jedi make him unable to commit murder? “Oh, he used to be an orphan, so he couldn’t have kicked that little orphan in the face.” Motherfucker, they’re not mutually exclusive. The fact that he’s not a Jedi anymore makes it entirely possible that he could have assassinated someone.
Colin:
It’s not “in his character?” Windu, you might be an even worse judge of character than George is. Just because someone was a Jedi (key word being WAS) they don’t have the capacity to do evil shit? Why’d he leave? Sounds like you’re just saying words.
Good thing these articles are one a day. You guys are gonna be passed out by the end of this one.
(Also, what’s with the Jew fro she has going on in this scene?)
Oh, but wait for it…
Colin:
Is her hair nappy, or do I just have a bad copy?
Nappy headed ho.
Palpatine suggests she be put under the protection of the Jedi.
Jimmy Smits (!!!!) wonders if this is a wise decision.
(What up, green chick? I like yo color.)
Colin:
Fucking Jar Jar’s here.
Jar Jar is the Dan of this franchise.
Colin:
What colors are Jimmy Smits’ bitches? I’ve never seen those colors in the crayon box.
What Colors Are Jimmy Smits’ Bitches?
Yoda is ‘spicious too.
Palpatine says why not have Obi-Wan do it? She knows him.
Colin:
Whenever someone suggests something like this seemingly off the cuff and then randomly has it all worked out, it’s ‘spicious. He suggests she get some Jedi bodyguards all of a sudden, then reaches the conclusion that it would be ‘inconvenient’ all on his own and then without further consultation just immediately throws out Obi-Wan’s name – it’s as if he’d planned this shit.
“That’s possible. He’s just returned from a border dispute on Ansion. (Motherfucker.)”
Was that line necessary? Who gives a fuck where he was? (I gotta stop trying to analyze the bad writing. It’s giving me tumors.)
“The thought of losing you is unbearable.”
Ha ha. He’s a dick.
Ah… Annie’s all grown up.
“You seem a little on edge.”
“Not at all.”
“I haven’t felt you this tense since I stuck my dick up your ass.”
Reaction shots.
Anyway, Anakin is nervous because he hasn’t seen Padme in ten years.
Also, just to get it out of the way – both of your haircuts are stupid.
Colin:
Why haven’t they seen each other in 10 years? She’s presumably his only friend at the time he enters the Jedi training, and she’s had different jobs here and there. You’d think they’d have kept up with one another a bit. Does this technological wonderland of a universe not have email? And before anyone tells me that Jedi don’t have “friends” as such, don’t forget that later in THIS FILM, we meet an ‘old friend’ of Obi-Wan’s who just owns a diner and spouts expository dialogue. There’s no reason Anakin couldn’t also have some buddies, and Padme seems like the one it would be. Especially if Jar Jar was with her a lot. You know Jar Jar’s the guy who’d be constantly sending you invites to Farmville and shit.
She’s clearly been unemployed for a bunch of it, and even when she does have shit to do — they WORK IN THE SAME CITY!
Jar Jar is sosa happy to see them.
Colin:
Speak of the devil, here he is, that loathsome cunt. And even though there was nothing that said the elevator was coming, he showed up just in time. That telescoppy’s working regular now.
Aww… old friends.
(They’re gonna fuck.)
“My goodness, you’ve grown.”
“Wait til you see how my dick’s grown.”
“Annie you’ll always be that little boy I knew on Tattooine.”
Well that’s fucking creepy.
So she wants to know who tried to kill her. (Why? It’s war. Everyone’s trying to kill you.) Obi-Wan doesn’t care about that. They’re here to protect her. Nothing more.
Colin:
Okay, so at least we find out who the black guy is. Already forgot. But we know he’s a good guyclops.
“We’ll find out who’s trying to kill you, Padme. I promise you.”
“Motherfucker, did you not just hear what I was saying?”
He balls him out, telling him to just fucking listen.
Colin:
Daddy’s hitting his padawan at the dinner table. Anakin’s a shit.
Anakin asks why he should.
“Motherfucker, what?”
Colin:
Looking at Jar Jar’s head, you don’t get the impression there’s much room for a brain. Of course, Lucas couldn’t pass up on some wide nostrils and full lips.
“Why the fuck else would we be protecting her? This is a job for local security, not Jedi.”
Insolent little fuck.
“We’re gonna do exactly as we were instructed. Or so help me, I will take of my belt and hit you right here in front of all these people.”
“Green?”
Super green.
Colin:
That’s right. Learn your place. Like Jar Jar.
“The fuck you think this is…”
So then Padme leaves, once the real purpose for the scene is complete.
Seriously, the writing is so bad it’s shameful. Lucas sets up this scene with filler that goes on for way too long, then completely cuts off the filler just when we start resigning ourselves to it being there and start to try to pay attention to it, and then he shoehorns in his point for the scene, which is Anakin disobeying Obi-Wan, which is some real Dick in the Ass subtlety (™), and then once that’s done, he just bails on the scene completely and is like, “Well, I guess that’s good enough.”
It’s like taking a very generic outline for how to set up a scene and following it to the letter. The problem with that is – the shit you’re putting in the scene isn’t interesting at all. Not to mention, every single line that’s spoken is almost completely ignorant of all the other lines that were spoken in these movies. They all contradict one another, and none of them make any sense at all, from a writing standpoint, to a logic standpoint – to any standpoint. That’s why I’m stopping to constantly be like, “Why would he say that? How does that make any sense?” Everything these characters say is written for that specific scene and pays no mind to anything they’ve said before, ever.
It’s almost like Lucas is writing with nothing but an end goal and macro ideas in mind the whole time. He’s not paying any attention to the logic or the universe he’s set up, and is only thinking, “I gotta get Anakin questioning Obi-Wan in this scene,” because he’s thinking about Anakin becoming Vader. So he’ll have this scene, and he’ll have that moment – Anakin jumps to say, “We’ll find your assassin, Padme,” and Obi-Wan going, “Whoa, now… hold on there, buddy. That’s not what we’re here for. And stop disobeying me.” Only, as a writer, you can’t just have that (though, you can. Since technically good writing is getting into a scene as late as you can and getting out as early as you can. But I’m not one to be succinct and I do like to play, so I get expanding a bit around the edges) in a scene. So he goes, “All right… I need to fill out the beginning.” So he sets up all this political dialogue –
In fact… let’s break the scene down.
We’re breaking it down, people!
We’re gonna start it after the whole, “Annie you’ll always be that little boy” creepiness. Since even though it takes place in the same space, it’s basically two separate scenes.
In fact — you may want to watch the scene first:
It starts at 7 minutes and 50 seconds.
I’ll repost some screenshots to break up the long paragraphs, but they’re all ones from up there.
I also don’t have all the shots of the stuff I talk about, since it’s a waste of space, so if you watch it, you’ll see what I’m talking about.
They walk over to the couches and Obi-Wan says their presence there will be invisible.
Which right there, we can question. Is the Secret Service invisible? No. That’s the point. What you should be saying is that your interference in her daily life will be minimal. Then again, she’s a fucking senator who was formerly a queen (which was not explained, at all) – she’s used to having fucking bodyguards. This is not new to her. So why you need to say anything is beyond me. Again, like I said – these lines pay no heed to anything that was previously said.
Then Captain Typhus, or whatever the fuck his name is, announces himself out of nowhere as captain of Her Majesty’s Secret Service, or whatever that is. He also throws out the name of the new Queen, which is like Queen Juwanna Mann or something. I have no idea why he does this outside of George going, “Well shit, we should probably get his name out there,” like people are going to be remembering it or caring about him at all. The only way we remember the characters in this franchise who aren’t Anakin, Obi-Wan, Padme, Yoda, Palpatine or Samuel L. Jackson is visually and visually alone. There is no way we all really remember the black guy who was Padme’s assistant guy in the last movie. He was just the black guy that was with Padme the whole time. You recognize him, but you don’t know his name because his name and his personality are irrelevant. It’s just his function within the plot that matters, therefore we only know him as his function in the plot – to protect Padme and do shit with her.
Then this guy, who is the HEAD OF THE SECURITY SERVICE OF THE QUEEN OF AN ENTIRE PLANET, says that he’s grateful the two Jedis are here, because “the situation is more dangerous than the senator would like to admit.” I’m sorry… did you just say that your security force is ineffectual? Because I’m not sure what you, the head of security for the queen, is doing protecting this senator. Pretty sure you’re saying that this chick is more important to your planet than the queen is. Which begs the question – why isn’t she still queen? Why aren’t you telling us this instead of your name? Why would you leave the queen unguarded like that? What kind of figurehead shit is this?
And again, I ask – you’re the head of a security force. What does it say when you go, in front of the person you’re protecting, mind you, “Man, I’m glad you’re here. Otherwise this bitch would be fucking dead”? I know I keep saying how horrible the writing is and how it pays no attention to logic or anything that came before it, but are you starting to see what I’m getting at?
And we’re only two goddamn dialogue exchanges into this fucking scene. Which isn’t even the full scene! And we haven’t even gotten to the actual point of the scene yet!
Anyway, onward, Christian Slater…
Padme then says, “I don’t need security, I need answers.” No. You need security. That’s why they’re here. You don’t need answers. People are trying to kill you. That’s the nature of the job. I don’t even know what her purpose is right now. Like I said, I saw this movie once and remember nothing from it. Colin can explain all this to me now, but I don’t want him to. I want the movie to explain it to me, because that’s its job. I don’t know why Padme is now a senator and not a queen. All I know (from the title crawl, which… good thing I paid attention to that shit, otherwise I’d be totally lost) is that she’s trying to get the senate to vote on creating an army for the Republic to use to help the Jedi, who are grossly overstretched in trying to maintain peace, because a shitload of systems are intending to leave the Republic. Got all that? Okay. So –
This is basically intergalactic civil war. Shit is very dangerous, there are systems seceding from the Union, and there’s lots of unrest going on. Now she – a former queen who was already a target for assassins in the last movie – is trying to get the senate to approve a galactic army to be built so it can be used to essentially put down the rebellion. It’s basically what was happening in A New Hope only from the other side of the coin. So you’re telling me, if, in 1860, someone from the North said, “Hey, we should get an army together to make sure them Rebs don’t start fighting and stop them from going against us,” that this person wouldn’t automatically become a target for anyone involved with the separatist cause?
So I don’t understand 1) why she’d say she doesn’t need security. She’s needed security for the past ten years. Why would you suddenly think you don’t need security? This is like being a really drunk (too drunk for her own good), half-naked girl at a frat party, sending her friends away because she’s “fine” on her own. No.
The second question – if the Jedi are so overtaxed, trying to maintain peace in the galaxy, why are they here? Why did Windu allow them to come here for this instead of going to try to maintain peace, why is she allowing them to stay, knowing how overtaxed the Jedi are, and why is she selfishly trying to use them to her own ends? The first point stands and doesn’t need to be expanded – I don’t get why Windu would waste valuable Jedis in protecting this senator who ALREADY HAS a protection service at her disposal. Second – why would she be okay with this too? She’s trying to maintain order as well. Wouldn’t you be like, “Fuck this shit, don’t protect me, go maintain order?” No, she doesn’t do that either. Which is hilarious – she doesn’t want the Jedi, not because they’re overtaxed and shouldn’t be wasting their time on her, but because she wants them to figure out who tried to kill her.
Which brings up the other side question here, which is – why is this such an issue? Someone tried to kill you. All right. Get up and brush your shoulders off. If you’re someone who has a huge target on their backs for political reasons, and someone takes a shot at you… why would you be so invested as to who it was? Are you gonna retaliate? Are you gonna bring this up in the courts? Are you gonna waste months prosecuting? What? If you’re Julian Assange, and someone tries to kill you, do you give a shit who it was? No, you go, “Well damn, I’m glad they didn’t kill me,” and you move on. Because you understand why people are trying to kill you. It shouldn’t be that big an issue. You’re not fucking James Bond. You’re not gonna go, “I’m gonna find out who tried to kill you,” and then uncover a whole masterminded plan behind the whole thing. (Though… I guess she is. Isn’t she?) There’s really no point for you to be like, “Fuck this – I want you two to stop helping the galaxy, and come help me figure out who tried to kill me.” You either do that shit yourself, or you have YOUR people do it. That’s why they’re YOUR people. Speaking of James Bond…
Are you still crying over Agent Saunders? Is that it? Is that why she cares? Because that decoy bitch was killed? I really don’t get this line. “I don’t need security, I need answers.” Maybe you need both, but you definitely don’t need answers more than you need security.
“I want to know who’s trying to kill me.”
This is the only line in the scene so far that should be here. You can cut out every other line and start with this and you get the same thing out of this scene.
And then Obi-Wan says, “We’re here to protect you, Senator, not to start an investigation.” Which I’ll allow. That is how you should respond to her previous question. So that’s two lines in this scene that are okay to still be here.
And then Anakin jumps in and says they’ll find out who’s trying to kill them. Which is the point of this scene. And Obi-Wan jumps in like, “We will not go beyond our orders,” and makes sure to remind Anakin that he’s just an apprentice and shouldn’t be making these calls.
And then Anakin says he meant it in the interest of protecting her, and Obi-Wan loses his temper a bit as they start arguing about not doing this again and Anakin questions Obi-Wan. And Anakin makes the point about how “protection is a job for local security, not Jedi,” which again – makes complete sense. He then says that “investigation is implied” in the task of them going to protect her. Which is a bit of a stretch, but it makes sense, given who he is and what he’ll become. I’ll allow all of this. Obi-Wan tells him they’re gonna do as they were told, and that Anakin will “learn his place.” This is all fine, because it’s why the scene is here.
Then we go back to Padme. “Perhaps with merely your presence, the mystery surrounding this threat will be revealed.”
Really? That’s it? “Well, you’re here, so maybe that’ll flesh out the threat.” Okay, fine. But did we need all that other bullshit before it? What happened to, “I don’t need no stinkin’ security”? Now you’re saying you do need security, but just to flesh out the threat. Why not just say that originally, then? And also, what “mystery”? You’re not interested in the mystery surrounding the threat, you’re interested in the threat. There is no mystery behind it. Mystery would be if two guys rolled up trying to kill you, and your guys killed them, and then on the bodies, they found they were wearing the uniforms of people who were supposedly on your side. That’s mystery. This is just a threat. Someone wants you dead. There’s no mystery to it. You think it’s Dooku, no one really has any leads; it may be miners, it may be someone else. There’s really no mystery except we don’t know who it is. So I don’t know why the fuck you’re calling this a mystery that surrounds the threat. And also, let’s point out the use of the word “merely.” It completely trivializes their purpose here. I don’t know if that’s her undermining Obi-Wan or if that’s just her being horribly written. Either way, their purpose is completely undermined.
And another thing, before I go back into that – shouldn’t Obi-Wan want to go investigate the threat? You can protect someone their entire lives from a threat. The threat will always be there. Wouldn’t finding out who’s trying to kill her then eliminate the threat (I’m completely ignoring the rest of my logic here in that this is not an isolated thing and that there are loads of people who want to kill her and will try to, in the interest of trying to meet Lucas halfway here) and allow them to go back to trying to keep the peace in the galaxy, which is what they should be doing and which is something they don’t have enough Jedi to do right now? So I don’t get why you want to waste time just sitting around “protecting” her from some nameless threat. This is starting to sound like an ISIS mission. “Oh, we have to go protect this blimp from a bomb threat,” meanwhile they have no leads at all, and are told not to bother looking into anything while they’re there. How long are they supposed to be “protecting” her before they deem her safe and can go back to doing more important shit in the grand scheme of things? Until the Jedi council says so? Are you actually gonna sacrifice two Jedi (which, side note here — is Windu just okay with Anakin now, even though he and Yoda thought he shouldn’t have been trained ten years ago? Now that he’s done it, is it just water under the bridge? Since if I were Anakin, I’d have some residual resentment about that) for weeks on end just because a bomb went off? Why not have them look into shit to make it end sooner?
Now I return to my other point – she says she doesn’t need them as security, but then says, “Maybe your presence will reveal what’s going on here.” Which is one of two things – either she’s undermining what Obi-Wan just said, which was, “We’re not doing anything except protecting her.” Maybe she’s then going, “Well, all right, so then maybe just your presence will figure shit out.” Which, if that’s what she’s doing, why the fuck are you being so goddamn selfish? You don’t need them to be doing this, and if you want them to help you discover shit, don’t be such a Coruscunt about it. And if she’s not doing that, then she’s revealing her true intentions here, which is, “I did need you guys here to figure out who did this,” which is openly admitting to wasting valuable Republic resources on a personal vendetta. Either way, the whole thing boggles the mind, because it doesn’t really make much sense either way.
Oh, but then she says —
“Now if you’ll excuse me, I will retire.”
Well, wait – what the fuck is that? Why are you bailing on the scene, George? What about all that political shit from earlier? I want to know about all this stuff. Why would you end the scene like this and not just end it with Obi-Wan putting down Anakin? That’s your end point. To continue implies that you have more to tell us. This is all just dead air, her saying she’s tired and walking out of the room. We watch her walk away, too. Why do we need to see that at all? You could have ended the scene with Obi-Wan’s line and nothing changes. You end on a more powerful note there anyway.
And then Typhoid says, “I know I’ll feel better having you here.” Which basically says he’s completely incompetent at his job and was an Affirmative Action hire. I hate to get into that at all, but how can the command of a royal security system be that unable to handle shit? This tells me that he’s not competent. Which, given his race, then brings up the obvious question – is that why he was hired? I’d hope not, but the fact is – it happens. (Which – is there a Rooney Rule in space?) But I digress, since I don’t really want to be getting into all that right now.
He then says, “I’ll have an officer stationed on every floor and I’ll be in the control center downstairs.”
Why do you need to say that? Is it relevant to the plot? Is there gonna be some Splinter Cell shit later? Is someone gonna slowly make their way through every floor and take out all the officers and avoid the security cameras so he doesn’t come out with his men? If not, why does this matter? We won’t ever see this happen, and it won’t be relevant ever, so why is this line necessary at all? Even if you wanted to leave some fat on the scene, you could still have ended it with Padme leaving.
No, because the scene isn’t done. This is padding between that previous scene and another scene that will happen in this place. Which is Anakin and Jar Jar talking about Padme.
What is this, a student film? Why is Jar Jar just looking straight down the barrel of the camera?
Anakin’s thought about her every day since they parted. (Really? Why?)
Obi-Wan then spouts some Jedi bullshit nonsense that Qui Gon would say that he would have ignored ten years ago.
“I thought they would have killed you by now.”
Basically the point of this (part of the) scene is that they say that Padme was really happy to see Anakin, to set up the relationship between the two later. Which is cool. It’s like the, “Cho couldn’t take her eyes off of you moment.” That’s fine. I get why this moment needs to be there. The problem with that is – YOU PUT ANOTHER MOMENT OF ANAKIN AND OBI-WAN ARGUING ON TOP OF IT! All right! We fucking get it! Anakin is headstrong and butts heads with Obi-Wan’s judgment. Doing it again so soon COMPLETELY kills the point of having had that JUST happen not thirty seconds ago! It’s, again, horrible writing on a basic screenwriting level. You’re beating us over the fucking head with this shit. And, you have three scenes in the span of one, with a lot of unnecessary filler, when you could have had two scenes. You could have had them meet again, you could have had them leave, had them mention how she was happy to see them, and then later you could have had the political talk, after they’ve rested or whatever. But that’s all by the sweet bye and bye.
This goes back to my original point of how I can barely watch these scenes because of how fucking horrible the writing is, how none of it makes sense in the contexts of the characters and the actions we’ve seen prior to this particular scene, and how the lines themselves are so completely inane that they bring you to the point of an aneurysm. (“If it weren’t for my horse, I wouldn’t have spent that year in college.”)
My problem with these movies is, when I watch these scenes and hear these lines, all of the stuff I just wrote out runs through my head. It happens all at once, and very quickly. And it makes my brain hurt. So when I say, “I’m tapped out with this dialogue,” and, “This writing is AWFUL” over and over – that’s what I’m talking about. I can literally do what I just did with EVERY SCENE in these prequels. It’s astounding to me how bad these movies are on EVERY POSSIBLE LEVEL.
I truly think that Lucas didn’t even give a shit about what he was writing in these movies. I think he saw three movies, and went, “Well, I have to get from Point A to Point B.” And he broke all that down to specific scenes and specific sequences in the most generic plot structure way possible. And he said, like you’re supposed to do by the book with screenwriting (and as we all should know, doing things entirely by the book leaves them devoid of character whatsoever. You know all those movies when one cop is by the book and the other cop isn’t? Which cop is more interesting? This is exactly like that), “What do I need to get out of this scene?” And he wrote exactly what he needed to get out of each scene, and then put filler around it. Only he’s not a very good writer, so the filler completely kills the scene. Because he’s thinking entirely macro here, and isn’t paying attention to anything he’s written before. Since every scene he writes is moving forward. He doesn’t remember what he wrote last movie. He’s only thinking, “Right now, I need this to happen.” So he’s thinking, “Padme needs to want them to find who did this, and Anakin needs to jump to help, impulsively, and Obi-Wan needs to chastise him for this.” So he starts writing that out, but in doing so, pays no attention to what their character (and I use that term loosely… if they even have one) would be thinking based on all the other shit that’s happened, and no attention at all to the logic of what he’s writing. It’s just enough to get through to the end of the scene, so he can continue moving the plot forward.
And the irony of it all is that he’s thinking macro, and trying to work in broad strokes in order to feed back into this big, overarching story, only it’s these little scenes that are making his big, overarching story, and that by having all these scenes not work, they’re killing his entire big picture.
It’s an Ouroboros of awful, these movies.
Okay… the rant is over.
Now, I’ll have you know, this rant was written (and I have an exact date for it) on April 8th. I know this because, when I got done writing, I had that moment of, “Wow, this is special.” I wasn’t gonna save this one. I immediately sent it to Colin, because I was texting him throughout my writing of it, so it became kind of this, “Oh man, wait til you fucking see what I did to this scene.” So I sent it to him, and he responded. And this was the response I got:
Colin:
So…that was fun. I wonder how many people are gonna stick it out through all of it. But goddamn. It’s all true.
And there are a few things that I can explain, but you’re absolutely right — that’s the film’s job. Some of the stuff is explained in exposition later on, but by then it’s irrelevant and we’ve already forgotten that it was something we needed to know.
The other thing is, there are one or two things that you’ve got mixed up here about character background/motivations (mostly just one thing) but on closer examination, I realized that at this point in the film, those were also COMPLETELY ambiguous, so it wasn’t a mistake on your part at all. You can just leave this and I’ll chime in at the appropriate times, because this helps to illustrate your point — the film doesn’t explain shit and you can’t be expected to know what anyone’s motivation is based on what you’re given.
The main thing is that Padme is opposed to the Military Creation Act. She doesn’t want an army to be assembled to fight the Separatists, she’s in favor of a diplomatic solution to the dispute. In the title crawl, it just says that she’s preparing for the vote, but it doesn’t tell you that she’s the leader of the opposition. Which — pretty major detail here. This calls into question — who’s trying to kill her if her voice in the Galactic Senate directly benefits the Separatists? Maybe it’s someone else on the side of the Republic who wants the Act passed? Which is ALMOST SORT OF KIND OF what it ends up being. The later attempt is by an impartial assassin hired by Jango Fett (another impartial assassin) who is hired by Count Dooku (on the side of the Separatists) who is under the orders of Darth Sidious (Palpatine, who wants the bill to go through so he can have make the Clone Army that he ordered someone to order 10 years ago legal). See how convoluted this is?
So if you remove all the chaff, it boils down to — Padme opposes the law, but someone wants her dead. They don’t factor in her opposition during this discussion of the “mystery” of the attempts on her life and instead shoehorn it into the filler during her next scene with Anakin while she’s packing clothes. “I haven’t spent a year fighting the Military Creation Act…” and blah, blah, blah. But that’s the first we hear of it! We don’t know what it is or what it calls for. We don’t know who supports it.
Theoretically, the Jedi, who are sort of charged with preserving peace (which, what does that entail? Are they under orders from the Galactic Senate, or are they an autonomous group that can decide how and when to protect the Republic? This is starting to sound like Wanted, where Morgan Freeman stops listening to the Loom of Fate and starts picking his own targets.) would be in favor of an army. We never hear if they want one or not, even though they’re constantly talking to people who have strong feelings on the issue. And then, when the clones finally show up, we see them commanded by the Jedi, so clearly they’re not UPSET about the new army.
But long story short, the whole plot of the new trilogy is that Palpatine fosters a threat to the Galactic Republic so that he can take power to fight it off and then maintain his control after it’s gone. So you’re supposed to think that the Separatists are the bad guys the whole time, and they are, but meanwhile Palpatine’s doing a Kansas City Shuffle and taking control of the new clone army to wipe them out and run the galaxy himself. But Lucas is glossing over major details about the Military Creation Act and who thinks what about it so that this plot isn’t immediately apparent to the people watching.
The only thing is, these are prequels. A New Hope doesn’t start with battle droids and the Trade Federation running shit. It’s an emperor with a huge army of dudes in white armor. So once we see the clone troopers in their storm trooper-esque outfits, that’s basically it. You know that in the future, they’re going to be the Empire and that whoever is controlling them now (other than the Jedi) is going to be running the Empire. So the whole third film becomes a formality, really. The whole plot is blown wide open near the end of the second movie. And it would have been even more wide open if Lucas had just taken the time to explain some shit at the beginning, like how Palpatine is in favor.
Then you see how Amidala is sent to Naboo after the second attempt on her life, the day before the vote? Think she could absentee ballot? And why is it that she didn’t need security before but NOW she needs to go into full hiding? Not only that, but JAR JAR FUCKING BINKS is left in charge of her Senate seat? Someone who you wouldn’t trust to work in a fucking pet rock factory. There’s nobody else you would choose from your WHOLE PLANET? Cause by the way, this is Palpatine’s plan: to get her out of the way, expose the existence of a Separatist Army and ride the shock value of that reveal into emergency powers as Supreme Chancellor so he can approve the creation of the army immediately. This all hinges on her not being there (so you’re telling me he couldn’t have killed her himself instead of going through 800 middle men and making it rain clues?) and on having a patsy (Jar Jar is about as patsy-ish as they come) vote him some emergency powers.
Meanwhile, this begs the question — why is one of your middle men the ONLY person in the fucking universe that could lead the Jedi back to the army that’s supposed to be a secret? It’s okay, though, cause even after finding out about the army, they just scratch their heads and don’t think that it could be linked to anyone supporting the Military Creation Act as part of a larger plot. Cause that would be inconceivable. Lucas is just running interference with the Separatist threat, never once pausing to acknowledge that the most likely assassin of the Military Creation Act’s most vocal opponent would be a Republic supporter of the act, or that the unexpected discovery of an enormous army for the Republic at almost exactly the time the vote is set to happen (and before it’s even passed) might point to a plot somewhere in your own operation. It’s just consistently, “Wow, that’s weird. Do you understand why this is happening? No? Me neither. Anyway, those droids are sure pesky! Let’s go fight them!”
This is actually similar to the extended plot of the original trilogy. Palpatine is actually the one who started the Rebel Alliance, basically. He wanted them around so he could identify his enemies and assimilate power for the Empire. He’s all about setting up straw men so he can do his other shit in the background. The only issue here is that his genius is limited by Lucas’ imagination, which isn’t anywhere near perfect. But even when there are AMAZINGLY obvious details available to anyone in the story, he either skips over them in a way that maintains the illusion of plot complexity, or gives them to you but keeps the main characters guessing because they can’t put two and two together. So this ends up making the characters look stupid for either not drawing the right conclusions about what they DO know or asking the right questions (or asking questions at all!) about what they DON’T know.
That was intended to be like two paragraphs. This is what happens when we get going.
So that’s what happened with me watching the first… I don’t know, twelve minutes of this movie.
Oh yeah… casino!
Well that’s who bombed the ship. You know… what’s her name.
And she’s working for Jango Fett!
The D must be silent.
Colin:
Okay, so that looks like Boba Fett. It’s not Boba, but it’s basically Boba. Seems like he could do the job himself.
He gives her these. Because that’s clearly the best way to do this. “Can’t bomb the ship… use poisonous shit!”
This is some Dr. No level stuff.
Like, actually. We’re basically following the Dr. No progression right now.
Colin:
Only not. That was a masterful scene in which Anthony Dawson is scared shitless by the voice of a man we can’t see. I was as interested (probably even more interested) in the scene in which Professor Dent GETS the tarantula than the scene where it almost kills Bond. God, I love that movie. That movie was so fucking good.
Her name is Zam.
And she’s a masked bandit.
Jesus, Obi-Wan. Stop checking your phone right in front of the guy you’re talking to.
cOlin:
Just got a sext from Aayla Secura. We meet her later, but feel free to Google her and google yourself.
Nice bedroom.
Nice Natalie.
He’s using her as bait to catch the assassin.
Colin:
He can sense everything going on in that room. Like when she was touching herself.
Obi-Wan’s like, “Motherfucker, please… your Jedi senses ain’t as good as my Jedi senses. My dick is bigger than yours.”
Which Anakin again questions.
Colin:
Anakin is the biggest shit in the world. It started when we first met him and he mouthed off to the fucking QUEEN. “I’m a person, and my name is Anakin!” And now he’s all skeptical with Obi-Wan, like, “You think you a baller, son?” And Obi-Wan has to be like, “Bitch I might be.”
“Motherfucker, I will slap you upside the head with my dick and stand still the entire time.”
Colin:
Just noticing, but based on the neon signs, this is the same exact spot as the conversation in the previous scene. Why did this have to be split up? Why couldn’t we have them do the Obi-Wan/Anakin scene before the assassin meeting?
At what point, as an assassin, do you actually think this is going to work?
That’s the problem with assassins nowadays – the chain of command kills you. Palpatine hires Django Fett, who hires Zam, who tries to use this droid thing to deliver poisonous whatever the fucks. Why can’t Django just do it himself?
This is like Brad Pitt in Killing Them Softly. (Great movie, by the way. One of my ten favorites from last year.) They hire him to find out who knocked over the card game and kill them, and he’s like, “Nah… they know me. I think we should hire this other guy to do it.” Once you start bringing in people, you’re ruining the likelihood of shit getting done.
Colin:
If you think about it, someone hired a guy, who hired another assassin, who has a random droid that’s gonna go take care of the job. I’d suggest that whoever put out the contract should just get one of these droids and do it themselves.
Also, Killing Them Softly was really good. Poor Gandolfini.
Quick – pick out the human element in the frame.
– – – – –
It’s a trick question.
“You look tired.”
Every single conversation these two have either involves Obi-Wan chastising him for his reckless behavior or commenting on how he looks.
He plays psychiatrist here, too. Anakin says he doesn’t sleep well anymore, and Obi-Wan’s like, “Because of your mother?”
You know you can go back and see her. There’s really no rule that says you can’t see your mother ever again. You’re a Jedi now. You can do shit.
And then we immediately skip past the mother shit, since that’s not important. Now he’s talking AGAIN about how much he loves Padme. It’s sickening. “Just being around her is intoxicating.” Seriously?
Colin:
Who uses the word ‘intoxicating?’ Someone had the bright idea to teach our Japanese secretary a bunch of pick up lines in English, which she understands exactly NONE of. And one of them was, “I’m not drunk, I’m just intoxicated by you.” Her pronunciation is lacking, but she’s so enthusiastic about having learned a thing that she says it all the time, when it’s not at all called for. At first it was endearing, but now it’s just too much. I’ll tell her I need some client information or whatever and she tells me she’s not drunk, she’s just intoxicated by me. And I have to think, “…ARE you not drunk, though?”
And of course Obi-Wan says, “Be mindful of your thoughts, Anakin. They betray you.” More evidence to suggest that Lucas doesn’t pay any attention to what he’s already written, since Obi-Wan has said this, or something very similar at least a half-dozen times already. And that’s not even getting into Qui-Gon.
Two questions about this – one, how come R2 doesn’t notice any of this? And two, how do these things know exactly where to go?
Colin:
See how boring this is? The droid cuts into the window in literally one second. I was SO into it when Patrice did it in Skyfall – like that whole action of cutting the glass open had me hooked. But this is a droid, so whatever.
Colin:
Things with lots of legs need to die.
I guarantee you if you put a poisonous spider in someone’s room, that fucking thing would go wherever it wanted. Not right to the bed where a person is sleeping immediately.
Wait, and now R2 gets up and they hide? What the fuck, George? At least follow some goddamn biology. Haven’t you watched Planet Earth?
I love the floor lasers. I can only imagine Darth Maul showing up and pulling some Night Fox shit.
A fucking search light?
If they know exactly where to go, why do you need two of them?
This is funny. Anakin says that Palpatine doesn’t appear to be corrupt.
Japan.
This is hilarious. They suddenly turn, and then Obi-Wan’s like, “I sense it too,” and they fucking run. Why didn’t you sense if before, assholes?
Yeah, I’m sure this is about to be safe.
He just lightsaber’d her in the tit!
Seriously, that can’t be safe. There’s no way that actually works. If you try that shit for real, you’re taking off a piece of her upper body.
Colin:
I guess he’s gotten some lightsaber practice. No awesome Dr. No tarantula moments here. But I don’t really get it. Are these things trained? Do they know to kill her? They seem intelligent enough to dodge R2’s scan. But I can’t see them EATING her.
Right, like you didn’t notice any of that.
WHY THE FUCK WOULD YOU HANG AROUND?
TALLY HO!
More like Tally Ho-fuck, he just jumped through a fucking window!
Colin:
Obi-Wan has no business jumping out this window. After going on and on about how they’re not there to start an investigation and how their only job is to protect her, he’s doing some seriously risky shit. I wonder what floor her penthouse is on. Plus, now he’s gone and Anakin just takes off too. So now she’s left unprotected, which…perfect.
Why not just Force it to stay around?
“Stay here!” he says, as he runs out of the room like a little bitch. Where the fuck else is she gonna go? After the thing that tried to kill her? That seems counterintuitive.
Also, if I’m an assassin, this is what I do. I get the Jedi off on a chase of this little pod thing, and then when her handmaidens and shit rush in, I come over and put two in her skull.
(You guys should be nearing the amount of drunk that George had to have been when he wrote this movie.)
Which, also… I waited to bring this up until after that part, since it would be weird if I addressed this half and not that other half up there. But — it is weird that Obi-Wan is the one that jumps and not Anakin. Anakin should be the one who jumps out the window. It fits with his character. Obi-Wan should be the guy who takes his time, gets in a speeder, then ends up at the right place at the right time, as if he saw five moves ahead.
No joke, this actually looks like it kind of could have came out of Empire.
Never mind.
This is the moment you realize, “Wow, I didn’t think this one through at all.”
Oh, right… you used to podrace.
Stop showing off.
It’s like he deliberately chose the flashiest car possible. (Bumblebee, too.)
Why are you checking your mirrors? There’s a chase on!
Hey, you guys remember when The Fifth Element did this chase better?
Just sayin’.
J.W. Pepper? What are you doing here?
Colin:
The close-ups of aliens swerving to get out of Obi-Wan’s way are completely unnecessary. Please get rid of them and everything else about this film that sucks.
Wanna know how he got those scars?
Colin:
Wait, did the Sebulba-looking guy just say ‘Jedi poodo’ or am I imagining things? I know he didn’t swerve, see Obi-Wan, recognize him as a Jedi just like that and immediately call him ‘Jedi shit.’
ARE YOU SERIOUSLY WAITING FOR THE FUCKING POD TO COME BACK?
Why would you do that?? Is it a special pod? Was that your grandmother’s pod? Did your father keep that pod up his ass during the Battle of Qotile? You’re asking to be caught. You know that, right?
Well that’s one way to handle it.
Reaction shots.
Look at the size of that fucking gun. That’s comically big.
She’s leading him. That’s good.
And she can shoot, too.
And she can shoot, too.
Colin:
Question, though. I think people just go with this shit cause it can’t work [for Lucas] any other way, but if you were that good a shot, why would you shoot your own droid thing that he was hanging onto? That not only doesn’t kill him, but it’s harder to hit, and it fucks up your droid. Maybe…shoot him? The enormous sack of flesh hanging from the small droid? Seems like the better target, and if you hit it, he’s pretty much guaranteed dead.
You know… I might actually allow what she just did. Her waiting around is stupid as all hell, but seeing Obi-Wan, pulling out a big ass gun, shooting him out of the sky and peacing – that’s pretty cool.
Might want to hurry up and go to a Pay & Spray, though.
Big Bada Boom.
(THE FUCKING CAR IS ALSO YELLOW!)
Right, now’s a good time to throw in exposition, DURING A GODDAMN CHASE!
Obi-Wan asks what took Anakin so long (which is one of the more overused lines in action sequences that should really go away for a while), and he says he couldn’t find a speeder he really liked. And Obi-Wan says if he spent this much time practicing his swordsmanship (which – they don’t have swords), he’d be as good as Yoda. And Anakin’s like, “I thought I already was that good,” and Obi-Wan’s like, “Bitch please. Severus please, Severus please! You ain’t that good.”
Which is fine, only – maybe not while in the middle of a fucking chase scene.
Colin:
Isn’t it interesting how his first question upon entering the car is, “What took you so long,” and not, “Who the FUCK is watching the senator right now?”
Is there a Wronski Feint coming up?
Colin:
Why is he laughing maniacally as they approach a midair collision? This is when you put one in his ear and call it a day.
Why do you need to wrap around the fire pillars, exactly? Can’t you just go forward? It’s not like you’re gonna lose her because you’re not following her every step. Just fly forward.
Lower Coruscant looks like a pretty cool place.
Or you can go over them. It’s not exactly like you’re trying to get back to 1985.
Unlimited power grid.
“That was good.”
Why was that good? Did it make your dick hard or something?
Anakin drives past it. Because he says if the chase goes on, the other person will end up dead. (How does he know this for sure?) He says he wants the person alive.
Fuck you. Keep going. The chase is more interesting than a fucking pod race, and that got like 25 minutes.
Oh shit… tunnels. That’s pretty great.
This reminds me of the final level of Twisted Metal 2, when you’re in Tokyo and are fighting Dark Tooth. And it’s fucking giant and will destroy the shit out of you in like, three seconds. So what I’d do is ride around in the subway all the time and lob ricochets out to lower its health. And then the fucking thing would show up randomly at a stop and try to ambush you and it would be fucking terrifying.
(But not as terrifying as that carnival level, right, Shiho?)
(Until we figured out how to do freeze missiles, that is.)
Colin:
Wasn’t Dark Tooth in Hong Kong? I know, why differentiate between Asian cities? I had that shit on lock with Spectre, though.
Oh, right, it was Hong Kong. I don’t remember. I just remember it was Asia. It was a video game, so I couldn’t quite feel the oppression.
So you just take the mask off now? Like, “Oh, I lost them.” Either keep it on or don’t.
I also like the assumption that they’re gonna spot one car through all this flying traffic.
Because Anakin knows a shortcut.
Colin:
Yes. You know a shortcut in this city the size of the earth. Oh, I know! Is it the PLANET CORE? Fuck you, Lucas.
Backseat driver.
This is how people should respond whenever they fuck up in a chase.
“I hate it when he does that.”
Why? And I meant that dually. Why does he do it and why do you hate it?
And how exactly did he know the car was gonna be there at that exact moment in time?
Don’t give me any of that “he foresaw it in the Force” bullshit. Obi-Wan didn’t see it. This is complete horse cocky and makes absolutely no goddamn sense at all. It’s not even exciting. Anyone with two brain cells should be thinking, “How did he know it was gonna be there?”
Colin:
I hate this whole sequence. None of this is at all like what you could see Luke doing. This superman shit. Freefalling thousands of feet to land on a speeder. Yeah.
Yes… fire wildly at your vehicle… that’ll do it. Maybe run into a building trying to get hlim off, too. That’ll do the trick.
Wasn’t she attractive a second ago?
You’ve gotta be fucking kidding me.
Blade Runner much?
Colin:
Since when is Coruscant so Blade Runner?
“She went into the club, master.”
“Next time, try not to lose this.”
“Why do I get the feeling you’re going to be the death of me?”
That would have been a good joke… if it was funny.
Colin:
Suiciclops.
If there’s no three-tittied woman in here, this club is bullshit.
It’s a video game bar?
Anyway, he’s a she, and she’s a changeling. Obi-Wan tells Anakin to go find her.
“Where are you going, master?”
“For a drink.”
Correct.
Two things – I love how the fat chick is interested in him. And I like how the black guy is interested in the fat chick.
Is that a Tron shot?
Colin:
Jedi drink? I don’t get how they get to do EVERYTHING that normal people do except love. They’re discouraged from having strong emotions, but I guess that just means you can’t fuck. Still, I do like the idea of Obi-Wan going for a drink as Anakin searches for the bad guy, cause this is why you have people.
“Wanna buy some death sticks?”
What the fuck are death sticks?
“You don’t want to sell me death sticks.”
He makes him go home and rethink his life, too.
Maybe he has kids to feed. Maybe your secret protection agency is keeping valuable security jobs off the table for former college athletes who blew out their knees or weren’t good enough to make it to the big time.
Maybe now he’s gonna realize it’s your fault and become a terrorist.
See what you just did, Obi-Wan? You created a terrorist.
Sup, Betty?
Colin:
Space Betty.
Well that was one swing too many.
Colin:
Another callback from the Mos Eisley cantina scene. Hooray.
That’s how you do it. Cut off her arm, then take her home.
Colin:
“Jedi business, go back to your drinks.” See how he’s like a cop here? And when you consider how few people in the original trilogy seem to be aware of Jedi or any of their ways, it’s weird that this is a normal thing to say only like 20 years earlier. Is it like Tiananmen Square or something?
Is that Black Swan back there?
Naturally they ask who hired her.
“It was a bounty hunter called –”
Nice shot.
Also, she was giving that shit up real fast.
I guess the best way to get a girl to give it up in da club is to cut off her hand.
You got a fucking dart in your neck.
Colin:
Wow… that’s some tranny business right there.
Colin:
Toxic darts. Her only weakness. How did he know?
“Toxic dart.”
WELL NO FUCKING SHIT IT’S A TOXIC DART YOU IDIOT.
This is where we’ll END PART I. Because it feels like we’ve had two parts already, and there’s a whole lot more to come.
– – – – – – – – – –
Tomorrow is Part II, and the question of whether or not these films actually kill me before we’re done.
(See the rest of the Fun with Franchises articles here.)
Wait, did the Sebulba-looking guy just say ‘Jedi poodo’ or am I imagining things? I know he didn’t swerve, see Obi-Wan, recognize him as a Jedi just like that and immediately call him ‘Jedi shit.’
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