I would like to start this off by saying that I keep looking at the picture I’ve chosen for this article and whispering to myself “You will try,” so … buckle in, folks! When it comes to Star Wars and the prequel series, there always seems to be a fight, mainly because older fans hated them while millennials typically loved them because it was the first time we got to see Star Wars in a movie theater that wasn’t just the rerelease of the original trilogy.
Look, the prequels can get complicated because there are plot lines and characters that people don’t like (and even some that are truly offensive), but they’re ours, in a weird way. Star Wars came back, and a younger generation got to experience the magic of seeing these movies for the first time in the theater, and nothing will take that away from us.
So, when Scott Malthouse asked Twitter to say something nice about the prequels, the call did not go unanswered.
Say a genuinely nice thing about the Star Wars prequels
— Scott Malthouse ☕ (@trollishdelver) June 27, 2020
What I didn’t expect was for Last Jedi director Rian Johnson to hit the nail on the head. Johnson, who gave us one of the biggest conversation pieces of the recent Star Wars sequel trilogy, pointed out that the prequels taught children (because yes, grown men, I’m sorry to say that Star Wars is aimed at kids) about fascism. Should we have Trump supporters watch the prequels?
Lucas made a gorgeous 7 hour long movie for children about how entitlement and fear of loss turns good people into fascists, and did it while spearheading nearly every technical sea change in modern filmmaking of the past 30 years.
— Rian Johnson (@rianjohnson) June 29, 2020
Johnson isn’t the only Star Wars creative to understand the prequel love, either. Jon Favreau pointed out that many Star Wars fans who love the prequels were the same age he was when he watched the original trilogy in theaters.
Jon Favreau understanding Star Wars and Star Wars fans, a mood pic.twitter.com/a15enMg49q
— rachel leishman (@RachelLeishman) May 8, 2020
What it all boils down to is that we were children when we watched these movies, so for many, their anger and upset over the entries in the series that came later in their lives probably stemmed from the fact that they were grown adult humans, not kids anymore. But that’s not the point I’m making. I’m finally getting my time to explain why the prequels aren’t as bad as people make them out to be.
At their core, the prequels are focused on the fall of Anakin Skywalker, something we already know happened because we watched the original trilogy. So, right off the bat, we’re not invested because we want to know what happens. Instead, we’re invested in the characters around Anakin and even, sometimes, the points that Anakin is making. (He’s a drama queen, and I love him.)
But the prequels gave us one beautiful being that has stood the test of time because, even now, fans are still excited about him getting his own show and that is Ewan McGregor’s Obi-Wan Kenobi. Fans loved his performance because guess what? THERE WERE GOOD THINGS ABOUT THE PREQUELS.
I know I already pointed this out, but the prequel trilogy was the first time I got to have a Star Wars that was all mine. It wasn’t my brothers showing me the original movies or someone else explaining it to me. It was mine. I got to go and experience it the same as everyone else, and I loved it. I dressed up like Padmé for Halloween after Phantom Menace and wouldn’t bob for apples because I was afraid my makeup would get ruined.
It brought me joy. It made me realize I was attracted to Hayden Christensen when I was 13 years old and saw Revenge of the Sith over 10 times in the movie theaters because he was really hot when he woke up in bed with Padme.
Yes, the prequels have some bad CGI, and we have to all just put our hatred of Jar-Jar Binks aside, but at the end of the day, the prequels mean something, and they taught an entire generation the dangers of fascism. Plus, we got the best version of Obi-Wan Kenobi we could have asked for, so why are we even talking about this?
Anyway, I leave you all with the one video on the internet that made me feel seen.
Literally me watching Revenge of the Sith: pic.twitter.com/aMhxSZBsOG
— rachel leishman (@RachelLeishman) February 2, 2020
(image: Lucasfilm)
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