This is MJ. I'm an author, I'm an artist, I'm an analyzer. Welcome to my fully operational
Star Wars podcast. Thank you for joining me this time out. As I continue my journey towards
the Ahsoka series, I am discussing Star Wars Episode 3 titled by George Lucas, Revenge
of the Sith. And this is going to be a casual chat about the movie. I'm not going to go
in too deep just to kind of talk about the highlights, some things that stood out to
me. And I'm going to jump right into it. So here we go. I like this movie a lot. I don't
know if it's the best of the prequels or it's the most enjoyable of the prequels. I still
think there are problems with it. I think there are problems with all the prequels that
range in severity. I'm not a prequel hater though. I do like them as a whole. I love
the story they tell. I just wonder why the story was told the way it was. And in my previous
two episodes talking about Phantom Menace and Chamber of Sieges and Attack of the Clones,
I gave reasons why I think Lucas did what he did. And I can appreciate it. But I think
it really would have been interesting to see this story played out over three movies. If
we get to see Anakin, the hero of the Republic, the hero of the Clone Wars, the good Jedi,
the exceptional Jedi Knight, and then we get to see him in his most desperate hour being
tested and being tempted by the dark side in the rescue of the Chancellor, that would
be episode two I guess. You could make episode one be Anakin's trials and ascension to knighthood
and then maybe a little bonus 30 minute adventure after he's a knight. And then episode two
could have been they have to rescue Palpatine and work through this whole thing and then
in it you get flashes of him being tempted to use the dark side and fight Dooku and all
that stuff and then maybe in the third one that's all fall and it's all bad. But that's
not what Lucas decided to do. That's not what he decided to give us. Instead we start off
this movie with a weird thing in the opening crawl that says war and there are heroes on
both sides and stuff like that which is weird because it makes it feel like nuance and it
almost gives justification to the line later on that from my perspective the Jedi are evil
and it's odd that you would have that but then again if one of Lucas's points or ideas
that he wanted to explore is that no villain thinks that they're evil or thinks that they're
a villain they think that they're a hero they think that they are doing something good.
I guess that makes sense. How does Anakin justify the slaughter of all the Jedi younglings?
Maybe because the Jedi are evil and they're raising these children to be evil therefore
there's no issue in slaughtering them so that they don't become the same kind of evil that
threatens his wife Padme and that prolongs war. I don't know what the whole package of
lies that I don't know what it was that Sidious told him. Is it that the Jedi fomented the
war and planned it or does Anakin know, does Darth Vader know, does he realize that his
master is the one who started the war who orchestrated this war that took so much from
him and has brought so much stress and tension to his life separating him from his wife Padme
and endangering him. I don't know. It's unclear. It's not addressed. You would have to assume
no and maybe as time goes on he becomes aware that that is the truth and that seeds his
anger and resentment towards Sidious. But that's a discussion for another movie. It's
a really interesting movie. I absolutely love the heights of adventure that we get in the
first bit and up until Palpatine is rescued and I love the fact that it just it drops
you into a space battle and it's the most action packed most scenery jammed I don't
know visual spectacle and that's why I thought looking at it this time I thought this is
a spectacular visual. It's just it's chock full of stuff and it reminded me oddly enough
of like some time sometimes in Studio Ghibli animation. I can't I feel like I've seen another
animation but I can't name anything off the top of my head but like there's such attention
to detail and you're in like a cottage and there's just like hundreds if not well there's
like hundreds maybe up to like a thousand like tiny little hand drawn items or hand
drawn details that fill the place and it's really special. It feels really I don't know
like breathtaking and captivating that like all this attention to detail was put in by
somebody by somebody or by a team of somebody's who drew each and every one of these little
things and it's astonishing and I love the idea that you had a whole team of people working
on all these you know CGI assets. I am pretty sure that scene that we drop into is all computer
generated there's no practical effects there just because it wouldn't make sense unless
they're you know compositing ship models or something in which is a you know art in and
of itself and I think a really good way to use the computer generated effects or imagery
software so anyway but yeah just it was a dazzling fight you know Coruscant looks amazing
from up above but then you've got all these you know giant ships fighting next to each
other you've got all the I think they're called Arc 150s or Arc 170s whatever the pre the
precursor to the X-Wing with like the you know hawk like nose on it and the wings that
split with the S-Foils and then the Jedi starfighters which I love the Jedi ships from last movie
that dock into those those hyperspace rings and we get to see a little bit more of that
in this movie but we get to see you know Anakin and Obi-Wan flying in these Jedi starfighters
that they have S-Foil things that fold out too but the shape of them and everything it
looks like these are pre-tie fighters and they probably even have twin ion engines on
them don't they huh I thought about that but I think they exactly do have twin ion engines
if you didn't know that's what tie of tie fighter means twin ion engine fighters why
they named after their propulsion system I don't know but they are anyway it's not because
they look like bow ties so anyway we get just this super exciting battle there's the thing
about you know oddball and his men the clone troopers are having trouble fighting and Anakin
tells Obi-Wan that he wants to break away and help them and Obi-Wan says no they're
doing their job so that we can do ours and you can tell that Anakin is pained at the
prospect of having to leave these men these clones these you know meatbags like all you
know about them is that they were cloned from Jango Fett who tried to kill Padme you would
think that Anakin would be mad at them but no something has happened in the last three
years of this war that has led him to love these guys and care about these guys to the
point where he would take himself off of the mission for a moment of saving Palpatine to
rescue some of these clone troopers who you would think would be nothing but flesh droids
to him that would be meaningless to him but they're not he cares he loves these guys he
wants to protect them and at Obi-Wan's insistence he lets them go but then Obi-Wan becomes in
danger and Anakin's focus shifts to doing everything he can to save Obi-Wan and he even
makes a mistake he accidentally shoots one of those TIE fighter wing panels off of Obi-Wan's
ship which is pretty hilarious and R2 gets in danger at some point there and Anakin shifts
his focus away from saving Obi-Wan and saving Palpatine to making sure that R2 is okay they're
doing a really good job of showing like the camaraderie and the friendship and the high
adventure but also Anakin's attachment Anakin is so attached to all these people to all
these different well to all these different people in his life and he's not willing to
let them go and it's setting us up for the fact that he doesn't want to let Padme go
and ultimately in the end that's his downfall his refusal to let go when he goes to Yoda
for advice Yoda tells him learn like to not fear losing people and learn to celebrate
for those people who become one with the force that sounds great in theory but when it's
your wife your mother your father your brother your sister who's going to die how good is
that now I'm a believer I'm a person of faith I believe that when we die we go somewhere
and we're going somewhere good unless we're you know the most wicked among us and I believe
that God would be I believe that it really is sort of a better place but I also want
to live as long as possible like for myself I would want to fight to live as long as possible
and yes I would want to fight to save the lives of people I love close to me however
I because of what I believe I believe that this is like all a test right now that we're
going through and that when we get to the other side that it's going to be well when
we get to the other side we'll be reunited with these people who we lost and it'll kind
of it kind of won't matter that we were without them for one month one year a hundred years
because in the you know in the face of eternity all of that will seem like the blink of an
eye and it will be basically meaningless and if you're telling me that it's faced with
the choice of either I don't know it seems like a rejection of his faith a rejection
of his understanding of the force the ways of the force and all that stuff if Anakin
can't see past Yoda's like dumb words and Yoda's like like clumsy consolation to him
and realize yeah you know in the long and short of it or you know when it's all said
and done even if Padme were to die you know I will lose my love I'll lose my child which
is super sad but I will live on and I will endure and I will be with them again one day
in the future and you know we'll be together for all eternity and there's something called
a short time preference and a long time preference a short time preference I believe I'm saying
this correctly and I think people accidentally say it the wrong way all the time so I'm tripped
up by that short time preference is you want instant gratification you want everything
now you only care about what happens in the immediate future and you don't think about
what happens in the far off future so what is it easy to do what's it pleasurable to
do now it's easy and pleasurable to sit on the couch and watch movies any Twinkies and
drink coke or whatever kind of pop you're interested in however what will that do to
you in the long term you'll become weak you'll become fat you'll become lazy you'll become
incapable of doing anything useful for yourself or for others and ultimately it will kill
you you if you do that and nothing but that you are choosing a life that will kill you
and if you even indulge in that a little bit you're opening yourself up to that I think
not that I never relax and eat stuff on the couch while watching something but it's not
the point of my life and it shouldn't be and I'm teaching that to my children that it shouldn't
be for them either however if you choose a life of like action and of taking care of
yourself and of you know health and well-being and vigor and vitality that's you'll have
long term benefits you'll have short term costs short term suffering short term you
know pain and inconvenience but ultimately you will be a stronger healthier more resilient
person when everybody else in the office or school or whatever is getting sick but you're
eating the proper human diet and you're exercising and taking care of yourself getting enough
sleep you're going to be fine and you basically have to be able to have the long view and
have a high time preference where you choose to think about things in terms of how how
the benefits will actually outweigh the costs versus how you know in the long run which
is harder to see than how the benefit of watching this and eating that while laying here how
that outweighs you know that's a much easier thing to say yeah the benefit of doing that
all now is great for me right now the cost of it it's gonna be pretty high later on but
that's later on so that's a problem for future me you don't think that way well a wise person
doesn't think that way and it is foolish and deleterious to one's overall well-being to
think that way I think Anakin is actually in that frame of mind of having a low time
preference and I think it's you know destructive and dangerous and I think that's pretty clear
to see from everything going on here again I don't like the way that Yoda handles the
situation and I can understand him being like a harsh teacher being a severe teacher and
you're trying to push the student and maybe Anakin to the point where he should be mature
enough and like the Jedi you know ethical teachings or whatever philosophical teachings
should lead him to a place where he knows this intellectually even if he can't accept
it I don't know what the like emotionally but I know I definitely feel like there's
something flawed in the Jedi teachings and the Jedi system of instruction but then again
maybe Anakin is just the one with the flaw and we don't see that because the story is
told from his perspective and maybe there are hundreds of other Jedi who face things
similar to Anakin and not fall into the dark side in order to you know prevent a tragedy
from happening and we we just don't know so I don't know I find it very curious and I
I don't have an issue thinking that the Jedi are fundamentally flawed and maybe the you
know arrogance and the shelf self-assuredness that Yoda talked about some of the older you
know wiser Jedi who should know better having but they don't have it he talked about that
with Mason Obi-Wan in the hallway in episode 2 maybe that Jedi hubris has led them to a
point where they're instructing their students poorly because they think yeah we got this
we're Jedi it's no big deal you just do this and there's like the lack of personal you
know mentorship and time and attention giving to students who need this sort of thing look
I'm gonna meditate next to you while I ask you to meditate and learn to let go this moment
of everything you fear to lose I don't think that works the overall advice I think is good
but the you know specific advice like you have to tailor anyway if a student fails in
something there's a saying that it's not that the student has failed it's that the teacher
has failed the student Obi-Wan later on in the movie tells Anakin I have failed you I
think that's right I don't think Yoda thinks that he failed Anakin I don't know though
he didn't say but I feel like Yoda thinks are nothing wrong did I Anakin at fault he
is and you know yeah Anakin is responsible ultimately for what he chose to do but because
our actions are what shape us our actions are what make us who we are even more so than
our background in our upbringing and you know maybe that's why we had as much focus as we
did on Anakin as a kid and you know Anakin's you know burgeoning romance with Padme in
the context of him you know not having seen her for 10 years and all this stuff maybe
all of that is to serve the point or put forward the idea you know push the theme that it's
our choices that make us who we are and we can choose to be good we can choose to be
bad we can choose to be selfish we can choose to be selfless and it's up to us to have the
moral strength and grit and determination to do that and if you're only there's a saying
it goes something like if you're only good when things are good then you're actually
not a good person if you're good when things are bad or when things are hard that proves
that you're actually a good person so if Anakin can only choose to do the right thing do the
morally right thing when it costs him nothing then how good and sincere is his goodness
and I don't know in some ways the movie is less about well anyway I don't know it's weird
like Anakin has to fall to the dark side he has to have this tragic fall which by the
way this could be entitled Star Wars episode 3 the fall of Anakin Skywalker or the fall
of the Jedi ooh the fall of the Jedi would be a cool name if we had episode 2 was revenge
of the Sith or the Sith conspiracy I think is what I called it it's return of the Sith
is phantom menace in my alternate titling scheme attack of the clones is the Sith conspiracy
and this could be the fall of the Jedi well those would be cool names anyway but like
this is the tragic fall or this is the tragedy of Anakin also it could be called the tragedy
of Anakin Skywalker it's really sad and awful and it's like a warning that you shouldn't
emulate him in ways that would lead you to make similar decisions or have similar moral
feelings because of what you fear to lose so yeah I'm not saying Yoda is 100% wrong
I'm saying overall he's right but again you got to tailor that message to your audience
if you can't say something to somebody in a way that they will receive it then I think
you may as well not say anything at all you're better off not saying what you have to say
because I don't know I think you're just going to turn them against you more and I know it's
really interesting I have so much to say about this movie but I plan on talking about these
movies again and again in different ways in these smaller more topical ways as I think
about them in different contexts so I'm actually going to stop right now and ask that you stick
around for the rest of these I'm going to do the original trilogy next and then I'll
be talking about Ahsoka after that until that shows over unless it stinks in which case
I'll drop it right away so until next time folks take care this is MJ signing out