Actually you could read this in a variety of ways.

Emperor Palpatine’s consolidation of power and rule seems to dovetail with what Putin seems to be doing in Russia.

However being an American, I of course read most of the parallels as it relates to our current political situation. There are a lot of examples of this. Palpatine controlling the Senate and the Courts and thus all the power gave him the freedom to do what he wanted—a direct parallel to Republican’s stranglehold on our government. Pretending that he waged war for peace. Controlling the populace through fear, removing their rights – demonizing those who spoke out against him, etc. etc.

Dialogue from the movie- “You are either with me or any enemy” is just a little too close to Bush’s (Nov. 2001) speech – “You are either with us or against us”. Ewan McGregor’s response about Siths seeing things in a simplistic binary was an excellent retort. There are probably a dozen other examples, but I don’t remember off the top of my head.

After watching the film, I was mulling over these parallels and wondering how internationally they were intended to critique the current American political system. I read an article that said Lucas had made this parallel on purpose and he was concerned about the danger of losing our democratic ideals.

I doubt this will serve as a great wake up call for all Americans but it is another reminder that we are losing our democracy too, and are turning into the Empire!

Anyway, besides the political warning/satire, I thought the movie was pretty good. (Almost made up for the first one!)

Dreadful dreadful dreadful. George Lucas continues to ruin Star Wars.

I reallly liked this movie! Especially Hayden’s performance. He had so much emotion, and it felt like it was seeded from somewhere real. It kind of bothered me how Padme was so clingy and dependent on Anakin. I know she’s pregnant, but she was a queen and is a senator. She should be able to think objectively. Anyways, when I first watched the movie, it was already on dvd, and people were telling me taht it wasn’t as good as they thought it would be, so I probably like it more because I came in with lower expectations.

I liked it! Actually quite a lot. I even liked Hayden’s moody descent into evil..

Unfortunately, the dire legacy of 1 & 2 has probably offset any praise that this film may have achieved.

you kind of have to watch it. not that great though.

Worth consuming in the sense that an epic story requires completion. It isn’t terrible but it isn’t great either. It might be worth it simply for the end which puts everything in place for “A New Hope” in a satisfying way. Hayden Christiansen was not the right person to play Young Vader and George Lucas has become far too enamored with CG.

I tried to hard to like this movie when it came out at the cinema, and it is a far sight better than the previous two prequels… but you can’t really look at it without realising that Lucas dropped the ball with how great this movie could have been. It should have been on the level of a greek tragedy, but the characters of Padme and Anakin never reached those heights. Perhaps that is the greatest irony, that the galaxy’s most evil tyrant started off as a whiny little dipshit who was easily manipulated.