No joke. The stories, pacing, and performances were of the same expired-yogurt quality and they were both stuffed to the gills with equivalent amounts of “wow golly gee willikers” CGI nonsense.
But Episode II had Yoda with a lightsaber. Respect, motherfuckers.
I appreciate this review. It tells me what I need to know.
Admittedly, the Yoda lightsaber thing was one of the highlights of my decade in moviegoing. Everybody in the audience started cheering when he was flipping around and kicking ass. It was like a great moment we had waited a long time to see.
Too bad about the rest of it, though. At first I resisted that seventy minute Phantom Menace review that’s going around right now, but I have to say after watching it that it’s certainly worth a look. The guy is funny (Ben Stein meets Dr Zoidberg) and it’s not just about slamming Lucas (although there’s plenty of that); there are a lot of good points being made here about storytelling in general. Here’s the first ten minutes, anyway; if you dig that, you’ll probably enjoy the rest of it as well..
