Review of Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones (2002) by Mark M — 18 Dec 2015

Continuing the Star Wars retrospective. I've always thought Episode 2: Attack of the Clones was the most disappointing of the prequels and re-watching hasn't changed my opinion. At this point, the problems of Episode 1 were not insurmountable but there are several molehills in Episode 2 that make for a mountain of trouble.

The first 45 minutes are actually pretty good. It's at the 45 minute mark that the threads of the story begin to unravel to the point where the climax of the last 45 minutes is an incoherent mess.

In principle, there's nothing wrong with the casting of Hayden Christensen as Anakin (at least, nothing that rewrites for a small amount of dialogue couldn't fix). Anyway, you can see why he got the role.

A really BIG problem is the ZERO chemistry between him and Natalie Portman. I don't understand why (Did these actors not like each other? Did one of them have bad breath? Were the Joey Tribbiani rules of acting in play, i.

E. there's no heat, they're having sex?). It's a mystery. I don't have a problem with Anakin going nuts and killing everyone in the Tusken Raider village as retribution for the murder of this mother as a 'Darth Vader' trigger point.

I do have a BIG problem with Padme's declaration of love occurring AFTER that event. This is a direct consequence of Anakin being 3-4 years too young in Episode 1, which makes the transition to love story in this film much more difficult and awkward.

Leaving to almost the last piece of dialogue in the film to explain who ordered the creation of the Clone army is irritating (and I'm still not sure if I correctly understand). Count Dooku is also extraneous.

I can't help but think the prequels would have benefited from a consistent 'front-and-center' villain by leaving Darth Maul's death until early in the third film, letting its best prequel villain assume the role of Count Dooku in the story (Palpatine is clearly the 'behind-the-scenes' puppet master villain of the prequels).

All-in-all, Episode 2 is a huge disappointment for what it is but also for digging deeper a very large hole that Episode 3 almost had no chance to ever escape (no matter how great it might have been).

Yoda's light sabre fight is cool, though. Mark's Grade: C-.