Growing up in the 2000s, the Star Wars prequel trilogy was always described to me as these terrible films that are not worth watching. I distinctly remember my dad begrudgingly taking me to watch The Phantom Menace for its 3D re-release in 2012. Even having seen it prior to this, I realised from then on it was, in fact, not a good film. My dad has never been the biggest Star Wars fan ever but it became clear to me that whenever I wanted to watch the prequels, he would not care to watch them with me, whereas he was all over the original trilogy. To be clear, I share the same sentiment and I have always preferred and love the original trilogy, Empire Strikes Back being one of my all-time favourites. However, Revenge of the Sith was seen as the better film out of the prequels and with the franchise’s generational revisionism, many 2000s kids call it a masterpiece. Whilst this seems extremely hyperbolic, people (for some reason) do think this. Whether its the fact the first two are pathetically terrible, making it seem so much better, or its had a helping hand with nostalgia, people really love this film. Whilst I have never shared affinity for it to the extent others do, I have always had a soft spot for this one. Watching it in the cinema for its 20th anniversary re-release was great fun, full of flaws as it may be.

As you probably know, Revenge of the Sith is the reason the prequel trilogy exists. This is the film where Anakin Skywalker is to follow his dark path and become the forever iconic, Darth Vader. It also takes place at the very end of the Clone Wars and gives us the reason for the creation of the Galactic Empire, that we know from the original trilogy, with the evil Emperor Palpatine at the centre of it all. We are placed right in the action with a huge space battle above planet Coruscant. Our heroes Obi-Wan and Anakin are on a mission to rescue Palpatine from General Grevious’ flagship, which is just another ploy from the dark lord. All this is apart of the weaving plan of Palpatine and though we initially just see Obi-Wan and Anakin’s bantering through the mission, this film immediately announces its darkness and thus Anakin’s too. Palpatine’s encouragement for Anakin to decapitate Count Dooku sets the wheels in motion for Skywalker’s dark turn.

Much of the criticism towards this is that Anakin’s turn is much to forced and sudden. As far as the trilogy goes, his fall into darkness is only really present here, apart from some very hamfistedly delivered scenes in Attack of the Clones prior. However within this film, it is certainly handled better than people give it credit for. I have seen many talk about it as if it is some Shakespearean tragedy and whilst that is hilariouslt overexaggerated, it does have traces. The irony of Anakin’s turn happening purely because he is trying to prevent premonitions of Padmé dying, in turn resulting in her eventual death is clever writing. It makes the overall character of Darth Vader much more tragic too and makes his eventual redemption all the sweeter. He only wanted the power due to love, an incredibly human emotion. We are told many time the dark side is of passion and obssession and that is the thing that corrupts him. It would help if the films before it built his turn properly but I think what is done here is good enough considering. His relationship with Obi-Wan is all the more loveable and you do truly believe they have been friends for a long time, with lots of mutual respect. It just does not help that the dialogue between them, along with most of this film’s dialogue, is very rocky.

A running joke through George Lucas’ career is that he could not write natural sounding dialogue to save his own life. The originals have some rough dialogue but the performances manage to pull it off and the whimsical nature of those films works in the dialogue’s favour. In Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith, the whimsy is toned down and it the tone is a bit more serious. There is a reason so much of this dialogue is meme material and has been for many years. Everytime I heard a line that has been used in a meme template like ‘this is where the fun begins’ or ‘hello there’, I just had to laugh. The deliveries of some of these lines, particularly by Hayden Christensen, are genuinely hilarious. Lines like ‘if you’re not with me, the you’re my enemy’ are a one-two punch of comical delivery and the baffling thought that this made it out the writing room. This line is a perfect example of Lucas’ problem with overly-observational, the need to say everything and show nothing. Padmé saying ‘Anakin, you’re breaking my heart’ or the iconic Darth Vader ‘Nooooo’ scream are stupid because we know how these characters are feeling at this time. We do not need the dialogue to tell us exactly how they are feeling at any given time, it can just show us.

Whilst all of this is true, I did say I had a soft spot for Revenge of the Sith. I grew up with it after all and as much as nostalgia is seen as a guise to be lifted in order to think critically, to abolish it as a valid perspective would be disingenuous to how we view art. Why should somebody not enjoy this film if they enjoyed it as a child? As 2000s kids, we were told these films were terrible and while I think this is true of Episodes I and II, Revenge of the Sith is not nearly as bad as people would have painted it out to be back then. It has its flaws but even then, things like the memes to come out of it show a cultural appreciation for it, embracing its awkwardness. When I said I was laughing at those meme lines, I laugh from a place of love too because I am so familiar with them. Outside of the flaws, it still has lots of redeeming qualities too. I was taken aback watching the intro in the cinema because of how well executed it is and the cinematic experience helped me appreciate that majorly. The action is great too because who does not love a good lightsaber battle? They might go on incredibly long in this and are very over the top but the set piece moments are massively entertaining. It does not touch the original trilogy for me but after seeing this in cinemas, it still keeps that special place in my heart all these years after it first came out.