Okay, I know everyone hates them, but I just wanted people to share they're views on why, or maybe you don't hate them.

Share your opinions on the differences between the prequels and the originals.

Honestly I think the serious SW fans that grew up with the original trilogies were expecting the second coming or something. I didn't roll my eyes at gungans nearly as bad as I do at Ewoks.

The point of the prequels was to tell the complete story, and I think Lucas did a great job. It was nice to see Darth Vader as Anakin and get some insight into why he did the things he did.

There would have been a very vocal peanut gallery no matter how the movies were made or where the plotlines went.

I enjoyed the prequels, they expanded the star wars universe much more. It added more action as well, don't get me wrong, the original trilogy had good action, it's just that the prequels showed it off in a bigger scale.

The story was quite clever as well and expanded on the sith lords, well, basically created them. I liked palpatines cunning and trickery, fooling the jedi and the republic and showing how the empire came about.

The lightsaber duels in the prequels probably inspired a lot of the awesome lightsaber combat in tonnes of star wars games, graphic novels and books.

Admittedly, I didn't like seeing Anakin the way he was. Darth Vader was one of the most iconic and evil villains ever, and seeing him be so deppressing and childish struck a blow at my idea of him.

Honestly I think the serious SW fans that grew up with the original trilogies were expecting the second coming or something. I didn't roll my eyes at gungans nearly as bad as I do at Ewoks.

 

The point of the prequels was to tell the complete story, and I think Lucas did a great job. It was nice to see Darth Vader as Anakin and get some insight into why he did the things he did.

 

There would have been a very vocal peanut gallery no matter how the movies were made or where the plotlines went.

Can agree with the last part really well, but I liked all the movies. And only until watching The Legacy Revealed about Star Wars, it solified my views on all the movies and made me like them even more because it put them all in a completely different and good view imo.

This should really drive home the point.

The moves were nice to look at but the dialogue and acting were absolutely atrocious and at times hilarious. Kind of like Michael Bay movies, heh.

The actors did their best with the script they were given.

The movies themselves made no sense. At the very start of TPM the droid army descends from space on the opposite side of the planet from the city they intend to attack, allowing the protagonists to take the "faster" route "through the planet core" which takes all of 10 minutes but is somehow accomplished faster underwater in a twisting cavern while being attacked by monsters than the droid army can accomplish above ground with aircraft.

It's just an excuse to see a shiny underwater bubble city and have a pointless underwater action sequence. It goes downhill from there.

The actors did their best with the script they were given.

 

The movies themselves made no sense. At the very start of TPM the droid army descends from space on the opposite side of the planet from the city they intend to attack, allowing the protagonists to take the "faster" route "through the planet core" which takes all of 10 minutes but is somehow accomplished faster underwater in a twisting cavern while being attacked by monsters than the droid army can accomplish above ground with aircraft.

 

It's just an excuse to see a shiny underwater bubble city and have a pointless underwater action sequence. It goes downhill from there.

Well, if you were trying to pull off a sneak attack, would you move an army slowly on the ground using the terrain as cover or just go all out and move everything as fast as possible in the air, giving everyone in a hundred mile radius ample opportunity to establish a defense? The invasion was very illegal to begin with and they had hoped to take the capital by surprise and force the Queen to make their occupation legal by signing a treaty.

If my memory serves, Qui-Gonn and Obi-Wan were too late anyways and had to fight their way through the city to get to the palace.

Well the first one is by far the worst one in my opinion largely because of the drawn out pod race and jar jar binks, I have no problem with the rest of the gungans but jar jar binks is too much of a clown and it's just not very funny.

Everything else I enjoy, now the movies are no masterpieces but they're good fun and I think the turning of Anakin is well made. My favorite character in the prequals has to be Obi-Wan, well acted and interesting character

Terrible script, terrible acting, terrible movies. I think it's kind of insane that they manage to take such good lore and make such bad movies out of them. I went into Episode 1 with hope, and walked out with disappointment and confusion.

But whatever, I'm sure someone enjoys them. I just think the movies might have been better if Darth Maul loved through all 3 movies. As it was, Padme and Obi Wan were the only characters who remained the same throughout all 3 films and they were so boring it was like watching paint dry. The whole reason the original 3 worked (despite some bad writing in there, too) was because the actors had chemistry.

The new trillogy had no chemistry and no charm. They were almost painful to watch.

• The acting is simply wooden. Even some of my favourite actors (Ewan MacGregor being a perfect example) had no screen prescence whatsoever.
  
• The story was badly written, lots of inconsistancies with the original trilogy, the romance took far too much screen time and Anakin's fall was started far too late in the series.
  
• Countless villains were introduced as one-hit wonders with no character development or backstory. Both Maul and Greivous could have been brilliant villains in their own right, but should have spanned all three movies (two at least).
  
• An over-reliance on special effects to do the story telling.
  
• Bad direction, not enough time to establish plot, no real depth to the story or sub-plots to explore.
  

I think that's everything, I'll come back if I think of anything else

The actors did their best with the script they were given.

 

The movies themselves made no sense. At the very start of TPM the droid army descends from space on the opposite side of the planet from the city they intend to attack, allowing the protagonists to take the "faster" route "through the planet core" which takes all of 10 minutes but is somehow accomplished faster underwater in a twisting cavern while being attacked by monsters than the droid army can accomplish above ground with aircraft.

 

It's just an excuse to see a shiny underwater bubble city and have a pointless underwater action sequence. It goes downhill from there.

I've seen Natalie and Ewan work off of terrible scripts from other movies but they were nowhere near as bad as in the Star Wars prequels. Just a bad day at the office for them. Either way agreed the TPM plot was ridiculous and the whole Anakin-Padme story arc was terrible from start to finish. There was a scene where Anakin ruthlessly murders an entire tribe of Tusken raiders (children included!) out of vengeance of his mother's death which shocks Padme but apparently this act is easily forgivable. Later on Anakin kills Jedi children and after Padme was confronted by Obi-Wan she refused to believe that he was capable of such a thing. Really?

Later on Anakin kills Jedi children and after Padme was confronted by Obi-Wan she refused to believe that he was capable of such a thing. Really?

Killing younglings?

I don't think I've cringed that much in my entire life.

• The acting is simply wooden. Even some of my favourite actors (Ewan MacGregor being a perfect example) had no screen prescence whatsoever.
  
• The story was badly written, lots of inconsistancies with the original trilogy, the romance took far too much screen time and Anakin's fall was started far too late in the series.
  
• Countless villains were introduced as one-hit wonders with no character development or backstory. Both Maul and Greivous could have been brilliant villains in their own right, but should have spanned all three movies (two at least).
  
• An over-reliance on special effects to do the story telling.
  
• Bad direction, not enough time to establish plot, no real depth to the story or sub-plots to explore.
  

 

I think that's everything, I'll come back if I think of anything else

I was going to write my own responce, but this is what I would have said 100%.

I didn't /hate/ the prequels, but there are definitely things that I hated about them.

Jake Lloyd - Anakin may have been fairly awful, but baby Anakin was almost painful for me to watch.

Too many Jedi - I hate to say this, I really do, but it made the movies boring. there needed to be more non-Jedi chars. what would the OT have been without Han, Chewie, Lando, or Leia?

as for more darth maul - I loved darth maul. I love ray Parks. but, (especially considering the director) I think I would have been too easy to over use him. better he died quickly when we were still fond of him than watch him beck e a broody charicature of himself.

as for more darth maul - I loved darth maul. I love ray Parks. but, (especially considering the director) I think I would have been too easy to over use him. better he died quickly when we were still fond of him than watch him beck e a broody charicature of himself.

I think it would have been nice if they actual gave him a personality. He was such a great idea that was never used.

1 - Inconsistencies with the first trilogy

2 - Jar Jar Binks and everything about him

3 - Hayden Christensen's terrible acting

4 - Too much Jedi, ie, the complete lack of a 'Han Solo esque' character.

I could go on, but those are the major problems. As a piece of eye candy, episodes 1-3 were masterful. As an example of epic storytelling, the first three episodes are atrocious.

I loved em.

Especially #3. cheezy answer, but eh.

I recently watched all six movies over several days which I had never done before and it had been a long time since I saw them, and it got me thinking about this topic (so I'm glad you asked).

My feeling after watching them was that the prequels are not that bad. They are very entertaining to watch. The problem is they do not nearly live up to the potential. They could have been so much better, and I think that's why people hate them -- not because they are bad movies, but because they are not great movies.

The issues I have with them:

-- The Phantom Menace is a waste of a film. Starting the Anakin story when he is so young was pointless. Not much of significance happens when the main character is a 9 year old. The core of the story is basically about a little boy trying to win a fancy go-cart race with nice special effects. Starting with Anakin so young also makes the romance between Padme and Anakin feel a little awkward later on in the other films since she apparently met him when she was a young adult and he was a toddler.

-- Once we get to Attack of the Clones, the next big mistake begins. Through a combination of acting and writing, Anakin is immediately not likable. Anakin should have been a tragic hero, a character we love but know he's heading somewhere dark. Like if Luke Skywalker fell to the dark side -- that's what it should have felt like. Instead he's just immediately creepy. In order to show early signs of him leaning toward the darkside, they made him all crotchety and annoying. He gives Obi-Wan attitude, he gives Padme attitude, he gives the Jedi Council attitude... and not in a charming way, but in more of a "this guy is a total d-bag" way.

-- If his attitude wasn't enough, Anakin is also very aggressive and creepy in his pursuit of Padme (made creepier by the fact that the last time we saw him, and the last time Padme saw him, he was 9). He stares at her with those creepy eyes like some hungry animal. When Padme supposedly falls in love with him, it feels phony and forced.

-- On another topic, something else I can't stand in the prequels is the invention of the midi-chlorians. The force was always something fantastical. It wasn't supposed to have an explanation. Creating a lame sci-fi medical explanation for the force was a ridiculous idea. It ripped away the mystique and fantasy of Star Wars. I hope the word midi-chlorian is never mentioned anywhere in SWTOR.

People talk about other things like how annoying Jar Jar is, or minor continuity issues between the films, but I don't think those things are very important. These issues I listed have to do with the core of the story, and that's where the movies really failed.

One word:

Mitichlorians.

I could forgive Jar-Jar. I could forgive "Baby Ani Built C-3PO." I could forgive killing Darth Maul instead of letting his evil percolate for another movie. I could even forgive "Anikin was born of Virgin Birth"

But to reduce the All-Powerful Universe-Binding Force to little more than a blood infection ... man, that tore everything else for me.

I myself think that they didn't make Anakin epic enough, he was supposed to be "The Chosen One", a very powerful force user, a character like Neo in Matrix.

But he very rarely shows any signs of being that good. If ever. If you guys have seen Jumper, (which conveniently stars the same actor) there's a scene in the end where he teleports a whole buidling, which was supposed to be impossible.

It needed to be some moment here Anakin show the same kind of "impossible feat", to really show the audience his potential.

But, by my opinion, Obi-Wan seems like a much greater Jedi, who is the first Jedi in a thousand years to beat a Sith, and he was only a padawan then.

Obi-Wan is so underrated.

With all due respect to the legacy of star wars.

Personaly I liked the prequels which i have watched first, more than the originals.

I understand that ok,the originals were made some decates ago.But especialy in the first movie,the hand to hand battles were imo poor,in comparison with other action movies of about the same age.

I had the feeling that nothing was so special about been a jedi or sith,Just a normal guy with a lightsaber and few telekinitic moves.