There’s a debate that rages on amongst Star Wars fans: the prequel movies or the sequel movies. Which is worse? Whether or not so much discourse and debate is necessary, it still occurs and I will join it.
Up until the release of Disney’s new Star Wars movies, it was widely accepted that the prequels were bad. After the new ones, however, there were not only people saying that the sequels were worse, but that the prequels were actually good.
Let me be frank, both the prequel and sequel trilogy are, on the whole, not good. There may be good moments and even a good movie or two, but the two trilogies as a whole are not good. But, which is worse?
I’m not concerned with audience or critical reception. If you’ve seen the Rotten Tomatoes page for The Last Jedi, you’ll know neither are reliable. So, I watched all three prequel movies and all three sequel movies to determine which trilogy is worse. And let me tell you, it was rough.
The Prequels
Of these two trilogies, this was the only I have completely seen prior to writing this piece. I watched these movies as a little kid on DVD’s packaged with the original trilogies. Because of that, there might be a chance of nostalgia-based bias, right? Wrong.
Even as a child, I was bored with these movies compared to the original trilogy. With The Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones, I would just skip to the ending fight scenes when rewatching, because I couldn’t understand the story. Even as a child, I didn’t like these movies.
The Phantom Menace is infamously difficult to understand on a first viewing. For Attack of the Clones, Cosmonaut Variety Hour’s “Palpatine Sends a Man…” rant highlights its ridiculous plot. Revenge of the Sith seems to be the only tolerable one, only ruined by poor writing and bad pacing after the space battle.
These three movies all suffer the same problems. When the plots aren’t confusing or don’t make sense, they’re boring. The dialogue and poor directing make relating to the characters difficult. The fight scenes suffer from this, too, because you don’t have connections to these characters. Aside from the scores, these movies just fail.
For a comprehensive critique and deconstruction of the prequel trilogies, I recommend the Mr. Plinkett reviews. If you can parse macabre and aged humor, these are the most celebrated and dense prequel reviews on the internet.
The First Two Sequels
Remember how genuinely excited people were for The Force Awakens in 2015? Remember all those fan reactions to the trailer? That was almost ten years ago. Simpler times.
This was the only Star Wars sequel movie I had seen in theaters when it first came out. I really liked it back then, and I still feel the same. The characters and dialogue were fresh and lively, the action was intense, and the story was easy to follow along. It may have been a rehash of A New Hope, but The Force Awakens is easily better than any of the prequel movies for these facts alone.
The Last Jedi on the other hand is, uh… different? With a change in director and a departure from the standard Star Wars narrative, The Last Jedi may have been the most divisive film of the 2010’s. Is it great? No. Is it terrible? No. It’s more of a decent mixed bag than anything.
There are matters of tone inconsistency, the Casino portion of the story, and the writing of Rose. However, it does many aspects incredibly well such as Luke’s conflict, having some of the best visuals in the Star Wars saga, and having Rey be a nobody. It suggested that Star Wars was heading in a different direction.
The Rise of Skywalker
After the insane and frankly overblown reaction to The Last Jedi, Disney decided to make the most-crowd pleasing Star Wars movie yet. They brought back J.J. Abrams who directed The Force Awakens and did some reworking to the story. And, if they made The Rise of Skywalker as a peace offering, it miserably failed.
The rehash of the previous two movies is insane, almost impressive really. They managed to take the interesting plots and themes present in the last two and boil it down to “Palpatine’s behind it all.” Like the prequels, it did make the universe feel much smaller.
The characters are no longer characters, but action figures. They are action figures through barrage of action scene after action scene, with little to no time for tender moments or reflection. Along with the many fake out deaths, aimless directions for certain characters, and questions of what the force now can’t do, this movie is frankly a hot mess.
The Rise of Skywalker suffered comparatively poor box office, fan derision, and the worst ratings by critics for a live-action Star Wars movie. I firmly believe that people hate the sequel trilogy more than the prequels because of this movie alone, and it’s not hard to see why.
Comparing the Star Wars Trilogies
Aside from the action scenes which vary from film to film, the sequels are honestly more entertaining. The Force Awakens is actually pretty good, and much of the Last Jedi—especially the last half-hour—is riveting. Even The Rise of Skywalker, the hot mess that it is, has an entertaining desert chase.
The prequels, on the other hand, are remembered for their boring political scenes and unrealistic romances for a reason. Politics in Star Wars could’ve been really interesting, but the results are anything but. And of course the romance, because who else loves cliché dialogue between an emotionally immature man baby and a senator who has no reason to love him outside of physical attraction?
Some may say that Rey is a Mary Sue—wrong, at least until The Rise of Skywalker—but at least she’s likable. She’s a kind spirit with a tragic upbringing, and she’s more than capable with both technology and combat.
Anakin’s upbringing is tragic too, but he’s honestly not that likable. He’s overly whiny, disrespects Obi-Wan numerous times, so stupid he can’t see through Palpatine’s manipulation, and commits mass murder on numerous occasions along with genocide. Add on top of that bad writing and directing, Anakin is honestly harder to like than Rey.
The Prequels are Worse
So, yeah. The Star Wars prequel trilogy is worse than the sequel trilogy, at least to me. Am I biased against these movies? Yes, but I’m not biased toward the sequel movies. The flaws in Disney’s attempt at the galaxy far far away are hard to ignore, but even harder with the prequels.
I can at least say I’m entertained with the sequel movies, while I’m either bored or baffled with prequels. George Lucas’ had little to no resistance or challenge from anyone making those movies, and that is seen in the infamous making-of documentaries.
What those documentaries show is a man, seemingly uninterested in the project he’s undertaking, surrounded by yes-men. Even with full support and agreeance of everyone around him and his ideas—the product he intended—it still turned out like this. Disney may have done some meddling with the sequels, but this was how the prequels were meant to be.
If nothing else, I can at least say that these both of these trilogies are not unwatchable. At least they’re not the Star Wars Holiday Special. Good God no.
