Originally written October 9, 2015

While The Phantom Menace is the first movie in the series chronologically, it’s the start of a second trilogy for the Star Wars series, a prequel trilogy that details the events of how a Jedi named Anakin Skywalker turns into the iconic villain Darth Vader from the original trilogy. Anyone that’s heard a fan of Star Wars talk about the prequel movies has probably heard a negative view of them. Truth be told though, this might be considered blasphemous to say as a Star Wars fan, but as a whole I actually like the prequels. They’re not perfect, nor are they as good as the original movies, but viewed in the right context I find that they can still be enjoyed. However, as an individual movie, The Phantom Menace is actually the only Star Wars movie that I just don’t like much at all.

The hate for the prequels is easiest to demonstrate with The Phantom Menace, and I think the context of it is very important. As a matter of fact, I firmly believe that if The Phantom Menace wasn’t such a bad movie, more people would have liked Episodes II and III. However, the hate for the prequels mostly stemmed from grown men that grew up as children watching the original movies and being massive fans of them. Viewed in that context, it’s very easy to see why The Phantom Menace was such a disappointment. The main reason for this is that when the movie came out in 1999, it had been a whole 16 years since the last Star Wars movie, Return of the Jedi, had come out. Naturally, hype was very high to see a new Star Wars movie, especially one that would show the origins of one of the best movie villains of all time. Die-hard fans went to see the movie and got so pumped when the classic scrolling text started to come up with the memorable Star Wars theme.

…And then you start to read the background story of what The Phantom Menace is going to be about in the opening text. The story is dealing with taxation on trade routes, and at this point I’m sure interest completely depleted among audiences. Then the opening scene involves our two main Jedi characters, Qui-Gon Jinn and Obi-Wan Kenobi, going to negotiate over the taxes, and it immediately becomes apparent that you’re not getting the same kind of movie that you got with the original trilogy. Don’t get me wrong, departures from the norm are fine, but not when your departure is so terribly boring. And that’s what Episode I is. It’s just a long, 2 hour borefest. The only thing that really ties it in to the rest of the series is the addition of Anakin Skywalker, who is just a child at this point. We see where Anakin grew up, and how he came to meet the Jedi that would begin to lead him on his path. Story-wise, this is the best aspect of The Phantom Menace, but it’s just bogged down by so many other boring plotlines that it’s hard to care.

For me, The Phantom Menace is just a movie that keeps getting worse every time I view it. I think it’s important for me to note my original experience with the movie, because I am not one of the men that grew up with the Star Wars movies and experienced disappointment as an adult when first seeing this movie. I was only six years old when The Phantom Menace came out, and at that point I had never seen a Star Wars movie before. This is actually the first Star Wars movie I ever saw, and so I never had that feeling of a beloved series being tarnished when I first saw it as a child. In fact, as a child, your mind tends to not know when a movie is bad or not, instead being more focused on how exciting something is or isn’t. And that’s why when I first saw The Phantom Menace, I actually loved it.

See, it’s easy to see why a child would enjoy this movie, especially when it’s their first introduction to Star Wars. At that time CGI hadn’t evolved yet, and so everything in the movie just looked so cool. The planets and the space stuff all looked really cool. The aliens and monsters all looked unlike anything I had ever seen before. Then there were the action scenes (which I never used to realize how few of them there actually were back then), which were so fun to watch that it blew my little child mind. Back then it was all about effects for me, and for that I loved the movie.

But then as you get older, naturally you get a deeper appreciation for the finer details of movies. I’m now 22 as I watched this on my most recent viewing, and at this point in my life I’m a huge movie buff. Over the past 16 years since this came out, I noticed more and more of the flaws of the movie. The story is terribly boring, minus some scenes concerning Anakin’s past. Most of the actors, with the exception of people like Liam Neeson as Qui-Gon Jinn or Ewan McGregor playing Obi-Wan Kenobi, give completely wooden performances. The delivery of a lot of the lines are completely monotone, with everyone looking so bored. And the characters that aren’t monotone/boring are just plain annoying, like Jar Jar Binks. The movie as a whole feels really lifeless, and a lot of the dialogue is pretty cringe-worthy.

Even the effects, which was what I loved most about the movie as a child, have aged so terribly. Now that our CGI technology has advanced and our screen resolution has gotten a lot better, The Phantom Menace keeps looking worse every time I see it. The viewing that I did before writing this review was watching the Blu-Ray of the movie for the first time, and all it did was make the movie look worse, because the flaws are so apparent now. It can’t simply be blamed on the time period either, because Jurassic Park came out five years before this movie, and that movie still looks fantastic to this day. The Phantom Menace just overused CGI, and the worst part about it is that it all just looks so fake now.

I can’t completely blast The Phantom Menace though, because it does have a few redeeming qualities even today. The action scenes are still pretty good for their time. That’s one thing the prequels excelled at really well in general. The action is fun to watch, in particular with a pod race in the middle of the movie and the final lightsaber battle at the end of the movie. The villain character of Darth Maul is also really great, and my main complaint with him is the fact that he’s way too underused in the movie. Also, considering how bad a lot of aspects are about the movie, the music in it is surprisingly really good.

I normally don’t delve this deeply into movies, but for The Phantom Menace I feel like it’s necessary. Without a doubt it is a bad movie, but rather than just bashing it for the sake of bashing it, I feel that it’s important to remember why it’s a bad movie. As I said, I feel that Episodes II and III are actually good movies if viewed in the right light, but Episode I is just hard to enjoy, and I’ve tried. While it does have some redeeming qualities that save it from being a total failure, this one is definitely the weak link of the entire series.

1.5/5