ManWitoutAPlan

Sadly after a great showing with the previous film, Return of the Jedi exacerbates and increases the problems of its predecessors. This ultimately creates a movie that's tugging between the decisive climax of a space political drama, and being silly sc-fi kids slop with no clear winner. It at least delivers where it was most important. This movie through the first act especially just uses ideas that are simply repugnant and dedicated decent amounts of screen time to them. Case-in-point, the "gross" alien races. Both fractions of the movie almost entirely are based around new species that are basic and predictable at best, and straight unpleasant at worst. And it begs the question as to why, as the movie had the big responsibility to be the finale. But the only "closure" with the first and second act comes from Jabba the Hut, a minor character in the first film. It focuses so much on the sc-fi world, it ironically comes full circle and makes the setting a detriment. All because the audience must watch cool in concept fight and adventure scenes that are dragged down by gross characters that seldom have dialog in settings more safe and generic than what you find in Indiana Jones. At least the score was still of similar quality to Empire Strikes Back, though it's more of the same while being a bit more subtle. The film does at least succeed in its attempt at closure to the trilogy. The movie put a particular bright spot on Darth Vader, fleshing a intimidating but mysterious villain to have a greater deal of nuance. Shifting the evil incarcerate shtick to Emperor Palpatine let's his beliefs and points of view shine a little, even if they are still kept a bit vauge annoyingly. There are fun callbacks to the prior films to give that feeling of all loose ends being wrapped up without any glaring ommisson. I also liked how the movie handled Luke, cutting to the chase in terms of his power to properly tackle the subject of the dark side and how it weavers with him. Though I gotta say that the plot twist involving princess Leia might seem like a cool idea on paper, it was terribly thought given some scene in the prior two movies, just yuck. Overall it's a bit of a must see if you liked the first two films in order to complete their stories, but on it's own two feet it definitely flatens. I'm worried that a catering to action and quirkiness instead of depth and lore had paved the way for its hated prequels.

An engaging and inspiring journey from start to finish. I find it to be a marked improvement over the already decent film before it ("A New Hope"). The film touches upon the exact story beat that the previous film had completely ignored, the Kurosawa-esque honing of the Jedi and dichotomy of the force. This makes it a far more intriguing and satisfying story that the basic sc-fi antics of its predecessor. The film has a definite improvement over it's thematics for sure. The cinematography, set design, and lighting are far more pleasant and epic to look at. Scenes of awe in cloud city for instance show fine glow over the actor's body, emphasizing their stature and the look on their faces in important scenes. Conversely, the snow and large pit scenes show a huge sense of danger and helplessness adding to the respective scenes' emotion. CGI and backdrops also seems to improve (though note I watched the remake not theatrical release) I also noticed the score being better as well. Instead of a rendition of one theme as A New Hope had, there are now clear cut leitmotifs for both Luke and the Empire that reflect the push and pull they have throught the plot. I still think the score is just decent, though there was definitely more care to it which I respect. The story for this film is such a step-up over it's predecessor, it's hard to belive it was created by the same writers. The movie has a excellent progression with a safe and comforting start, calling to adventure, unpleasant and shocking twist, then a heroic sacrifice to achieve a sense of heartfelt conclusion. This is much more engaging than a predictable introduction, followed by inciting incident, etcetera. That's because it makes us learn and share the desires and whims of the characters unlike a forceful call to action, as well as sets up many plot twists and downfall to retain engagement which this movie has in spades. We get a sense of Luke's pain in the intro, and the grit it takes to become a Jedi instead of just being told so. And the movie had a strong theme of valuing integrity over convenience, morality over power, and hard work even through sacrifice. I will say I only have two problems with Empire Strikes Back. Firstly, the movie's kind of lack of focus. While it succeds where it really tries, to much screen time was given to Han Solo and Princess Leia in their own subplot that doesn't interact with Luke until the third act. And while it contributes a bit to Luke's growth, the subplot of him being kidnapped by a yeti then having to be revived at the very start is also contrived. I know it was just to explain why Mark Hamil had scars on his face, but it's pretty anticlimactic since it's solved so quickly without any consequences for the rest of the story and could've been weaved to fit more of the story's theme. So the movie unfortunately has a bit of the problem of valuing set pieces and CGI sights over it's story. Definitely less so than A New Hope, but the film could've been something really special if it was an uninterrupted hero's journey about training and tests of faith. My second problem is that the movie does also rely on clearly being the second in the trilogy as it pertains to the ending. I really like that the ending is not all happy with huge problems arising that don't just get whisked away, but there is a bit of a "that was it" with how the movie awkwardly ends when it seems like there might be one last conclusion. Overall I had a great time watching it. While it's not intensely deep or exactly my cup of tea, Empire Strikes Back sets a midst of intrigue, steaks, insight, and heartfelt theme definitely above my expectations. While the desire to stay a fun laser blasting sc-fi for kids holds it back from being very special, I have to give credit and say the film was fantastic for at least what it was.

I have a better reception to it upon my second watch, when I initially had a much worse view of it. The movie follows a much more traditional adventure type of plot. A naïve hero explores the world and achieves his goals type of plot. I at first found the intro to be bloated and lacking in focus, but realized it doesn't overstay it's welcome and is a nice time spent world building upon my second viewing. World building in general was the movie biggest strength, you can easily tell the intention was always to make a large franchise. I liked that the movie didn't just show alien and robotic lifeforms just for the sake of novelty. It expanded upon relationships, debts, how the civilians interact with the empire, and how they carry on disobeying it. Sadly, I also think the movie showing off it's big budget was one of its biggest flaws. It constantly uses CGI and sc-fi backdrops to carry all of it's scenes, whereas the cinematography and set design itself is drab and uninteresting (with the exception of the garbage lockup scene). Though do note I watched the 90s remaster, which I heard gets rid of many natural props for jarring and terrible looking CGI like the prequels. But anytime the movie resorted to space battle CGI as opossed to sets, my intrest wained massively. Especially in the final act where it takes over the remainder of the film, completely bottlenecking the story and imagery. In terms of story, I have to give credit to the characters. They have a clear-cut dynamic and all serve their purposes driving the plot. Luke wishes for more to life and learns, but still kept as the aspirational paragon. The real growth is given to Han Solo. He does take a lot of focus away from Luke due to having a true character arc, but I get the didn't want to make Luke unlikeable. Princess Leia was also a great mediator, as she shared aspects from the two of them, but lacked their combat prowess so she must lead them. However, the plot I thought was very contrived at certain points. While it's a simple hero's journey mostly, there was a lot of convinces to move things forward. The biggest by far was "the force". The movie tries to make it seem very cool initially, but it quickly becomes a Deus Ex Machina that lets Obi Wan Kenobi just bend the enemies to his whims with no limitations or drawbacks. A big thing about the film in regards to plot is how it drops certain set-ups (like Luke's use of the lightsaber). It does a great job at emotional character arcs, but why even bring in these elements to the plot in the first place? Overall, I see why it became popular as it is quite the "everymovie". It takes and uses all the fundamental of making a film quite nice for a basic but wholesome movie.