Hey, if we *can* change Christensen in our counterfactual history, I’m not against it.

I think you’re probably right that the protagonist problem is the root of it. I’m not convinced the solution is giving Hayden Christensen more George Lucas lines to deliver, but it would at least provide a throughline, especially if they let him be more teenage, less angst, for a film. Give us a baseline for his descent.

I do not think Attack of the Clones is better than this, but given that it’s broken in different ways, I fully understand thinking that.

Little A, little B for me

I probably prefer Force Awakens to Rogue One as well! Though in my case that’s more to do with indifference to Rogue One than affection for Ep 7.

I like the idea of Qui-Gon as a drunken master, but I don’t think Neeson likes the idea! At least, he doesn’t play it that way.

I don’t begrudge anyone liking this one more than me! It’s funny how we all see these cultural monoliths from different angles.

I’m reserving final judgment on Episode 9 until I revisit it, but am guessing I will not have it ranked last, though I’m not a defender. I am a little bit of a defender of the sequel trilogy overall, though. Episode 7 > Rogue One was one of my common movie argument battlefields in the late 2010s, but that’s one I’m not sure will hold up with revisit.

I can’t speak for ATTACK OF THE CLONES, but must confess that REVENGE OF THE SITH is one of my personal favourites – which I attribute in no small part to Mr Matthew Stover’s excellent novelisation putting everything quite beautifully in context for me.

I have always maintained that while it wouldn’t fix every problem, and Phantom Menace would still be kind of bad, it would be closer to normal bad–and it would do the whole Prequel Trilogy’s story a favor–if Anakin were just already a teenage Force user here, flirting with Padme, making Jedi uncomfortable, and presumably already being played by Christensen (and potentially allowing him to create an actual character, why, even a protagonist, which the follow-ups of course don’t really quite do). Oh well, hindsight’s 20/20 I guess.

I do more-or-less think Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith improve and hit “normal bad.”

Quite frankly I feel – and have always felt – that while THE PHANTOM MENACE isn’t the Best STAR WARS film it’s closer to the better films than the worst (Also that seldom in the history of feature films has a piece of cinema been so subject to excessively-close scrutiny, all too often spiteful).

To sum up: I feel no small amount of warmth for this film, but can accept that not everybody will feel the same (Also, Qui-Gon Jinn makes quite a bit of sense as a ‘drunken master’ type: think about it).

(I am, however, sympathetic to the idea that the *real* nadir of the series is The Rise of Skywalker.)