Word: jedi
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...around whom the disappointment in Phantom Menace crystallized. Lucas blames the anti-Jar Jar sentiment on "37-year-old guys who spend all their time on the Internet. But you have to remember that when we did The Empire Strikes Back, some people hated C-3PO. When we did Jedi, they just loathed the Ewoks. There was no Internet to jazz it up, but there was the same conversation. Fans are very opinionated, and that's good. But I can't make a movie for fans." Nonetheless, Jar Jar has a far less prominent role this time. In movie theaters...
...Anakin of Clones is an attractive fellow, full of a young man's roiling contradictions. He respects the Jedi ethic while squirming to elude its strictures; he loves both his faraway mother and the royal temptation at his side; he does engage in a revenge massacre but feels remorse for it; he is disarming and, finally, literally disarmed. By the end of Clones, Anakin is still a decent, stalwart gent, light-years removed from the malefic Vader...
Kids watching the new Star Wars films may think movies were always like this, because so many are like them now. But Lucas' first Jedi epic was, in its way, revolutionary. It established sci-fi as a hot genre and teen boys as an audience that made hits by buying tickets early and often. It spurred the toy industry with its synoptic range of characters. "Star Wars was so 'toyetic,'" says Brad Globe, merchandising executive at DreamWorks. "It wasn't just one character or one vehicle; it was a whole world that was created, then extended through each movie...
...director Rob Coleman based Yoda's performance on the hand movements Oz used inside the puppet, including the flaws. "When Frank would move the head, the ears would jiggle," says Coleman. "If we hadn't put that in, it wouldn't look like Yoda." Indeed, the 900-year-old Jedi is awfully spry during the climactic lightsaber duel. Get ready to cheer when you see Yoda...
Onscreen he's a Jedi knight with a very dark future. She's a galactic Senator with the worst taste in men in the universe. Offscreen Hayden Christensen and Natalie Portman seem far less exotic. Unlike some of their Hollywood counterparts, neither has ever made news by trashing a hotel suite or getting arrested outside the Viper Room. Instead, they have become known for smart career strategies and finely tuned performances in films whose budgets wouldn't pay for the wigs in a Star Wars movie...