Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace (1999)

And so it begins. We’re gonna FORCE it all down one more time. This isn’t just a casual viewing and discussion of Star Wars on a YouTube/podcast for the umpteenth time. Well, it kinda is but we’re likely never going to watch these movies ever again after this month. We have our personal place in Star Wars history. Our own generational emotional attachments. Taking it all in to this day, our personal excitement for the franchise has greatly waned. It’s probably just a natural feeling as we get older but the nostalgia dump is getting very unwieldy across several film franchises and we’re more than happy to let others get emotional about Star Wars after the month of May. So one more ride within a galaxy far far away all month long and we say it’s the final word on these movies. Empty your brain of all opinion and simply adopt our perspectives with no question. We’re going chronologically so we’re starting it off with the prequel trilogy and easily the strangest of all the Star Wars movies. We’re discussing George Lucas’s 1999 prequel to his massive sci-fi franchise called “STAR WARS: EPISODE I - THE PHANTOM MENACE”. Even its apologist have to admit that the first foray into the story of a young Anakin Skywalker is absolutely weird and helping greatly with that feeling is the notorious alien sidekick “Jar Jar Binks”. Jar Jar isn’t the only bizarre choice for the movie but he’s definitely the hardest one to contend with. It almost seems like an Andy Kaufmanesque prank to observe this strangeness in such a major blockbuster film. We also got a messiah narrative, metachlorians, Jedi being fully complicit in slavery, pod racing and Darth Maul who you know is badass because he can get it at both ends of the lightsaber. We were chomping at the bit to watch the first Star Wars movie in 16 years. When it released, and the dust settled, many of us were more than a little confused. But it’s okay. Now we know that Jar Jar is the key to all of this.

Here’s the pretty good making of doc: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=da8s9m4zEpo

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