Stuff I Grew Up With/Franchises: Star Wars. Return of the Jedi (Episode VI: Return of the Jedi) (1983)

While The Empire Strikes Back will always be my favorite entry in the saga, Return of the Jedi was the one that really got me hooked on Star Wars since it was the first one I saw from beginning to end and, as such, it remains my second favorite to this day. The interesting thing about this one is that for the longest time, I always thought everybody just hated the prequels but loved the entirety of the original trilogy; it turns out that's not quite the case. There are many who not only feel that Return of the Jedi is the weakest of the original trilogy but is also just as poorly written and directed as the prequels, if not more so, which really surprises me. What's more, on a film discussion show that I watch from time to time called the CineFiles, they once did a two-part episode on the Star Wars saga and they all unanimously agreed that Return of the Jedi is the weakest of all six films. While the four commentators on that show are welcome to their opinion, my jaw still hit the floor when I heard that. I'm not one of the many who absolutely hate the prequels but I still couldn't believe that they felt all three of those movies were better than Return of the Jedi. I agree that, when compared to its predecessor, it's not nearly as strong, and that there are some overly silly and weird aspects to it, especially in the special editions, but overall, I still think that this a great conclusion to the saga (or it was before The Force Awakens continued the story) and ties all the loose ends up nicely.

George Lucas originally wanted Steven Spielberg to direct the film but because he'd had a falling out with the Writer's and Director's Guilds, he'd instead have to go with someone who was non-union. To that end, he tried for two very unconventional directors for this type of film: David Lynch and David Cronenberg. Both of them declined, of course (Lynch has said that he was perplexed as everyone else when he was asked to do it), but man, Lucas must not have wanted this to be a family film at all if he wanted one of those guys! Eventually, Lucas chose Welsh director Richard Marquand, whose most well known film before this was Eye of the Needle in 1981. Marquand would only direct three more films after Return of the Jedi and only seven films total in his lifetime before he died in 1987 from a combined stroke and heart attack at the age of 49. To this day, there's some controversy about how much of the film was actually directed by Marquand because Lucas was apparently so heavily involved in the production, as opposed to his very hands-off approach to The Empire Strikes Back, that he could be considered a co-director. According to the book A Brief Guide to Star Wars, one of the reasons Lucas chose Marquand was because he felt his relative inexperience would make him more willing to bend to his whim, something that the strong-minded Irvin Kershner wouldn't do. Marquand himself even once commented on Lucas' presence by saying that directing Return of the Jedi was like directing King Lear with William Shakespeare himself being around. Plus, since the film was threatening to go over schedule and Lucas had shot some second unit stuff on previous films that had been made in the same state, it is possible that he was doing that at the very least. Lucas has also said that he had to help Marquand a lot because the latter wasn't used to directing a movie with so much effects work and there are also rumors that the actors didn't like him that much, forcing Lucas and an assistant director to take over much of the directing duties. Moreover, the two of them reportedly didn't get along that well, although Lucas has never said anything bad about Marquand (not that he would even if he did have a problem with him). So, in the end, who knows what went on during the making of the film? Given the confused nature of the production, though, I'm willing to guess it's one of the reasons why the movie isn't quite as good as its predecessor.

By now, Luke is as far from the young, naive farm-boy he was in the original Star Wars as you can get. Since his duel with Darth Vader at Cloud City, he has continued his training and is now very, very close to becoming a full-fledged Jedi. He's built a new, green lightsaber for himself, has become quite skilled at handling the sword, and has also learned to use the Force very well, as shown during his first appearance at Jabba the Hutt's palace where he slightly Force-chokes two guards to make them move out of his way and manages to use a Jedi mind trick on the Bib Fortuna. He's become a real bad-ass as well, as you see during the battle on Jabba's sail-barge where he skillfully fights off the Hutt's men. After he rescues Han Solo from Jabba the Hutt, he goes back to Dagobah to complete his training with Yoda but the dying Jedi Master tells him that he doesn't require any more training, that he now knows everything that he needs. Yoda also confirms to Luke that Darth Vader is indeed his father but, even though he knows how evil his father has become, Luke is confident that there is still some good within him and that he can bring him back to the Good Side (I know some sources say the "Light Side" but I've never once heard it called that in the actual movies and I don't particularly like the sound of it either). Unfortunately, when he tries, it does seem that Anakin Skywalker no longer exists as Vader resists his son's urging to let go of his hate and brings him to the Emperor.

The theme with Luke's clothes signifying his journey to adulthood is complete now as well. He's now wearing an all black outfit and sometimes even wears a cloak and hood similar to the one Obi-Wan wore in his first appearance. In fact, his wardrobe is very similar to how Anakin dressed in Episode II and III, albeit without the leather sections. This can be seen as a symbolism of the darkness within all of us, with the difference being while Anakin eventually succumbed to it, Luke has accepted it and is able to keep it under control without letting it completely consume him. He does almost fall over the edge a couple of times, however, but always manages to pull himself back, an example being when, after Vader stops him from killing the Emperor, he defends himself from his father rather than attacking him and kicks him away, saying he will not fight him. This leads me to something else: even though Lucas messed up a lot of stuff in the prequels, I do like the parallels made in hindsight between the lives of Luke and his father. They both came from nothing on the barren planet of Tatooine, both set out on the journey to become a Jedi, and both were faced with the Dark Side of the Force. It all comes to a head when Luke momentarily gives into his anger when Vader threatens to try to turn his Leia to the Dark Side and he viciously attacks him. After he lops Vader's right hand off, the Emperor tells him that he must now fulfill his "destiny" by killing Vader and taking his place at his side. Luke then looks down at the artificial hand that replaced the one that Vader chopped off previously and sees that Vader had one as well, realizing that he has come dangerously close to suffering the same fate as his father. He decides right there that this ends now and it's as far as he's going to go, throwing his lightsaber away and telling the Emperor that he will never turn to the Dark Side. He has now reached the end of his journey. He has confronted Vader a second time and while he hasn't killed him, he has defeated him in that he has resisted both his and the Emperor's attempts to turn him by sparing his father's life. Luke now truly is a Jedi.

Harrison Ford was reluctant to come back and play Han Solo one last time and you can kind of understand why since, by this point, there really isn't much else he can do with the character. In The Empire Strikes Back, while he was now an ally of the Rebel Alliance, he still had to pay off Jabba the Hutt; after Jabba is killed here, he no longer has any reason to be a smuggler and so he becomes a full-time member of the Alliance, even volunteering to lead the attack on the new Death Star's shield generator. It is definitely a big change from his portrayal in the original film where he was more than willing to turn his back on the Alliance after he fulfilled his original promise and got his reward but it's the only new thing that Ford is able to bring to the character here (and even then, you could sense that he was more than likely heading that way in the previous film). That said, though, Ford is still as bad-ass and likable as ever. Even when he's temporarily blind after being released from the carbonite, he's still awesome, able to help Luke and the others in their battle aboard Jabba's sail barge, even if by accident. (The bit with Boba Fett is particularly great.) He's also great in the forests of Endor: the way he fights with the Imperial guards they run into there is nicely rough, his interactions with the Ewoks, like that one that hugs him after they are accepted as part of the tribe and those that fall asleep on him during C-3PO's story, are cute and funny, and the way he ultimately gets inside the bunker housing the shield generator is quite clever. Speaking of the latter, one bit that I particularly like is when he's trying to hot-wire the bunker's door controls and he ends up activating another blast door on top of the one that's already closed. His expression when that happens is great. Despite Luke and Han being very close friends by this point and the revelation that Leia is actually Luke's sister, they still harken back a bit to the original love triangle concept between the three of them since Han doesn't find out about it until the end. He becomes jealous at one point when Leia, after Luke reveals to her that she is his sister and that Darth Vader is their father, is clearly hiding something from him that she seemed more comfortable telling Luke rather than him. He immediately apologizes to her for getting so mad, though, again showing how much he's changed, and they share a loving embrace. At the end of the film when the Death Star has been destroyed, Han promises not to get in-between the two of them and that's when Leia assures Han of her love for him by telling him that Luke is her brother (Han's shocked face is priceless, I might add). Finally, I've read some opinions that Ford's portrayal of Han here wasn't as great as it was prevously given his fatigue with the character at this point but, as you can see, I think he's just as good here as he was before.

Carrie Fisher is still in top form in her (at the time) last performance as Princess Leia. She's still tough as nails, sassy, and independent, entering Jabba's palace disguised as a bounty hunter to release Han from the carbonite and, even though she's temporarily turned into a sex object by Jabba (there's no getting around it: Fisher was hotter than hell in that slave outfit), she gets her revenge by strangling him with the very chain that he puts on her. On Endor, she's still very much a woman of action, helping Luke in the speeder-bike chase with those two troopers and taking a big part in the fight to destroy the shield generator. She really shows just how awesome she is when she's injured and, as Han tries to tend to her, a storm-trooper comes up behind them. She then secretly pulls out a laser blaster and the, "I love you" "I know" exchange from the previous film is cleverly reversed before she blasts the soldier. She's also the first one of the Rebels to make friendly relations with the Ewoks so she deserves some credit for that as well. The biggest step forward for Leia, however, is when Luke reveals to her that she is his sister... and now I feel have to talk about the incest issue. Luke and Leia did share inappropriate kisses in the other films but they didn't know that they were brother and sister... or at least, Luke didn't. When he reveals it to her, she says, "I know. Somehow, I've always known." You think about that and it makes you go, "And yet, you still cleaned his tonsils with your tongue in the previous film?" (You have to wonder if Luke thought that as well when he used the Force to find that out.) Okay, maybe that was meant to say that she had a feeling rather than she knew for sure but still, it does make you kind of gag. This is why Lucas shouldn't add certain stuff to an ongoing story after the original film because it ends up either not matching or just being unsavory.

Besides the brother-sister revelation, you also have to take into account that she discovers that Darth Vader is her father. While everybody talks about the famous scene in the previous movie where Luke learns the truth, if you think about it, that had to have been just as horrific for Leia, perhaps even more so. While Luke was justifiably horrified to discover that his father bad turned to the Dark Side, that was the first time he had ever confronted Vader and, by extension, it was the first meeting between father and son; Leia, on the other hand, had been tortured by Vader, forced by him to watch her home planet be blown up by the original Death Star, and had to stand to stand by helplessly as he froze the man she loved in carbonite. To find out that this horrible man is her father and that her brother, whose identity she had also just learned, is going off to face him and might not return, must have really hit her hard, which is why she told Han that she wanted to be alone. I don't think a lot of people take that aspect of her character into account. It's lucky that she had Han to eventually comfort her after that scene, even though he didn't know what was going on. Finally, I have to wonder if Leia herself has any Force powers. She probably has the potential, since the Force runs strong in her family, but since she's had no Jedi training at all, she's at the moment unable to do anything noteworthy. She does say at the end of the film that she can feel that Luke got off of the Death Star before it exploded but, again, that might be just intuition more than the Force. Still, I think that she could have possibly become a great Jedi herself with training.

Lando Calrissian may have betrayed Han and everybody else in the previous film but he more than makes up for it when he goes to great lengths to help Luke and Leia save him. He infiltrates Jabba the Hutt's palace as a new guard so he can help with the eventual escape and takes part in the battle aboard the sail barge. After his realization in the previous film that he messed up and the extent of his redemption here, I don't see how anybody could still hate him. I do think, though, that the rift between Han and Lando was fixed rather abruptly though. We never saw a confrontation after Han was released from the carbonite (you know that Han would have tried to fight Lando at some point) nor did we ever see Lando himself or Luke tell Han that he felt bad about what happened and was now trying to help him. When Luke mentions to Han, "Just stick to Chewie and Lando," Han doesn't react at all to the knowledge that Lando is there. (Maybe Chewie told him the whole story when they were locked up in the dungeon together.) So, if I have one major complaint with the movie, it would be that I wanted to see their friendship actually get repaired after what happened previously. But, whatever: Lando is still a cool character and proves to be a great leader when he heads the actual attack on the second Death Star. You also have to love his faith in his friends, especially Han, when, after the Death Star itself begins firing on the Rebels' major fleet-ships, Admiral Ackbar wants to retreat but Lando says, "Han will have that shield down. We've gotta give him more time." He also bravely leads the squadron of fighters into the heart of the Death Star once the shield is down, (I smirk when he loses an antenna on the top of the ship and says, "That was too close") and once they come out the other side after having destroyed the core, he lets out a triumphant, "Yee-haw!" It's such a great moment, made even better by Billy Dee Williams' enthusiastic way of yelling it, and helps to put a great cap on Lando's redemption.

C-3PO and R2-D2 get into more antics in this movie right from the start. When they go to Jabba's palace, R2 plays a message for Jabba from Luke where he says that he offers the two droids in exchange for Han Solo. Obviously, it's part of a plot to rescue Han but you have to feel bad for poor 3PO, who wasn't in on the plot and believes that Luke hates him now (R2 was in on it, though, since it's revealed that he's had Luke's lightsaber with him the whole time). Regardless, 3PO in particular is put through a lot of abuse during his time as Jabba's servant. He's led down these dungeons full of creatures that are being kept prisoner, one of which tries to grab his head with its long tongue, and he then sees some robots being tortured in another room, much to his horror. It's especially bad when that one robot shows him what happened to Jabba's last interpreter, whom he's replacing, and as he's being led away, he yells, "R2, don't leave me!", before seeing the destroyed parts of another droid next to the doorway. As Jabba's interpreter, 3PO gets smacked around by the giant slug when he translates something that displeases him, is forced to watch when Jabba captures Leia and the newly freed Han Solo, and later has to tell Luke and Han the grisly details of their upcoming execution. He also gets his eye poked out by that hideous Salacious Crumb and ends up falling off the sail-barge and headfirst into the sands of Tatooine as a result. As for R2, he's forced to serve drinks on the sail-barge but he isn't put through nearly as much abuse as 3PO. After all of that, 3PO gets the exact opposite treatment on Endor when the Ewoks treat him as a god (I like when he says that the Ewoks think he's a deity and R2 actually snickers at that). Although, if there's anything that 3PO does in the entire saga that I don't like, it's when he initially refuses to order the Ewoks to release his friends, even when they're about to be cooked at a banquet in his honor, because he says it's against his program to impersonate a deity. Against his programming or not, you'd think he would try to do something to save his master, but it's only through Leia's insistence that he tells them to set them free and even then, Luke has to use the Force to ensure that they will listen to him. It's only a small bit but that rubbed the wrong way; otherwise, 3PO is just as charming for the rest of the film, still being as twittery as always, telling R2 that, "This is no time for heroics!" and so on. Although he escaped abuse on Tatooine, R2 does eventually take some himself when he gets blasted at one point during the climactic battle on Endor and even though he's not badly damaged, he short-circuits big time afterward. My favorite moment with R2 here is when the Ewoks chop everyone loose and he decides to get revenge by shocking some of them with a gadget he has inside one of his panels. A feisty little droid to the end!

When it comes to Chewbacca, I first have to mention that I really like his tweaked look in this movie, with a much more ruffled hairstyle on his head that makes him look a lot like a dog rather than a Sasquatch as he had before (although when they filmed in the California forests, Peter Mayhew needed to be protected from potential Bigfoot hunters!) He also seems to have a more expressive face that he did before because I'm sure I actually saw him smile a few times. In any case, it's a change that I do really like and would say iss probably my favorite look for Chewie in the whole series. One part I still can't get over is when he's talking to Han in the dungeon in Jabba's palace and Han actually knows everything that he's saying, that he's talking about Luke's Jedi training and so on. I would get it if it sounded like an actual language but instead, it's a bunch of nonsensical growls, barks, and roars. How does one pull sentences out of that? I like some of the comedic stuff with Chewie in this movie, like when he's flying the Imperial shuttle with Han and they're approaching the Death Star while waiting for clearance to go on to Endor. Han tells him, "Keep your distance, Chewie, but don't look like you're trying to keep your distance," and he growls something that's clearly along the lines of, "How am I supposed to do that?", with Han answering, "I don't know... fly casual!" Unfortunately, Chewie's the one who gets them captured by the Ewoks when he falls for a trap they rigged with some dead animal and e even has to give up his crossbow to them, much to his annoyance. I also like when 3PO explains to them that they're going to be the main course at a banquet and Chewie whines something that's probably like, "Hell, no!" One moment, though, that I thought was a bit much was when Chewie swings onto the top of AT-ST and does the Tarzan yell in his wookie roar. Yeah, it was cute but it wasn't necessary and was far too kiddish (it wasn't as bad as when the real yell was used for a similar scene involving James Bond in Octopussy the same year). After that moment is when Chewie shows that he can pilot anything when he commandeers said AT-ST and you have to smile at the cute interplay between him and the Ewoks inside the machine when he takes control of it. Nothing else to say about Chewie other than he's a big, dependable teddy bear of a wookie as always.

At first, I felt that Yoda didn't need to be in this movie but, now that I think about it, I think it was important for Luke to go back to Dagobah to keep his promise to his mentor and also for Yoda to tell him that he doesn't require any more Jedi training, that he already have the necessary knowledge and skills and all that's left is for him to defeat Darth Vader and the Emperor. He also confirms to him that Vader is indeed his father and that it was unfortunate that he found out the horrible truth at a point where he wasn't ready to handle the burden of that knowledge, which could have easily swayed him to the Dark Side. I personally feel that if Luke had finished his training with Yoda as originally planned, Yoda and Obi-Wan would have told him the truth when the time was right, when he was strong enough with the Force to resist the Dark Side and to avoid his father's fate. Finally, with his dying words, he tells Luke that there is another member of his family out there besides his father but is unable to tell him exactly who before he dies. My only problem with this is that Yoda repeats some of the stuff he told Luke in The Empire Strikes Back, about how the Dark Side will consume him once he starts down the path towards. Was it really necessary to tell him that again? He already knew how powerful and seductive the Dark Side could be due to the revelation about his father and how he himself had been tempted by it. What's really good about Yoda here, though, is how, even when he's frail, old, and dying, he still has his sense of humor, noticing how shocked Luke seems to be by his condition and telling him, "When 900 years old your age, look as good you will not, hmm?" That's just great. Finally, Yoda's actual death is very profound in how his body just disappears afterward, signifying his becoming one with the Force. Even more telling is when Luke and R2 look back at his hut aand they see the light from the fire inside go out, a sign that his very presence on the planet Dagobah is gone forever. But, seeing his spirit at the end of the film with those of Obi-Wan and Anakin Skywalker is comforting because you see how, like his friends, he's still very much alive in the Force.

The minute that Luke sees the Force spirit of Obi-Wan Kenobi after Yoda's death, you can tell he has a bone to pick with his old mentor, especially when he calls him Obi-Wan rather Ben, which he had always referred to him as before. He confronts him with the truth about his father and Obi-Wan explains that, through his point of view, he didn't lie to Luke. When Anakin became Darth Vader, Anakin ceased to exist; ergo, Darth Vader did kill Anakin, as he told Luke. Some may consider that to be a crock but, given how Obi-Wan referred to Darth Vader as such when he confronted him in the original Star Wars, it's obvious that he doesn't feel that Anakin exists anymore. That's why he doesn't believe that Luke can turn Vader back to the Good Side, that there's nothing there to salvage, and that the only way to stop the Empire is to kill both Vader and the Emperor. Going back to the truth angle, like I said before, I do feel that Obi-Wan and Yoda would have told him the truth when the time was right and he was strong enough to handle it, whereas if he had told Luke outright when they first met when he was a naive young man, he would have been devastated. It's part of the reason why he and Yoda didn't want Luke to face Vader before his training was complete, or at least that's how I feel. As for why Obi-Wan kept the truth about Leia being Luke's sister a secret, I think of it as being connected with the father issue. If he had told Luke, he would have asked why he had no knowledge of her beforehand, which would have led to the revalation that they were separated at birth and that would have unavoidably led to the truth about their father. Still, you'd think Obi-Wan would have dropped a hint like, "Don't get too close to her," and if Luke had asked why, hecould have said, "I can't tell you but, trust me, it's a bad idea." Since Luke trusted Obi-Wan, I doubt he would have questioned his old mentor (or maybe not, considering the hormones of that stage of life Luke was in). As you can tell, the whole Luke/Leia thing does get to me a bit. It's just lucky that things worked out the way they did, otherwise Star Wars wouldn't have been quite so family-friendly.

Darth Vader is another character who has had a character arc throughout the trilogy. He started out as just an evil, faceless embodiment of the Dark Side in the original Star Wars, became gradually more humanized in The Empire Strikes Back with the revelation of his being Luke's father, and, by the end of Return of the Jedi, he becomes completely humanized as per his redemption by his son. In fact, Vader doesn't do much until quite a while into the film. We see him at the very beginning of the movie when he informs Moff Jerjerrod at the new Death Star that the Emperor isn't pleased with the lack of progress on the station and that he is coming to personally oversee its completion. After that, the next time we see him is much later, when he greets the Emperor upon his arrival at the Death Star. He only begins to take part in the actual plot when he senses his son aboard an Imperial shuttle that he allows to move on to Endor and when he informs the Emperor of this, his master tells him to go to Endor as well and wait for Luke, saying that he will seek him out. When Luke and Vader meet again, Luke tries to turn his father back to the Good Side, telling him that he can feel that there is still good in him; Vader, however, tells his son that it is too late for him, that, like Obi-Wan, he no longer considers himself to be Anakin Skywalker, and has Luke sent to the Emperor. Luke sadly shakes his head, saying, "Then my father is truly dead," but after he's taken away, you can tell by Vader's actions that what Luke said did strike a nerve in him. Still, he's determined to help the Emperor turn Luke to the Dark Side, forcing Luke to fight him in a lightsaber duel. Even though Luke is now as powerful as Vader is with the Force, he refuses to fight him and insists that he can sense the conflict between good and evil within him, which is why he didn't kill him before. Vader still insists that there is no conflict, which, at this point, is hard to believe given how he probably could very easily kill Luke but doesn't. Even when he throws his lightsaber at Luke when he's up on the scaffolding, don't you think he could have easily hit him if he wanted to? All throughout, he keeps telling Luke to submit to the Dark Side, saying that it's the only way he can save his friends, which says to me personally that he truly wants his son to join him because he doesn't want to kill him. To that end, he'll do whatever's necessary, which you see when Luke is hiding in the darkness and Vader uses the Dark Side to search his thoughts and discover that he has a sister. He then uses that knowledge to manipulate Luke into giving over to his anger by saying that if he won't turn to the Dark Side, then she might. Vader pays a price for this, though, because Luke angrily attacks him and slices his right hand off, giving back the scar that he inflicted on his son.

It is after this defeat that Vader slowly begins to turn back into Anakin Skywalker, which comes to a head when the Emperor is about to kill Luke. Unable to take the sight of his son being tortured to death in front of him, Vader grabs the Emperor and flings him down the reactor shaft of the Death Star. However, he ultimately sacrificed himself in order to save his son because the Emperor's Force lightning destroyed his breathing equipment. This whole scene got to me when I first saw it, due to the combination of Luke's agonized screaming when he's being electrocuted and his begging his father to help him, as well as Vader's labored breathing after he kills the Emperor. The most touching scene between Luke and his father is the last one, where he asks his son to take his helmet and breathing mask off so he can look at him with his own eyes. That's when you know for sure that he is no longer Darth Vader; he is now Anakin Skywalker again and wants Luke to rid him of what's left of Vader so he can look at him as his real father. That was another incredible moment for me when I first saw the scene where Luke removes his father's mask to reveal his face. It was just amazing to see that underneath that intimidating armor and mask and the source of the frightening breathing was a scarred, frail man. In his last moments after he has fully regained his humanity, Anakin then tells Luke that he was right, that there was still good in him all along. All it needed was a way out. After Anakin dies, Luke releases his father from Vader for good by burning the armor on a funeral pyre. That's especially interesting when you put it into context with Episode III: in that film, we saw Anakin become Darth Vader by having his humanity literally burned away and now, those same flames rid both Anakin and the universe of the evil Sith Lord once and for all. For all of Lucas' mistakes, I have to give him a lot of credit for that.

However, I think I've found a bit of a flaw with Vader's repent, especially when Episode III is taken into consideration. After the battle between Luke and Vader, the Emperor tells Luke that he must fulfill his destiny by taking his father's place at his right hand. Vader must have heard that and it would make me believe that he turned on the Emperor not only because of what he was doing to his son but also because he realized that the Emperor saw him as an expendable asset and nothing more. That's not explicitly stated but still, it does cross my mind Now, what I'm getting at is that would be okay... if Vader hadn't told Luke in the previous film that he could destroy the Emperor and they could rule the galaxy together. You might say, "Well, he was probably just saying that to turn Luke to the Dark Side." You could also argue that when the Emperor made his intention to replace him clear, it made Vader realize the true evil of the Dark Side, that his master was eventually planning to do the same thing to him, and that it would help him see the error of his ways. Those are both valid arguments; however, Episode III contradicts both of them in hindsight. First, as I said in my review of the previous film, Anakin offered Padme the same scenario that he offered Luke: kill the Emperor so they could rule the galaxy together. So, that wasn't the only time he's thought about overthrowing his master and, therefore, the idea that he was just saying that to Luke to turn him to the Dark Side doesn't work. Second, in that film, Anakin found out that Chancellor Palpatine was really Darth Sidious and, by extension, that Count Dooku had been his apprentice. And what did Palpatine have Anakin do at the beginning? Behead Dooku so that later, Anakin could replace him as Palpatine's apprentice. So Vader shouldn't have been that shocked when the Emperor revealed that he plans to have Luke kill him so he can replace him. Some would say that I'm probably looking too deep into this and that Vader always knew that Sith Lords tend to replace each other. I'd be willing to go with that notion if Dooku didn't look so shocked in Episode III when Palpatine tells Anakin to kill him. So, neither of those arguments work when the prequels are put into context with this film. The end result is that it makes Vader, and therefore, Anakin, look much less savory and redeemable. I know many would argue that the prequels already did that and that this idea is old news but I always felt when the prequels are taken into context, the actions of his son would make Anakin see not only that he shouldn't have turned to the Dark Side but also that he wasn't the best Jedi Knight beforehand. I guess you could say that the love for his son still overrode all that,  which might be true and I, being sentimental, do like to believe in the power of love. Also, you could say that when it actually happened to him, he knew how Dooku felt and that could have led to his repent as well. However, I still can't help but think that's a bit of a stretch. I shouldn't blame this movie since Episode III was made over two decades later. That makes it the fault of George Lucas. I've always said that the best thing about sequels and prequels is that you don't have to acknowledge them if you don't want to but seeing as how I do like Episode III (although I think it could have been done a lot better, as with all the prequels), that makes it very troubling in this instance. In any case, you can make up your own mind but this is just something that occurred to me when I was writing this part of the review.

Even though the Emperor briefly appeared in The Empire Strikes Back, he's truly introduced here in the form of Ian McDiarmid, who is just deliciously evil in the role. He is very much like Satan in that  when Luke is brought before him, he keeps trying to manipulate and goad Luke into succumbing to his anger, revealing that he allowed the Alliance to discover the location of the Death Star's shield generator so as to lure them into a trap, knowing how Luke feels about his friends. As he makes Luke watch the ongoing battle between the Rebellion and his forces near the Death Star, he continuously baits him to take his lightsaber and attack him, taunting him by saying that his friends and the Rebellion are all doomed and that he can feel his anger about the situation. When Luke does momentarily give into his rage and tries to attack the Emperor only for Darth Vader to stop him, the evil look on the Emperor's face and his laughter is just terrifying. Luke played right into his hands. He encourages Luke to use his anger, and when Luke slices his father's hand off in a rage, the Emperor is ecstatic because he thinks he's triumphed and has Luke now. He then reveals that he intends for Luke to take Vader's place after he's killed him so he can go on ruling the galaxy with a younger and more powerful right-hand man. But, when Luke refuses once and for all to turn to the Dark Side, the Emperor is positively enraged and decides to kill him, to me, not just because he wouldn't turn but also because Luke had basically made a fool out of him. That's also why he drags it out: he doesn't want to just kill Luke but rather to torture him, to make him suffer as long as he can. However, he didn't count on Anakin reemerging from within Vader and saving his son. In the end, his faith in the Dark Side was his undoing.

I guess now would be a good time for me to finally talk a bit about Rogue Squadron member Wedge Antilles (Dennis Lawson). I know he's been in all three of the films but I haven't really mentioned him until now because he's never left that much of an impression with me in any of them. In fact, he looked and sounded different (I think he was dubbed in the two previous ones) in each film... so much so that, for the longest time, I didn't think it was the same actor each time. I barely remember him in the original Star Wars but I did remember him in The Empire Strikes Back when he brought down one of the AT-ATs and said, "Wow, that got him!" when it was destroyed afterward. In Return of the Jedi, he's very much a part of the final battle at the Death Star and he does appear briefly at the Ewok celebration at the end of the film but he doesn't do much for me to think of him as that noteworthy character. He's just kind of there as part of Luke's squadron, albeit the one that gets the most screentime. And Lawson is Ewan McGregor's uncle, which is an interesting coincidence.

As usual, this final entry continued the saga's intention to push the boundaries of special effects work and ILM really stretched itself to the limit this time, with about 900 effects shots that had to be completed by April 1, 1983; to that end, the studio had to remain running for 20 hours a day, six days a week. It's amazing that the budget, which was $32.5 million, didn't spiral out of control like the previous film's. The outer space battle at the new Death Star in particular pushed the company. The first two films had challenging space sequences but this one, with so many ships flying around and so much laser fire, including multiple firings from the Death Star's main laser, must have been excruciating to get done, as were the detailed shots of the station's surface and the tunnels leading to the core. But, as always, the end result is amazing and you really do feel like you're in the middle of an all-out space war in that sequence. They also some introduce some new ships for both the Alliance and the Empire. I'm pretty sure this is the first time you see the TIE Interceptors, which are the TIE Fighters that have jagged points on their wings. (It doesn't come across in the movie but in video games, they made those things really hard to avoid because of their speed and maneuverability.) The new Death Star also looks interesting with how it's not finished yet and there are sections of it missing. You're also introduced to new Alliance vehicles, like the A-, B-, and Y-wings, and really big battle-ships such as Admiral Ackbar's cruiser and ships taken from the same design as Princess Leia's in the original film. Another notable effects sequence is the speeder bike chase through the forests of Endor. The closeup shots of the riders on the bikes are clearly done with blue-screen compositing behind them but the POV shots of the bikes and the frontal and long range shots of them zipping through the forest is just as impressive now as it no doubt was back then for my money. Even though the AT-ST walkers were introduced briefly in the previous film, this is where they come to prominence, in the battle of Endor. Oddly, there is a brief appearance by an AT-AT next to an Imperial landing pad that doesn't take part in the battle. Wonder why they didn't use them to guard the shield generator since they're far more powerful? While I prefer the blue lightsaber, Luke's green one here does look pretty good, as does the Emperor's Force lightning. Finally, there are a lot of great creature effects in this movie, ranging from puppets an animatronics, to makeup and costumes. Jabba the Hutt was a massive, one-tone puppet that took three puppeteers to operate and even had its own makeup artist! The result is very impressive and, needless to say, disgusting. The rancor monster was originally supposed to be brought to life by a guy in a suit but, because the effects team couldn't find a way to make the monster look believable with that technique, it ended up being another puppet. While some of the compositing of the monster in the scene is wonky (you can clearly see the black line on its edges) and there are brief moments where its hands aren't moving, the closeup shots are well done and you'd swear that thing was actually twenty feet tall. There are a lot of other well-designed and executed creatures that I'll talk about shortly but those are the ones that are the most impressive on a technical level to me.

Even though there's only one new planet environment introduced in this film, there are still some interesting settings in this film. For example, you have Jabba's palace on Tatooine, which is just as unpleasant and disgusting as he is: it's grimy and filthy, with dank dungeons, rooms where droids are tortured and destroyed, and the main room where Jabba and his minions stay. That room is just an absolute freak show for me, with all those bizarre creatures along with Jabba himself, and I get the feeling that it stinks like hell too. His sail-barge isn't all that pleasant, either. Being jammed in there with all those creatures in the heat of the Tatooine desert must be absolutely miserable. Among the other obvious reasons, I can see why Leia was so eager to kill Jabba and escape! I really like the forest moon of Endor for the very reason that I myself live in the woods. I may live in Tennessee, whose forests look nothing like those of California where they filmed, but to me, woods are woods and I was like, "Alright, the movies have come to my type of environment!" Those forests are beautifully photographed and look very mysterious, particularly in that moment where the Ewok Wicket senses something when he's with Leia and everything gets very still for a few moments, with the only sound being that of a bird in the distance. I also have always liked the idea of a technologically advanced human settlement, such as the bunker that leads to the shield generator, being in the middle of the woods, I guess because it reminds me of the contrast of myself sitting here and writing this in a well-furnished house with all the comforts in the middle of the woods. The Ewoks' treetop village is interesting as well and does look like something that a primitive tribe would build (some levels in the Donkey Kong Country games look as if they took inspiration from this setting). Finally, there's the Emperor's throne room aboard the Death Star: very cool, clinical-feeling room, with the gray, muted look to the walls, its dimly lighting, and the Emperor's chair in front of the window where he can see everything. It almost has a kind of Gothic look to it if you look carefully. I don't know why his throne room is in the same area as one of the reactor's main sections but I guess that they had to have some iconic way to kill him. I also find it kind of cool that his stairs glow and that there's an entire section beneath the platform where he sits that's even darker than the upstairs, which is where Luke hides from Vader.

The chapter on this film's production in the book A Brief Guide to Star Wars is called Creature Feature and it's very appropriate. Lucas' team must have felt that they didn't introduce as many bizarre creatures in The Empire Strikes Back as they did in the original Star Wars and set out to correct that right from the start. The first major one introduced, if you don't take the special edition of the original film into account, is Jabba the Hutt, probably the most repulsive creature in the entire Star Wars universe. It's not just that he's a big, 1,000-pound slug but also due to all of the fluids that seep out of his fat body. It seems as if he has a runny nose because you can see the residue of something that looks like mucus around his nostrils, he drools a lot, the inside of his mouth, when you get a good look at it, is hideous (the moment where he eats that little creature in that bowl next to him horrified me as a kid), and that tongue is especially revolting. Plus, he keeps good-looking females of any species as apparent sex slaves, and there's no hiding what he's thinking when Leia is first brought to him and he licks his lips. I'm like C-3PO when he says, "Oh, I can't bare to watch," because that takes Jabba to a whole new level of gross. Even worse, if his slaves don't do what he wants, he feeds them to the rancor, that sick, lard-ass of an alien. I was so glad when Leia strangled him to death with the very chain that he used to keep her and all his other slaves close to him. One thing I have to wonder about Jabba, though, is how he gets out of his palace. He's so fat that I doubt he could fit through that little door we see that connects his main room to the hallway that leads to the entrance, so he must have a backdoor somewhere. And finally, here's where I really rip George Lucas a new one. I haven't listened to the audio commentary for the DVD edition of the film but apparently, Lucas whines about the way the gigantic puppet used to portray Jabba looked, that it had to be moved around the set to film different scenes, and that he wishes the technology had existed back then to make Jabba completely CGI. Okay, seriously Lucas, go to hell. The model-makers and puppeteers busted their butts to create that one ton puppet and make it work and it looks pretty damn good to me. But no, Lucas whines, "I want it to be CGI so Jabba could be more mobile and so I wouldn't have to move a big slab of animatronics from one set to another." And how did Jabba look like when he was CGI in the special edition of the original film and in Episode I? He looked like crap (if he replaces the puppet here with a CGI version in a later edition, I'm really going to be mad). That just really gets my goat how Lucas has no respect for the artistry of practical puppet and model effects. S, for all of you who were waiting for it, there's my first real rant at Lucas in this series of reviews for you.

Jabba is hardly the only disgusting thing in his palace: every part of it is crawling with bizarre, gross-looking inhabitants and droids. Those pig-like Gamorreans that act as guards are about as nasty as their master, with how slimy their faces are from all the drool and snot. Bib Fortuna, the creature with two long, snakelike appendages growing out of the back of his head, really took me aback the first time I saw him. He's really freaky-looking with those things, as well as his red eyes, sharp teeth, claws, moist skin, and the way he talks. A not bad-looking female member of his species, which are called Twi'leks, gets fed to rancor when she resists Jabba. I absolutely hate Salacious Crumb, that ugly, monkey-lizard thing with a beak that's always sitting next to Jabba. He's just hideous and unpleasant with all his cackling. When he poked C-3PO's eye out, I was so happy when R2 zapped him. I wish I could have actually seen him get incinerated when Jabba's sail-barge blew up. Jabba even has his own band, made up of a big, fat, blue elephant guy that plays the keyboard, a fat cyclops creature that plays a woodwind, and a spindly female creature named Sy Snootles that sings (I'll get into the ridiculous added musical number with them when I talk about the Special Edition). There's other weird stuff roaming around the palace, like this big, spider-like droid you see in the background when 3PO and R2 first enter, a lizard-thing that acts like a guard-dog when the droids walk by it, some squid-faced freak, this thing with three eyes, several Jawas, some frog-like creature that plays an instrument in Jabba's throne room, a big fat woman dancer who I thought was human but I learned in other media is of species where the females have six breasts (that's charming), and a droid in the dungeon that tells 3PO and R2 their new jobs. There's also this weird thing outside of the palace that looks very much like a frog and swallows some little creature whole with its long tongue (I'm not sure if that's a creature that was introduced in the special editions or what). I really like the rancor monster that Jabba keeps beneath his room to feed to those who displease him. He has a really cool dinosaur-esque look to him with his big head, scaly skin, and long claws. The part where he eats that Gamorrean that fell into the pit with Luke is really horrific and Luke himself barely manages to escape being eaten but is able to kill the rancor by dropping a heavy gate onto him. (By the way, who was that big fat guy who started bawling like a baby when he saw that the rancor had been killed? He must have been the guy who raised the creature because he sure does take his death hard.) The last creature you have on Tatooine is the sarlacc that lives in a pit in the middle of the desert. The way the creature is described before you see it, in that when you're eaten by it, you're slowly digested over a thousand years, is a horrific notion to say the least. Judging from clips, I think the way it looked in the original version was the best, where it was just a mouth with rows of sharp teeth and tentacles; in the Special Edition, Lucas felt compelled to add a CGI beak and more tentacles. It doesn't hurt this film as much as the other changes he made but it's still unnecessary. The sarlacc is also where Boba Fett meets his demise (although according to other media, he eventually escaped). I've always wondered why he was at Jabba's palace to begin with. I know he delivered the frozen Han Solo to Jabba but that was a while ago by this point. Why is he still hanging around? It doesn't matter, though. He doesn't say a single word in this film and while he does take part in the battle aboard the sail-barge, he's eventually knocked into the sarlacc by accident because Han still can't see after being released from the carbonite.

Throughout the film, you meet other creatures, as well as new kinds of guards working for both the Alliance and the Empire. Even though they don't do anything, I think the Emperor's royal guards are really creepy, with their blood-red suits, their complete silence, and slow movements. You also meet some new kind of troopers in the form of the forest guards on Endor. They're not much different in look than the regular stormtroopers other than the design of their helmets but, by this time, the Imperials must have fixed the helmets' com-links because these guards' voices sound a lot clearer. As for the Alliance, you meet the fish-like Admiral Ackbar, who operates a ship run by other members of his species that is a main part of the attack on the Death Star. Although Ackbar is a pretty good character, with a nice design and shows some good leadership skills, lately I've started to become a little sick of him because the clip of him saying, "It's a trap!" has become an annoying internet meme that you cannot escape. There's also Lando's copilot aboard the Millennium Falcon, this black-eyed, gill-faced guy called Nien Nunb. Not much to say about him but he's a weird looking thing. But let's get to the creatures that everybody remembers from this film for better or worse: the Ewoks. I know there are a lot of people who really don't like them, who say that they're overly cute in their design and are only meant to be marketed towards little kids, which is hard to deny (in fact, Gary Kurtz, who produced the two previous films but was replaced on this one, has said in recent years that this was when George Lucas was starting to become obsessed with marketing), but I like the Ewoks. I can't help it, I think they're really cute, with their big eyes, teddy bear-like designs, little furry ears, and the way they move. Their way of speaking makes me smile as well. The most prominent one is Wicket (Warwick Davis), whom I really like because he's such a feisty little thing. There are too many different ones for me to mention all of them but I also like the fat, gray one that growls a little bit, the one that seems to be the leader who insists on the humans being the main course in a banquet, and the one that gets on the speeder-bike and flies around crazily. I'll talk more about Ewoks when I discuss the action scenes but I freely admit that I like them and they're far from the biggest problems that Star Wars has ever run into (although I wouldn't be caught dead watching the spin-off, TV movies involving them).

There's a lot of action in Return of the Jedi, with the first big sequence being the battle aboard Jabba's sail-barge. Luke and Han are about to be fed to the sarlacc when Luke makes use of his Jedi skills to get off the plank and R2 gives him his lightsaber (kind of weird that when R2 was made into a servant droid for the barge, nobody checked him and found the saber). He then proceeds to go to town on Jabba's minions, showing off his new skills, particularly with the sword. While Luke battles Jabba's minions and Boba Fett, the still partially blind Han Solo tries to help Lando, who falls on the edge of the sarlacc pit and risks being sucked down in by the monster. This is the moment where Han accidentally knocks Fett into the pit by turning around sharply when Chewie warns him about him and hits his jet-pack, causing him to whack into the side of the barge before tumbling down into the pit. This is where Leia puts a much welcome end to the disgusting Jabba the Hutt by strangling him with her chain (he even dies in a gross way, with his face coming right at the camera as he lets out a gurgling death rattle with his tongue hanging out). After that, the friends are reunited, the sail-barge is destroyed, killing the rest of Jabba's minions, and they leave Tatooine. Unfortunately, C-3PO doesn't manage to escape the battle unharmed. Not only does he get his eye poked out by Salacious Crumb but he falls headfirst into the sand and has to be picked by his feet when the heroes are leaving. I just feel bad for 3PO; he always gets the worst of it.

The speeder bike chase on Endor is another noteworthy action scene. Han and Chewie decide to take out two forest guards but Han, unfortunately, steps on a twig, tipping the guards off and starting a fight. They manage to stop the second guard before he can get away, while Han fights the other, but two more guards show up and speed off to contact their headquarters, which is when Luke and Leia get on the remaining bike to chase them. The result is a high-octane sequence unlike anything in the two previous films. They're smashing alongside the other bikes, shooting at them, and Luke manages to get on one after they fling the guard off but then, two more pop up behind them and Luke decides to take care of them while Leia pursues the last one. This is where Leia gets separated from Luke when she falls off her speeder and passes out. Luke manages to destroy one of the speeder bikes but falls off of his and has to use his lightsaber to fend off the last one, ultimately sending him flying right into a tree. Very fast-paced and exciting sequence.

The climax to the movie is unreal because it has three battles going on at once (which George Lucas would take one step futher in The Phantom Menace with four battles but let's not jump the gun). First off, you have Lando and Admiral Ackbar leading an all-out attack on the Death Star, a battle that I think is even more impressive than the climactic one in the original Star Wars. That battle, while still well done, was a simple assault on the actual Death Star involving a few ships trying to blow the station up; this scene, like I said earlier, is an all out space war, with the Rebels desperately fending off an attack by a dozen Star Destroyers and hundreds of TIE Fighters while they wait for Death Star's shield to be destroyed. There are ships getting blown up left and right during the first half of it but the second half becomes even more grim for the Rebellion when the Death Star itself begins firing upon the major battle-cruisers, blowing them away like nothing. Admiral Ackbar proposes a retreat but Lando tells him that if they do so, they've lost the war against the Empire, prompting them to ultimately decide to continue fighting either to the end or until the shield is taken down. Once that happens, Lando leads a group of fighters down into the Death Star's core, while Ackbar orders an all out attack on the Super Star Destroyer. That ship is ultimately destroyed when one of its main reactors is blown up and an out of control Rebel fighter crashes right into the bridge, killing Admiral Piett and the rest of Darth Vader's men, and sending the ship crashing into the Death Star's surface. Of course, the station is completely destroyed once Lando, after blowing up the core, flies the Millennium Falcon victoriously out of it with that triumphant, "Yee-haw!"

The other two sequences going are the lightsaber duel between Luke and Vader (which I've already talked about in detail and don't know what else I could add), which is more emotional than just straightforward action, and the battle of Endor, where Han and the rest of the gang try to enter the bunker housing the Death Star's shield generator. This battle always gets a lot of criticism from people who say that they find it implausible that the Ewoks manage to win the battle without any advanced technology. First of all, people act like the Ewoks manage to defeat the whole Empire but they didn't. They just aided in the fight and even then, it wouldn't have mattered had they been unable to lure out the Imperials who were holding up in the bunker, which Han was finally able to do. Second, everybody seems to think that the Ewoks defeated the Empire's machines easily with primitive weapons. They managed to destroy a few AT-STs with big logs and subdue some storm-troopers with basically boomerangs and bolas but the Ewoks suffered some losses all their own. Remember those two who were retreating when they got shot by laser-fire? One survived but he discovered that his buddy was killed. Another got on a hang-glider and dropped rocks on an AT-ST but he got shot down as well (although I'm not sure if he died or not). The only way they were able to turn the tables on the battle was when Chewie (who has piloting skills) and a couple of Ewoks took over an AT-ST and used it to destroy the remaining ones. That's also how Han was able to trick the remaining Imperials into leaving the bunker so they could destroy the shield generator. I don't get why people seem to think that the Ewoks single-handedly defeated the Empire when they didn't, they only helped. Despite my rant about people's perceptions of how it went down, the battle is still great, with a lot of action and memorable moments, like Han trying to hot-wire the bunker's door controls and R2 getting blasted before proceeding to short-circuit. Great stuff.

Once again, John Williams comes up with some great new music while still using the familiar themes that we all know and love. I personally really like the driving music during the battle of the Death Star, the Emperor's creepy theme with the low, vocalizing male voices in the background, the very big and grand version of the Imperial March when the Emperor arrives at the Death Star, and the music during Luke and Darth Vader's lightsaber duel, which is less about the actions and more about the emotions going on. I think the best musical cue in the entire film is when Luke angrily attacks his father. With the swelling sound of it and those voices singing, it perfectly captures the emotion and how ferocious the duel between father and son has gotten at that point. I've always found the music that plays when the Emperor is electrocuting Luke to death to be really horrific and grim, especially the bit that begins after he says, "And now, young Skywalker, you will die," (it was used very well in the trailer for Revenge of the Sith). It then gets heroic when Vader repents and kills his master. There's also a nice soft, touching melody when Luke unmasks his father and Anakin Skywalker peacefully dies after having seen his son through his real eyes, and I like the reprise of Luke's theme when he burns what's left of Darth Vader, which perfectly signifies that his journey has finally reached its end and he is now a man. As for the Ewoks' theme, I think it sounds cute when you first see them but I really, really wish that they hadn't played an orchestral version of it over the majority of the ending credits. That just baffles me. This is the final entry in this grand space opera (for over 30 years, anyway) and you're going to leave us once and for all with that and a very lackluster final cue at the end?

There are some new interesting sound effects in this film as well. Jabba the Hutt's voice is very memorable, with its sheer deepness and his, "Ho, ho, ho" laugh. When Leia is dressed up as a bounty hunter, she manages to create a strange-sounding voice with the mask she has on (though why she spoke in another language the first time while she spoke to Han in English before taking the mask off, I don't know). The snorting and grunting sounds those Gamorreans make sound really gross and the scream made by that thing that Jabba eats has always kind of disturbed me. I think the rancor's roar is really intimidating and the screaming made by Gamorrean that he eats makes it all the more disturbing. I also like listening to the Ewoks' chatter amongst themselves in their language, especially when it sounds like they're arguing. However, the sound that sticks with me the most is when Darth Vader's breathing equipment has been destroyed by the Emperor's Force-lightning and he begins to breathe in a very stifled, raspy way. You hear that and you know that he's on his last legs, a fact that really got me the first time I saw this movie because I was always so used to hearing his strong, deep breathing. Hearing him sound weak and helpless was quite sobering, to say the least.

Return of the Jedi is the film that I think suffers the most from the special edition treatment. I know many despise the changes Lucas that made to the original Star Wars the most but there are additions here really get under my skin. Let's start with something good, though, which is the new musical cue that plays over the ending montage. I really like it and think it captures the feeling of celebrating the end of the Empire perfectly, whereas the Ewok song in the original version sounded too kiddy and silly. I like that montage, including the new stuff (most of it, anyway) in particular as well, showing the various planets celebrating and then ending with the heroes, including Wedge Antilles and the other surviving members of Rogue Squadron, reuniting on Endor. It's such a wonderful way to end the long battle to free the galaxy. But now, onto the bad stuff in the special edition, particularly that musical number in Jabba's palace with Sy Snoodles dancing and singing. What in the hell, Lucas? First off, Snoodles' singing about bursts my ear-drums. Second, it's completely pointless and stops the movie dead in its tracks. I didn't want to see this crap or some ugly furry thing run right up to the camera and go, "Aah, yaah!", with a big wad of spit hanging off his teeth. Damn! Even when I was ten years old, I was thinking, "What is this?" Going back to the ending montage, while I do like it, I think the 2004 DVD version of it shows that Lucas loves antagonizing his haters. In that edition, he put in a shot of Naboo and you can hear Jar Jar Binks yell, "Weesa free!" Given other things he's done and said regarding that character, I just know he did that to piss off all the Jar Jar haters.

My biggest bone of contention with the 2004 edition, though, is the depiction of Anakin Skywalker's Force spirit at the end. In the original and 1997 version, it was Sebastian Shaw, who played the unmasked, scarred Anakin but in late 2004, with the release of Episode III approaching, Lucas replaced Shaw's image with that of Hayden Christensen, which really pisses me off. One, Christensen sucks as an actor for the most part and I did not want to be reminded of him in the original trilogy. Two, when Shaw appeared in the other versions, the way he looked at Luke radiated warmth and pride in his son, whereas Christensen just blankly stares at Luke with that smirk of his that never feels sincere (I've heard that Christensen didn't even know he was being filmed, which, if true, means I can't blame him in that respect). Third, why is Anakin suddenly young again as a Force spirit even though he died as a middle-aged man? And finally, it just feels like Lucas is pissing all over the memory of Shaw, which is disgrace. In the 2011 Blu-Ray release, Lucas messed with it even more so. The Ewoks blink now! Whoop-dee-doo, I couldn't care less. And as if putting in a sound-byte of Jar Jar wasn't enough, now you have Darth Vader once again yelling, "No!" as he did in Episode III, this time coming when he saves Luke from the Emperor. Now this is proof to me that Lucas has to know what he's doing. No one is that naive. He knows people hate Jar Jar and he has to know that people hated that part of Episode III, so to me, it's just him flipping off his haters, saying, "I know you people hate the stuff I do but I can do whatever want and you can't stop me. Fuck you." And even putting that aside, that just ruins that moment for Vader. Him silently look back and forth between the Emperor and his dying son was much more powerful than that wimpy, "No!" In short, the special editions of Return of the Jedi in particular are proof to me that not only is George Lucas a moron now but he knows that a lot people hate him and just loves making them mad.

I honestly don't get a lot of the criticisms for Return of the Jedi. True, it is a step down from its predecessor and the tone is a bit more light-hearted, with the Ewoks being catered more towards kids, although I don't think it's necessarily a kids' movie in that there's still a lot of freaky and dark stuff, with the beginning section at Jabba's place and the Emperor trying to kill Luke. Overall, I think that this is a great finale to these characters' story, the effects-work is still top notch, the action scenes, especially the climax, are great, the music is once again excellent (for the most part), the film isn't without palpable emotion, and everything is wrapped up nicely at the end. Again, Lucas may have weakened it in recent years with the special editions but I still think it's more than a worthy, at the time, finale to the saga. If you haven't seen it in a while and you don't remember liking it too much, I'd say give it another shot. For me, it's the movie that really got me into Star Wars and it will forever remain my second favorite entry in the saga.