The new Star Wars movie: Rogue One

I saw Rogue One last night, and I realized that I am very unhappy with Episodes 1 to 3 for ruining my ability to watch a new Star Wars movie without skepticism.  I went in to each of the releases for 1 through 3 with excitement and anticipation for wonder and magic.  I even enjoyed them the first few times I watched them.  And then I started noticing that my love for Star Wars had blinded me to just how awful episodes 1 to 3 are.  So when I saw Episode 7, I reserved judgement, and ended up liking the characters and how well the actors did.  I liked a fair amount of the lines.  But I was disappointed by how much of it was a direct copy of Episode 4.  So while episode 7 doesn't upset me as much as episodes 1 to 3, it's still not quite the level of magic and wonder I get from episodes 4 to 6.

Don't get me wrong.  I understand that the concept of teddy bears fighting storm troopers and winning is pretty ridiculous.  I understand that there are flaws with the originals, but the story and characters were good enough, and the setting great enough, that I am still moved to tears when Luke snaps at the thought of Vader stealing his sister to the dark side of the Force... and Luke (accompanied by a masterful John Williams) creates the best scene in all of Star Wars.  And that's saying something since there are lots of truly great scenes.  Han wasting no time and immediately shooting at Darth Vader comes to mind.  I love that scene too.  And even though the logic behind the trench run is a bit flawed, I truly love that scene as well.

So I went into Rogue One with suspicion but still a little hope.  I was worried because of episodes 1 to 3, but hopeful because it's Star Wars.

And I'm pretty happy with it still the morning after seeing it.  I'll see it again a few times, and time will have to pass for me to trust my own judgement, but at this moment I think I can say that I really liked this movie.  There are three nitpicks I'll make in the spoiler section of the review, but they're nitpicks.  Some excellent new characters that have their own personality and interest, and I think the writers overall did an excellent job.

On a scale of 0 to 100 I'll give it a 94 (only suffering because perfect scores aren't really possible, and because of the three nitpicks).

Now we're moving into spoiler territory.  If you haven't seen the movie yet and don't want to hear about any of it yet, this is the spot to stop reading.

~ SPOILERS FOLLOW ~

We knew from before the movie came out that it's the story of the rebels getting the first death star plans, which is just before episode 4.  The beginning of episode 4 is Darth Vader's Star Destroyer chasing a rebel blockade runner that is carrying the plans.  Rogue One ends with the blockade runner fleeing an imperial base where they stole the plans.  But of course, that's not the movie.  That's just how it relates to the existing movies.

I'll start with the nitpicks.

Nitpick 1: One of Vader's lines
Darth Vader is having a conversation with the imperial director who was in charge of the Death Star project.  This guy is arrogant and ambitious.  He spends most of the conversation shifting blame for problems away from himself, and trying to get recognized for the things he accomplished.  He's a sniveling brown nosing coward.  Well written.  Vader is obviously getting impatient with him, but is restraining himself from killing the guy because he IS useful to the Death Star project.

The end of the conversation has the director asking Vader if he gets to keep his command.  Vader responds by Force choking him for a bit and then delivering the worst line of the movie (in my opinion)...

"Don't choke on your aspirations"

What I want Darth Vader to have said is just "Go away".  Making the cheesy play on words is not Darth Vader.  Really though, this is the only thing they did with Darth Vader that bothered me at all.  The scene at the end is freaking awesome, but I'll talk about that later.

Nitpick 2: R2-D2 and C3-P0 are in the wrong place
There's a point in the movie where the rebel fleet charges off of Yavin IV to get to the imperial base where their agents (the main characters) are currently stealing plans for the Death Star.  They realize they need to back them up.  As the ships are taking off, they show you the cameo appearance of R2-D2 and C3-P0 standing at one of the entrances to a hangar watching the ships leave.  3P0 makes some comment about them flaying away and him not knowing what's going on.

This is a problem.

At the beginning of Episode 4, the droids are on the ship with Princess Leia that has the Death Star plans.  If Rogue One ends with Leia on her ship fleeing the battle that the droids didn't attend, how did she get the droids?  If she went back to Yavin IV and picked them up, then she would already have achieved her most important goal from episode 4... getting the plans back to the rebel base.

So Rogue One seems to mess up by having the droids on Yavin when they should already be on the ship with Princess Leia.

Nitpick 3: The CGI faces
Several of the characters are from Episode 4.  They're only supporting characters in this movie, but you can clearly see them, and because the actors either don't look like they did in 1977 or the actor has passed away, they used computer graphics to overlay faces on the characters that look like they did back in 1977.  The problem with this is that the CGI isn't perfect.  You can tell it's not quite right.  It drew my attention.  It's not awful or anything, but the differences are enough to draw attention.

Now the the nitpicks are out of the way...
There's a lot to like about this movie.  The progression of the story is pretty good.  Most of the lines are well written, including some of the humor, especially from the re-programmed imperial droid K-2SO.

Major Spoiler - don't read this paragraph if you haven't seen it and want a little surprise:

I also LOVE that they didn't shy away from characters dying.  I sort of figured at least a few would leave the story since the main characters in the story don't appear later with the rebellion.  But... really... all of them die.  It doesn't feel forced or wanton.  It fits right into the story, and made me cry when my favorite characters died.  This part is wonderfully written.

The main character girl is Jyn Erso.  She had her father taken away when she was little because her dad is apparently a brilliant scientist capable of being the primary contributor to making the Death Star work.  Jyn escapes when her father is taken, and ends up being raised by a family friend who hates the empire.  But even they get separated and Jyn ends up in an imperial prison.  This is all pretty early in the film.  I guess I'll leave that as all I write about spoilers for her.  The character works.  She's been kicked around by life a fair amount, and then she finds herself in the situation of deciding whether to do good things for all people, or just run away.  She's definitely the hero character that we are following for the story.  And I think they wrote her character well.  Along the way she meets people that will aid her in her journey...

The first human that is injected in the story as an ally of Jyn is Cassian Andor, a rebel.  His character fills an important role in the story, and he has a couple good moments.  Most notably is his speech given to convince Jyn to take him and a group of rebels along with her to do the big awesome thing they are supposed to do.  So he fills that role of being the not completely trusted ally very well.

The other ally she meets at roughly the same time as Cassian is his droid friend K-2SO.  K2 is a re-programmed imperial droid that works with Cassian, and who's programming makes him prone to saying what he's thinking.  This is the source of most of the funny lines in the movie.  He's also in the running for my favorite new character in the movie.

Major Spoiler - don't read this paragraph if you haven't seen it and want a little surprise:

K-2SO's death made me cry openly, and I'm near to crying now as I type this.  Holy crap.  It's going to make me cry every time I see the movie.

The next character that joins Jyn's band that I really like is Chirrut Îmwe.  He's a believer in the Force that stays at a Jedi holy city trying to protect it despite the lack of Jedi.  He is also blind.  And he's such an earnest caring character that I don't know how to describe it here.  If you've seen the movie, you know what I mean, and if you haven't seen it, you will see.  I remember telling my wife during the movie that Chirrut is a much better version of Daredevil than Daredevil could ever be.  And in fact, Chirrut is my new baseline for blind characters that can fight.  So... Daredevil is just a poor version of Chirrut.  He is also in the running for my favorite new character in the movie.

Major Spoiler - don't read this paragraph if you haven't seen it and want a little surprise:

Chirrut's death made me cry openly, and I'm near to crying now as I type this.  Holy crap.  It's going to make me cry every time I see the movie.  Yes I copied the paragraph from K2's section.

Chirrut came with a support character of his own, who I think is really a main character.  When he's introduced, he's kind of the quiet friend that stayed in the background.  His name is Baze Malbus.  You start not knowing much more than that he follows Chirrut as a protector.  Chirrut doesn't need a lot of protection since he's so bad-ass, but Baze jumps in when things get to the point of need.  Chirrut is the spiritual one that gives himself to the will of the Force.  Baze is the skeptical one that teases Chirrut, but at the same time respects him.  As the story progresses, it becomes apparent that the two are long time loyal friends.  And the writers did an excellent job of making it apparent.  Bravo on this one.

Major Spoiler - don't read this paragraph if you haven't seen it and want a little surprise:

Baze dies soon after Chirrut does... so I was already crying.  Yes, I cried more.  Especially as Baze takes up Chirrut's chant as he marches off to take out more storm troopers.  Holy crap.  yeah... I'm still going to cry every time is see this scene too.

So what you can probably see is that I loved several of the characters.  There are more that I liked, but this review is pretty long already.  So I'll mention just the one more thing: Darth Vader.

In the original trilogy, Darth Vader is awesome.  Just awesome.  He's the terrifying villain that shocks us all with the revelation of Luke's parentage, and who is redeemed just at the end of the story.  It IS technically the story of Anakin Skywalker after all.  His character should be well done.

In his supporting role in Rogue One, I think the writers did an excellent job (except for that one line nitpick) of making villainous and frightening.  There is menace in him that just pours out of him.  I have to give credit to the actor playing the director that was in charge of the Death Star.  He did a great job of conveying the character's fear talking to Darth Vader.

But that's not all there was... Darth Vader had a scene that makes you understand why people fear him.

Major Spoiler - don't read this section if you haven't seen it and want a little surprise:

At the end of the movie when they're showing the rebels trying to get the Death Star plans into a ship that can run like crazy out of there, they show what is very good sense of urgency from the rebels carrying the disk.  They're fleeing through the big ship they're on because it's been boarded this point, and they have a smaller faster ship that can still take off and leave.

A malfunction stops the carrier of the disk from getting all through a corridor.  He manages to pass it through a small opening to another rebel.  But this is the scene that is awesome.  Totally awesome.  I love it.  Darth Vader is so scary.  Darth Vader is one of the imperials that boarded the ship, and he catches up to the rebels running with the disk.  There are like 12 of them.  They open fire on Darth Vader with looks of fear on their faces.  Their fear is justified.  Darth Vader is scary.  He starts parrying shots with his lightsaber, and blocking more shots with his other hand.  And he just advances and starts cutting people down... and then he starts grabbing people by the throat with the Force and either crushing their throats or slamming them into other people... it's freaking awesome.  I'm scared that after time has passed I'll look back and realize something about this scene was not awesome, but right now I'm a fan-boy shaking in my seat over how awesome this scene was.  Holy crap Darth Vader is scary and awesome.

So that's it.  Those are my main thoughts about Rogue One.  Now that I've gotten it all down in words, I think I really like this movie, and I consider it to be an excellent addition to the Star Wars universe.  I can't wait to see what else Disney has to offer.  And I hope some of the creativity we see in Rogue One is apparent in Episode 8 when it comes out.  My rating of 94 on a scale of 0 to 100 stands.

Edit: 7 Sept 2017

I came back to read this recently, and remembered a complaint my brother had with the movie that I hadn't thought of. He brought up that the movie didn't need to connect directly with episode 4 by having the fleeing blockade runner come right from having stolen the plans to Tatooine. It felt like rushed things in a way that made it less logical. When you see Episode 4, in my opinion, it gives the impression that Vader has been hunting for the rebels who have those plans for quite a while instead of for the past day or less. There's that meeting with the imperial leaders where Vader gets chastised for not having them safely back yet... as though he's been failing at the task for a while. He wasn't responsible for protecting the plans to begin with, so if Rogue One is the way things happened, Vader only took on responsibility for recovering the plans a very short time before that meeting.


So it just doesn't quite feel right to me. But then I thought about it a little more. If Vader has been hunting these plans for a week or a month... why hasn't the rebel ship been able to make it back to the base in that time? What the heck are the rebels doing? Are they that incompetent that they can't get those plans onto a ship and headed to Yavin IV? So maybe the movie had to play out that way. Maybe it had to be that close to explain why the rebels were still in the process of getting the plans back to the base. So maybe I'm okay with it. But then I think about one more problem: Darth Vader...


In Episode 4 we see Vader and Obi Wan face off. They are seeing each other for the first time in 19 years. They're both old, and neither has had much practice to keep them sharp in their skills. They're not as nimble as they used to be, and Vader is on cyborg legs that might not work as well as his natural legs did. They're both fighting in a reserved way. And to be clear, this one of the best lightsaber fights in the whole series of movies. And if you disagree, you're wrong. It has nothing to do with choreography... it's about emotional content. But I'm digressing. This lightsaber fight makes sense. It's logical that the two aren't as flashy as they used to be. Vader is diminished from his younger self.


But if the Episode 4 version of Darth Vader makes sense, then the Rogue One version can't. It's probably my favorite scene in Rogue One: Vader wrecks house... he's a machine of destruction and it's so well done that I'm still getting giddy thinking about it. But that version of Vader doesn't jive with a version that maybe two days later is as diminished as he is in Episode 4. When I first saw Rogue One, and saw that scene, I assumed still that the this was much earlier in the 19 year span between Episode 3 and Episode 4. It hadn't occurred to me yet that the plans wouldn't have been stolen years before... since getting the plans to the rebel base wouldn't take years if the rebels are the ones who stole them.


So now I'm left with a vague unease. It doesn't feel like the end of the movie took into consideration everything it should have. And the drastic change in Darth Vader over the course of a day or two is hard to accept. I feel like the Rogue One version of Darth Vader could have existed a few years after Episode 3, but not days or hours before Episode 4. That's my update. I still really like the movie, but it does have some minor issues.

Star Wars - Lightsaber Fight Scenes Review

There are other scenes with lightsabers used in combat.  I'm just focusing on the scenes where it is lightsaber against lightsaber.  And I'd like to set the stage by saying that these scenes are fundamental parts of the saga in my opinion.  The Force and its users are the mysterious awe inspiring thing that gives the setting its character, and that separates it from other science fiction stories.  The characters and technology are all fun and important too, but when I watch the original trilogy, what fills me with wonder and captures my attention is the idea of a mystical thing that only some people can use, and which allows abilities that I dream of.  It's just cool.  So when I see the lightsaber fights... they seem like focal points of the story.  And all the technology and mystical ability is just a structure to put these clashes on.  Each fight should tell an important part of the story.  Each fight should have you on the edge of your seat.

One last thing to mention, I'm listing the fights by memory.  If I forgot one... it probably wasn't worth mentioning. EDIT: Note that this was written in 2016... before Ep 8 (travesty) and Ep 9 (flailing mess with at least a little nostalgia). So, for now, this blog entry is limited to Episodes 1 to 7.

Episode 1: The Phantom Menace

- Quigon & Obi Wan vs. Darth Maul

This is the exciting moment where the prequels show us their first attempt at a lightsaber duel.  I remember being excited when it happened.  And John Williams is a genius... his music makes it difficult to not love this duel.  But the duel has a few issues upon consideration that make it difficult to like this duel.

Let's start with Quigon.  He shouldn't have been a character in the movie at all.  He served no purpose.  And if it suited him, he had no problem cheating people with his power.  This is not only a pointless character but a terrible role-model.  And the writers sort of hold him up as the only Jedi that went the right way since the council had grown arrogant and short-sighted.  It's confusing, and poorly written.  If I keep going down this path, I'm going to start describing how the entire movie should have been done differently, and that's not the purpose of this essay.  Perhaps I'll write that piece later.  But for now, please just accept that my opinion is that Quigon is a terrible character that should never have been in the series.

But since we're stuck with him, we have him and Obi Wan meeting a Sith that the Jedi thought were all gone.  So let's consider the Sith making their appearance here.  What exactly did it accomplish?  If Darth Sidious/Palpatine is trying to manipulate the governments of the galaxy into a war, one of the most important tools he has is secrecy.  All he has to do is not tell the Jedi that there are Sith running around, and then they're not even looking for him.  Of course... for being a master manipulator that succeeded in taking control of the Galactic Republic, his plans are pretty freaking stupid.  Why order the Nemoidians to kill the Jedi that came to be diplomats?  Why not tell them to go back to the council and deliver a message that the Trade Federation is just not interested in backing down?  But then... the logic there fails too... why is a Trade Federation blocking trade again?  And why is a lush green planet in dire trouble if trade with other planets is blocked?  The whole premise sucks.  But again I'm straying off topic.

We now have a character that should never have existed as he was, and a Sith pawn being sent in to let the Jedi know the Sith are around for some reason.  Finally we get to Obi-Wan.  He is in my top 3 favorite characters of the entire saga including the Extended Universe stuff that is now called "Legends".  He's part of this fight so we can see some early emotional influences on Obi-Wan.  Specifically, there's this bizarre complicated force field set up that separates the three fighters at one point in the duel.  They take the opportunity to show Darth Maul being agitated and unable to sit still.  They show Obi-Wan being practical and ready.  And they show Quigon meditating... being the calm master.  And we come to the first truly stupid thing the writers did.

At the beginning of the movie when Obi-Wan and Quigon are attacked by a Destroyer droid with a shield, they decide it's time to run away.  They use the Force and run so fast that their motion blurs.  A car can go 200 MPH in front of you and its motion doesn't blur as much as it does for these running Jedi.  But in the lightsaber fight scene, with those goofy force field segments, Obi-Wan runs at a normal pace, and makes it to the last gate, and gets stuck behind it while his master and the Sith are on the other side.  So my first big complaint with the lightsaber fight itself is that moment.  If the writers are telling us that the Jedi have the power to run so fast that they blur, why didn't Obi Wan do that to make sure he could help his master?  I get that the writers wanted to separate them so that we could have the emotional effect of Obi Wan being powerless to help as he sees his master get struck down.  But this is just super lazy writing.  It broke my suspension of disbelief, and a moment that should have been emotionally stirring left me wondering what the writers were thinking.

Obi-Wan and Darth Maul get to have their fast paced fancy sword fight and we are treated to the wildest imagination of the choreographers.  I thought is was pretty.  But this is not what I look for in a lightsaber battle.  I'm looking for meaning.  Sure we have Obi-Wan using emotion in his fight after seeing his master stabbed through the body.  But this pales in comparison to the fight between Obi-Wan and Darth Vader in Episode 4.  Or really... any lightsaber fight in the original trilogy.  The only emotional attachment we have to this fight is Obi-Wan lamenting the death of his master who was a crappy character.  So again, in my opinion, this fight falls short of what it should be.  It's flashy and doesn't have enough emotional weight to it.

Then we get to the truly stupid part.  Obi Wan gets knocked down a gigantic hole in the ground, and he catches a protrusion so he's just hanging there down this hole, out of reach of Darh Maul.  They've been fighting around this hole for a while, and we can see that the hole is wide.  Obi Wan drops his lightsaber down the hole in the process of catching the protrusion so he doesn't fall.  But they make sure to give us a shot of his master's lightsaber sitting there on the ground.  We know Obi-Wan can use the Force to grab it, but he needs to get up top onto the floor again.  So the writers do the dumbest thing they could have done.  Darth Maul is standing right over Obi Wan on the edge of the pit, and Obi-Wan decides to use the Force to leap straight up within reach of the scary foe with the sword that can cut through metal easily and who has Force assisted reflexes like every other Force user.  Obi-Wan's trajectory takes him over Darth Maul to come down behind him.  And only after he lands does Obi-Wan reach out with the Force to grab his master's lightsaber.  In that time, Darth Maul should have been able to cut parts off of Obi Wan about three times.  The only thing that saved Obi-Wan was plot-armor.  But somehow Darth Maul just stands there as though he has no training at all, and as though the only thing he had to do wasn't to hold out his sword in the path of Obi Wan's jump to win the fight.  This moment is just stupid.  It's mind-bogglingly stupid.

There's an image of the situation I drew.  Obi-Wan is in blue hanging on the side of the hole with Darth Maul standing at the top.  I have two arrows for paths Obi Wan could have taken when he flung himself back up to the top.  Arrow number 1 is the path he took that was stupid.  Arrow number 2 is the path he should have taken... to the other side of the pit.  Or at least not to the spot where Darth Maul is standing.  That would have given him a moment while Darth Maul is trying to close distance for Obi Wan to get his balance, and to grab his master's sword. Surely the choreographers could have found a beautiful way to have Obi-Wan defeat the Sith.  Heck... Quigon was still alive enough to talk to Obi Wan.  It would have been awesome if Quigon broke the stalemate by flinging some object at Darth Maul that distracted him enough for Obi-Wan to end Maul.  A last act to help his pupil.  Anything.  Jebus this fight was poorly written.

Still... the music was beautiful and inspiring.  Nice work John Williams.

Episode 2: Attack of the Clones

- Anakin & Obi-Wan vs. Count Dooku

This lightsaber fight is okay.  It doesn't have the flash of the Darth Maul lightsaber fight which is a good thing.  That one went way over the top.  This one had a pretty good purpose.  We see that Obi-Wan is having a hard time controlling his student... his student doesn't listen when he really should.  Anakin is shown to be brash and arrogant despite not really being skilled yet.  Dooku is a really good calm bad-guy here.  He knows he's the most experienced Force user there, and he's highly skilled with the saber.  The cocky idiot that fights him never stood a chance.  So we get to see a lot of important character detail in that fight.  Obi-Wan is wise and tries to lead Anakin with a plan that might work.  Anakin is impulsive and over confident, and he ignores Obi-Wan.  Dooku is tremendously skilled master that doesn't even have to draw upon all of his power to fight off Anakin and Obi-Wan.  I like the simple display of character that sets a stage for us and gives us insight.

- Yoda vs. Count Dooku

This is... well... I can't decide if it's the worst lightsaber fight in the entire series or not, but is definitely a contender.  I remember when I first saw the movie, my ignorant hopefulness and love of Star Wars are what my reaction came from.  I saw Yoda draw a lightsaber, and my heart soared.  I was super excited to see it.  I was shaking in my seat for all the energy I had that I didn't know what to do with.  It was sort of magical.

Unfortunately upon reflection, I'm really disappointed with the writers for this one too.  Yoda is a 900 year old master of the Force.  Yes... even a 900 year old master still has things to learn, but Yoda is noted as one of the most powerful Jedi in the galaxy, if not THE most powerful Jedi in the galaxy.  He's been alive and learning about the Force for over 800 years.  His powers must be incredible... hard to even imagine.

But we got the flipping green gerbil with a lightsaber.  I'm totally cool with Yoda being able to move fast as part of his lightsaber fighting style.  But flipping through the air... just... it feels so... embarrassing.  Instead of jumping for a target that's off the ground, I want to see Yoda fight logically.  Go for the guy's legs.  Cut him down to your level.  Hack off a limb that's in reach.  But even beyond lightsaber fighting, I want to see Yoda's mastery of the Force come into play.  While Yoda is moving for position, I want to see him fling rocks at Dooku that he has to attend to to give Yoda openings.  I want to see Yoda ignoring lightsabers entirely, and just over powering and out maneuvering Dooku in use of the Force.  I want to see after Dooku handling Anakin and Obi Wan that Dooku realizes he should be afraid of Yoda... his old master.

But we got flipping around, and the idea that Dooku was close enough in power to make Yoda exert himself.  Dooku should have had to work his butt off to escape.  Oh well.  Maybe it's not the worst fight in there, but I think as I write this that it was the second worst.

Episode 3: Revenge of the Sith

- Anakin & Obi Wan vs. Count Dooku (round 2)

Here we get the re-match with Anakin and Obi Wan fighting Dooku.  This is where they show us how much the two have grown in the three years between Episode 2 and Episode 3.  And I appreciate the need to show that Anakin isn't quite as over confident as he used to be.  And I understand the need for separating Obi Wan and Anakin so that we can see Anakin choosing to kill Dooku despite Dooku being defeated.  It sets us up for Anakin wrestling with having done something wrong, and makes him a hypocrit later in the movie when Mace Windu is making the same argument that Palpatine made that convinced Anakin to kill Dooku.  I might try to address my thoughts on the morality at play there another time, but for now I'll just mention that it's an interesting part of the fight that helps to make this lightsaber fight a middle-of-the-pack fight in my ranking.

What I dislike about this one is how useless Obi Wan is in this fight.  He gets a platform collapsed on him, and that's it.  He's out of the fight.  It's a direct way to get him out of the fight that I guess just rankles at me because I love the character of Obi Wan so much.  Aside from my bias though, I think that the fight could have been written better.  If you're going to use a simple thing like a falling platform, why not use something from elsewhere in the Star Wars universe... a throne room with a trap door.  It would have been pretty easy to have Dooku notice that Obi Wan is on the trap door, use the Force to pull the lever, and Obi Wan gets dropped into the middle of a bunch of droids.  The hole in the floor closes before he can jump back into the room.  Now Obi Wan has to fight his way back to the room if he can, and Anakin is left alone with the two Sith.  Anakin still has reason to worry about his master who is suffering some unknown fate and Anakin is stuck fighting Dooku alone to save the Emperor.  His anger and frustration make him strong, and he defeats Dooku.  Palpatine still whispers encouragement for killing Dooku.  Dooku is still powerful and can't be imprisoned or put through proper legal channels.  Palpatine implores Anakin to protect the galaxy from Dooku by ending him.

And Obi Wan gets back to the room just in time to see Anakin cutting off Dooku's head.  He doesn't know that Dooku could have been taken prisoner.  He just thinks Anakin defeated him and says something like: "Impressive Anakin... I fell for a trap door, and you still managed to defeat Dooku and save Chancellor Palpatine.  Now let's get off this ship."

- Obi-Wan vs. Grievous

Very dumb.  The comments by Grievous about being trained in the Jedi fighting styles, and then just wielding four lightsabers while he spins two of them in circles... I just... This is silly.  Grievous ignored the benefit of having four lightsabers and computer assisted coordination.  I remember Obi Wan putting his sword in the path of all four lightsabers at one point.  Why did Grievous make all his swords come together at that one point?  Why wasn't each lightsaber striking at a different height and at different angles?  Why did Grievous suck so horribly?  I would have liked seeing Obi Wan being backed up as he gave ground to avoid being hit, and then one by one, when he parries a strike, it's a parry that cuts off a hand, and Grievous loses some of his offensive ability.  I would have liked to see Obi Wan use the Force in other ways too... maybe moving something to trip Grievous.  Or hit him in the head from behind.

Just not a well written fight.  And it didn't have any emotional content at all.  It's just... Obi Wan destroying a general in the Separatist military.  I think I would have liked it better too if instead of Obi Wan going in at a different time from the clones he was working with, they all went in at the same time.  And I would have liked seeing Obi Wan fighting alongside a bunch of the clones until he got to Grievous.  Seeing them fight alongside each other would have made it so much more poignant when Order 66 was given and the clones turned on him.  That would have been good actually.  They really missed a good opportunity by focusing on the nearly meaningless fight between Obi Wan and Grievous instead of the relationship between Obi Wan and the clones.

- Windu vs. Palpatine

So this fight was set up as the moment Anakin decides between the light and the dark sides of the Force... the moment where he decides whether to follow Palpatine or not.  And it does that... sort of.  The thing it lacks in my opinion is any real reason for Anakin to have believed Palpatine.  Really... I should back up...

Palpatine gives Anakin visions of his mom dying until Anakin can't take it anymore, and he goes to find his mom.  He gets there in time for his mom to die in his arms.  This sets up Anakin to believe his nightmarish vision dreams.  Palpatine gives Anakin visions of Padme dying in child birth... and Anakin doesn't know how to deal with that.  He believes his vision are accurate, and he begins desperately trying to find a way to prevent her death in child birth.  It's really a pretty good bit of the writing.  Possibly the only compliment I'll give about the prequels.  So Palpatine sneaks into a conversation that he's heard about stuff from the Force that the Jedi won't consider.  He's heard tales of a man that was capable of controlling life and death through the Force.  Anakin has a new hope (word play intended) and Palpatine seems the only path to finding the information he needs.  Yoda has already told Anakin that the correct path is to stop clinging to things enough that fear of what might happen to those things will influence your actions.  Perhaps Yoda's advice is a bit overboard from the perspective of avoiding emotional attachment entirely, but the idea of not letting fear guide your actions is a great one.  Of course, this makes Anakin give up on Yoda as a help because Anakin is already acting on fear and is desperate for a way to save Padme from the imagined threat of death in child birth.  Palpatine has Anakin's attention now.

So when Palpatine admits he's the Sith, Anakin wrestles with the idea that Palpatine has been lying to him, but that Palpatine is still the only person who might have a way to save Padme.  He never considers the possibility that part of his lies might have been around having a way to save Padme, or that his visions might have been a set up and Padme wasn't in danger in the first place.

Now we get to the fight between Windu and Palpatine.  Palpatine is told that he's under arrest.  The Jedi tried to go the legal route.  Palpatine attacks and cuts down the few Jedi that Windu brought with him.  And Palpatine seems to be having fun while he kills people.  Anakin doesn't seem to care that a few Jedi were just killed while Palpatine was resisting arrest.  He watches as Mace Windu and Sidious fight.  And whether it's that Windu was actually strong enough to best Palpatine or it was Palpatine purposely putting himself in a bad situation to force Anakin to make the choice... I don't know.  But we find ourselves in a situation where the Jedi who was trying to arrest Palpatine just watched several of his closest comrades die in the effort, now just barely clinging to his victory, and realizing that Palpatine was untouchable politically, and was pure evil.  Windu realized that it was the truth that legal means of dealing with Palpatine wouldn't work.  He knew that the Sith lord was the one responsible for the deaths of all the people who fought in the war and died.  He was looking at an evil dictator that would have caused many more deaths if he were let go.  Windu knew this and he was correct.  He had that one opportunity to end the war and the suffering.  And he even paused long enough to plead with Anakin to get him to understand.

And Anakin stopped Mace Windu.  Ankin prevented the good outcome because he believed despite all evidence to the contrary that Palpatine was the only one that could save Padme.  Anakin was a fool.  His decision was made without all the information, and trusting the man who had lied to him and everyone in the galaxy... causing death and suffering to get what he wanted.

This was the lightsaber fight that decided Anakin's fate.  Notice that I didn't even mention choreography.  Because that part doesn't really matter.  But it's one of the best lightsaber fights in the series.  It's certainly the best one in the prequels by a wide margin.

- Yoda vs. Palpatine

I'm not even sure how to begin analyzing this one.  Palpatine is a master of the dark side.  He's been around a long time, and he was capable of bringing the entire Galactic Republic under his control causing death and suffering across planets while he just kept gathering power.  Palpatine is powerful, and should be.

Let's just get down to it: Yoda is the most powerful user of the Force on the light side.  the more I think about it... the more I think that the confrontation between Palpatine and Yoda should have had very little to do with lightsabers.  And throwing large objects at each other seems a bit bland too.  The confrontation between these two should have been something different.  Off the top of my head, I imagine them facing off across an expanse (large room, city street, or something), and seeing them using telekinesis  to best each other... each of them tearing up huge numbers of small items, that get flung in furious storms at each other, and their focus is divided between hurling clouds of shrapnel at each other and deflecting the items being hurled at them.  As they get tired, they find themselves having to dodge out of the way of a colun of tiny items instead of deflecting them more and more.  And Yoda realizes he's losing... he's going to give out first, and for the first time ages, he feels fear... raw fear.  And he flees.  And the emperor doesn't even chase him... just laughs.  Maybe he orders the troopers nearby to look for Yoda to keep him from mounting a new attack easily... but he is not supreme in his confidence.  He knows he beat Yoda, and he has an apprentice with the most potential in the galaxy that now belongs to him.

The lightsaber fight that did happen here is just silly.  I wanted to see the giants of the Force show us something we hadn't seen before.

- Anakin vs. Obi-Wan

And here we had what should have been the most emotionally charged lightsaber fight of the prequels.  It should have been second only to the fight in Return of the Jedi between father and son.  But instead, it ranks as one of the dumbest lightsabers fights in the entire series, second only to the Darth Maul fight.  What they gave us was the Choreographers' efforts to make a spectacular flashy thing that would impress people which could be augmented with flashy special effects and a freaking river of lava.  They gave us ridiculous garrishness instead of tragic emotional pain.

This is supposed to be the confrontation between a broken Anakin Skywalker and the pure master of the Force who had gorwn to love his student and friend.  There should have been far more conversation, and far less swinging on ropes over a lava river.  There should have been more views of actors' faces as their characters wrestled with trying to kill their closest friend.  We should have seen Anakin angry with tears streaming down his face.  We should have seen the look of heart-break on Obi Wan's face.  We should have seen moments of hesitation as each one struggled with what they were trying to do.  I wanted to hear Obi Wan pleading with Anakin every step of the way.

And when Obi-Wan finally realized that his one true friend was gone... was dead... replaced by this creature of the dark side... Obi Wan stops holding back, and defeats Anakin... cuts off his limbs.  But in that last moment... he can't bring himself to kill the person lying there.  Can't do it.  And he senses the approach of Palpatine... he leaves quickly and recovers Padme and the droids.  Instead of a calculating lie that Obi Wan told to Luke in his house on Tatooine, the words Obi Wan speaks become the pained truth that Obi Wan has accepted... the belief that Anakin Skywalker is dead, and only Darth Vader remains.

Gah... they totally screwed up on this fight.  We got the over extended farce with swinging on ropes over the lava of river instead of the emotional story of the two loyal friends forever losing each other.  It could have been wonderful.  I'm so disappointed in this one.

Episode 4: A New Hope

- Vader vs Obi-Wan

What should have been the third best light saber fight in the whole series behind the fight in Episode 3 between Anakin and Obi Wan, is the second best lightsaber fight in the series.  No flashy acrobatics.  No crazy setting with weird force field gates or rivers of lava.  It's a hallway.  And Vader is standing between Obi Wan and his ability to rejoin Luke and Leia... the two biggest hopes for the galaxy against the two Sith leading the oppressors.  And it is the first time in 19 years these two have seen each other... or talked to each other.  Obiwan has had years to see the atrocities Vader has committed.  He's had years to think about what happened.  To think about what he might have done differently to have saved Anakin before he fell to the dark side.  And Darth Vader has had years to let his hate fester... for the man that should have saved him.  Vader likely blamed Obi Wan for not protecting him; for not having any way to deal with his visions; and for defeating him the last time they faced each other.  We have the two friends... teacher and student... who went through so much together, and now were left unable to reconcile.  They fight intent on killing each other, and Obi Wan realizes that he has accomplished his goal.  He has started Luke on his path, and in the bargain managed to re-unite the siblings.  It's his time, and he knows he will be able to help Luke still.  He lets Vader cut him down.

There's so much going on here that it's impressive that George Lucas pulled it off.  And it's frustrating when people brush this lightsaber fight off and suggest the prequel lightsaber fights are better.  It tells me they have no idea what they're talking about.  Or that they don't care about character depth and story in the face of choreography and special effects.

Episode 5: Empire Strikes Back

- Vader vs Luke

This another good one, but this time because we're seeing father and son meet, and we get to see that Luke has a long way to go.  He's brash and doesn't understand that his training hasn't been long enough.  Vader toys with him.  You can see that Vader is intent on not actually hurting Luke.  And it culminates in the biggest reveal in the series.  You find out at this point that Vader is Luke's father.  That's assuming you watched the movies in the right order.

So we get the lesson in Luke's character where we are shown through his actions that he is still a bit cocky and impulsive.  We see that Vader has more to him than the bloodthirsty brute who kills his own subordinates when he's mad.  And we have the big reveal.  It's a wonderful lightsaber fight.  Again... nothing to do with Choreography.  But lots of meaningful content.

Episode 6: Return of the Jedi

- Vader vs Luke (finale)

This is the best lightsaber fight in the entire series (in all of Star Wars really).  I'll tell you why.  The whole original story that George Lucas had in mind is the story of Anakin Skywalker.  His rise as a Jedi, his fall to the dark side, his existence as Vader, and finally his redemption at the hands of his son.  That's the story.  Everything else is support for that story, though there is a fair amount of great content in there alongside it.  This lightsaber fight is the culmination of the story of Anakin Skywalker.  His son has come to save him.  And he believes he can't be saved.  He watches as the Emperor begins to try to bend Luke to the dark side.  He watches as his son stands confidently still hoping to save his father.

Luke eventually succumbs to pressure and tries to strike down the Emperor.  But Vader is there to stop that from happening... and father and son begin their fight.  Luke disengages and tries again to talk to his father... tries to stop fighting his father.  Vader attacks again and continues the fight.  Vader is still not trying to kill his son.  He's trying to help the Emperor convert him to the dark side.  It's the only thing Vader can understand to do... he's been so twisted by the Emperor.

And Luke manages to hide.  He's hiding behind a column in a place where he can talk and the echoes will hide his location.  Vader walks trying to find him, and talks to him.  Vader is listening to Luke's thoughts and feelings.  And he taunts Luke with it.  Luke looks scared as he tries desperately to think of a way forward.  And Vader finds a piece of information that Luke wanted to keep hidden.  Vader tells Luke that if he will not join them, he'll go after Leia... Luke's sister...

And Luke loses it.  Luke was okay with dying in the effort to save his father, but when his sister is at risk... he loses control.  His lightsaber style becomes rage filled and he just swings the blade at his father over and over again, eventually overpowering him, and cutting off his father's hand.

And the event gives him pause.  He realizes what he's done.  And comes back from the edge.  He overcomes his anger and regains control.  He possibly stupidly throws away his lightsaber, but it is an act to tell the Emperor that he will not kill his father in anger, and he will not turn to the dark side.

The Emperor begins killing Luke slowly with painful electrical arcs.  He tells Luke that he will pay for his stubbornness.  And Vader stands back up... and watches as his son is tortured.  And he begins to think about how his son had succeeded where he failed.  His son stood up to the emperor and didn't do what he wanted.  His son had spared him.  His son was good, and his son still believed in him.  And Vader finally became Anakin once more.  He killed the Emperor... and saved his son.

This is the most emotionally charged moment in the entire series, and it is perfectly scored by John Williams.  I still tear up just listening to the music.  The choreography can be commended here too because it was apparent throughout the fight what each person's intentions were... what the emotion was.  Vader still sort of toying with Luke.  Luke trying desperately to not hurt his father.  And then Luke losing control... the choreography was perfect too.  And it wasn't flashy... just full of the right phrases to convey the message.

I love this scene.

Episode 7: The Force Awakens

- Finn & Rey vs Kylo

I wasn't sure I should bother with this one.  But what the heck.

I guess Kylo isn't that practiced with a lightsaber, and he's dealing with an injury from a bowcaster that Chewbacca hit him with.  So maybe Kylo isn't fighting at a hundred percent.  Finn fights him for a bit, and holds his own a little.  Rey steps in and does okay until she for some reason meditates on the Force, and suddenly she's awesome at lightsaber fighting.

I guess it has a little bit of a "cool factor".  I like the character of Rey, and maybe there's more to her than we know (I think it's possible my wife is right that Rey was trained when she was young, but doesn't really remember it).  So I can overlook this I guess.  But four things still stand out to me as problems.

First, Kylo uses the Force and luanches her at a tree, slamming her into it, and then she drops maybe fifteen feet at a guess.  Yeah it's a movie.  Yes it's cinematic.  Yes Rey has the Force and maybe you can say she instinctively protected herself some... but that's all weak explanation to me.  I'm pretty sure I would need to be in a hospital recovering from that if it happened to me.  It's just a little too much.  Maybe I can let this one go, but there are three other problems...

Second is something of an addendum to the first.  Kylo knocks out Rey with a wave of his hand when he captured her at the Mos Eisly Cantina... er... the different bar with scum of the galaxy and a live band.  Anyway... at one point in the movie, Kylo can knock her out by waving his hand near her, and for some reason this time he flings her into a tree hard enough that she might have died.  I don't understand when writers have such a hard time keeping a balance.

Third is the goofy mechanism they use to make the two stop fighting.  The grounds splits beneath them just right so they are too far apart to reach each other.  The Force did it?  Okay, we're just throwing explanations in for bad writing.  The Millennium Falcon should have shown up and Kylo should have run away from that when he realized he was unlikely to be able to take on Chewbacca in a space ship.  Rey would rush to check on Finn.  And there you go.

Fourth is biggest complaint really.  There's no emotional content.  It's just people fighting.  I guess there is one moment of emotional content.  When Rey takes the lightsaber from the ground instead of Kylo.  That part was cool.  But beyond that the fight didn't feel like much.

Overall, the lightsaber fight is in the middle of the pack.  It's not awful.  But it's not good either.