Kieran's 5 simple ways to make Star Wars Episode 1 suck a lot less

I really truly love Star Wars. It's probably my favorite series of movies. Now when I say that, I am referring to the Original trilogy which came out between 1977 and 1983.
I hate the Star Wars Prequels with a fiery passion only equal to my love for the originals. They're nothing but big toy advertisements now. They don't care about writing the storylines as long as they can shove as much shit on screen as possible and have the characters change outfits hundreds of times to increase the number of toys they can sell. They're really not that different from the Transformers movies.
Episode 1 The Phantom Menace is probably the prequel that I hate the least. The other two are so pointlessly bad that they are absolutely beyond saving. However, while the Phantom Menace is an awful awful movie, there are certain things that could have been changed that would have made the movie really good.

I will now list 5 major problems in the movie, any reasons why they might be that way, and a solution that would have vastly improved the film.
So let's break this shit down.



PROBLEM 1: Darth Maul has no personality outside of folding his arms

It saddens me how popular Darth Maul is. When I ask people why they like Darth Maul I always get responses like: "He's so badass" and "I love his double edged lightsaber"

Let me make this clear once and for all: Wearing black and having a lightsaber is not enough to make you a character. It just makes you an action figure.

Darth Vader wore black and he had a lightsaber, but he had depth to his character. For fuck's sake, even Count Dooku had more character development than Darth Maul did.

Yesterday I was watching my friend Peter play Star Wars Unleashed, and I may be wrong about this, but it appeared that one of the characters was called "Ceremonial Jedi Robe", and I thought that this was basically the prequels in a nutshell. The content doesn't matter, as long as it looks good. This movie is no different than a game that has awful gameplay and awful characters but it gives you millions of skins for your characters. I guarantee that the creators of that movie spent more time and energy worrying about Darth Maul's tatoos than they did writing his character. They probably just decided that he was "mysterious" and "brooding" because anime hasn't given us enough characters like that already. I mean, who needs character depth when you can just give them tatoos and horns and a fancier version of the sword that everyone has?

SOLUTION: The solution to this is to develop the character of Darth Maul a little, and make him the movie's villain. This is the single most obvious solution to many of the problems with the movie. The movie is called "The Phantom Menace" which implies that the identity of the true villain is a mystery. Not all movies need to have a central villain, but if this movie is supposed to be made for children, then you should really have a "bad guy" that does bad things. Darth Vader was a great villain for the old movies, and they borrowed everything else they could from the old ones, but they didn't even bother to create a central villain for the movie.


Now I ask you? Did Darth Vader just stand around and not do anything? No. Darth Vader went around and fucking did things. He used his powers on people. It was a cool way to demonstrate to the audience what this man is capable of, and that he is evil. It's a simple way of telling the audience who not to root for.

What does Darth Maul do? He wears black clothing and stands around and looks intense.
He says: 'Yes my master" once and then he fights the other two jedi without exchanging one word of dialogue with either of them and then he dies.
Wow, what a great character.
Darth Maul should have already been on Naboo, working with the Trade Federation. He could have had scenes where he met the queen and tried using his powers to intimidate her. He could have had scenes where he met the Jedi and said things that would foreshadow the next 2 movies.

You know what would have been a great scene? If they had included a scene where Palpatine is really mad at Darth Maul and is yelling at him through the hologram.

He could say that if Maul fails him again that will be his last chance, implying that Darth Maul isn't so perfect after all, which also implies that Palpatine is much much worse. This would give the audience so much information about Darth Maul in one short scene. It would establish a character and some motivation, and the audience might actually sympethize with the guy a little. Right now, we're led to believe that he's Palpatine's star pupil, which is less interesting than him being an underdog desperate to prove himself to his master.

Now would you like to know the reason why Darth Maul says like 2 words throughout the entire film?

Well I have a two word answer for you.

Ray Park

Ray Park is the name of an accomplished martial artist who has worked on a wide number of movies, and he is the actor who plays Darth Maul. He is actually a wushu expert, which is what I do. My old wushu president actually knew Ray Park, so that's kinda cool.
But let's talk about the man. What has he done lately?

Well he played Snake Eyes in the movie "G.I. Joe Rise of Cobra"
He was chosen for this role because Snake Eyes is an amazing martial artist who never says a single word throughout the entire movie, but has many fight scenes.

Ray Park is also Toad from the Movie X-Men, and he also has like 1 line in that movie.


The point is that when they cast an actor to play Darth Maul, they essentially cast a stuntman. The man has no acting ability, which says a lot about the style of the prequels. We don't care if you can act as long as you can do backflips. Ray Park should never have been cast to actually play the character, and they should have cast an actual actor, and given the character lines and backstory and motivations.
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PROBLEM 2: Queen Amidala's age

Wow, I spent a long time talking about Darth Maul, let's hurry this thing up.

Okay, so a lot of people don't know this, but Queen Amidala was meant to be 14 years old. How did they decide to accomplish this? Well, they hired a 16 year old girl who could probably pass for 18, and then they had her speak in a weird creepy robot voice that sounds like it's coming out of a 40 year old. The result: no one knew that she was 14 years old and the effect of having a young person thrust into a position of responsibility like that was completely wasted.
Basically, they did not push the concept far enough for it to have any impact.

"And why am I dressed like a geisha anyway?"

SOLUTION: Make Queen Amidala like 8 years old

Seriously, this one is kind of a no brainer. The cliche of having a ruler be a little kid is kinda neat. All of the events of the Phantom Menace would be more interesting if Queen Amidala was younger. A lot of people would completely dismiss her because of her age but she wouldn't care and she would probably be the smartest character on screen. She would probably be headstrong and adamant in her beliefs.

I recently watched the movie True Grit. The main character was a little girl who hires a man to kill the man who killed her father.
She was a character that acts like a grown up even though she's a little kid, which would be perfect for these situations. Having a bunch of people talking in the Senate is really boring, but if a kid is the main character in the scene then we might be seeing it through the eyes of a child and the whole scene would make more sense.

Also, the character could act all smart around others because she's had to grow up so fast, but if she were to get off the ship on Tatooine and meet Anakin then maybe the two of them could have scenes where she is able to have fun and she gets to be a kid again. Then the audience could be reminded that this girl who puts up such a strong front on the outside is only like 8 years old and should be outside playing, not in charge of a planet.
Also, it would probably help if the little kid didn't wear so much makeup that you couldn't tell her age and if she didn't speak in a weird creepy robot voice.

Also, it make the future romantic scenes with Anakin a little less creepy if they were a closer to the same age when they met.

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(This is loosely based off of something that RedletterMedia pointed out, so I'd like to give credit wherecredit is due, but most of this is what I've come up with.)

PROBLEM 3: Obi Wan doesn't do anything, and is really boring

Obi Wan doesn't do anything for the entire movie, and Qui Gonn is the character who probably does the most in the movie, which makes no sense, because the movie isn't really about him and having him do things doesn't set up the other movies at all, because he dies. If Obi Wan were to do things, it would count as character development for a character we've already seen but could use a little backstory.

Here's a picture of Obi Wan talking to people that are doing things while he does nothing

In the original trilogy, Obi Wan is an old man who seems to have a better idea of what 's going on than the audience does. We know he's a good guy and that he seems to have a long history with many of the characters, and then he dies fairly early on.
Before he dies, he talks about how Luke's father was his student and his good friend and he seems to feel really sad about how a lot of things happened back then, and I always took it that he blamed himself.

It's pretty obvious to me that Obi Wan should have been the main character of Episode 1, but he wasn't. He sits on the ship and occasionally fights a battle droid.

SOLUTION: Make Obi Wan do most of the things Qui Gonn does, and Obi Wan should have the exact opposite personality from what he has

In A New Hope, Obi Wan is fairly calm and stoic. He seems to have the answer to everything. When I was trying to imagine what Obi Wan would be like when he was younger, I wanted to see him wide eyed and eager. I imagined him as foolish, hot headed, cocky, arrogant, scrappy, and brash. He'd be extremely talented so he would show off all the time, and not listen to his elders. I imagined he would think he knew the answer to everything, but instead he would actually be extremely misguided.

He totally should have had scenes where he argued with Yoda

Instead, when he was like 20 it's like he was already an 80 year old man. He just sat and around and complained about everything and didn't seem interested in anything. He should have been passionate in the things going on. Actually, a lot of the personality characteristics they eventually gave to Anakin should have been given to Obi Wan in this movie. You already know that Obi Wan is going to grow up and be really wise and everything, so it would be nice to see him as the opposite of that when he was younger. Then the rest of the movies could show him gradually becoming more like how he is in the old movies. He would go from immature to mature over the course of several decades, which would be interesting to see. Maybe his failure with Anakin would make him see the error of his ways and he would be very ashamed as an old man.

A related problem with this movie was Qui Gonn. Qui Gonn is supposed to be "wise" but he's extremely reckless at times and makes very rash decisions that conflict with what the Jedi are taught. All of these are things that Obi Wan should be doing, but instead Obi Wan is shown to already be extremely smart, which is boring.

Qui Gonn should have had a much smaller role in the movie. He should also have just been "wise", very similar to how Obi Wan is in the original trilogy. Obi Wan should have the been brash one of the two, who gets into trouble. The best way to handle Qui Gonn would have been for him to take care of lots of things offscreen. He would move the plot forward, while the movie focuses on what Obi Wan does. Qui Gon himself would be really quiet and he would meditate once or twice which would frustrate Obi Wan who would get impatient and want to go kick some ass. It's nice when you see that someone you know will eventually be a wise old master is a total screw up when they're younger.

"Damnit Qui Gonn, let's go fuck some shit up!"

Another thing, both of them should have left the ship on Tatooine, not just Qui Gonn. Qui Gonn should have been busy trying to attain the part they need for the ship. Meanwhile Obi Wan would meet Anakin and would develop some kind of friendship with the kid. In the actual movie, Obi Wan literally spends no time at all with Anakin and Qui Gonn is the one who develops a bond with him, but then he dies so it doesn't matter in terms of character development.

Obi Wan would then tell Qui Gonn about how they should free this slave kid. Qui Gonn and Obi Wan would have some kind of a prolonged argument about the boy that would have lasted throughout the rest of the movie. Qui Gonn would say that there are more important things to be done besides freeing slaves but Obi Wan would want to help the poor kid that he sees is in need. Obi Wan should then have gone behind Qui Gonn's back and made the bet with Watto to free Anakin. Then Qui Gonn and Obi Wan would finally show some emotion, which we never see them do in the actual movie.
They would go to Coruscant and the Jedi Council would agree with Qui Gonn that the boy should not be trained, but Obi Wan would take Anakin back to Naboo against Qui Gonn's wishes. This would create an even further rift between the two of them and they would absolutely hate each other at this point in the movie. Then they should go back to Naboo and be in the midst of an argument about what to do with Anakin, right when Darth Maul shows up. Then they would have to work together, despite the fact that they've been fighting amongst themselves for such a long time.

Wouldn't this fight have been more interesting if these characters had had things going on in their stories?

Obi Wan would be way too reckless in the fight, and Qui Gonn would save his life, getting killed in the process. Then Obi Wan would be realllllllllllly pissed, because he'd also feel bad about his actions throughout the movie.

It would actually be sorta similar to the death of Uncle Ben in Spiderman.

Then Obi Wan would kick Darth Maul's ass, and run over to dying Qui Gonn. Qui Gonn would tell Obi Wan to not train the boy, and Obi Wan would tell Qui Gonn that he wouldn't, even though he'd be lying, and would train him anyway.
This would set the stage for Anakin to be trained by a brash, arrogant version of Obi Wan, which would better explain why he would eventually go down the path to the Dark Side.


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PROBLEM 4: C-3PO was made by Anakin

This is the most random thing inserted into this movie, because Lucas believes that everything needs to tie together somehow.
RedletterMedia had a number of great reasons why this made no sense, first and foremost being that Anakin says he built the droid to help his mom, suggesting that C-3PO would help with housework, but C-3PO is not a maintenance droid. His series of droid is used mostly by diplomats as an interpreter.

SOLUTION: Make C-3PO the interpreter of the Trade Federation

This would be all kinds of awesome. Imagine if the Trade Federation guys couldn't speak English, and they needed an interpreter to communicate with Queen Amidala and Darth Maul and everyone else like that. This would be a practical way to introduce C-3PO and it would be fun to see his character actually somewhat involved in what was going on.

Minor Point: They would not need it to talk to Palpatine because they never should have been talking to Palpatine in the first place, they should have only been talking to Maul, because then they would have identified only Maul as their other conspirator.


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PROBLEM 5: Jar Jar

Jar Jar


SOLUTION: Not have him in it, in any way

Jar Jar literally serves no necessary purpose in the movie plot wise. He could have been written out of the script. This would mean the jedi go down to Naboo, and then immediately go to the city, which would have paced the movie much better.
The jedi go down to find the queen, yet they go follow Jar Jar to a hidden underground city as soon as possible, where Jar Jar knows he is a wanted man. They didn't go to the planet to hide, so why would they go to a "hidden city"?
This would mean the entire scene with the Gungans would be lost, as well as all of the fish chasing a submarine bullshit.
Now if you're thinking that this doesn't work because you need the Gungans at the end of the movie to fight the droids, they don't have to do that. They never should have fought the droids at all.
The whole team should have gotten captured by the Trade Federation ships upon returning to Naboo. Then they'd get taken aboard the droid control ship, and they would be brought before Darth Maul. Padme would do something clever and they'd escape the immediate clutches of the villains, while the two Jedi would battle Darth Maul. Then Padme and Anakin could work together to plant some kind of bomb or press the self destruct button and they'd have to be out of there on a timer. Obi Wan and Padme and Anakin would get off, and C-3PO would somehow manage to bumble his way onboard as well. And maybe Obi Wan would be injured so Anakin would have to pilot their ship out of the place in time, utilizing his piloting skills, which should have been only talked about in the movie, as the podrace was pointless and should have been skipped.

This would also mean that no Gungans would have to fight the boring battle against the droids.

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Minor bitching: The end of the Phantom Menace where Anakin blows up the control ship is literally the most nonsensical thing I have ever seen. So apparently the control ship has a really powerful shield. However, they leave their hanger wide open. WIDE. FUCKING. OPEN. and unshielded. We know this because Anakin accidentally flies his ship into it.
Now if you have to leave your hanger open for some reason, I get that. But, you should at least protect your weakness. When Anakin flies his ship into there his ship becomes non responsive for like two minutes and there's this crowd of battle droids gathering around it looking puzzled. And they don't immediately start trying to kill him. If an enemy ship flies into your hanger, you blast it, you don't stand around not sure what to do.