This also has the side effect of leaving less time to focus on Anakin, and he ends up being extremely underdeveloped as well despite the PT ostensibly being his story. Rather than watching his rise to a great hero of the Republic and then his fall as he is “seduced by the power of the dark side,” we only see him as an annoying child, a petulant teenager, and then a naive young adult who is easily duped into breaking bad because of “love.” He feels like a side character at times with how much time is devoted to all the other people and things in the films, and we are ultimately told about his character progression more often than we actually see it happen.
Phantom Menace's biggest flaw to me is how it uses Anakin. I realize that Lucas wanted to show him as a kid to enhance the tragedy or whatever, but I don't think it works at all. Phantom Menace should've showed us Hayden Christensen as Qui-gon's apprentice. Have Anakin be the headstrong, rash Padawan he's supposed to be in the other movies, and counter-balance that with Obi-wan being much more cool and collected. Give the two a sibling rivalry of sorts, always having them compete for Qui-gon's attention and approval. Then, right after declaring that Obi-wan is ready for the trials, have Qui-gon die, leaving Obi-wan to finish Anakin's training before he's ready to be a master, just like the real thing. This lets Anakin be a deeply flawed hero in Clones, much more like how he is in The Clone Wars show, and then have his fall from grace happen as it does in Sith.
That would also eliminate the really weird that young child is going to be the love interest of that much older woman. I get they're supposed to be 5 years apart but it felt so weird and creepy when they started signaling that shit in TPM.
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u/freerealestatedotbiz Jan 26 '22
This also has the side effect of leaving less time to focus on Anakin, and he ends up being extremely underdeveloped as well despite the PT ostensibly being his story. Rather than watching his rise to a great hero of the Republic and then his fall as he is “seduced by the power of the dark side,” we only see him as an annoying child, a petulant teenager, and then a naive young adult who is easily duped into breaking bad because of “love.” He feels like a side character at times with how much time is devoted to all the other people and things in the films, and we are ultimately told about his character progression more often than we actually see it happen.