What makes a good movie? Turning your back on 28 years of lovingly crafted mythology may make for a good movie, but doesn't make for good movie making.
What exactly was wrong with Star Wars Episode III? Several things. Here are the most important three:
1- Kenobi would never have simply walked away from the defeated, maimed and horribly suffering Anakin aka Darth Vader. This goes against the mythology Lucas has crafted, which Jedi by definition serve others, are just and noble, where life and death hang in the balance with loyality to family and friends. Writing Kenobi as indesisive and insensitive in this scene was a glaring conciet to the locomotive EIII had to become as a bridge between the new stories and the 1977 original.
2- Kenobi's skill path which culmunated to match those of, by every ones admission, a far superior Anakin Skywalker just didn't add up. We see Kenobi rendered inconsequential by Count Dooku/Darth Tyranus in Episode II (mere flesh wounds took him out of commission; at least Anakin succumbed only after losing his right hand). Again Kenobi is bested quickly in the early scenes of EIII, this time knocked unconcious by Tyranus and pinned by a bridge control console. While Kenobi is down, Anakin bests and kills Tyranus handily. Anakin claims his skill had increased 'ten-fold', Yoda also acknowleges Anakin as Kenobi's superior in force skills. While Kenobi shows a flash of greatness in his protracted saber battle with General Grievous, he was ill-prepared to hold his own against the now powerful, end-game Anakin/Vadar.
3- Anakin/Vadar's drawing of his light saber and slaying of the Jedi younlings was unnessary. The slaying of the younglings is an understandable mechanism for Lucas to justify the evil that Vader has come to embody, but Anakin turning so quickly, completely and irrovocably away from the Jedi community and teachings, to the point he slew scores ( I imaging) of helpless teens, preteens and toddlers is far fetched. Frankly, my bias shows here, for I was very unsettled and dissappointed in this turn of the screw.
The kicker for me is that Lucas could have spent perhaps 3 more minutes total to flesh out and explain these jarring inconsistencies; make it impossible physically for Kenobi to complete a mercy stroke to put Anakin out of his misery, credit a balance of light and dark sides of the force for Kenobi's sudden 'buffing up' with skills so event with Anakin/Vader. And perhaps show the dark figure of an anguished, stumbling Anakin/Vader leaving the devastation of the youngling quarters.
A little more attention to the story arc might have kept this final installment firmly within the mythological trappings FIVE previous films weave together.
On the bright side:
If you haven't seen Star Wars: Clone Wars, the annimated series by the creator of Samurai Jack, you are missing a vital piece of Star Wars lore approved by Lucas himself. DVD 1 begins where EII ends, and is where Grievious first enters the picture. Star Wars fan? Get it.
