Originally Posted by Roughneck
Why are the prequel fights ####ty? Because I don't give a crap about the people in them and for the most part they don't care about eachother either. It's protagonist vs. generic bad guy in order to stuff some action in there. With the exception of one fight they aren't even important ways of advancing the plot.
Darth Maul vs. Obi Wan and Who Cares.
Who is Darth Maul? Well according to how we are introduced to him he is a bad guy, not the key figure in the plot, but basically a henchman. What does he do that is particularly evil? Nothing. Why do our protagonists want to fight him? Because he's there and it was in the script. They don't know who Darth Maul is. They have no emotional investment in the fight either, why should I? Eventually Who Cares dies, Obi Wan looks pissed, and finally has a reason to be invested in this thing. Some more choreographed fighting then he kills Darth Maul and we can finally move onto seeing that dumb kid again. Nothing screams exciting like a disposable henchman biting the dust.
Now compare it to A New Hope. We know who Vader is. He's the bad guy. Killing guys with his bare hands, taking prisoners, waving his big stick around. Vader does more in the first 10 minutes of A New Hope to show he's a villain and how capable he is than Darth Maul did in the entire Episode I, and he hasn't even used the Force to choke anybody yet. Without any more information, a fight with Vader by anybody is already more compelling than anything with Darth Maul.
Now we learn that not only did Vader kill Luke's father, but he was Obi Wan's pupil to boot. So now Luke not only knows Darth Vader's name (so he's got a leg up on Qui Gon and young Obi Wan already) but has a reason to hate him. Obi Wan lost a friend to Vader, and wants redemption for failing the training. So when those two face off and Vader says "I was the learner but now I am the master" you actually feel like there's some bad blood here. Choreography or not this is an actual duel of fates, master and apprentice finally going at it, this is a big deal. Then Obi Wan just gives up? Why did he do that? He said he'd become more powerful than he could possibly imagine but that's kind of vague, isn't it? Luke is all alone now, in his fight against the ####ing badass villain, but most importantly a villain who actually lasts long enough to get some sort of a story arc going.
Episode II
Who the #### is Count Dooku? I care even less about this fight than the one with Darth Maul. At least he has some kind of introduction. Why am I suppose to care about this fight? Why do the characters aside from "it's in the script that you need to fight the bad guy who we again know isn't the main bad guy"? Just terrible.
Empire Strikes Back
The duel of all duels. Luke is angry, trying to confront the man who killed his father and mentor despite Yoda telling him he isn't ready. Vader toys with him, continuing to show just how powerful he is. Luke is flailing around, Vader is overpowering him with one hand and throwing #### at him and you can't help but feel the blind rage that Luke is feeling. The one of the most culturally impactful moments of cinematic history is unleashed: "I am your father." WHAT?! Are you ####ing kidding me? Who the hell is thinking of fight choreography at this point?
ROTS vs. ROTJ
Luke finally overpowers Vader, resists temptation, and then Vader gets redemption. Perfect. Again, who cares about fight choreography when Luke is just wailing at Vader, or when the Emperor is blasting Luke.
Anakin vs. Obi Wan finally gives us a duel with a little bit of backstory, but is dragged on so long that I don't remember any of it except when a couple of the most hamfisted lines in blockbuster history are given. I'm not sure there is a smiley or emoji good enough to convey just how cringeworthy "From my point of view it is you who are evil" was. This is what is going up against "You don't know the power of the dark side!" Ugh.
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