I actually quite liked the light saber dueling in the Phantom Menace. It was based around practical effects and choreography than the later light saber duels, which seem to be all CGI based. The bits in the Phantom Menace with Qui Gon, Obi Wan, and Darth Maul, were all pretty good. It was the rest that stunk.
The overall story line of Palpatine slowly taking over with Darth Maul as the enforcer was pretty sound. If they took out the CGI, including all the CGI characters, they could've had a decent movie.
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