"From my point of view the [George Lucas is] evil!" Or, how to write a competent ending to Star Wars

I'm under the impression that almost everyone on earth, and certainly most of the western hemisphere, is at least vaguely familiar with Star Wars, and unless you've been living under a rock for the past decade, you've seen, and have been annoyed by, the prequels. And while there may be a scattered fanbase who remains loyal to George Lucas and his Vision, the simple fact remains that they're just not as good as the first few.

I could go on for days about why I think the prequels are awful, but everybody already knows why and adding my opinions of the matter is like trying to pissing in a river of already-years-old-piss from other people. I'll take my golden shower elsewhere, thank you. No. What I'm here to talk about is Anakin and his specific story, from Phantom Menace to Revenge of the Sith, and add my own awesomely epic opinions of what would have made a much better movie in the sexy opinion of an unpaid internet blogger (which we all know is like, third highest on People's Opinions Who Matter scale).

Ok, so the first two movies, in terms of Anakin's development, aren't that bad. He's a little kid who delivers his dialogue stiffly and builds wacky robots and high-tech flying machines from scrap metal, pretty basic. But we do hit a snag here in the introduction of midichlorians, an apparently microscopic little bug that oozes force power - meaning that anyone who has a bunch of these nano-plot devices in their body can the t3h best jedi evar. Which makes no sense, if you think about it. These people have had Faster-than-light capable travel for a millenia, but wouldn't they be able to, I dunno, transplant midichlorians? Then anyone could be Jedi-capable and not even have to worry about it. I can imagine some nefarious Sith lord attempting it, if not the Jedi themselves for some purpose. But I digress - midichlorians = moar power, and Anakin has that shit in spades. He wins the race, leaves Tatooine and awkwardly promises his mother he'd return, only to - oh no! - find out that the Jedi council won't train him because he's too whiny. Er... old. He's too old. And they really, really dig his haircut.

More stuff happens. A badass lightsaber fight ensues, people die, and George Lucas kills the most compelling bad guy in the series (more on that later, actually). Obi-Wan starts training Anakin, but in the next movie - gasp - he's arrogant and headstrong! Just like Obi-wan used to be (somewhere, George Lucas turns to you and says: See the duality?), but now his hair has a braid, and Obi-wan's doesn't. In this movie, George tries his hand at writing a love story with dialogue so awkward and forceful (look guys, they're REALLY in love, okay?) it would be out of place in the High School Musical prequels. Despite Anakin's obvious cliche-ridden romance, he gets married to a senator in gross violation of the Jedi's strict "no fucking" policy, but does it in secret.

And here, even if it was poorly written and poorly executed, we have a worthy plot point. Anakin is passionate and emotional, which ties into his willfulness and arrogance. It fits. It should have been the beginning of a very major rift between Anakin and the Jedi order, but instead serves no other purpose than to justify Luke's existence later, and give rise to the ridiculous plot device present in the third movie - "he wants to save Padme!"

George, let me take you aside here, and just say this: We Fucking Get It. Anakin's a good fellow, he's in love with his wife and wants to keep her safe. Logical. But he's also a Jedi, and shouldn't be married, and nobody knows he's married to her (expect maybe Obi-wan). Now look - the way the rest of the plot plays out makes no goddamned sense. Sure, the political backdrop thing is alright, but nobody really cares about that. We wanted to see Darth Fucking Vader, not senate debates, even if they are, in a hyper-nerdy sort of way, sort of interesting. But only sort of. Say, interesting in a way that watching a video recording of the Yalta Conference is only interesting because you've seen Saving private Ryan - it doesn't really serve the plot of the movie, but knowing about it gives you street cred. Back on topic. Anakin learns from the Chancellor that he can learn things about keeping people alive through the Force, but not from a Jedi (because they're total pussies compared to the Sith).

Now, again, you have another element that could possibly work. Anakin is already sort of estranged from the Council because of his arrogance, and because of his secret romance. So, giving him a mentor whose designs are less than moral is a good way to develop that rift. However, I think the focus of that mentor relationship is fundamentally flawed. I can understand that Anakin would like to keep his lady alive, especially since she looks so much like Natalie Portman, but its execution is amateur in the extreme, given that, later, Anakin goes from "I want to keep my hot wife alive" to "murdering children is ok, as long as my hot wife is alive and I please the lecherous old dude who promises to teach me how to do so. Oh, also, killing mace Windu is totally easy. " in the space of about 2 scenes. Guh? Oh, but then he has yellow eyes! Yellow! He must be evil, right? Totally. But at least Padme is still alive, and fuckable.

And the rest of the plot is melodramatic and ridiculous, but we all know it well. Darth Vader (a name Palpatine pulled right out of his ass) yells "Noooo!" and hearts break, and another relatively awesome lightsaber battle ensues (a sidenote - look how Obi-wan kills Darth Maul, then watch how he maims Anakin. Why did Maul not realize he had the high ground? Shouldn't Obi-wan have ended up in five peices underneath Darth Maul's lightsaber? Another plot misfire, and another visual link between Anakin and Obi-wan was squandered), but that's the high point of the movie, and only if you ignore everything Ankain says.

So, that's the plot. Now, here's my alternative plot. It contains most of the same elements, but ends up becoming almost coherent. Almost. I am, after all, doing this for free.

So, in movie one, most things happen the same. Anakin gets of Tatooine, the Council decides his bowl-cut is too awesome to pass over, and he get trained as a Jedi.

Movie two - that shit with the sand people, sure. Keep it. Or maybe use something less convoluted, like she died of old age or some sickness that the little flying guy didn't bother to help cure, and Anakin, instead of killing armed, known-to-be-hostile warriors (then feeling way emo about it), he fuckign murders someone. That's a helluva lot stronger than some sand people, and something that would certainly raise some red flags in the viewer. Wouldn't even have to show it. Just have Anakin pick up some scrap titanium then cut away. Oh fuck son! It might even make Anakin's murder of countless children feasible. Then Ankain marries Padme, and maybe have a scene where Obi-wan (who we know knows about his secret wedding) lectures Anakin about the dangers of emotional attachment. Ankain is like "Whoa man, off my grill." Then Obi-wan can make him do some lame shit like guard some decrepit chancellor instead of going with him and kicking ass in the Clone Wars.

Movie Three - Anakin is guarding some old fuck who turns out to be kind of interesting, since he knows the Force (but ain't a Jedi!). Palpatine, using his midichlorians, finds out about Anakin's marital state, and warns him about the Jedi, maybe even makes up some story (or borrows one from the EU) about a married Jedi expelled and dishonored from the Order ("the point here, Anakin, the Jedi are douchebags, and I'm totally awesome" - Chancellor). The old guy then talks about how badly the Jedi are fucking up the war, and someone needs to go take care of that fucking Sith guy that's breaking the Republic's balls. Anakin brings it up to the Council - "hey guys, the lame bad guy George introduced for this movie is killing a lot of our laser-fodder clones, so I'm gonna go kill him." "No, fucker. Guard the Chancellor." Anakin gets all pissy and complains about how the Jedi are fuckfaces, and he could totally go kill the dude. Then Palpatine says "Hmm... I could always take a trip..." then they go, Anakin has a fight with somebody who'll never be cooler than Darth Maul, but finds out that it was all a set-up! Palpatine, being the Sith Lord in secret, lured Anakin away from his hot wife and she gets way hurt in a secret attack (disguised as an attack against the Jedi), and then twists Anakin's emotions so that he has a reason to blame the Jedi, and justifies his change of heart. So Anakin, already blaming the Jedi for the attack, gets even more pissed when the Council finds out that he has a secret wife who just gave birth to twins on her death bed and dies (not of a freakin' broken heart, George Lucas) and decides to give him some sort of punishment. They also tell him to stay away from the Chancellor, because he's all evil and Ankain's like "No, he totally isn't, we're like, best friends." Anakin gives them all the finger and wanders away with his kiddies to the Chancellor, trying to get some justice.

The difference is that while George Lucas' plot was only ok because "It's Star Wars" it really is devoid of any level of sense. Anakin's change is compltely illogical and hardly justifies such a drastic turn from sort-of good to totally evil. But if his wife dies, and he blames the jedi for it? Who wouldn't want to take people down? They fucked up, and let his wife die. Any egomaniac would react the same - it's not his fault, it's the Council's. And so he takes his feud with them to the extreme - hunting them don and exterminating them because the Chancellor/Emperor filled the void left by the deth of his wife with hatred and malevolence. It fits with the themes of Star Wars as a whole and gives us even more sympathy for Dath Vader, and more strongly emphasizes his other change of heart, at the end of Return of the Jedi.

The rest of it could go the same, with the Jedi trying to arrest the Chancellor, Anakin stopping it, then being totally committed to being a douche and fights Obi-wan (with a more satisfying ending), and after being picked up by the Chancellor he gets cyborged and becomes the badass, emotionless killing machine we all know and love.

I want to see that fucking movie.