Hardly anyone made jokes and the few that did were actually pretty funny with my favorite being during Anakin's final scene with his mother.
Anakin: Will I ever see you again.
Random Person in the Theater: Eh, at least one more time.
God help me actually I laughed at that.
But one thing I found so fun is how exited the audience got for so many moments. When Anakin, Obi-Wan, Qui-Gon, Padme or Sidious showed up people went NUTS. I'm talking cheering, clapping and a standing ovation at the end. And guess who got the biggest cheer from the audience? Jar Jar Binks!
Yeah, and not in an ironic mocking way because people were screaming things like "Ahmed Best is the Best" and "We You Love Binks". This lasted for a solid 30 seconds which is more than Anakin got (20 seconds if anyone's curious and it was equally unironic there too). I love this because these two actors were needlessly harassed and bully because of this film so to see so many people cheer for them. To shout out these actors name's to show support to them, was truly heartwarming.
For me I've liked the Prequel Trilogy. The films are flawed but at the same time their charming and there are a lot of good ideas here, some of which are even executed pretty damn good when you get down to it. The music is great, the action is awesome, the plot is a lot more clever and nuanced then people give it credit for IMO and is even a nice twist/deconstruction on the Chosen One/Prophecy Hero Tropes.
One thing that often bugs me about the Disney Sequel Trilogy and a lot of other "Sequel Trilogies to the Original Trilogy" like Dark Empire is that the stories are often not as clever as they think their are. Take for example the Bomber Scene that I covered last week, that scene is all about the senseless sacrifice of Rebel fighters and working to knock Poe down a peg because again, Rian Johnson didn't like the character.
But the scene is stupid because of the damn bombers they use. To avoid repeating myself the problem with this scene is that it gets rid of the Y-Wings and B-Wings to which they are inferior in every way, shape and form. The scene is contrived because instead of using established tech that exists in universe the movie invests new tech that is someone worse then the old stuff.
But re-watching the prequels I never had an issue like that with one exception which was all the droids shutting down because the command ship was destroyed even though nothing like this happens in the series ever again. Even Lucas made fun of this bit, calling it contrived and stupid.
But everything else? It mostly makes sense why things happen the way they do. Sidious wanting to kill the Jedi, the Jedi go and save the Queen and get her off the planet, they manage to escape go to a world that isn't under the control of the people hunting them. They then look for a few replacement bits for their ships but can't afforded it and need to get to Corasant as soon as possible because people on Naboo are dying and they need to do something. They enter into a Pod Race because it's the only way to get what they need without drawing the attention of the Hutts.
The characters here are making the best choices they can with what options are available. Hell for all the talk about Jar Jar being an idiot even he makes a number of good calls and never does anything stupid enough to endanger the mission at hand.
Compare this to TLJ, where characters who were competent in the last movie are now making idiot choices for the sake of moving the plot forward while ignoring all the lessons learned from the last film and the series as a whole.
Luke learning to honor what it really means to be a Jedi and risking everything to save his father from the Dark Side, all forgotten now he has to relearn what it makes to be a Jedi and give up on saving one of his family members from the Dark Side.
But I have no issues with Anakin's bad choices because it fits his character. Anakin IDOLIZES the Jedi, he sees them as heroes yet their always standing in his way, refuse to even consider training him. His own mentor and surrogate brother is constantly criticizing him, and being a Jedi didn't fix anything. He failed to free his mother, failed to save her, let his anger consume him and killed those who killed someone he loved. And even after that he STILL kept his faith in the Jedi and believed that they were heroes until finally he foresees the death of his wife and they don't anything to help him with that but instead tell him to let go of what he fear to loose.
Anakin is a tragic character who wants nothing more then to be a Jedi and in the end is the one of the Jedi's greatest enemies.
Meanwhile Kylo Ren is just some looser who wants to be Darth Vader and fails at almost everything he does and poses no real threat to anyone until the third film... where he dies and effects nothing.
But back to Episode 1. I still love this film, is it flawed, yes. Is it also quotable, filled with great and unique visuals, does it expand on the lore of the series and have one of hte greatest Lightsaber Duels in all of Star Wars with one of the most popular villains in the series? Also yes.
This will never be the best film in the series but damn I still like it and that's not going to change.
