Jedi in the Star Wars Prequels – Too Many And Too Powerful

It’s a well-known fact (okay maybe not a fact, just universally accepted) that the Star Wars prequels are terrible. But why is this? For certain no one piece of the puzzle ruined the entire film, instead being a culmination of poor choices that resulted in, surprise, a poor series of movies. That being said, there is one major reason why I find the Star Wars prequels to be so much weaker than that of the original three films – Jedi’s.

More specifically, my reason is that there is an overabundance of them and their (apparently) godlike powers in the prequels.

Remember in Empire Strikes Back when Yoda lifts the X-Wing out of the swamp? That was the epitome of force power, and it took all of Yoda’s strength to do it. Flashback twenty years and the leaps, jumps and force powers Obi-wan and Anakin are using make Yoda look like a Jedi youngling.

Remember in Return of the Jedi, as Luke, Han and Chewie are about to be fed to the sarlac? Luke grabs his light saber in midair and begins to fight, only to get shot in the hand. In the original films, fighting more than a handful of guys meant trouble. In Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith, we see Obi-wan and Anakin cut through hundreds of droids no problem and even laugh about it. Sure, the point could be argued that Luke wasn’t a “true” Jedi, but even then Jedi were never supposed to be super heroes.

In the original films we also had other characters to balance out force users such as Darth Vader and Luke. Han Solo, Chewbacca, Lando Calrissian, Leia, all these important non-force using main characters helped ground the world we were watching on the screen,  and when something did happen on screen that was impossible, a Jedi mind trick, or the lifting of an X-Wing with the force, viewers bought into it.  Force powers were so few and far between that when they were used it was a treat.

The prequels however, throw this balance out the window. There are no main characters who don’t use the force, and jumping forty feet into the air is a common, and as a result, mundane occurrence. Using something over and over again eventually wears out its welcome, something Mr. Lucas apparently didn’t foresee when he decided to give his Jedi even more power. As a result the prequels are poorly conceived and almost snore worthy, as when your heroes can do just about anything at any time, what’s the point?

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