It's over, Lucas has the high ground
I mentioned that my cousins had no idea why the Clone War was being fought. There was no real buildup, no reason, or anything. It just happened because Sidious wanted it to. So with nothing for the audience to relate to, the battles are just a kaleidoscope of special effects and nothing more. Which is exactly how Episode III started. The space battle began and Berri said, "I have no idea who's fighting." And it's true, without identification, the battle just looks like hot dogs shooting at triangles with a bunch of little ships zipping about. Once again, I had to point out who was whom and what was trying to be achieved, and they caught on pretty quickly; then General Grievous showed up. The questions about him continued all the way to his death: "Who is that guy, is he bad? Why is he coughing? Is he a robot? Is he a dog? Is he a robot dog? etc." Grievous has the unique honor of being the only villain in the films who has absolutely no back story whatsoever, and I mean none. Maybe it's explained in the Clone Wars cartoon, but I can't bring myself to watch that and the information belongs in the film anyway. Another who wasn't given much intro was Bail Organa, and he was a far more important character. They also didn't seem that impressed with Chewbacca. (They knew about him because my dad had mentioned a certain encounter I had with him at DisneyWorld, long story). Anyway, he doesn't really do much in the movie and is thus a disappointing cameo to old and new fans alike. It was about this time, that I think my cousins really gave up on the films' writing. Some new creatures/special effects show up for no reason and eventually die/disappear, and they just had to roll with it. This is unfortunate because the expectation of watching mindless action would make it harder to watch the later films.
On the flip side, they also started to get into Anakin's story. Don't get me wrong, there was still a bit of snickers and scoffs with the dialogue, but they definitely became emotionally invested when Anakin began to turn to the dark side. I could see them all literally on the edge of their seats during Windu's duel with Palpatine, so praise to Lucas there. The climax was the strongest of the prequels and they noticed. Though the dialogue was bad and they shared my outrage at Yoda taking a facefull of force lighting, they really seemed to get into it. There was again a stunned disbelief when Obi-wan dismembered Anakin, and Berri was noticing an alarming pattern with the characters' limbs. I would call the film's ending a success because the audience came away with the intended feeling; the bad guys have won, a hero falls from grace, but there is a glimmer of hope. Once again, the Death Star was glazed over, no one asked about it.
Final Thoughts
So it wasn't until this one this one that I think the series started to hook the audience, though with a rather bitter bait. Indeed, my cousins were so heartbroken about the ending that they weren't sure they wanted to continue. Upon learning the next film was called A New Hope, they agreed to proceed. There was one catch that I didn't see coming, Lucas was so caught up in being as grand as possible in this film that the transition to the original trilogy was very rough indeed.
Next...
We'll call them George, Rick, and Gary...
