Seduction of the Innocent: Regarding Attack of the Clones

There has always been some debate if Attack of the Clones is better or worse than The Phantom Menace; let me assure you, Attack of the Clones is not as bad as its predecessor but still not a good movie at all. Episode II is the first Star Wars live action film (and, to date, only) that has come out while I've been alive that I haven't seen in its opening weekend. The thrill of it just wasn't there anymore; seeing new Star Wars had become more of an obligation and less of an event.

And this movie certainly didn't do itself any favors to change my mind.

The fall of Anakin Skywalker should be the most tragic thing in the world. We should just get our hearts broken that the Hero of the Republic and prophesied Jedi savior turns out to be the one that directly causes its undoing. But we never actually like the guy so when we see hints of him going evil here, there is absolutely no pathos. A lot of that is Hayden Christensen's performance which makes the young Skywalker come off as whiny and largely unlikable; some of that is Christensen but a lot of that is on George Lucas' script too. After all, what else can make Academy Award winner Natalie Portman turn in such a bland performance? Black Swan was no fluke, Portman has been able to act expertly while most kids her age were learning how to tie their shoes [See Leon: The Professional].

I think she's just trying to get off set as quickly as possible here and I can't really blame her.

Taking place approximately ten years after the events of The Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones sees Obi-Wan Kenobi and his apprentice Anakin called back to Coruscant to protect Padme Amidala after an attempt is made on the senator's life. What was once the brash slave kid from the slums of Tatooine is now a swaggering Jedi-in-training; Anakin has presumably heard for years from his peers that he is destined for greatness which has undoubtedly fed his ego but he's also overcompensating to cover the pain from being separated from his mother at such a young age. As such, he's a lightsaber-wielding hotbed of emotions and he's leaning more on his own darker impulses.

"Okay, Hayden, we're going to need you to look like your mother just died not like someone just double-dipped a chip."

Being reunited with Padme certainly isn't doing him any favors. His schoolboy crush on the former Queen of Naboo has led him to fall head over heels in love with her and, as much as she initially denies it, she's starting to feel the same way. While the two younger adults come to terms with their feelings for each other, Obi-Wan finds himself drawn into a galaxy-spanning conspiracy involving clones and one disgraced Jedi Master played by the always good Christopher Lee; it's really just him and Ewan McGregor that turn in reliably solid performances. Meanwhile, a formidable bounty hunter named Jango Fett and his unaltered clone Boba wait in the wings.

What's kind of important to note in Attack of the Clones is that our heroes fail; it's a recurring theme across the prequel trilogy. The Phantom Menace saw Naboo liberated but at the cost of Qui-Gon and without the identity of the true Sith Lord ever revealed even as he stood right among the Jedi. Here, Obi-Wan and Anakin succeed in their initial goal of protecting Padme but they don't stop Count Dooku from escaping and the Sith Lord that ordered the production of vast clone armies continues to elude them. Worse yet, they accept the clone army without question and fail to stop a war that consumes the entire galaxy for five years. But, hey, Padme is safe and marries Anakin in secret. Break out the bubbly.

Who says war doesn't bring people together?

Attack of the Clones improves upon The Phantom Menace in that it moves along at a slightly tighter clip, doesn't have any characters as unwatchably annoying as Jar Jar or Boss Nass, and largely has better action sequences (Though Anakin and Obi-Wan's final duel with Dooku pales in comparison to the fights against Darth Maul; no, Yoda's surprise appearance doesn't close the gap). There's some more imagination going behind the plot and new settings in that Obi-Wan's story plays out like a mystery while Kamino and Geonosis feel more interesting and developed than Naboo. Even Coruscant comes off better here with its neon-lit back alleys and dive bars over the stuffy administrative offices in The Phantom Menace.

Like a less gritty Neo-Los Angeles from Blade Runner.

What holds Attack of the Clones back really is the love story at its emotional core; whenever the action isn't on Obi-Wan, it completely drags.. There is zero chemistry between Portman and Christensen and we never really get why she falls so hard for him in the first place. The closest we get to feeling for the guy is when his mom dies in his arms when he returns to Tatooine to rescue her from Tuskan Raiders...but his scene where he confesses how he slaughtered them all in immediate retaliation undercuts all the emotion there. I've heard Christensen delivers a decent performance in Shattered Glass, in his defense, but I've never seen it and his work in the prequels should maybe not be listed on his CV.

"Look contemplative..."

But we do get more Samuel L. Jackson as the badass Mace Windu, so badass here that he feels like he's from a different film franchise entirely. And while Jango Fett is a shameless way to get a Boba Fett bounty hunter analog into the narrative (Somehow finding out Boba is a clone really demystifies the character for me), I do like his rain-soaked fight with Obi-Wan on Kamino as well as their dogfight in the asteroid belt surrounding Geonosis. He does go out pretty hard in the climactic battle though completely getting his ass handed to him by a space rhinoceros before Windu shows him the business end of his purple lightsaber.

Apparently the rumors of Jackson having "BMF" engraved on his lightsaber for "Bad Motherfucker" are true.

I left the theaters in 2002 not feeling completely enthused by Attack of the Clones. I immediately knew I liked it better than The Phantom Menace but that was/is such a low bar of quality. There was a three-year gap until Episode III would close out the Skywalker Saga, that much was already clear. I just wasn't in any rush to get there anymore.