Star Wars Movie Marathon Part 1: The First Trilogy

I posted awhile back that I thought it would be fun to re-watch all the Star Wars movies prior to the last and final (right? it is the end for real, right?) movie coming out in December. I'm a little behind of course, but I have at this point managed to rewatch the first trilogy, Episodes I-III. Here are my thoughts just for fun.

Episode I: The Phantom Menace

I remember enjoying this movie thoroughly when it came out in the theaters. There was no one there to tell me that I shouldn't be. However, during the course of the years and the criticism, I do agree that this movie has issues. For me it's mostly a matter of very cheesy dialogue. I do enjoy little boy Anakin but I still find the age difference between his little boy self and teenage Padme disturbing. Like how does that age difference shrink suddenly in the second movie? I can't remember how old they are supposed to be, but in my mind in that first movie he is 10 and she is 14 or 15 (but looks older). I have no idea if this is right, but it seems like a doable age difference for the second movie's events.

Anyway. The plot and the set up for the events that are to come work for me. The scary addition of the Sith characters, the getting to know the corruption of the Emperor, the discovery of Anakin, and etc. I love the pod race, and light saber fight at the end. Also, it rips my heart out when Anakin walks away and leaves his mom. Painful.

So despite the flaws, I sill find this movie full of emotion and heart. I also enjoy Liam Neeson and Ewan McGregor a lot and find them to be pretty awesome Jedis.

Episode II: Attack of the Clones

The clone part of this movie I never quite understood. The development of the Storm Troopers, yes? Which is intended for our side (ie. The Republic) but ends up being for the Empire somehow. Guys, I don't follow some of the politics of these movies really, so how this happened still confuses me!

Anyway, again the dialogue is somewhat cheesy and Anakin's angst is distracting, but I seriously think that is how this character is truly suppose to be and still find Hayden Christensen to portray him very well. I think his method of delivery his lines is how someone turning to the dark side would be.... quite emotionless. AND YET, with too much emotion. He does it well. I think I'm in the minority on that. But there you go. Anyway, he has very expressive eyes and regardless of everything else, his eyes say it all. The scene after his mom dies is so very powerful to me, no matter what people say.

I've always thought the romance could have been developed a little better. It seems like he demands, she resists, and then she suddenly gives in. I wish we could see it happen a little more naturally. But still, the music for this romance makes it all seem beautiful! LOL.

I love the fight scene in the arena at the end. I find the final fight scene with Count Dooku to be forced and sudden. He seems to come out of nowhere too. Anyway. The back story of Boba Fett is also interesting to me.

Episode III: Revenge of the Sith

This third movie has always been a hard one for me to watch, which must imply that by this time, I have become fully and emotional attached and invested. Seeing Anakin turn is painful. Seeing him give up everything with the hope of saving Padme is painful. Seeing him actually believe the Emperor is painful.

The younglings scene is heart wrenching and will forever be one of the saddest movie moments. But then it just gets more heart wrenching to me when Obiwon and Anakin fight at the end. Like I feel teary every single time. When Obiwon cries..."you were like a brother to me!" AH!!!  It's so intense. And the music. The music is SO GOOD! And the setting. I mean could this have happened at a more perfectly awful place?

I love the tie ins with what's to come in Episode IV too. The sunset at the end with Luke especially. I mean you know they knew we would love that.


Anyway. I do feel like these movies continuously need to be defended, which is why it might seem like that's what I was doing. But despite their flaws, I feel like they did a great job of setting up the world for the original/middle trilogy.

Every time I watch them, I am reminded of the moment when as a 13 year old kid I read a blurb somewhere in some pop culture magazine that they had plans to make a prequel trilogy that would set up the story for the Star Wars that I loved. The idea of this blew me away and so when I watch it, I am fascinated that it actually really happened.

So there're my disjointed and random thoughts. Now I need to watch Solo and Rogue One before moving onto the original trilogy of my childhood/teenage years. I'm getting a little behind with the one a week plan, but I'm still working on the marathon in general. Anyone else out there doing this mission? Let me know!

Reading Recap October 2019

Fall in the canyon

Books I read this month:


A Darker Shade of Magic by V.E. Schwab: A "traveler" has magic that enables him to go back and forth between alternate realities of London, but things get scary when he ends up with a magic rock that needs to be transported back to its home.

A Very Large Expanse of Sea by Tahereh Mafi: Our girl is angry at life's injustices but after making an unlikely friend she learns better how to see the world.

A Heart in a Body in the World by Deb Caletti: A tragedy has caused our girl take off running across the country where she finally figures out how to deal with the pain.

Field Notes on Love by Jennifer E. Smith: A dude from Britain needs to find someone with the name of his ex girlfriend so he can continue with his plans to travel by train across the US.

Favorites of this month: Wow, but they were all good. However I gave A Darker Shade of Magic and A Very Large Expanse of Sea both five stars.


Plans for November:

• continue with the Beehive Award long  list reading
• read this month's book club pick: Crazy Rich Asians
• participate and win in Nanowrimo

Rock on!

Book Review: Field Notes on Love by Jennifer E. Smith

Book: Field Notes on Love by Jennifer E. Smith
Genre: Contemporary YA romance
Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★ 

So, we have Hugo who is about ready to set off on an adventure riding a train across the US just when his girlfriend breaks up with him. But sadly, everything is in her name and it's nontransferable. Problem. Solution: to ask any random girl with the same name as his ex to step in and go on the trip with him.

And so that's when Mae comes in and fills the spot. And you can probably guess what happens from there. But for both of them, so much is going on at home that they can hardly be in the moment. Hugo has to figure out what he's doing about school, and Mae is very worried about her sick grandma, and about getting into to film school in California.

So yes, this is an insta love sort of story, if that bothers you, but I enjoyed it just fine. It's another travel across the US story (just like the previous one I reviewed) and so I enjoyed THAT again too. (going by train seems so fun. I want to do this!) Anyway, that seems to be a thing suddenly!

But as with all Jennifer E. Smith books, the romance is fun and very swoony and sweet. She is similar for me to Kasie West in that regard. Cute teen romances. But there's always some depth too. Another great one!

Book Review: A Heart in a Body in the World by Deb Caletti

Book: A Heart in a Body in the World by Deb Caletti
Genre: Contemporary YA
Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★ 

This one is about a girl who is struggling with some tragedy that has made her nearly unable to function. When the story begins, she runs out and away from a diner she's at, and just keeps on running. After many miles, she decides she just wants to keep on running. So spontaneously, she finds herself running across the US just to... get it all out I guess.

Her friends and her brother are masterminds so they start a gofundme and raise money for her... her grandpa comes to get her in the motor home, so he is her guardian.. and suddenly. she becomes famous and is met by people at every stop she goes to.

All along the way, as she runs, we get the flash back story as to what happened. Though, it's not until the very final pages do we get to the tragedy, so by then we are guessing what happened, and it sort of made me crazy.

So on one hand, I enjoyed the running journey, seeing the country and meeting the people... I would actually love to do this someday, only not running. But you know, driving the back roads and see the small towns and awesome countryside. It would be amazing.

But I was very much losing patience by the end as to what happened. And what this girl's future was. I was pretty convinced she had actually committed a crime. (Wrong) And was headed to court herself.

Anyway, so I won't give it away what happened... but when we do find it out, the whole thing suddenly became a bit political, which as you know, rubs me the wrong way too.

So, this is a hard one! I really enjoyed reading it. The writing is fantastic and the journey engaging. (I don't think I've read any other books by this author, which kinds of surprises me.) But the dragging out of the "thing that happened" and then making a statement bit... was just... eh.

Have you read it? I'd love to know what you thought!

Movie Review: Gemini Man

Movie: Gemini Man
Starring: Will Smith
Genre: Action Adventure
Rating: one and a half thumbs up


I have a goal to start finding my love for the movies again, so the plan is to just simply go more often for date night, or whatever. Here's hoping some decent ones show up now and then! Mostly I look at the list of available movies and there's just nothing that looks good.

Anyway, that being said, the other night we ended up randomly at Gemini Man. Because anything Will Smith has got to be good, right?

And it was... not bad. Actually quite good I'd say. I actually enjoyed it!

The premise is that we have an assassin... Will Smith, who kills the bad guys. And then just as he's about to retire, someone is out to kill HIM. And when he finds out who it is, this dude LOOKS JUST LIKE HIM... a younger him. So he and his cohort (a girl he has just barely met) set out to figure out what's going on. And who this dude is.

It's all quite fascinating really. And a little disturbing.

There is lots of violence and fighting, but not as much as I expected. The movie actually had a lot of chill and quiet moments which was surprising. I remember leaving the theater thinking... there were some great parts and some really weird parts. I think some of it seemed very real... and some of it seemed way too fake and digital-ized, you know? I think that was it.

But we had no idea if Will Smith played both characters, and it turns out, he sure did! So somehow they managed to make him look all those years younger. It didn't look fake, that part, either. And he looked just different enough that it made us wonder (not knowing going in) if it was him, or someone else.

Anyway, what an excellent acting job! I loved that.

So, if you are up for a decent action adventure, and you are a Will Smith fan, then check it out!

Here's the trailer.

Book Review: A Very Large Expanse of Sea by Tahereh Mafi

Book: A Very Large Expanse of Sea by Tahereh Mafi
Genre: YA Contemporary
Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★ ★


I was at once both leery and intrigued by this book. I worried it might be a bit too agenda-y and try to shove lessons to be learned in our faces.

But, while it did teach us something, it was done in a very palatable way. And I ended up loving it.

Based on a year in the author's own life, this is about a girl who is dealing with being a Muslin girl in high school, the year after 9/11. She is angry. Very very angry. At lots of things, and not just how she is treated by people, both at school and not.

When she gets paired up with a dude for science lab, she is curious about him, but figures his curiosity about her is just like everyone else's and doesn't really mean anything.

As it turns out, they click and become friends and then more. In so doing, it helps her to look at the world a little differently, and when she realizes his life isn't as perfect as she thinks it is, she starts to look a little more outside herself instead of focusing always on her own pain and anger.

There's a quote at the every end of the book that I wish I'd written down before I turned it back to the library, but the gist of it is what I just said above... that in all the anger she has with dealing with all the injustices, she realizes that it's her attitude and her choice with how she reacts to all that. And that she can choose to be happy over angry. That other people have their own things and that everyone is all the same and that her prejudice against people is just as bad as their prejudice against her. Or something like that... whatever it was, it was good and I inwardly cheered.

Anyway. All that deep stuff aside, the romance is AWESOME! Perfectly swoony. I loved it. I loved the writing (as I've come to expect from this author) and the way she handled this subject. It hit me just right instead in preachy or self-pity-ish... which I very much appreciated. Thank you!

Let's Watch Some Star Wars!

So I saw this movie watching schedule on Facebook and I think I'm going to give it a shot. Which means I need to watch that first one soon!

Who's with me?