Episode III was a really great SW film. If I'm making a rank list of the 6 movies, which is hard to do when I'm still buzzing from the movie that I saw last night, then it goes something like this:

The Empire Strikes Back
Revenge of the Sith
A New Hope
Return of the Jedi
Attack of the Clones
The Phantom Menace

It's by far the best of the prequels. The dialogue has been improved, as has the acting. Hayden had some really great acting moments in the movie. There were a couple spots where it was whiny Jedi time (this is the father of Luke after all), but overall, I was really pretty blown away with some of his acting skills.

Obi Wan completely owns this movie. He was cool in Episode I and II, but he completely makes this movie his own. I can tell that he really wanted to go out with a bang, and made sure to pull out all the old stops. Kudos to him for personally trying to bring a sense of the fun that the old movies had into the new movies.

The Emperor was really fantastic in this movie. He captured much of that evil vibe he had from "Return of the Jedi." There were a few moments where he took up the camp levels a notch, which I thought was kinda fun.

The movie is dark. Dark, dark, and dark. People die. Lots of em do. Parts of this movie seemed almost like I was watching Attack of the Clones part 2. But then the movies takes this pretty dark and violent turn, and Darth Vader messes some poor mo' fo's up.

The lightsaber duel between Obi Wan and Anakin was impressive, both in action and in the dialogue between the participants. Good stuff.

The movie was awesome, but then again, I think all the Star Wars movies are awesome. Can't wait to go again. I almost always like a movie more the second time I see it.

matt out

that's about it for now...expect a full on, lengthy review when time permits. :-)