Everyone’s doing it, but has everyone read more than 100 Star Wars books? I have! But that doesn’t make me the biggest Star Wars fan ever or anything, I just like to say it. I mean, I love Star Wars and may have named my son after Luke Skywalker, but still, I think wars over who is a bigger fan are silly. Also at least 40 of those books weren’t very good. Anyhow, here’s the real definitive ranking of the Star Wars movies*
Episode IV: A New Hope – It’s complete on its own, it’s gorgeous, it still stands up today, and I love it
Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back – *inserts obligatory “it’s so dark, oh my gosh blah blah” phrases*- seriously, the reason this ranks so highly isn’t because it’s dark–any slasher movie is *dark*–it’s because it is viscerally foreboding
Episode VI: Return of the Jedi- For a long time, this was my favorite, until I realized that A New Hope was really much better. I just like finales
Rogue One- Yes, it was truly amazing pretty much all around. The action, the acting, the plot–all were superb.
Episode VIII: The Last Jedi- perhaps the most inward-looking Star Wars movie, but it felt a little bloated, didn’t have enough aliens, and I felt it was a bit silly at times. But Luke… was awesome and they really did quite well making this feel full of enough answers while still raising issues for the next movie(s)
Episode VII: The Force Awakens- I loved it all around, but it did feel maybe a tad too fan servicey and redundant from the Expanded Universe. That said, it was well done.
Episode I: The Phantom Menace- say what you want about it, there were a lot of scenes here I actually really enjoy; Darth Maul–and let’s just throw it out there, “Duel of the Fates” is possibly the greatest movie track ever made; the underwater scene was crazy, big, and fun; I enjoyed the podracing, so deal; etc., but yeah Jar Jar and Midichlorians ruined this
Episode III: Revenge of the Sith – not well acted, and the whole Anakin to Vader is super rushed at the end, but at least it kind of wraps things up
Episode II: Attack of the Clones – It’s trash
*ranking not definitive
Eclectic Theist 