Review: Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones

Directed by: George Lucas

Written by: George Lucas & 

Jonathan Hales

Starring: Ewan McGregor, Natalie Portman, Hayden Christensen, Ian McDiarmid, Samuel L. Jackson

Rating: [1.5/5]

With a prequel barrelling towards an inevitable conclusion, seeds must be planted to see how we plausibly reach the endpoint in question. Through this journey watching Anakin’s descent into Darth Vader attempts to bring moments of joy infused with the reality of this character and the tendencies that would find him killing innocent people. Unfortunately, this gets wrapped in yet another gravely substandard story. 

10 years after Anakin (Hayden Christensen) began his Jedi training with Obi-Wan Kenobi (Ewan McGregor), they get tasked with protecting their old acquaintance, Padmé Amidala (Natalie Portman). As the young duo begins to develop feelings for each other, rumblings of a clone army in production begin to make waves. 

Following such a dreadful film in The Phantom Menace, this feature received the opportunity to right the wrongs of the predecessor as well as build upon the larger themes of what George Lucas wants to build in this trilogy. It certainly accomplishes both of these aspects with much less Jar Jar Binks in the story of a natural progression of the political sphere of the Republic, but once again the execution leaves so much to be desired. It leaves the only way for one to find enjoyment in this feature stemming from thinking of the narrative on a conceptual level as opposed to what gets presented on screen. 

While Attack of the Clones serves as much more of an improvement to the previous feature, that does not necessarily make it good, which several facets of this film seek to prove. Essentially split into two different stories for a large portion of the narrative, we follow Obi-Wan Kenobi in his quest to learn more about this clone army being built and then the budding romance between Anakin and Padmé with one yielding much better results than the other. Obi-Wan’s journey through the planets in inquiring about this army makes for an intriguing plot line to follow certainly helped on by Ewan McGregor representing the very best the prequel trilogy has to offer, but unfortunately, it splits time with quite the unfortunate romance. 

Much maligned for conversations about sand, the romance between Padmé and Anakin becomes paramount to the entire arc of the individual who would then become Darth Vader. As Revenge of the Sith displays, it’s quite evident how much Padmé means to him, and while Anakin’s affection for her makes itself quite clear from the beginning of this feature, from the other side it never quite makes sense. This feature has Padmé tell Anakin she’ll always see him as a little boy, express her distaste for the way the guy even looks at her because it makes her uncomfortable, and then tries to make us believe she eventually falls for him as they frolic through the gardens. Their conversations on this mega date of theirs really exemplify the horrors of this screenplay and the bad draw Hayden Christensen received with this character. His line delivery remains horrid, which certainly blows back on George Lucas who set him to fail, unfortunately. 

As Anakin’s heart grows through his relationship with Padmé, elements of his darker behavior begin to flare up like red flags through different conversations and some gruesome actions. This feature definitely lays them out in a more righteous way before abandoning all hope in displaying exactly what makes him Darth Vader in the next film but it’s quite comedic in those moments where Vader’s theme quietly plays making it clear to the audience in case they forgot exactly who Anakin will turn into at the end. No need to be subtle here. 

Amid a marketable improvement on the previous film, Attack of the Clones has some entertaining aspects, mostly revolving around Obi-Wan’s missions, but this feature just does not have the necessary juice in telling a compelling story. It continues to feel like groundwork building towards something bigger and it gets hindered by the horrid screenplay ailing not only this feature but the entire trilogy as a whole. This makes the more enjoyable scenes of the film something you want to hold onto before we get back to having Midi-chlorian explained back to us. As a preteen this feature had a hold on me solely because of Natalie Portman as Padmé but, as difficult as it may be to believe, she did not have the power to solely elevate everything this feature did to undermine her greatness.