Star Wars The Phantom Menace Review

Hellooo Mets! This is Jesse from Rock Sugar and

you're listening to the GeekCats Radio Network.

Keep it right here. There is nothing wrong with

your podcast player do not attempt to adjust

the volume Hello, and welcome back to our studio.

You are now inside studio 2009 I'm of course

TF2 and Mike and joining me for the first time

is not Steve Megatron It is Mike the Birdman.

Hello, sir. That's right. I have returned from

lands beyond and And it's interesting that you're

here now because you're gonna be here later at

some point Because normally inside studio 2009

we don't have guest hosts on until after they

do their podcast approach But that's a whole

other story, but Mike is here because we are

starting something I have wanted to do since

Quite frankly 1983 when I was three years old.

I wanted to watch the Star Wars movies in order

In story order, folks. So over the next 12 months,

at least the nine of the next 12 months, you're

gonna have one episode a month dedicated to all

nine of these Skywalker Saga movies. Holy crap.

We should talk about Rogue One and Solo 2 at

some point because those are actually, you know

what? The more I watch Solo, the more it sticks

with me. And Rogue One is a friggin gem of a

movie, but that's another discussion for a different

day. Yeah, I wanted, I've all, ever, ever since

I was a kid, ever since I saw the original Star

Wars, now technically known as episode four,

A New Hope, I'm like, wait, Chapter four, where

are the other three chapters? What's going on

here? I didn't know I was a kid in the 80s I

had no clue, you know and ever since then I've

always wanted to and ever since especially Episode

one the Phantom Menace. I've always wanted to

do them in story order Well now that the Skywalker

Saga is quote -unquote complete because episode

9 is is here as well We're doing them in story

order, and I'm sure we will dedicate an episode

of the show for Solo and Rogue One. I do remember

watching Rogue One when it first hit, I don't

know, like Redbox or something. And at the time,

I just wasn't into it. The best thing was the

ending. But that was just me, I guess. So we

have both rewatched Star Wars Episode One, The

Phantom Menace. This is my second time watching

it ever. And you refer to the prophecy of the

one who will bring balance to the Force. You

believe it's this boy? He can see things before

they happen. He can't help you. The Force is

unusually strong with him. He was meant to help

you. Anakin! Tell him to take off! Will I ever

see you again? What does it hurt to tell you?

Are you sure about this? Trusting our fate to

a boy we hardly know? Anakin Skywalker, meet

Obi -Wan Kenobi. I sense much fear in you. The

boy is dangerous. They all sense it. Why can't

you? Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear

leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads

to suffering. I think for me, this is probably

it's less than 10, but more than five. Uh, cause

I saw it in the theaters. I think I saw it twice

or three times. I've seen it a few times on Blu

ray and I streamed it last night in 4k on Disney

plus. And I was actually surprised it wasn't

a more exciting experience in 4k. Like, cause

I'm watching it. On a 60 -inch TCL, I've got

a Dolby 5 .1 surround setup with Dolby Atmos

and I was paying attention to certain scenes

that I was really hoping the pod race would really

pop and It did and it didn't I remember in the

theater. It was a much more visceral Experience

because obviously you're seeing it on this gigantic

screen with like 500 other people, but I don't

know I was expecting more Technically, but I

was just realizing how bad. Some of the CGI looks

from back then to now, like, although that being

said, Yoda, uh, like the, the version that's

on Disney plus, I don't know whether this is

the same version that was on the 2011 Blu ray.

If that was the Yoda from episodes two and three,

the one on Disney plus they replaced the Yoda

puppet with the new CGI model from episodes two

and three. So it looks Yeah, so it looks more

consistent because I was watching last night

thinking something don't look right. So I went

back and did a little bit of research and I'm

thinking ha. So I was right. Um, there's a great

photo floating around out there somewhere. Someone

took a picture of the Lucasfilm archives and

there's a picture of the Yoda puppet who's kind

of rotting because it was made out of rubber

and latex and all those kinds of materials and

it's cross -eyed and it looks like it's dying.

So yeah, there's that nightmare fuel for you.

All right. So Most people know all this stuff,

but just some quick just the facts written and

directed by George Lucas produced by Rick McCollum

starring Liam Neeson, Ewan McGregor, Natalie

Portman, Jake Lloyd, Ian McDermott, Anthony Daniels,

Kenny Baker, Frank Oz. The music was done by

John Williams, released and then I find this

funny, I guess, but they used to do this back

then. I think they still do it now. It had a

Los Angeles release May 16th of 99 in the United

and the US world premiere release was May 19th,

1999 22 years ago. This may this movie is 22

years old this year. Holy crap. Yeah. I remember

a lot of the hype for this. I remember a lot

of the marketing kind of leading up to this.

Cause this is when the internet where I was was

frankly shit. So I was downloading materials

on a 26 .4 BP. BBPS modem. Let me tell you, you

don't know how long it takes to download something

until you're on a dial -up connection. And I

remember downloading the trailer the second this

came online. I remember watching Entertainment

Tonight before we got Entertainment Tonight Canada,

where they showed little bits of the trailer.

I remember people were buying tickets. I can't

remember what movie it was for, but people would

buy tickets to watch the trailer for episode

one and then walk out. So they buy the tickets

to some stupid like Meg Ryan movie and then just

ditch. So some movies made tremendous bank off

of this trailer. Captain. Yes, sir. Tell them

we wish to board at once. With all due respect,

the ambassadors for the Supreme Chancellor wish

to board immediately. Yes, of course. As you

know, our blockade is perfectly legal and we'd

be happy to receive the ambassadors. Do you want

me to talk about my experience with this? Because

sure, absolutely. This is one of the times I

skipped school and didn't get in shit. Okay.

Okay, so when this movie came out, I had to camp

out for tickets. This is before the era, really

in Canada anyway, of online kind of ticket sales,

especially for small towns. So my town was about

20 ,000 people. We had, I think at that time

it was Owens Sound Cinemas five, maybe three,

I'm pretty sure it was five. Yeah, it was five.

So in this dirt mall that has long since been

destroyed and been replaced with this huge multiplex,

I told my teacher, all my teachers that day,

I'm not going to be in class tomorrow. Why? Star

Wars. Really? Yeah. Star Wars. One of my teachers,

Mr. Bane, I said, all right, Mike, I'm not going

to mark you absent, but there's a catch. What's

the catch? You saved me a seat. No problem. So

I went, I took the school bus in the towns. I

wasn't going to tell my parents that I was doing

this. They fucking knew. Um, so I went in line

at, I think it was eight 30 in the morning. I

was not the first person in line. Um, I think

I was number five. So I sat in line and then

my friends started trickling in from all across

the town and surrounding counties. So by about

10 o 'clock, there is about a group of, I want

to say between six to 10 of us. And at that time

I was playing the Star Wars role -playing game

from West End Games. Wizards of the Coast had

taken over the license, would take it on a little

bit later, I think after Attack of the Clones

or just a little bit before. So we're sitting

there in line, we're playing Star Wars, the role

-playing game. We don't know what to expect.

We're kind of speculating. I remember one of

my friends at the time, Matt, had bought one

of those candy Darth Maul lightsabers. And we

thought it was the coolest thing ever. So we

get the thinking, oh man, we're frigging hungry.

And because 1999, I'm the only one that has a

cell phone. So I've got this Zach Morris brick

cell phone called the local Domino's pizza. And

they're like, okay, where do I deliver this thing

to? I'm like, okay. I want you to go to the Onesound

Cinemas 5 and look for the fat kid in the Star

Wars t -shirt. They're like, what? And I'm like,

yeah. So they come deliver pizza for me and all

my friends. Wow. And we're sitting there eating

pizza. We're talking with like other Star Wars

fans. We're probably about middle of the pack

in terms of like age. There were some younger

fans there. They were mostly older, but we were

some of the only high school kids. So we're sitting

there and probably by about noon to three o 'clock

the line starts getting bigger and bigger and

I think when the theater opened at six o 'clock

I think the line was easily two or three hundred

people and my teacher strolls up at about four

thirty five o 'clock he's like wow you really

did save me a seat I'm like yeah um so we go

into the theater now before you went in you could

pay ten dollars and get um a Memorial or whatever,

um, theater booklet, which was like 50 or 60

pages, uh, kind of like a coffee table size,

but it was like high glossy kind of paper, but

it wasn't bound like a book, um, of all the production

stuff for like star Wars episode one. So. I skipped

it. You can buy these things on eBay for like

10 bucks now, I think. So we go in there. We

were, because we were so close to the front of

the line, we got really good seats. We were like

fourth or fifth row in right dead center in the

middle. No tall guys beside us sat in there.

I don't think I had a girlfriend at the time,

but I think my best friend Ryan at the time was

there and my friend Jared and Mr. Bain and all

of them. And we sat there and for the next two

hours and I think 16 minutes, it was something

else. And Seeing it for the first time, I was

like, okay, some of this is really cool. I mean,

everybody loved it. Darth Maul, though he deserved

better and ultimately got better as the years

and expanded universe kind of filled out his

backstory and clone wars, rebels, whatever. Um,

and it was fun. I mean, everybody remembers corn

on the, the cob, which became the meme from dual

of the fates. But that fight scene, everybody

was really excited. The pottery scene was really

cool, though, admittedly a little long. Um, and

it was something else. Um, although I remember

seeing it when the first episode one crawl came

up and they're talking about taxation of trade

routes. I'm thinking, well, okay, sure. I guess,

um, it just wasn't what we were used to because

we're used to seeing like the galactic empire,

the Senate has fallen and all this other. Shit,

we're talking about what is essentially a day

in Congress here that just happens to end badly.

What's so funny about that is that I, when I,

when I went to rewatch this movie, I saw all

the US politics in this movie. It's true. Especially

like there's one line. Palpatine says in this,

he's like, and now you see the real power of

the Senate, enter the bureaucrat or something

along those lines. I'm thinking, yeah, if that

isn't echoing some things that used to happen

under your previous administration, I don't know

what is. Um, and I was, I was fairly pleased

seeing this movie, but then The fandom menace

kind of showed its head and I started to dislike

this movie upon second and third viewings because

I saw it in theaters a few times. I think I took

my, my girlfriend at the time. I took a couple

of friends and the episode one coolness just

kind of wore off after a while, but, um, it was

one of those things that. It's gotten better

with time now that I've kind of went back and

rewatched it, especially for this podcast. Um,

but I've got some thoughts and feelings, but

I've been rambling on long enough, but I do want

to talk about the marketing, the toys and everything

else. We will. Yeah, we will get to that. So

here's my history with it. It's one of those

things where from, I want to say 87 to 97, I

coveted the three. VHS versions of the original

trilogy there are three specific VHS covers that

were they were the covers at the time and I absolutely

loved it so when I heard about this I was like

oh cool and at the time I was this was May of

99 oh geez I was 19th I was nine days away from

graduating high school a year late. It's a long

story. I got flunked in eighth grade for health

and PE. But anyway, that's neither here nor there.

That's all history under the bridge. At the time,

I had to actually recommit to the state of Kentucky

because I was in the state of Kentucky's care.

When you turn 18, you are, you know, see you

later, kid. You know, go do your thing. I had

to actually recommit in order to graduate high

school, so I was still in the state -run facility

that I had been in since 97. And one of the counselors

said, hey, Star Wars. And I'm like, oh, yeah,

I remember episode one. I'm like, wait, what?

They're finally putting out a first episode?

Sure. So we go to the theater, we have fun. I

remember nothing about being in that theater.

Nothing at all. Have no clue. I just remember

the fact that we went, we went, I think, The

Saturday it came out so you know the day after

it came out and all of that. I only ever saw

it then. And when we rewatch like I honestly

do not remember watching Phantom Menace in the

last 22 years other than as of this recording

last night when I rewatched it for this podcast

have no clue in the last 22 years if I had seen

this film before all as I remember is everybody.

hating on it and hating the kid and hating with

this and hating them the midichlorids this and

this that the other thing and whatever else and

All that that's all I really remember and then

The two things I remember most about this film

of the pod race scene and The Duel of the Fates

lightsaber battle at the end There's a question

in here Of in our script that we're using here

folks. What level of fan were you heading into

the prep work for this record? I have now that

I had now that we live in an age where Disney

plus is a thing and everything Disney owns because

Disney owns everything is online and streaming.

I have actually been watching the Clone Wars.

I'm up to season four episode 14 or something

or other. So I've been binging through the Clone

Wars. animated series from 2008 and all this

and all that and I love Star Wars, but it's never

been my number one, but I still do love it. So

in prep for this, Mike, how much of a fan were

you of the franchise going into this? Okay. So

my history with, with Star Wars goes back very

much to the 1980s. I had a neighbor I would borrow

return of the Jedi from. I saw a new hope a bunch

of times on Cinemax on my satellite dish and

I didn't see Empire a whole lot just because

it was never on in like repeats, but I loved

it. So in the early nineties, I can't remember

precisely how this happened, but I started reading

the star Wars expanded universe books. Um, in

like the summer of nineties. three 94. It was

after I, it was just after I graduated grade

eight, before I went in the high school and they

were the, uh, Timothy's on books that is known

as the, the Thrawn trilogy. And I started really

getting back in the star Wars. And then when

they announced the new special distance for coming

back to theaters, me and my friend, Wayne and

Jared. would go to the theaters to go like see

these movies every time and again the first the

first kids in line because we go to the theater

two or three hours before the movie started because

the theater would open at six the movie was started

seven we show up around four so we go and i started

getting into it then i met another kid in grade

ten i think it was maybe was great nine and his

name was james and he was a big star wars nerd.

But the thing that got me into it was the Star

Wars role playing game from West End games. Second

edition revised. I got obsessed with it because

at the time I only role playing experiences.

was advanced Dungeons and Dragons. And I didn't

really like it then. Um, and vampire, the masquerade

second edition, I think. And star wars, like,

I know this universe. I know these characters.

I know these stats. And I just, I started picking

up source book after source book after source

book and me and my friends, Ben, Brad, Matt,

I think one of my girlfriends played with us.

And we play Star Wars every single day at lunch

for like a year and a half. Memorable things

was burning down the entirety of the forest moon

of Endor with a thermal detonator, nuking Boba

Fett at one of the spaceports, because at that

time Star Wars N64's Shadows of the Empire had

just come out. So I'm thinking, I want to use

this source book from West End Games and we kill

Boba Fett. And just all these ridiculous and

stupid adventures in Star Wars made me obsessed.

And at the time Hasbro or not. Hasbro, Kenner

was still making the toys and they were doing

power of the force to our power of the force

one. I think it was part of the force too. Um,

and those were known as the buff figures were

princess Leia. Looks like she could take on Brock

frigging Lester is the, the sculpting was terrible,

but the vehicles were great. Um, so Lucasfilm

had done this wonderful push with shadows of

the empire, which was, which was considered then.

An exciting thing, because it was a multimedia

property that would be considered canon. What

happened between Empire Strikes Back and Return

of the Jedi, and that got me more and more into

Star Wars. So I had the toys. I had all this

crap. I had the things I treasured the most was

a return of the Jedi Luke lightsaber from Power

of the Force II. I had a Han Solo blaster, which

was the orange one. That was based upon the one

from the seventies, but this one had better sounds.

It was a better, uh, sculpt for the toy and,

um, a stormtrooper blaster from, uh, a new hope.

And I just really got into everything Star Wars

for the longest time. I didn't really get into

the films, like the film's history and background

until much, much later. I was more into the expanded

universe. And then I started reading, uh, the

Kevin J Anderson books, which was his. Jedi Academy

stuff. One of my favorite books as a kid was

a book. I think the I think the author's name

was Dave Wolverton. And this is a book that I

don't think like very much in the Star Wars legacy

or legend series books. And it was called The

Courtship of Princess Leia. And it shows how

Han and Leia got together where Han wins a planet

in a card game. But they want but the Rebel Alliance

wants this guy. From think it's called the Hapien

cluster. It's somewhere near the unknown regions

and they pledge their ships and their fleets

to the rebel Alliance so they can defeat the

empire. But the catch is that she has to marry

this Prince Hapien, but he's a piece of shit.

So This actually ties into the Clone Wars later

on because that book introduces the idea of the

Nightsisters and Dathomir and the Zabrak, I think

it is, which Darth Maul's a part of. So that

book really set up a lot of stuff that would

happen in Star Wars canon later, which I always

thought was really cool. And then I just kept

reading as many of the, the expanded universe

books as I could. I read part of the X -wing

books by Michael Stackpole. I read, um, there

were two books I fricking hated, but they were

so weird. I remember one called the dark saber.

And, um, I seem to remember one of, uh, one of

the characters that was introduced in the throng

trilogy, shooting somebody with the. Um, stun

setting of her blaster. And I think the Jedi

was like, well, I can't block that because the

stun setting is rings that eject from the gun.

And like, how do you block that? Um, and then

one book, this book was fucking terrible. And

I think it was called children of the Jedi or

it was crystal star, but it was just so boring.

And I think it was Delray books at the time.

If you could write Star Wars, and if you could

write Luke Skywalker did X, you got a book deal.

And it didn't matter. I read that crap because

I wasn't reading anything else. It was so bad.

But you got cool characters like Mara Jade and

Talon Card, Kip Durin, who is ultimately the

ultimate Mary Sue because he had a weapon called

the sudden crusher that could blow up solar systems.

Um, it was so ridiculous, but yeah, like I was

deep in the star wars fandom for a very long

time and I stayed into the fandom pretty hardcore

up until college in 2006. When I kind of stepped

away to focus on my studies, but at the height

of my fandom around 2005, I was a moderator.

and the public relations agent for a fairly prominent

Star Wars website at the time, dealing specifically

with FX sabers. I was known on Yoda's news. I

was known on rebel scum .com because I would

do a lot of trading and stuff like that. And

I would just post in every thread that I possibly

could. Actually, Star Wars led me to podcasting.

In a very, very, very real way. There are these

two podcasters named Arnie and Marjorie Carvello

who started a podcast called Star Wars Action

News. And that was the first podcast I ever listened

to starting in back in 2004. For me, I was a

fan, but I wasn't like, I wasn't in it as much

as you. I had never read any of the books at

the time back, you know, 22 years ago. I knew

of the toys, but I never really had any of the

toys, because honestly, the toys really... For

me at the time, I was 19 when Phantom Menace

came out, and I was growing up, I hadn't had

action figures in years, years and years and

years, and I wouldn't actually have an action

figure collection until probably... 2005 2006

somewhere around there, but I still loved what

I saw I still enjoyed what I did and I'm enjoying

what I what what parts of the fandom I'm getting

into now with You know again for me right now

as Almost 41 years old because we're recording

this like a week and a half before my birthday

It's one of those things where As a kid, I needed

my toys to transform back and forth. As an adult,

I don't. I'm perfectly fine with a Star Wars

Funko Pop that doesn't do much, let alone, you

know, have action figure battles or whatever.

Getting into the film breakdown, now we have

several things here. We have highlights and lowlights

of the film, favorite character moments, favorite

special effect, pacing of the film, and favorite

characters, main recurring guest, whatever. For

me, highlights and lowlights... Going back and

watching this for the second time ever, I forgot

how good Ewan McGregor was as Obi -Wan in this

movie specifically, even though he's still technically

a Padawan. He's not a Jedi yet. Obviously, he

doesn't become a Jedi until the end of this film.

But I forgot how good he was as young Obi -Wan,

because again, folks, this came out after we

saw old and decrepit Obi -Wan. Well, he wasn't

so decrepit, but you get what I mean. You know,

so that's a highlight. I do enjoy the pod racing

scene, but it's not... I don't think the special

effects for it have held up over the years, sadly.

Lowlights? Midichlorians? Really? Organisms inside

our organisms? Really? Come on! That's a little...

Whackadoo. Um, and I couldn't, I wanted, I wanted

to just shoot Watto. I hate that guy. I'd say

for me, highlights of this film is this is going

to be a little bit showing sort of my film nerd

side, costuming and props. Um, cause I think

in a very, very real way, episode one set the

hone for a lot of future Star Wars properties

moving forward because we're seeing the old Republic

as it's starting to downfall. But you're also

seeing a lot of elaborate costumes. You're seeing

more aliens on screen. You're seeing more elaborate

aliens on screen because obviously they wanted

to push Jar Jar as this big CG character who

could interact with other people. And that really

change Star Wars fundamentally forever. Um, because

he would kind of change how Hollywood would,

would like kind of do, uh, digital characters.

But, um, the costuming for this movie is astounding.

Like Princess Amidala's like almost every scene

she's in. except when she's in like her handmaiden's

outfit and even then it's still gorgeous looking.

It's her palace outfit that I don't like. It's

the brown with the yellow trim outfit. Right.

looks fantastic. It's textured. I remember there

was a book that came out in the early 2000s,

where it had costume swaths where you could touch

the fabric of everything. And I remember, I think

I remember this right. So maybe I hope I didn't

invent this. this late memory, but I remember

seeing Chancellor Palpatine's robe, Chancellor

Valorum stuff like that. And just looking at

how that looked and felt also the weapons from

this movie. I remember being rather cool. Like

I've always been a big fan of the battle droid

blaster because it looked Different than the

stormtrooper blasters and that's another thing

too. I liked the look of the battle droids. I

mean they weren't as iconic as stormtroopers

and I think that's the big problem is this series

like the prequel trilogy never had a truly iconic

Droid I think you could probably make an argument

for the destroyer droids Maybe the super battle

droids, but the regular rank -and -file battle

droids was whatever Another highlight for this

for me, obviously the music for dual of the fates

and while I was watching this I was just paying

attention to how dual the fates played out because

that's also happening at the same time as the

battle in space above Naboo against the droid

control ship and how it would swell and fall

with that battle and then going back to Obi -Wan

and Qui -Gon fighting Maul, stuff like that.

I'm trying to think of what else would be a really

good thing. I really enjoyed about this. Liam

Neeson, I wish had been in one more movie. Um,

even as like a forest ghost, that would have

been nice, but I can see why they didn't kind

of lean into that. Yeah. I would say another

highlight for this, the pod racing scene I really

do like, cause there's some really interesting

sounds mixed into that. And I paid attention

to it last night. Um, when you, when you hear

sub bulb as pod racer specifically, it reminds

me of the clone wars gunship. Um, and I, I would

wonder if they were mixed very, very, very similar.

Like they sound like a certain brand of American

helicopter, uh, mixed with, uh, some like other

stuff. Also vehicle design in this movie does

not get enough credit. Like anything from Naboo

has this very elegant look to it. And the Naboo

star fighter was the star vehicle for this movie.

Cause it was in so much of the marketing. Oh

yeah. But I wish it had, I wish we'd seen it

more throughout the trilogy. Like that should

have been the X -wing for this series, but instead

we got the Jedi star fighter, which you only

ever see those in two movies and not for very

long. But, uh, the Royal cruiser I thought looked

fantastic. You don't see much of Darth Maul's

Sith infiltrator, but I thought it was neat.

Yeah. And ultimately a big highlight, Darth Maul

himself. He was cool. Didn't do much, but he

looked cool. And that's kind of a low for me

too, is you introduce the idea of the rule of

two for the Sith and you don't do much with Darth

Maul. He just gets chopped in half. He says maybe

five words and that's the end of it. And Ray

Park then was awesome. Ray Park now, not so much.

So it's. It was cool to see Jedi fighting in

their prime, because I think the stunt coordinator

was a guy named Nick Galliard, I think, or something

like that. So you're seeing all these hybrid

styles of fighting with swords, how it's fast,

it's rapid. It's kind of like, I think it's been

described as like kendo samurai and like fencing

and some other. moves. So when you're in the

heat of fighting, there's only ever one way to

get out of it. It's like chess where you're constantly

in check. So you have to react a certain way.

And I've always appreciated the hyper intensity

of the action. When it comes to any scenes involving

the Jedi, which I'll talk about that one. I do

Episode three with you because I know so much

about that movie. It's sad. But yeah, episode

one showed us Jedi's in their primes. This is

the first time we'd seen Jedi that weren't old

men, young boys or cyborgs. And it really showed

what the Republic was capable of. But it also

thing as a highlight and you kind of have to

read into it. You saw how the Republic was on

its way out because the Republic was. buried

in bureaucracy, red tape, you've got thousands

of member worlds. How do you expect to get a

vote that's going to go 60 -40 to pass anything

against all these different races, all these

different cultures? The Republic was too big

to sustain itself. And the Confederacy of Independent

Systems, which would be introduced in the second

movie, The Trade Federation, that was going to

happen in my opinion anyway. Someone was going

to stand up to the Republic, be it through the

Sith wanting to take control or some lunatic

who had enough money in droids to make something

happen. Regardless, this was going to happen

sooner or later. Just Darth Sidious put this

plan in motion years beforehand. And for me,

because I had been watching Clone Wars and Clone

Wars takes place after the beginning of Clone

Wars, season one, I think takes place after this

movie does, obviously. I think it does if I remember

correctly. I, when I rewatched this, I completely

forgot about the no confidence and I completely

forgot about Chancellor Valorum altogether. Never

even remembered it. Like originally I thought,

oh, we're starting this off with Sidious being

You know, Palpatine and the, you know, all that

and already in charge. I completely forgot about

the vote of no confidence and the whole politicking

of it all. And you look at 22 years ago, where

we were in politics. Uh, yeah, it's not, not

as bad as it was four years ago, but still. I'm

going to say this right now because I've been

watching so much Clone Wars and I've seen so

much Jar Jar at this point. Jar Jar Binks. in

this film for me personally, not going to speak

for anybody else, not going to speak for the

Geekcast Radio Network or anything like that.

He is not a low light. He is a highlight because

he is a character that admittedly, sadly is probably

meant to be in there for the kiddie type character

kind of thing. Cause what child in 1999, age,

let's say six to 12. Was really gonna look at

young Anakin Skywalker as the one that they could

You know relate to but at least Jar Jar was the

fun kitty type, you know I almost want to say

barf character because you know bar from spaceballs

I think the problem with Jar Jar and It's not

anything against the actor because you know,

he's only gonna do what's written on the page

is they tried to make him a mascot and they tried

to insert, in my opinion, a little too much humor

into him and he became obnoxious. Now, as the

character went on through the series and even

into the expanded universe, and I just read this

last night, there's a tie -in novel that happens

after Return of the Jedi. They go back to Naboo

and Jar Jar's living on the streets as a clown.

And that's sad because it turns out after the

creation of the first Galactic Empire, people

know it was Jar Jar who gave Chancellor Palpatine

emergency powers to create the army of the Grand

Republic. And that was seen as the fall of the

Republic because now he's got this army. So he

was banished and exiled from Gungan City again.

Adults and Gungans in the city won't look them

in the face. So what happens on Naboo? He's living

on the streets, being a clown and entertaining

children. He meets an orphan who's all sorts

of disfigured and they kind of become friends

and they decide, Hey, why don't we look out for

each other? We're, we're both outcasts. Nobody

wants us. And him and Jar Jar go off and have

their own adventure together that way. So Jar

Jar is a tragic character because he's so naive

in the movies. In Clone Wars, he becomes a little

bit more competent. It's he's not a terrible

character. I think he got a really bad shake

because Lucasfilm and has or Kenner I guess at

the time or was it has but I don't know The the

toy companies really want to push here. This

is a cool toy. Please make him marketable They

wanted their own Chewbacca their own you are

that could talk And I think that's the tragedy

of Jar Jar is you could have turned to potentially

really funny character because Ahmed Best, at

least in recent years, has really embraced Jar

Jar. I think it was at Celebration 2019 or something.

He came out to thunderous applause and he does,

he's done his own voices Jar Jar in multiple

different series. One of my favorite bits he's

ever done is they did a robot chicken. Uh, and

this came out after revenge of the Sith, uh,

after Anakin becomes Vader and Jar Jar appears

as a force ghost. And, uh, Anakin is trying to

explain to Jar Jar that he's not Anakin Skywalker

anymore. How he's Darth Vader and Jar Jar's just

not having it. He's like, Oh, we're such friends.

Look at me. I'm all blue. low and sparkly. And

he's like, uh, and he's like, Jar Jar, go into

the escape pod. Uh, the separatists are coming.

He's like, Oh, really? And then he launches Jar

Jar into space or something. Um, it's ridiculous,

but yeah, like I ultimately, I think Jar Jar

deserved a little bit better than what he got.

But one of the weirdest things, and then I'll

let you get back to this mic. There was a sucker.

like a actual lollipop, where you can pull back

Jar Jar's head and his tongue came out. No, stop.

Yeah, it was weird. It's one of the weirdest

things I've ever seen outside of Star Wars dog

food that came out in like, I think, 83. It's

just so weird. Yeah, very. Okay, so character

moments, favorite character moments. There's

a ton in here. I like 3PO's surprise that his

insides are on the outside, that he has no coverings.

I thought that was a funny moment. This is going

to be a running thing for me throughout the nine,

well, at least the first six of the nine episodes

that we do on the films. I remember when episode

four came out and they're like, oh, well, the

war, the clone war, the this, the that, the past

that these two characters have with 3PO and art,

like they've been through so much. In the prequels,

my love for R2 -D2 could not grow any more than

it already has because we actually get to see

R2 in action. Next time when we talk about episode

2, I will be gushing all over flying R2. I don't

care what anyone says because it's awesome. But

I love R2 and how I forgot how he was found.

Like how he was like how he basically was part

of their units thing and then he just kind of

saves the day so i love r2 i'm not i know you're

a big fan of it but i am not a big fan of the

duel of the fates yes i like the battle i just

think the space battle was more i was at that

point i was more intrigued to what This kid in

the star fighter who doesn't know what the hell

he's doing was gonna do versus a lightsaber battle

and even on this the second time watching through.

I still found myself saying hurry up and get

to the end of this battle already with the lightsabers

i don't know what it is i think it's because

of the. Pacing that they put into that scene

with the closing doors and the supposed tension

they were trying to get out of it. It just made

me want to fast forward through it i didn't but

it made me want to do it. I'd say for me, um,

there's a scene, it's very, very, very small,

but they're mostly involving pad mags. I think

Natalie Portman is okay in this movie. I do like

her in two specific scenes. There's two. The

first scene is where she's cleaning R2 and she's

talking to Jar Jar. There's just something about

her mood and her mannerisms. I really like in

that scene. She's dressed in her handmaiden's

outfit that I really like. And another scene

is where Anakin essentially starts like hitting

on her and he says, are you an angel? And just

the look of what, what did you just say to me?

Um, that scene I really like. And another one

is, uh, Obi -Wan comes out of the, uh, the shaft

with Qui -Gon. I have a bad feeling about this.

The negotiations will be short. I think this

is on the droid control ship. And I think he

says something along the lines of, well, the

negotiations were short. You were right about

one thing, master. The negotiations were short.

Yes, that's that's always a good line. Yeah.

You and McGregor has wonderful comedic timing,

and he does capture a lot of what Alec Guinness

Kinda gave off in the original trilogy like there's

just enough humor there or it's not overpower

It's not in your face, but it's a sly wink and

I like that about his character and Qui -gon

One -on -one with maul. I really like as well

as a scene do all the fates I like for the most

part, but I wish there hadn't been as you mentioned,

the doors with the energy that just it breaks

up the flow of the fight. Yeah. And it's and

I think when you look at Battle of the Heroes

in episode three, that's meant to be their duel

of the fates because I think they realized having

a down moment like that in the middle of such

a hyper kinetic scene kills the momentum. And

I think Battle of the Heroes was An answer to

say, you know what? I think we fucked up. Here's

20 minutes of actual Jedi fighting. I think now,

going back and thinking about it after watching

it again, I think the thing that they were trying

to do was show between the three characters.

You got Maul, you got Qui -Gon, and then you

got Obi -Wan way back in the back section there.

Qui -Gon sits down and he's like... Jedi meditating

or Jedi mind tricking or whatever he's doing,

but he's trying to show that he is not necessarily

at peace, but he's calm in the moment, whereas

Maul is pacing, Obi -Wan's about ready to cut

through the thing kind of thing. Like they just

want to get to the battle because I don't know

how old Maul was in this, but Obi -Wan was still

a Padawan. So Obi -Wan was not a Jedi yet. So

I could understand why a young Padawan learner

would want to be so antsy in getting through

these things. And I mean, I understand it now,

but I still say that it, it just, it takes away

from the overall fighting and I'm glad that they

have. Battle of the heroes when we get to episode

three favorite special effect. What was your

favorite effect in this? I'd have to say the

starfighter stuff. I think holds up the best

Yeah, and then probably the lightsabers because

they do look different than they did in the original

trilogy and that's just a the advancement of

computer technology and kind of rotoscoping which

is how they used to do them way back in the day

and Painting over the individual frames. This

is different because it's actually CG and I think

it's a pretty consistent ever since then. Another

special effects. Again, I would call back to

props and costuming. I think is not to be understated

because there's an elegance to it. And I just

want to make this point super, super quick. While

I was watching Duel of the Fates last night,

a lot of Naboo architecture. I think has influenced

Imperial stuff kind of later on, because I guess

that's where Palpatine's from. He is from Naboo.

And I'm just noticing the power reactor and obviously

it's meant to be a callback to the kind of Death

Star and everything. But I got to thinking, wow,

Naboo really has a utilitarian... uh used to

how their industrial stuff works as opposed when

you see the outside of theed and the royal palace

it has a very rich and warm feeling to its architecture

but when it comes to its industrial stuff it's

very okay here it works sure there's some blinky

lights but what you see is what you get and i

always thought that was kind of neat how you

see the Consistency of imperial design evolve

through each movie. Yeah, absolutely. And it

probably is because Palpatine was from new, but

at least he was from new boo in this and whatever

else for me. The. It just, I don't know. Like

I said, the lightsabers, I agree with you, the

costuming. Yes. Um. I like the droid effects.

I didn't realize how much less of Roger Roger

there is in this movie. Check it out, Corporal.

We'll cover you. Roger Roger. People always complain

about the droids and Roger Roger, Roger Roger,

you know, all that and everything else. I'm like,

there's not, they actually talk more. They don't

talk more, but they actually say other things

other than just Roger Roger because they're what

I what I noticed when rewatching this is that

they're getting Getting in giving orders to each

other throughout the battle and I was like, oh

that is kind of cool Alright pacing of this film

overall. I think it needs to be trimmed by about

15 minutes I agree but I have to say on this

second rewatch and I I'll fully say this and

fully admit this I did take Breaks like for bathroom

and that kind of thing, but I like I watched

this Consistent like I didn't probably never

stop watching this set. Maybe two different bathroom

breaks But it's one of those things where in

the day and age where I control the media I don't

have to worry about you know sitting in a theater

for two hours and missing something or whatever

like I I said to Karen I said, oh I have an hour

and 42 minutes left of this film I was like okay

well I'm gonna go check this and there was like

47 minutes left and I'm like wait what how did

that happen I felt like and I know this isn't

really a pacing thing it's more of a time thing

but I just felt like this film did not feel like

the agonizing two and a half hours that people

think that it people assume that it is and the

pacing of it The only, like I said earlier, the

only problems I had with it really is that lightsaber

battle at the end. I didn't even have, normally

I have problems with the back and forth, like

switching scenes, like from the Starfighter scene

to the lightsaber scene, like that constant back

and forth, but I didn't even have a problem with

it then watching it. I would - agree I like this

movie wasn't as bad on the second rewatch in

terms of pacing though I would trim a few scenes

here and there I actually one of the things I've

been meaning to watch for years is there are

various recut to this movie and I think was it

Toby Maguire did a bunch I like I think the guy

who played spider -man did a but or was it Elijah

Wood it was one of them I can't remember who

had done recuts of this movie, I think. And if

I'm wrong, whatever. But I would trim some scenes

on Tatooine just a couple seconds here and there

just to tighten the pace a little bit. I maybe

would trim a little bit of stuff at the beginning

of the movie, because I think some of the Jar

Jar stuff just drag a little bit. But overall,

it's not as agonizing, as you mentioned, as people

say it is. And I think a lot of that, our perception

Of this movie being oh god it's so terrible is

because we've been fed this for what feels like

deck it's twenty years now so yes we've been

fed this for twenty plus years all those movies

sucks movies bad twenty two years yeah you know

what it's not bad it's not great. But it's not

this death march into the abyss that everybody

says it is yeah absolutely. Alright before we

get to how the film held up. Let's talk about

favorite characters overall main recurring guest

whatever For me favorite characters. I love the

differences between Qui -Gon and Obi -Wan that

Qui -Gon is the Jedi master Qui -Gon is a little

bit rogue He likes to do he doesn't always like

to do what the Jedi Council expects of him and

he doesn't always like to go by the Jedi way.

He goes by the Jedi way, but he goes just outside

the lines, whereas Obi -Wan's like, but master,

this is how it's supposed to be done. Blah, blah,

blah, blah, blah, blah. I see Qui -Gon is a little

bit of a rule breaker. I see Obi -Wan in this

film is you must follow the rules no matter what.

Like Obi -Wan obviously has not been able to

come into his own yet in this. I love going back

and watching this again. I'm just going to say

this right now. In this movie. I love what Jar

Jar does because Jar Jar is a character who got

introduced to us and he's learning, he's learning

from his mistakes. If you have a character that

can constantly learn from their mistakes, even

though later he will make the biggest mistake

of them all, I just, I really enjoyed Jar Jar

this time around watching this. Padme is great.

I love the double switch with the, you know,

the The handmaiden thing and whatever else. I

think that's cool with the with the with the

decoys I'm Darth Maul doesn't do enough in this

for me to actually call him a favorite character

I love the moment that the double lightsaber

is revealed but and I haven't gotten to him and

I'm just now getting to the point where I was

introduced to his race in the Clone Wars for

season four. So I haven't actually seen him yet,

but it's like, I just don't, I don't care about

the character because he doesn't do much. Like

you already said, he's a marketing gimmick with

a lightsaber. And I think that's his biggest

downfall. Like they had him hyped up to be this

next big, he's supposed to be Darth Vader level

bad -ass and you don't, he's honestly the most

capable lightsaber guy. Before general grievous

and even general grievous doesn't get that much

kind of screen time Like if the prequel trilogy

has any real detriment again it Against it is

it's secondary villains suck like Darth Maul

Sounds awesome. He looks awesome. He has a double

-bladed lightsaber. He's kick -ass cool Count

Dooku Sounds impressive sounds regal sounds right.

It's fucking Chris Christopher Lee He has two

lightsaber fights, gets his ass kicked in both.

General Grievous, awesome droid general. Okay,

he has one lightsaber fight, has four lightsabers,

gets two arms, cuts off immediately, big deal.

That's where the prequel trilogy falls apart,

so I agree with you. Darth Maul, you're a cool

idea, but you don't do anything. Yeah. The prequels

Darth Sidious is one of my favorite bad guys

because at least two episodes one through six

there's a consistent plan you can see how things

evolve you can see how things are being manipulated

you see how bad things are eventually gonna friggin

get at some point. And but my favorite character

has always been Obi -Wan I love his attitude

I love the way he. evolves throughout the series

and the big reason I love him is I love his lightsaber

design and there are subtle differences between

this lightsaber design and the one he wields

in attack of the clones but you literally need

close up photos to tell but I'm that much of

a dork. Qui -gon I'm a huge fan of Like I said,

he really deserved more screen time in the entire

prequel trilogy. And I really like Padme again,

a character who I think deserved a little bit

better because they wanted her to be the next

Princess Leia. She does get to do a little bit

more in the other ones than be barefoot impregnant

somewhat, but Again, there are arguments for

and against her character will make those in

subsequent Episodes and I think Jake Lloyd as

Anakin has Occasional moments where he's the

most comfortable his stuff on Tatooine is really

stiff Yeah, I think his stuff in the starfighter

is his best stuff in the movie and because yeah

in this yes Yeah, like he feels I think the actor

Jake Lloyd felt most comfortable acting in a

starfighter cockpit as opposed to acting against

other people. I don't think that's a strike against

him. He was a nine year old kid. I don't blame

you. You're not like, you're not going to be

one of the great child actors of your era. And

that's fine. But he's not as bad as everybody

says he is the amount of hate that that kid got

was vastly undeserved. And I never hated him.

I never, even back when I saw the movie in theaters,

I never, like the character is just beginning

here. We're just seeing the beginnings of Anakin

Skywalker. He's a little kid. He's a little kid

who is told that he has organisms inside his

organisms. Like, I mean, come on, you know, it's

not the actor's fault. It's the way George Lucas

wrote the damn script, if anything. If any fault

is to be found in the Phantom Menace, it's solely

on George Lucas's shoulders. End of story in

my mind. All right. How the film held up. There's

three things here, and then we'll go to the GCR

and Universal rating system for an overall rating

of the film. Here are the three things. Did the

film keep your interest throughout? Are you itching

to watch the next film now? And would you recommend

this film to people? So for me, This film kept

my even though I paused it a couple of times.

I was it wasn't like oh, I'm Pausing it and then

coming back four hours. I watched this within

not necessarily the full two hours of the movie

But within three hours total of starting it to

finish. I finished this movie in one sitting

so There were only maybe one or two scenes that

I kind of was like, okay What else is on but

in general I really dug my second ever Watch

of this movie what about you. It held my interest

because obviously I wanted to be as informed

as I possibly could be for this it got me thinking

back a lot to just older memories and things

that had come previous to this and how it holds

its place in my life in the fandom. Like I said,

I would probably trim it up in a few separate

places if I could lose 15 minutes out of this

without losing much plot or characterization

I'd do it I'd give this movie a solid six and

a half out of ten. Hang on a second. We won't

know like the point I'm trying to get here is

I Enjoyed my time with it. I didn't hate it as

much as I expected to and I'm glad I watched

it again Because it it sets the tone For the

prequel trilogy right and I'm glad I see echoes

of episode one in things as late as the Mandalorian

In this current year, right? Yeah So are we itching

to watch the next movie after watching this one?

I am actually For one scene only I am dreading

watching attack the clones again There just should

not be that long of a love scene in Star Wars.

See, I'm an Attack of the Clones apologist. I

unapologetically love that movie. Again, there

are massive problems with it, but I love the

clone movie because I love clones. That's my

thing. Right. But again, if I could trim episode

two, yeah, probably by about 15 minutes. Again,

there's that magic number. That's what I would

do and I'd maybe re edit a couple scenes here

and there. Um, but yeah, I'm a big fan of like,

uh, episode two. And I did, that's one of the,

that's the only Star Wars movie I did not see

on opening day. Uh, cause I think I was going

through a really bad breakup at the time. But

yeah, um, I'm excited to go through the rest

of these movies with you just because again,

I've got vast history with a lot of the toys

and the marketing and all that stuff with it.

So yeah. All right. Now this is not the rating.

The rating is after this, but after watching

this again, would you recommend this movie to

people? I'm going to have to say yes, because

it does set up some stuff, but it's almost You

can almost skip this because it does introduce

ideas and characters that are very important

to Star Wars, but ultimately all it does is really

set up Darth Sidious and Obi -Wan and Anakin.

A lot of other stuff. kind of just happens. And

they are they're kind of just there. Like there

are certain plot themes and character developments

that are will become important later. But I don't

know. I mean, if you're going to watch the entire

nine movies, it's two hours and 15 minutes. What

else are you doing during lockdown? Exactly.

For me, I, here's my thing. And this is why I

wanted to do this. And this is a question I want

to post to the audience as well as you is that

growing, we had no control over it, but growing

up in the eighties, we got episodes four, five,

and six. And then in the nineties and the two

thousands, we got one, two, and three. And then

in the last, you know, five year while in the

last five years, we've gotten seven, eight, and

nine or six years now, actually 2020 was long,

you know, The reason why I wanted to do this

series the 12 months of Star Wars Starting with

episode 1 and ending with it's not ending but

going through episode 9 is because How would

I recommend this to people if I was watching

the story if I could be able to watch the story

in order 40 years ago I would recommend this,

that people check it out and see it, because

it is the beginning of the story, even though

you've already seen the original trilogy, most

likely. If anyone hasn't seen the original trilogy,

you must be living under a rock. But what I noticed

again, before we get to the overall GCN rating

for each of us, is the little things in this

movie have so much consequence and effect on

things that happen in the future of the film

franchise. And that was so cool to see where

it all started. Yeah, I think episode one, when

you look at it's expanded universe stuff that

kind of spider webs out into it. There's a lot

of really neat connective tissue because Darth

Maul didn't become cool until Clone Wars and

Rebels. And the books expanded it out. Another

thing Episode One did was showed, this is just

my own personal opinion. When Episode One Toys

came out, I remember there being a massive rush

to people go to Toys R Us, KB Toys, when that

was still a thing. We're buying up. cart loads

of this. People bought episode one toys as an

investment. Man, you can buy these things at

flea markets, mint on card for like $5. So yeah,

these things flooded the market. And I think

it changed the way the toy and collector markets

looked for a really, really, really long time.

But episode one also gave us a lot of really

neat prop replicas. A company that I used to

do some stuff with years ago called Master Replicas

produced some incredibly high -end lightsaber

replicas like Darth Maul's. battle damage lightsaber,

which is a signature series. There was a force

FX double bladed lightsaber that came out of

this. Like episode one gave us a lot of really,

really, really neat things. Um, and I'm really

glad that it did. Like I love the look of, like

I said, the battle droids I've always been a

huge fan of. And I've always been a fan of the

music from this movie. So episode one does. A

lot of things, right? And I think it's time this

movie gets a second look at now that we've had

22 years of time to reflect upon its place within

the entire Skywalker trilogy. Or sorry, nine

movies or whatever the hell that word is. The

Skywalker saga, essentially. Okay. So the GCR

Universal rating system, it's zero to five with

half marks. I am going to give this a three and

a half and three and a half. According to our

website rating is good and it says issues are

certainly prevalent but so are the successes

typically there is one specific area of extraordinary

achievement or multitude of quality moments that

make the negative aspects relatively easy to

accept the failures are not necessarily glaring

and are often a byproduct of design, though the

difficulties one encounters holds your enjoyment

back from reaching its full potential. Um, I'm

going to go with a three again, sets up some

wonderful things that do spiderweb into like

other properties. And it does have some flaws,

some significant flaws. But this is not the thing

that you were told in an internet video 10 years

ago was the death of the franchise or the beginning

of the end. And I am a prequel lover. I've got

no problem saying that. Is this my favorite prequel

movie? Hell no. But watching it again, it's not

as bad as I remember. I appreciate what it's

done. And, um, I would love to get my hands on

that jar jar. black series figure that's on store

shelves right now. That's how much I appreciate

that character now suck. Very cool. And I will

probably do this every time we do a rating. So

for Mike's rating for three, it says average.

While the overall takeaway is positive, you do

not necessarily walk away happy. It does not

extraordinarily succeed in any specific areas.

If it does, it gets weighed down by something

as equally unsuccessful, though overall enjoyable

is easily disposable. And I think that goes back

to your thing of you don't necessarily have to

start with this film in the Star Wars film canon.

You could start with something else, you know.

But I just I'm always a sucker for starting the

story at the beginning of the story And now that

we have all nine films. This is whether we like

it or not This is the beginning of the story

for for The Skywalker Saga. All right, we are

gonna take a quick break You're gonna hear some

ads and some other stuff and we'll come back

with final thoughts and closing out the show

after this At last, we are getting results. Again,

you come before us, Your Highness. You will not

be so pleased when you hear what I have to say,

Viceroy. Your trade boycott of our planet has

ended. I was not aware of such failure. I have

heard that the Chancellor's ambassadors are with

you now, and that you have been commanded to

reach a settlement. I know nothing of any ambassadors.

You must be mistaken. Beware, Viceroy. The Federation

has gone too far this time. We would never do

anything without the approval of the Senate.

You assume too much. We will see. Through the

magic of the Cybernet Space Cube, the computer

repents stories of the Transformers. Transformers

Generation 2. Wrong. This is not Generation 2.

This is Generation 1 done right. The year will

be 2014, and from secret staging grounds on two

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prepare to reclaim their reputations. September

17th, 2014, the TFG2 Podcast premieres 45 podcast

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they redo TFG1 and get it done right. You can

find the TFG2 Podcast on www .geekcastradio .com

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film and a few other special episodes. You can

find this 125 episode long podcast in iTunes

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power and honor of Grayskull, we all have the

power. I hope I didn't miss anything exciting!

On the Simplistic Reviews Podcast, we talk movies.

We talk TV. We talk... Hello, Julie, what the

heck are you doing? Trying to make our spots

sound more exciting by adding explosions. Yeah,

I'm pretty sure you could've got the point across

with sound effects. Not the real thing. I'm sure

your insurance company will cover that. No, they

won't. No, they probably won't. A communications

disruption can mean only one thing. Invasion.

It is now time for our last words here inside

Studio 2009. Before I close it, I close it out.

God, I can't talk. Was there anything that we

forgot to mention, Mike? Is there anything you

were going to mention earlier that you didn't

mention? kind of put all those thoughts here.

Okay, so one of the things I'd love to talk about

is toys, and I've talked about that a few times

during this, and prop replicas. Star Wars Episode

One as a collection does have some expensive

pieces in it, but to collect this series of figures

is, in my opinion, not overly hard and not overly

expensive. If you want to collect Star Wars figures,

it's probably one of the more easily found ones

outside of a few carded examples that were maybe

harder to find on card that that particular wave

may have been hard to find. Um, and if you're

collecting things like high end replicas from

say master replicas, yeah, you're going to pay

a bit of a premium, but you're also getting fantastic,

um, kind of quality with them. So, uh, eBay is

a wonderful resource for you, uh, to look at

if you're looking for any of these things, if

I were to recommend, uh, anything specific to

star wars, episode one, uh, the There is a Darth

Maul piggy bank that's electronic that is really,

really, really cool. And there's like, there's

like another version, I think that connects.

to a Qui -Gon and an Obi -Wan, and you hook all

three together, and they perform like a battle

sequence, which is really neat. There's the Naboo

Starfighter toy, which makes lights and sounds,

which is really, really, really fantastic. One

of the most expensive pieces in this line is

the Royal Cruiser, and that will cost you a fair

chunk just because... It's an older vehicle.

It retailed for $100 back in 1999. So expect

to pay a lot, especially if you want a mint in

box example or a complete example. There were

several, there were several figures that were

canceled in this line. I think only prototypes

exist of those, which is, I always love looking

for prototype stuff, even though I don't have

any of it. Yeah, I mean, Ultimately, if you want

something really cool and if episode one is truly

your jam, it's not hard to break into the collecting

scene for this. Um, sometimes even looking on

places like Facebook marketplace, you'll like

see people selling this. And I know we're in

the middle of the coronavirus thing, but flea

markets, if you look around to the right vendors,

you can find people selling episode one figures

on card. I've seen them as cheap as $5 within

the last couple of years. So don't be afraid

to ask. Don't be, don't be afraid to barter,

uh, with people for them. Um, and. One thing

that's kind of fun that I like is the Star Wars

role playing game. And there were books focused

around episode one. And I think it was the Wizards

of the Coast, not the saga edition. It was the

book that wasn't shaped like a coffee table book.

This was a more traditional book. Had books that

were based around episode one, episode two, but

there wasn't an episode three book produced,

I don't think. Or at least I didn't have it any

actually no wait. That was the sog edition, but

never mind Um, but yeah, there are some really

neat tie -ins to this that you can find and look

into There is an awesome hot toys Darth Maul

figure that looks Really nice. There's a hot

toys Qui Gon gin So if you've ever wanted your

own little tiny Liam Neeson You can get them

in 12 inch scale if you're willing to pay like

five six hundred dollars Yeah, like there's some

wonderful merchandise out there for like. Episode

one, there's even a really cool, uh, Star Wars

black series, which is more of the Hasbro high

end figures. They're about 30 bucks in Canada.

I think they're $24 in the States. And there

are some really neat battle droids and Star Wars

episode one, uh, Obi -Wan's. I think there's

you and I'm 99 % sure there's a Qui -Gon. So

if this movie is your jam, you can certainly

get high end figures and high end collectibles.

Certainly recommend it. And as a fun piece, I

don't know whether you can still track the sound

probably on eBay. there is a battle droid super

soaker so if you so if you want a water gun that

looks like a battle droid gun you can do that

oh wow absolutely my final thoughts for this

before I close it out is I remember playing the

episode 1 video game oh my god I could talk about

those for 15 minutes I hated the beginning of

that game because you had to scale the palace

wall by the waterfall Oh, it was so friggin hard.

I hated that thing. One of the best tie in video

games for Star Wars ever. Hands down. Star Wars,

pod racing, not just on consoles because it got

a rerelease last year in HD, but the one you

could sit in at the arcade. Oh, yeah, absolutely.

Yeah. It's. Awesome. And you can still find them

in the wild. It's not often, but they're still

out there. I've seen episode one pinball machines.

There was even one of the weirdest tie in video

games I ever saw was Star Wars episode one super

bomb bad racing. So if you've ever wanted to

play Mario Kart, but use Star Wars characters,

you can do that. Yep. There's also Star Wars,

like battle chess and everything. Like episode

one had a lot of video game tie -ins. Yeah, it

did. They're on, I think they're on the, they're

mostly on the original PlayStation. There's some

on the N64. If you want the re -releases, you

can get that. on your Xbox One, PlayStation 4

and 5, the Nintendo Switch. And I think there's

even a physical edition from Limited Run Games,

which comes with a bunch of extra crap. I don't

know whether it's still in stock right now, but

take a look around. My final, final, final thought

is if you want to learn more about Star Wars

toys, I recommend the site rebelscum .com. They've

got a photo archive of Almost every episode one

toy even some of the canceled ones that i'd mentioned

there's a few omissions because i guess they

just don't have photographs of those particular

ones but it's one of the most extensive archives

out there if you want to learn more you can visit.

I think if you type in the name Steve Stan Suite,

he's the guy who runs Rancho Obi -Wan or something

like that. Right. Yep. I remember that. Yeah.

Like it's worth looking into seeing all the neat

props and costumes that exist. from this movie

that still exists. So yeah, I mean, if you're

willing to go down some rabbit holes or some

cool stuff on YouTube, just look it up, man.

You're gonna find something neat from this movie

that you're gonna say, hey, I remember that,

and that was cool. Thank you for joining us here

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TF2 and Mike. What is your Twitter, Mike? Okay.

So if you want to follow me on the socials, my

personal Uh, Twitter is at Birdman Dodd. That's

also my Instagram and my, uh, TikTok. You can

also find me on Facebook under Mike the Birdman

Dodd. And yeah, just, you can leave me feedback.

Mike at thisweekengeek .net. I love to talk Star

Wars. We are doing a new, a new actual role play

podcast on thisweekengeek .net right now. We're

going to be starting Stargate SG -1 or Tactical

Weapons Integration Group. Where we play through

the Wyvern Games version of D &D 5th edition

with a Stargate skin. Maybe we'll do Star Wars

as I used to be with TerribleWarriors .com. We

played through a number of prequel era adventures

there. So yeah, there's a lot of good stuff coming

up from This Week in Geek and myself. So be sure

to keep it locked to those socials and I'm sure

there'll be pictures of cats. I'm sure there

will. Become a fan of Facebook or you can go

to facebook .com slash geek cast radio network.

You can also check out studio 2009 podcast, uh,

and as well as this week in geek as well over

there on Facebook. Join us next time when Steve

and I will be back talking about Burton's Batman.

That's right. We have already recorded and talked

about Batman 89 and Batman returns for now. I

am TF2 and Mike with I've been Mike the bird,

man. You'll hear us back in the studio soon.

Hey, wait! Oh, Mui Mui, I love you! You almost

got us killed. Are you brainless? I speck! The

ability to speak does not make you intelligent.

Now get out of here. No, no, Mr. Stey! Mr. Kodja

Jampinks! Mr. Your humble servant! That won't

be necessary. Oh, but it is! It is demanded by

the gods, it is! you