This movie copped a lot of *beep* from fans old and new. I admit that I was nine years old when this came out (arguably the targeted audience) and I absolutely loved it. And then, as the years went on, I joined the bandwagon in hating this movie for the irritating addition of Jar Jar Binks, Ewen MacGregor's appalling acting,the smart-arse little *beep* named Anikan, and the general childishness of the whole film.
But recently I bought the blu-ray collection and watched all six films - and surprisingly, I found that this movie had a much more distinctive atmosphere than the other two. Not only did I really enjoy it, but I also realised that since George Lucas was intentionally trying to give us a modern-day Starwars, I think he did a very good job.
I know it's not the best starwars film, but it does not deserve the criticism it suffers, in my opinion. I recommend all the haters to re-watch it.
For me, after all the dust has settled, this is actually the best prequel movie out there. I walked out of this movie in a bit of shock. Shocked to see SW on the big screen (loved the originals growing up, but wasn't born or was too young). I was excited to see it back on the big screen and walked out of the theater smiling, despite the feeling I had in the back of my head it wasn't that good.
Then I realized it was kind of disappointing. All the prequels are. None of the measure of up the originals. But after having seen all 3, this one is actually the best. It feels the most like a SW movie to me. There's only really 2 big problems with this one movie.
1. Jar Jar is awful. He's not remotely funny. In fact, not much of the humor is.
2. Jake Lloyd's acting was not good. Not good at all. Thankfully for me, most child actors don't bother me. They're kids, so I cut them slack.
Once I thought about it, I realized I had less problems with this than the other movies; and actually kind of liked it minus those two bad parts.