5 Favorites Redux #9: Favorite Star Wars Properties

Welcome to 5 Favorites. Each week, I will put together a list of my 5 favorites (films, performances, whatever strikes my fancy) along with commentary on a given topic each week, usually in relation to a specific film releasing that week.

Friday, or really Thursday evening these days, is the beginning of the end of the latest Star Wars trilogy. J.J. Abrams returns to direct the final film and in honor of this noted occasion, I’ve decided to look back at all of the non-animated films in the franchise and select the five best. It was a tough call for that fifth position with Solo barely making it in over Return of the Jedi. Below is my commentary on my five favorites and they are in release date order. If you want to know my feelings about the entire list, I’ll have the ranked list at the very end.

While these may not be the all-time best Star Wars films or everyone’s agreement on the best, these five are among my favorites. Here they are in order of release.

Star Wars (1977)

I was only two years old when this film came out and five when the sequel was released, but I became familiar with it from an early age. One of my favorite toys as a kid was from Return of the Jedi, which came out when I was eight. Looking back at this film several years later, it became obvious what a special occasion it was. The mythos, energy, and excitement were all well regarded even if it could now be considered little more than pop entertainment.

Being the first in the series gives Star Wars a certain level of uniqueness that helps keep it at or near the top of most estimations as the best of the series. George Lucas might not have been a great writer, but the inventive energy of the film made it a significant achievement.

The Empire Strikes Back (1980)

While Lucas continued as story writer and producer, the second film in the series was turned over to Lawrence Kasdan and Leigh Brackett to screenwrite and Irvin Kershner to direct. That new blood helped take the series in a darker and more sinister direction. The Empire Strikes Back remains the most downbeat film in the series, but that nascent realism helped make the film one of the best in the series and is sometimes even considered the best.

Taking away the newness of the premise, the second film was better written and directed than its predecessor, but remains slightly inferior to the original simply because it didn’t establish the universe. That distinction aside, this wonderful sequel is one of the rare ones that is largely better than the original and stands almost on an even level to the first in terms of overall quality.

Rogue One (2016)

In order to bridge the gap between the first, second, and third films in the most recent trilogy, Disney decided that since they now owned all of LucasFilms that they would ramp up production on as many films as possible to tap into the hunger of series fans who would lay down any amount of money to continue living in Lucas’ universe.

Rogue One was an attempt to tell another story in the Star Wars universe outside of the main trilogies of films. Situated right before the film that started it all, we get a thrilling adventure wherein rebel forces try to thwart the Empire’s designs and retrieve plans for the massive death star they are about to unleash. The film is the most sorrowful of any of the films made so far and the film’s ability to weave into existing narratives makes it a most exciting and valuable entry into the franchise.

The Last Jedi (2017)

Looking at the fan furor over The Last Jedi, it became pretty obvious that Star Wars fans have become so accustomed to being catered to that any deviation from their expected content sends them into an unnecessary fury. Yet, had the forums existed for this kind of outrage in 1980, I remain convinced that Empire Strikes Back, which went darker and more intense than its fluffier predecessor, would have been met with the same level of animosity as The Last Jedi and for almost the exact same reasons.

The reason The Last Jedi works so incredibly well is that it takes expectations and franchise convention and turns them on their heads by becoming more grounded, realistic, and challenging than its lighter predecessor. It’s almost the exact same reason why, in many ways, Empire Strikes Back is better than the original Star Wars. The Last Jedi is easily one of the best films in the franchise and is the best since the very film on which hinges much of the film’s foundation for being a deviation rather than a carbon copy.

Solo: A Star Wars Story (2018)

Similarly maligned, Solo: A Star Wars Story deviates from fan expectations by presenting a younger Han Solo and giving him more depth and conviction than the previous films had given him. Exploring his reasons for becoming the scoundrel he would be celebrated for, Solo does a tremendous job taking us back to his origins without destroying the mythos that was built around him.

For his part, Alden Ehrenreich does a tremendous job imitating the carefree personality of Harrison Ford’s Han Solo while giving him a shade of depth and mystery. As younger versions of well known characters go, Ehrenreich does a superb job evoking that spirit and humor. The rest of the film is exciting, engaging, and just the kind of Star Wars adventure the rest of the series has been. That it wasn’t as new and shiny as fans wanted is one of the reasons they cannot seem to like it.