Chat corner 109: Phantom Menace

[annathecrow]

Welcome to the Monday chat corner!

This week we start another round through the Star Wars movies, with Star Wars: The Phantom Menace. If you’re curious or nostalgic, you can check out our chat from 2021 and 2022. Otherwise, well, what do you think? Who is your favorite and least-favorite character? And have you ever read/watched/played any tie-in EU material?

Comments

[extrapenguin]

I liked it! Yeah, the podrace went on a bit too long, but then again, so did the fucking Ewoks in RotJ. And there was zero sexual harassment! (Unlike ESB...) Watching the other movies made me appreciate it more lol. I don't even particularly mind Jar-Jar Binks.

Favorite character: Well, Maul is iconic and I love his character trajectory from Sith zealot to Ezra's moderately evil uncle. For characters whose characterization mainly comes from this movie, I like Shmi! She's sympathetic and it's fascinating how much her personal philosophy ("you can't stop change", "the biggest problem in the galaxy is that no-one helps each other") resembles the Jedi's. Also a lot of potential for fanfic, in that she can easily be headcanoned as Force sensitive, given how that's shown to be hereditary.

The handmaiden thing is interesting worldbuilding, though Padmé is too rich for me to be able to give a fuck about her, and most handmaiden stuff is obviously Padmé-centric. I don't really have a least favorite character, though, as everyone ranges from "I like them!" to "well, I guess they're ... there?" The worst I can say is that I dislike the fanon treatment of e.g. Obi-Wan, but that's not really the movie's fault.

[annathecrow]

"zero sexual harassment" -- ouch, but true :D

I like Maul in TPM! My only reason is that he looks cool, and I feel that I don't need any other :P He has such a great design.

I needed to grow up and get some pointers from fanfic to really appreciate Shmi, but I'm ever thankful for both because now she's probably my favorite SW character right now.