Star Wars for the Next Generation

Last week Nick was finally given the green light to watch the first Star Wars movie. By 'first' Star Wars, I mean the original Star Wars, Episode IV. Of course Nick and I had to have a conversation about starting with Episode IV.

Nick: "Why are we going to watch episode IV first?"
Me: "Because that's the movie they made first. They started with IV, V, and VI, then went back and made I, II, and III."
Nick: "Why was the first Star Wars movie episode IV?"
Me: "I don't know."
Nick: "They really should have started with episode I, don't you think?"
Me: "Uh huh."
Nick: "Why did they want to start in the middle?"
Me: "I don't know."
Nick: "They really should have started at the beginning."
Me: "Uh huh."
Nick: "Maybe we should start by watching episode I."
Me: "No, we'll start with IV. Episodes I, II, III were made to be watched after IV, V, VI."
Nick: "That doesn't make any sense."
Me: "Yeah, I know."

I didn't want to get into the whole thing about how episodes I, II, and III kind of sucked and were weak compared to the original movies. I'll let him figure that out for himself. (Or at least form his own opinions.)

In all seriousness, one of the reasons we didn't start with I-III is because episode III is much darker and more violent than the rest. It makes no sense to finish off a bunch of PG movies with one that is PG13. Thanks, George Lucas!

Anyway, the movie was well received. Nick doesn't usually like movies that are too scary or suspenseful. He still won't watch the opening scene in finding Nemo where the baracuda attacks. He did fine with this one, even the scary Darth Vader scenes.

He had millions of questions. Since he's played a lot of Lego Star Wars on the Wii, he knows lots of characters from all 6 movies. He kept asking where the clone troopers were or where the droid army was or why Obi Wan Kenobi was so old. My usual response was for him to hush up and watch the movie.

Ironically, Xander got to watch the movie, too. We make Nick wait until he's almost seven, but Xander got to see it when he was three. It turns out that it is just too difficult to separate them when it comes to a movie like this. Xander has become almost as obsessed with Star Wars as Nick and he would have thrown a fit if he couldn't watch the movie, too. As it was, he watched a little of the beginning and then played with Lego Star Wars figures for the rest of the movie. I think he was pleased that Nick was too distracted with the movie to notice Xander playing with his stuff.