The Lord of the Rings Extended Editions. :D

Darth Maul is easily my favorite Star Wars character.

Probably because Lucas only wrote like two lines for the character. Any more than that and he probably would have annoyed everyone.

The over actiony action wasn't a because they were Jedi. It was because of a current trend in film that thinks stuff has to be exploding or falling to get someones interest. You see the same trend in non pixar CGI movies. It's hard to think of a 2 minute stretch in Madagascar where someone didn't suddenly trip and knock something down that then fell in to someone else who then runs towards someone trying to keep something balanced which might topple and so on and so on adnausium. A lot of crappy movies take this approach. A lot of fantastic movies don't.

Take the factory for instance. Here they are in a movie with tons of action scenes, so why did they feel the need to turn discovering a factory in to a whole giant worthless action sequence? Suddenly Padme is stuck in a vat and Anakin is clamped on to the conveyor belt and R2 D2 is flying around and all this crap that doesn't actually have any story purpose. I think that's what I'm trying to get at with the over action element. Action scenes can't stand entirely as an Island to the rest of the film. They have to at least serve some purpose. The Prequels forgot that.

Now as for the effects argument. There are plenty of films with spectacular effects that still last to this day. Jurassic Park, Starship Troopers, even Terminator 2 hold up better. And why do they still hold up? Because they acknowledged the limitations of CGI and worked within them. As Joss Whedon said in the audio Commentary of Serenity (another movie where the effects really worked, even if they weren't as high quality tech wise) "Limitations are a good thing. Because they make you be creative"

Lucas seemed to ignore the fact that even with current technology being what it is, there are still limitations to what you can get away with.  And because of it, There are entire sequences that may look very flashy, but they also look very much like a bunch of CGI shooting at a bunch of other CGI. 

 Take the Matrix 1 and the Matrix 2. The first Matrix accomplished fantastic and oft talked about action scenes by filming real life actors on strings and filming it from tons of different cameras. It was original and it really worked. For the second film. They're much anticipated "agent smiths" was just a bunch of CGI. And that's what it looked like. CGI can look amazing at certain times. But we're still not at a level where it looks amazing always no matter what.

Stof, I think you're over-analyzing that sequence in Episode 2. It's not like it was one of the better moments in the film(probably my least favorite), but when they go to Geonosis they have to get caught to set up the big finale. Though we'll never know what it would have been like with a more traditional action sequence, it was probably done the way it was to refrain from another straight up blaster/lightsaber fight. There really was not much choice in what to do with them getting caught. Do the heroes just walk on in and get caught in a trap, putting up no fight at all?

Episode 2 was probably the least impressive of the three, though it does include some of my favorite moments from the prequels: the verbal exchange between Jango and Kenobi, their subsequent battle, the Yoda/Dooku duel, seeing Watto again, the whole Sifo-Dyas mystery, Mace Windu's disposal of Jango, and of course, Dooku himself. I will also say that Anakin pouring his heart out to Padme was pretty painful in some parts.

Terminator 2 and Jurassic Park do indeed have great special effects that have aged well, but I consider the prequels to be the same. There are actually parts in the prequels that I thought was complete CGI, but later found out were actually real. It really wouldn't have been practical to make the prequels any other way. I do wish that they had used more rubbery/foam/whatever material for aliens, rather than CGI, but it's not something I really focus on.

It was a no-win situation for Lucas in making these films though. People had been marinating in roughly 20 years of childhood nostalgia when these films came out, and many had ridiculous expectations. Two of the primary criticisms that surfaced when the prequels came out were ridiculous in my book. One was that Anakin was too boyish or childish in Episode One. A lot of people were expecting him to be some raging little jerk, which was completely out of line with the pre-Vader Anakin we were told about in the originals. We knew he was once good, so why would he start out as a mean little jerk, as opposed to a rather innocent kid? The other big complaint was the dialogue and how they didn't "talk like they did" in the originals. Utter rubbish, I say. The settings, realities, and backgrounds of the heroes was often quite different in the originals and prequels. Senators and Jedi living by a Buddhist-like philosophy probably shouldn't sound like a bunch of smugglers, gamblers, and ragtag rebellion fighters.

Still, if I had my wish, there would be some things I would have changed. I would have wanted more 3PO, Episode 2 to be more like Episode 1 by focusing on less action and more mystery/plotting/etc., more rubber aliens, less stilted "oh my aching heart" chatter from Anakin to Padme, to actually see a Bothan, and more Jar Jar. Instead of pulling back on the Jar Jar, Lucas should have given a big "FU" to all the haters and shoved Jar Jar down our throats until even I hated him.