They were so-so to bad to begin with. Combine that with a terrible director, and voila. But even so, Christiansen and Portman's performances were even worse. And the dialog was even worse.

As a 10-year-old, I was entranced by everything about the first movie. The story, the actors, the whole shebang. The sheer exuberance of the film pulled me in and held me. When I got older and started to broaden my film horizons, I found out that the story was loosely based on Kurasawa's "The Hidden Fortress," which I sought out and loved.
When I go back and watch the OT, I can see all the flaws, yet I'm more forgiving than I am with, say, a Corman quickie from the same era.
I think my fondness for SW is part nostalgia and part gratitude for being my intro to cinema.
(Sgt Pepper isn't my all-time favorite record either, but I have the same kind of respect for it)

That may be true. But I think the big difference between the O.T. and the prequels is that America and the world became rather fond of Luke Skywalker, Han Solo, Princess Leia, Chewbacca, R2D2 and C3PO long before the finale installment hit the theaters.

Is anyone fond of Amidala or Anakin or Jar-Jar or even young Obi-Wan? If you have answered "yes" to one or none of those, then you have the major problem with the prequels right there. Beyond all the bad writing, poor story, horrible directing and all-around crappy execution ... we just don't give a fvck about the main characters. Bad acting regardless, we liked Luke and we liked Leia. We even liked Han Solo enough to forgive his RotJ performance that makes Christensen seem like Olivier.

The world loved the O.T. characters. And the world is meh about the prequel characters. Death. Knell.

It comes down to this:

Star Wars, Empire Strikes Back and RotJ were FUN, the actors were FUN, and the characters were FUN. And I cared about all of them.

The new movies? The characters are a drag, save Yoda. And some of the Jedi. And instead of thinking the characters are FUN, I think, "Christensen, I've seen you in Shattered Glass and Life as a House, so I KNOW you can act. Better than this. I KNOW THIS! Portman, I've recently seen you in Garden State and Closer, and you gave two of the best female performances I'd seen all year, so I KNOW you can REALLY act. Ewan. EWAN! How can you now reflect any of Guinness' affability, charm, gravity, interest? When I know for a fact you can be affable, charming, weighty, and interesting?"

I must blame the bad writing and the bad directing. Why Lucas suddenly needed complete control over everything is beyond me. He used to work with more people, yes? The fact is, maybe it's the fun factor, but I never notice any painfully bad acting watching the other three films. Not even from Hamill.

But Christensen, McGregor, and Portam are fine actors in their own right, and whether they're characters are just sucky and boring, or the writing is terrible, or they have NO idea how to behave with blue screens, I have no idea. But the fun factor is seriously missing, save for a few memorable moments in Attack of the Clones that I really, really liked.

But one would assume that if Jackson directed the prequels, they'd have been better.

I blame Lucas.

This is true. The way I look at it is this. When Lucas announced that he was going to make prequels, he could have gotten anyone he wanted. He scoured the acting world to get the exact actors he wanted. And we end up with blocks of wood? I'd agree with what some others are saying and blame a large part of the bad acting on Lucas. Look at Samuel Jackson, a fine actor that totally sucks in these films as well. I actually liked Liam Neeson and Ewan McGregor (although Ewan was much better in II) but it was obvious that they, like everyone else, were extremely limited by the crappy direction/dialogue.
Like I said, they are put out as being a part of the same universe. They want to inspire the feelings that the former movies did. They do not. I am disappointed.

I'll admit as quick as anyone born the year the original came out that I have no perspective on the OT. Yes, there was bad acting in it, especially ANH. Yes, there is cheesy dialog. But I maintain that it was a different kind of cheese! It was the kind of sillyness that made you LOVE THE CHARACTERS. The kind of banter that made you think that these were real human beings. The lighthearted moments weren't filled with crappy slapstick. The romantic moments were sweet. Compare Han and Leia's moment alone in ESB with the bullsh!t in AotC. If you look at the lines on paper, perhaps they might seem equally sappy, but watched on screen, it's a far different story.

That's like saying "Disney built DCA. Get over it."

Definitely bears repeating. Lucas took himself a little too seriously. All the fun is gone from the main characters. That's why Jar-Jar and 3PO's slapstick in the prequels stands out as SO much worse in the prequels than any of the comic relief in the originals. It's not because there wasn't comedy in the OT. It's because in the OT, the comedy wasn't "comic relief", it was integrated into ALL the characters. Han, Leia, Luke, 3PO, Chewbaca. They all had light hearted moments, lots of them. In the prequels, everyone seems "too important" to make quips and have silly banter, so all of it is lumped into either Jar-Jar or 3PO. So instead of comic relief, you get out of place slapstick. And instead of fun likeable characters, you get uninteresting blocks of wood whose emotions range all the way from angry to annoyed.

DCA is not a sequel or prequel to Disneyland but it too was created decades after the original ;)

When I see Yoda flying through the air with that face.... it so reminds me of Miss Piggy crashing through the wall on a motorbike in The Great Muppet Caper. Since then, I can't shake the "Yoda is a Muppet" image from my mind.

Wait.... Yoda is a muppet??? :eek:

He was in the original trilogy. ;)