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6/14/2025, 12:14:58 PM
Prequel hate is complicated. There are many different subsects of it.
When TPM first dropped in 1999, it was well liked by younger star wars fans around ~12 years old or younger. Most older fans were disappointed by/hated it, and amongst the most die-hard fans you had the "normie" hardcore fans who felt hugely betrayed and hated it and the turbo hardcore deepcel fans who read EU shit that liked it for the worldbuilding. The media elite/monoculture film critic community despised it for what were mostly sound/logical arguments and reasons. The general public was interested in seeing it but apathetic with the end-result, and went along with all the hate it got in the media at large because it was popular to do. This only exacerbated with AOTC. Meanwhile, the prequel era saw a huge growth of Star Wars due to very successful toys, games, comics, books, merchandise, etc.. So while they movies were generally seen as meh to bad save for a smallish diehard community, the star wars community was still healthy and growing.
With ROTS, you had a large segment of the normie population and anti-prequel die-hards that came around to it while the media elite were more apathetic to it and not as overtly hostile. Star Wars then fell into a status quo after where it continued to do well, though not enormously well, and fans came to gradually accept the prequel status quo.
The RLM reviews ultimately revived popular prequel hurt in the post-ROTS-era and was able to expertly and humorously point out just what was wrong with the movies on a technical and storytelling level. Old fans who felt betrayed by TPM way back when were reinvigorated, kids who grew up liking the prequels were swayed by the arguments. Burgenoning social media and youtube saw every star wars discussion with someone linking the RLM reviews with "I'll just leave this here ;). It became impossible to resist.
End of Part 1
When TPM first dropped in 1999, it was well liked by younger star wars fans around ~12 years old or younger. Most older fans were disappointed by/hated it, and amongst the most die-hard fans you had the "normie" hardcore fans who felt hugely betrayed and hated it and the turbo hardcore deepcel fans who read EU shit that liked it for the worldbuilding. The media elite/monoculture film critic community despised it for what were mostly sound/logical arguments and reasons. The general public was interested in seeing it but apathetic with the end-result, and went along with all the hate it got in the media at large because it was popular to do. This only exacerbated with AOTC. Meanwhile, the prequel era saw a huge growth of Star Wars due to very successful toys, games, comics, books, merchandise, etc.. So while they movies were generally seen as meh to bad save for a smallish diehard community, the star wars community was still healthy and growing.
With ROTS, you had a large segment of the normie population and anti-prequel die-hards that came around to it while the media elite were more apathetic to it and not as overtly hostile. Star Wars then fell into a status quo after where it continued to do well, though not enormously well, and fans came to gradually accept the prequel status quo.
The RLM reviews ultimately revived popular prequel hurt in the post-ROTS-era and was able to expertly and humorously point out just what was wrong with the movies on a technical and storytelling level. Old fans who felt betrayed by TPM way back when were reinvigorated, kids who grew up liking the prequels were swayed by the arguments. Burgenoning social media and youtube saw every star wars discussion with someone linking the RLM reviews with "I'll just leave this here ;). It became impossible to resist.
End of Part 1
Page 1