Star Wars: Episode I

Somebody wrote up some complaints about Episode I. Their complaints are in quotes. My responses follow.

"However, even though the primitive beings have the technology for explosives they can't seem to come up with gunpowder. "

Just because they have the weapons doesn't necessarily mean they have the technology to produce them. Not that much different than most of the 3rd world where we have armies wielding AK-47's.

"In the great battle scene, the bad guys drive up in giant tanks and attempt to blast the good guys who are protected by their force field. This force field is transparent to visible light but nevertheless repels blasts of visible laser beams."

Could it be that the field can be penetrated by low intensity energy, but becomes opaque to higher levels? Seems I've run into this kind of physics elsewhere, though probably not involving energy.

"Why use armored vehicles to protect your troops if you're going to openly expose them to danger when you're parked in plain sight of your enemy?"

You use armored vehicles when going into battle. After you have engaged the enemy and found they are not a substantial threat, you may discard your armor. Or maybe they just used the troop carriers for carrying troops.

"A single W.W.II vintage 50 cal machine gun could have turned the entire army of droid tin men into a pile of tin cans."

Bullets are expensive. Some bean counter has decided energy weapons are more cost effective, or maybe they use energy weapons for environmental reasons.

"Once unloaded, the tin men came to life and marched forward, effortlessly passing through the force field's wall! Once again, we were left wondering why the bad guys wasted their money on a droid army when the force field was clearly incapable of stopping a metal object."

The force field evidently only blocks high concentrations of energy. Don't know if the droids are metal or not. Could be ceramic and/or plastic. You use a droid army for the same reason you use a real army: when you want to kill the enemy in detail without destroying everything and everyone else.

"A few marines with a machine gun could have easily done the job for a lot less expense."

You use the tools you have. Droids are built in automated factories. Droids are cheap. A few marines with a machine gun are not cheap.

"First, why would anyone design a droid army which was entirely dependent on receiving signals from a mother ship in outer space."

Common to all evil empires: central control.

"Second, why were none of the good guys smart enough to figure this out and jam the signals."

Even current technology allows us to send virtually undetectable, and therefor, unjammable signals. And we've only been messing with radio for 100 years.

"There was the flying junk yard dealer, Watto, with wings so small they couldn't possibly provide enough lift"

That's what science says about the bumble bee.

"the movements of the Jedi which appeared to have been pulled straight from B-grade kung fu movies"

they use the force.

"the incomprehensible pod race physics"

they've been using repulser fields for floating cars since the original. And the "jet engines" obviously use an advanced Eveready battery to heat air to an extreme temperature to give us the jet engine effect.

" not to mention a six year old poverty stricken, fatherless, slave boy who nevertheless had the time and resources to build a high-tech pod racer and an artificial life form."

depends on what you've got to work with. What can a precocious six year old make now that would have amazed a scientist from 100 years ago?

"Please kill off Jar Jar Binks"

I don't understand why we have Jar Jar Binks, but he certainly is a point of contention.