The Podrace was there for the same reason the Coruscant speeder-chase was in Ep2: To break up the monotony of an hour of exposition.

Oh, God, don't get me started about that ridiculous pod race.

Here we have a race so important that the entry fee is the equivalent of a star ship -- surely a multi-billion dollar value. And this race is contested and won by an eight year old kid who designed and built a racer out of parts from a junk yard.

Right. And my next-door neighbor's third-grader is going to win the Indy 500 on her father's lawn tractor (she'll have to remove the cutting blade to get it through pre-race tech inspection). A movie is supposed to be about enjoyment through suspension of disbelief, but nobody over the age of 10 could possibly suspend enough disbelief to lose himself in that scene.

I haven't seen Episode 2 yet, and I won't see it until it comes out on network television because after Episode 1 and what I have heard about Episode 2, I certainly wouldn't spend a nickel to see it sooner than that.

Has it occurred to anybody that these movies (in some contrast to the original three Star Wars movies) are aimed squarely at a 10--12 year old audience?

tanstaafl.