Why The Phantom Menace is Actually an Ironic Masterpiece

I was only 10 when The Phantom Menace came out in 1999, and while I saw the movie in theaters four times, I didn’t appreciate until I was an adult how unsettled it must have made older Star Wars fans feel. It had been sixteen years since Return of the Jedi, and those who’d seen the original films in theaters likely experienced a strange mix of emotions on that May evening in 1999, a heady…