Samuel L Jackson: 5 Awesome Performances And 5 That Sucked

4. Mace Windu - Star Wars Prequel Trilogy (1999-2005)

To balance the influx of relatively new actors - and perhaps to distract from a woeful lack of talent - George Lucas needed some older, established talents to populate his misguided prequel trilogy, and to compete for screen time with the collection of CGI monstrosities he thought could pass for fully realised characters. Quite what Lucas saw in Jackson remains to be seen: when cast, his profile had been boosted by Pulp Fiction and Jackie Brown, and there was very little further back in his filmography to suggest that he could fit into the Jedi council as seemlessly as was necessary. Star Wars fans had certain expectations for lofty Jedi, including (but not limited to) a classical acting background, and it seems Jackson's clipped delivery is an attempt to bring something of that to his role. Sadly, the writing is too poor, and the performance way too stunted to make his Mace Windu a success, and he became just another superfluous ornament in Lucas' bloated universe.