Star Wars: Ranking Every Film From Worst To Best

The initial culmination of the saga remains incredibly affecting and arguably even more powerful all these years later.

Lucas and Kasdan's script does a great job of honing in on Luke's emotional journey across the trilogy and presenting him with the ultimate challenge here; now that he knows the truth about his father, which side will he choose? Richard Marquand's direction plays this up incredibly well, as does Hamill's wonderful performance, portraying Luke as a man constantly on the edge. This gives his every action, every lightsaber swing, every force choke, infinitely more weight.

And while it's doing all of this heavy-lifting thematically with Luke's arc, it's also delivering a profoundly satisfying 'final' adventure for these characters. The opening at Jabba's palace is ludicrous amounts of fun, as is the entirety of their encounter with the Ewoks, and the finale remains one of the franchise's very best.

The other thing to note about this film is just how much Lucas' work pays off here in subsequent rewatches. The entirety of his reverse-engineering in the prequel trilogy builds to this moment and makes the film infinitely more powerful. Luke's arc ties directly into Anakin's own fall, Yoda's death carries that much more weight, Luke and Leia's realization that they are siblings feels so much more earned, and most of all, Vader's redemption is entirely recontextualized. It's kind of amazing.