Five Reasons Empire Strikes Back is Still Awesome

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Did you know that The Empire Strikes Back had its 30th birthday recently? It’s true—it’s been three decades now since the movie first hit theaters, and it seems like we still haven’t fully digested all of the pop-cultural implications of the Star Wars saga (probably because Lucas will slap the Star Wars logo on just about anything these days, but I digress). Empire is widely considered to be the best of the Star Wars flicks, and rightly so; here’s five reasons why it’s still an awesome cinematic experience.

1. Character, character, character
Of all the Star Wars movies, Empire is far and away the one that gets you attached to the characters. Well, attached in a good way. There’s plenty of character development here: Han and Leia’s budding romance, Luke grappling with becoming a Jedi, the roguish Lando Calrissian. A New Hope gave us a world, Empire made us care about it.

2. The Battle of Hoth
A New Hope was Lucas raising the bar for technical wizardry; the Death Star battle alone had already permanently redefined special effects in cinema. And then along came Empire, with its cornucopia of snowspeeders, AT-ATs and AT-STs. The bar had just been raised that much higher. Plus, it gave us the Bacon AT-AT.