ROTJ is my favorite film and I can't even give you a reason why.
As for ROTS, I just don't really mess with it. It is solid but I feel it was poorly executed.
For a long time, ROTJ was my favorite as well. The story had been elevated, stuff was completed, filming was improved.
As I've gotten older, I have learned to appreciate Empire so much more, and it was clearly the cleaner, more polished film, and certainly darker, but outside of the Ewoks, Jedi was the "funner" film.
The battle at Jabba's barge, the Rancor, Sarlacc, Boba Fett, the battle of Endor, Luke v Vader, the battle at the Death Star, and the Emperor shooting lightning out his finger tips was all incredible stuff. In 1983 no less!!!
If you look at the first battle at the Death Star in ANH, compared to ROTJ, it's not even close how much better it was in Jedi. More ships, more speed, everything was faster and more elevated.
The only thing that harms Jedi is the tone lightened, and the damn Ewoks came. If they would have kept the mood dark, like Empire, but still finished everything off with the good guys winning and what not, it would have been much better received. Killing Fett as they did, killing Jabba as they did, the Ewoks, all made it too light and fluffy.
ROTS was tremendous, considering the amount of garbage it had to follow. In theory, if I would have done the first two movies, ROTS should have been the best film of the 6, BY FAR. But Lucas completely screwed the first two films, and created a huge hole to dig out of in ROTS, but I'll be damned if he didn't do a pretty good job getting out.
Now, I surely would have liked to have seen more. For instance, had he done better in 1-2, he could have had Anakin become Vader within the first 45 minutes of Sith, and spent the next hour and a half killing Jedi in a way that would have probably killed me with happiness right then and there. I mean, from the very first movie, the first 35-40 minutes, Ben Kenobi tells us of Luke's Father, who was a great Jedi and fighter pilot, who was murdered by Darth Vader during the Clone Wars. That lore sat with everyone the entire time from 1977 to 1999, and somehow, he couldn't get it right?
Vader should have been choppin fools down for 90 minutes in Sith, not killin kids and gettin his *** kicked by Owi Wan.
But like I said, despite all that, the tone was MUCH darker, the severity of everything was felt, the killing of all the Jedi, while done wrong, was still powerful. The creation of Vader was awe inspiring, my theater was SILENT while that **** went on. And when the breathing kicked in.......... *wipes tear*
I remember walking out, happy, feeling good, but also ANGRY that I knew this kind of stuff was still in him, in the franchise, and that he had wasted my ******* time with the first two prequels that completely let me down.
Star Wars was the beginning, and a HUGE moment in movie history.
Empire upped the ante and is one of the best 3-5 films in movie history.
Jedi was a fulfilling close, albeit a bit too fluffy.
Menace was a piece of crap, with Darth Maul
Clones was a piece of crap, with the start of a famous war that should have stolen my breath.
Sith was a solid conclusion, with much darker tones, and the right feel as the 6th film closed and you knew how 4 would be.
Had he just gotten 1 and 2 right.........
Revenge of the Sith could have been the best movie ever made. It would have made Empire look like a childrens book. It could have been the darkest, saddest damn story ever told. Shoulda sent Ben and Yoda hiding, scared to their cores. Could have seen Vader in his prime, young, angry, completely lost following Palpatine. Jedi slaughtered, Boba Fett helping Vader hunt down Jedi, a complete, utter altering of the galaxy, til closing credits. Knowing, the next film would restore all "Hope".
Damn it George.