Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace effort after a 22-year hiatus following "Star Wars" in 1977. "The Phantom Menace" was released in theaters on May 19, 1999, almost 16 years after the premiere of the previous "Star Wars" film, "Return of the Jedi". The film's premiere was extensively covered by media and was greatly anticipated because of the large cultural following the "Star Wars" saga had cultivated. It received mixed reviews; critics praised the visuals, action sequences, John Williams' musical score and some of the performances, but criticized the screenplay, characterization, and Ahmed Best and Jake Lloyd's performances (as Jar Jar Binks and Anakin Skywalker respectively).
Star Wars (film) had "Episode IV"s subtitle in mind before its release, but removed it to avoid confusing audiences. Kurtz has corroborated that they had originally considered using a higher episode number to emulate the chapter numbering used in the "Flash Gordon" serial. Some of Lucas's early script drafts bear titles such as ""The Adventures of the Starkiller (Episode One): The Star Wars"" (1975) or ""The Adventures of Luke Starkiller as Taken from the Journal of the Whills: Saga One: Star Wars"" (1976). The revised fourth draft of the script dated January 1975 acquired the subtitle ""Episode IV: A New Hope – from