As for my favorite Jedi, my vote goes to Qui-Gon Jinn, and it's not particularly close. There are a lot of things to like about him - a maverick Jedi with tons of talent, and yet at the same time, a little too big for his own britches. His padawan is arguably the greatest hero in the story (Obi-Wan, for his heroics in the prequels and his guidance of Luke in the original trilogy), he finds and correctly identifies Anakin as the chosen one, and he even ties Dooku into the story as well. It helps that I've always enjoyed Liam Neeson's work, and he is awesome in this role, essentially co-starring with Portman in the film (although, even having seen him in a number of films before and since TPM, I cannot see him as anyone other than Qui-Gon anymore).

As for the raging discussion of the originals vs. prequels, I think it really depends on your tastes. The prequels are more of a story about diplomacy and politics (and the blurred lines of good and evil), whereas the original trilogy was more about heroes. If you think about the prequels, Obi-Wan and Padme are really the only consistent central heroes (an argument could be made for R2D2 or Mace Windu, but their heroics aren't exactly center-stage, and Qui-Gon is gone after one episode). We're drawn to Anakin, but his behaviour is often less than heroic. However, in the original films, heroes are everywhere at all times - Obi-Wan, Luke, Leia, Han, Chewy, R2, etc....Even villians like Lando and Darth Vader become heroic by the time it's all said and done.

I grew up with the original trilogy (born in 1973), but I have to say that I prefer the prequels now because I enjoy the politics and the character development. While I tend to agree about Natalie Portman's acting (bad), I tend to disagree about Hayden Christensen's work. He's supposed to be a pouty and whiny teenager in Attack of the Clones, just like his son was in A New Hope. I think his work in Revenge of the Sith is strong as well.

If there's someone to be faulted in all of this, it's the poor dialogue by Lucas. The entire series is rife with lousy writing, which is odd considering what a great overall story it is. Star Wars touches a broad audience because there are so many themes (dark vs. light force, romance, action, scifi, tragedy, drama, comedy, etc), and it's ironic that such a good story has such bad writing. However, good dialogue might take away from the campiness of all of them, which is also a drawing point.

I'm rambling and consuming your time. I'll leave with a final thought - I really hope someone can talk Lucas into making an Episode Zero - There's a lot of backstory that could make a whole other movie. In Episode Zero, we could learn about where Palpatine came from (is it really Naboo?), his training by and eventual betrayal of Darth Plaguis the Wise, and where he came up with Darth Maul (and the series of events that led to his teaming up with the Trade Federation prior to the blockade/invasion of Naboo). We could get some backstory on the corruption of Count Dooku and his relationship with former padawan Qui-Gon (and perhaps something about Syfo-dias). Plus, we'd undoubtedly get to see Obi-Wan and Padme as children, starting to develop their identities (Obi-Wan as a young padawan with Yoda, and Padme learning politics at school).

A great series. Thank you for all your thoughts.

I remember seeing Episode 2 on IMAX and thought the movie was really good - the difference between the IMAX and the screen version was that they had to cut down the film to fit the 2 hour limit (mostly cutting out the Anakin-Padme scenes which were awkward).  If he hadn't tried to do too many things with the films (tell the backstory, show the cool visuals) I'm sure the films would have been received much better critically - but it's his world and he can do what he likes (and we'll keep buying stuff).