I should think it's obvious why Empire takes first place but, to sum up: it has the greatest battle of all (Hoth); it introduces Yoda and explores the wondrous power of the Force; it shows the bad guys are actually pretty competent; it has the great duel between Luke and Vader.

Before Episode VII, Star Wars took second place right above Return of the Jedi. I have been comparing in my mind Star Wars against Force Awakens but Star Wars wins that battle outright if only for virtue of being the first and telling us the story we see in the latter. It also has better world building and, why not, an excellent score that can carry the movie on its shoulders. I'll admit Awakens does a couple of things better, particularly insofar Act One is concerned but, overall, Star Wars remains on top.

The real showdown is between Jedi and Awakens and I'm torn. The ewoks aren't particularly bad but I'm not exactly a fan of them. If we're being fair, Jedi also took a few pages out of Star Wars with the Death Star 2.0 so we're retreading old ground there. However, Jedi also has the epic conclusion to Vader's redemption story and wages a psychological and physical battle between Palpatine, Luke, and Vader. Awakens, on the other hand, despite its flaws, maintains a relatively even tone/pace throughout and, guess what, it doesn't have ewoks. I don't have a clear victor here yet what means I'll probably have to re-watch Awakens.

Talking about the prequels is a bit of a mixed bag because there are aspects of the prequels that I genuinely liked. Anakin's journey, however, was not one of them. And his interactions with Padmé... I shudder just to think about it. It's kind of curious how despite Clones (the movie, not you, Clones) having some of the most cringe-worthy dialogue ever it managed to not earn last place. I think I'll have to chalk it up to Obi-Wan Kenobi who really comes into his own in Episodes Two and Three. Plus, I enjoyed the mystery surrounding the creation of the clone army and Christopher Lee is always a pleasure to watch (and dozens of Jedi battling on Geonosis!). Having said that, Phantom Menace is not that far from Clones, to my mind. After all, what you lose to Jar Jar you gain by having a very young Anakin who's not yet of age to woo Padmé (thank God). Of course you then have Anakin pilot a starfighter and destroy a Federation control ship so... um, yeah.

Out of the three prequels, however, Sith comes out on top, though perhaps barely. Unfortunately, we have to deal yet again with the Anakin/Padmé storyline but at least the movie started promising enough. Anakin and Obi-Wan's relationship was fortunately better than what we saw in Clones. It has the advantage perhaps over the other two in that it ties into Episode IV so we get to see Anakin dueling Obi-Wan and becoming Darth Vader, Yoda exiling himself to Dagobah, the Lars welcoming Luke into their family. A pity though that Palpatine played his character a little too over the top for me. Okay, a lot. Also, Order 66. Man, the feelings when the clones turned on their commanders and blasted them to oblivion (what makes it even more awesome when Yoda slices their heads off!).

So, yeah, that's my order until I get sorted out my feelings over Awakens. I hate to give numbers but if you were to force me I'd say Empire is probably 9, certainly not lower; Star Wars is a solid 8 or 8+; Jedi is 7+ closer to 8; Awakens is probably in a similar situation to Jedi; Sith is in the realm of 6 to 7, similar to Clones; and Menace might be around 5 or 6. I really have to re-watch the prequels to judge them more accurately. If and when I do that, I have a feeling they might get lower than that.


EDIT: Who am I kidding? Subtract at least one more point from the prequels.