It’s also widely said that the early rough cut of the original Star Wars was a disjointed narrative and tonal mess, that George took a bigger bite than he could realistically chew by himself, that he got all tied up into knots trying to sort out the details and stitch them together… does this sound similar to what we got in The Phantom Menace, perhaps?
Didn’t he end up in the hospital, collapsed from stress and exhaustion? I seem to remember something like this happening.

Then George’s wife Marcia Lucas stepped into the editing room to rescue the film, and for her legendary effort and result she received the Academy Award. One of eight Oscars that film won.

The original trilogy was the result of Lucas’ vision, but also of many people collaborating and not afraid to sometimes say “Let me try it my way, George, please step aside.”

1999’s The Phantom Menace was the result of so many younger people who got into the movie business because they were inspired by Star Wars itself in the first place, deferring to George Lucas The Cinema Demigod, and operating on his strange combination of weirdly specific and vague instructions, sometimes at the same time, while enthusiastically trying to make sense of it in blind faith: “He must know what he’s talking about, he’s a genius”.

Well… once again George had bitten more than he could chew in his peculiar workflow. But this time, he had surrounded himself with people who did not dare question him at any step of the way.