For me New Hope and Empire were like Godfather I and II. You could make arguments both are the best. Jedi was like as you said Beneath the Planet of the Apes. The best part was the acting of Ian Mac Diarmid. He along with Christopher Lee were the only good parts on the new trilogy
After the first “Star Wars”, the 2nd best entry in the series was “Spaceballs”. Too bad Mel Brooks stopped after just one; there is so much material in the Lucas/Disney stuff for him to work his magic on.
It’s taken us 47 years to realize that Emperor Palpatine was actually the good guy - if he had won all of this wicked wokeness could have been prevented. :)