So, you’ve finally done it. You’ve convinced your friends, your family, or the orphans held at gunpoint in your garage (because let’s be honest, who would do this willingly) to marathon Star Wars with you. They haven’t yet watched any of the movies, so it’s your duty as a Star Wars fan to introduce the series to them, welcome them into the fandom, and get them on board with the most uniting, defining trait of being a Star Wars fan—hating Star Wars.

Without further ado, here’s the optimal movie order to do that with! Beware, spoilers ahead.

1. Return of the Jedi (Episode 6).

By putting the ending of the original trilogy first, you get to give massive spoilers for the entire rest of the series. As an added benefit, newcomers to the series will have absolutely no idea who many of the characters are, trivializing character-defining moments and creating an overall sense of confused disengagement. A great start!

2. Revenge of the Sith (Episode 3)

This movie is only good in the broader context of Anakin’s overall character arc—by placing it this early on, you totally eliminate all of that preceding character development, making Anakin’s fall seem cheap and insignificant. Cool!

3. Rogue One

This one’s actually a great movie. As such, you’ve gotta get it out of here fast, just to make sure the rest of it becomes a complete slog at the end. It’s an investment!

4. The Last Jedi (Episode 8)

After watching Rogue One, your captive audience may have enjoyed themselves or even had hope that the rest of the series would be good. Crush that hope. There is no mercy.

5. Rise of Skywalker (Episode 9)

Normally I’d be in favor of abrupt unexplained time jumps, but keeping sequence is actually better here. If there’s one thing Episodes 7 and 8 do well, it’s setting up for a potential finale in Episode 9. And if there’s one thing that Episode 9 does well, it’s completely squandering that potential. Be prepared to answer fun questions like “What did they do to Finn’s character?” “What the hell is Hux doing?” and “What do you mean somehow Palpatine returned?”

6. Empire Strikes Back (Episode 5)

Not too much to say here—another good movie, so you need that gone. Also, abrupt era shifts will always be a good thing. Han ending up in carbonite also becomes a lot less effective of a cliffhanger when the first thing you saw in the series was Leia freeing him—what even is narrative impact?

7. A New Hope (Episode 4)

With Episodes 6 and 5 having already happened, you’ll have already had many important details for Episode 4 spoiled already. “Oh hey, that’s Luke’s Dad!” “And wasn’t that guy a ghost earlier—does he die soon?”

8. The Force Awakens (Episode 7)

This might be a hot take, but I think Episode 7 is good. Unfortunately, it is in fact a carbon copy of Episode 4, with all the proper nouns swapped out. By putting them back to back, you make sure that really sinks in for the audience. Awesome!

9. The Phantom Menace (Episode 1)

You’re in the home stretch now, and by that, I mean the slog. The really bad, incredibly non-memorable movies go here at the end, just to inflict the maximum misery possible. Not to mention, all the foreshadowing and buildup gets to be totally wasted this late in the game. Perfect!

10.  Solo

The slog continues. Can you remember any major details from this movie? Neither can I! Bonus points if you say as little as possible about the setting of the movie so that when your audience sees Maul alive after being “killed” in Episode 1, they draw deeply inaccurate and confusing conclusions about the Star Wars timeline!

11. Attack of the Clones (Episode 2)

“I don’t like sand. It’s coarse and rough and irritating and it gets everywhere.”

Well, that’s it! We at the Hare sincerely hope this guide helps you, as well as your would-be victims, have the worst consecutive 25 hours and 7 minutes of your lives. And remember, stopping to pee or eat is cowards’ work. Good luck, godspeed, and May the Fourth be with you.

Image Credits: Kenlynn Ingham