The Clone Wars - Season One Discussion Thread

[Brian]

I really enjoyed "Lair of Grievous", probably one of my favorite episodes yet.  Although the writing was on the wall pretty much from the beginning, I was a little disappointed to see Nahdar get offed in this episode.  I kind of liked having a Mon Cal Jedi.  Anyways, I really enjoy these episodes that feature the "other" Jedi.  As I've said, Kit and Plo are my favorite "other/background" Jedi of the prequels, and its nice that they've both gotten feature episodes.  I can understand obviously why these other members of the Jedi order didn't get much time in the prequels (wasn't really time), but its nice to see them fleshed out further in the Clone Wars series.  Its going to be a rough couple of weeks waiting for a new episode now, but I'd say - going into this holiday break - the series has been very good so far.

Oh, and here's the Episode Guide for "Lair of Grievous", as well as the preview for "Dooku Captured", which looks pretty cool.

[Jesse James]

So I enjoyed this week's episode a lot as well...  I wouldn't say it's my favorite, but it was good.  I enjoyed last week's a bit more I think, but mostly because it was more combat/military oriented whereas this episode seemed almost like a horror movie!  Grievious' house of horrors basically. 

I was talking with a buddy of mine who is just now getting into watching the series, and he loved the last couple episodes.  I told him they're not all perfect but the last two weeks were pretty close.  He digs the humor from various characters like Grievous' medical droid.  I told him Anakin's droid/holo are pretty entertaining as well, mostly due to the sort of slow voice.

Anyway this past week was awesome due to Grievous' home being this shrouded fortress nobody knows or knew about.  Then inside he's got beasties for pets, and lots of traps, and his guards and some droids...  Very cool.  I also liked Grievous' disgust at the use of battledroids, and how his relationship with the Separatists is strained (at best).  It's funny how Grievous almost is pitiable, in that he'd be a good leader but he's warped now and so he's with the wrong side.  It almost makes you wonder if the Republic had gotten to him before the Seps, would he be happier commanding Clones?  He's clearly not happy with sub-par soldiers the Seps give him.

It's a very interesting series I think, mostly because of these little questions and details they slip in there.

Last week's episode was similarly good, but like I said it had a more military touch to it, and I liked that a lot...  The boarding craft the Seps use are incredibly cool to me, and I thought the Senate commandoes were quite cool.  My buddy and I are noticing the trend though where new characters last about as long as red shirts on Star Trek.  Argyus, Grievous' Droid Doctor, R3S6, Trandoshan Scavenger...  Lots of people getting offed.  I love that the show gets a violence rating, haha.  Ya know they're aiming for our attention spans by making it something more than the cutesy Jar Jar episode.

[Phantom-like Menace]

Last week's episode was similarly good, but like I said it had a more military touch to it, and I liked that a lot...

It occurs to me I never really commented on last week's episode. I enjoyed the episode. I get the feeling I'm always going to have to comment on liking the lightsaber stuff in this series. There were little novel bits like the split Ahsoka performs, or Ventress' using her 'sabers to descend the turbolift shaft, and all of it continues to be on par with Episode III and far and away better than the pisspoor lightsaber work of Episode II.

My one complaint was the portrayal of Luminara. For a person who changes her assessment of the situation one-eighty inside of two seconds, she's adamant about selling whatever the current version is. One moment Ventress is no match for her (and honestly, Luminara holds her ground even with a gout of steam in her eye), and Ahsoka isn't remotely needed. The next, Ventress is so powerful as to shake her confidence to the point where she undermines her own authority in a distracting confessional in the middle of the battle. I'm all for admitting to one's mistakes, even to subordinates; it shows maturity. However, you should do it after the crisis, and you should remember that you need to balance that with the fact that you are in charge and need to maintain at least some amount of authority after admitting your mistakes. Luminara all but submits to Ahsoka. I could almost hear Eyore-like her thinking "Why bother?"

[Jesse James]

I agree.  I think Luminara's character fell prey to the time constraints of the series though, unfortunately.  Squeeze in, in 22 minutes or so, all the crap you want.  Luminara "growing" as a leader and teaching Ahsoka and things...  Did Ahsoka learn anything?  Not really by my estimation.  She disobeyed Luminara, she got violent with Gunray...  It's like Luminara was easily talked into anything.  That was weird for sure.  Definitely if there were another half hour, i think they would have done a better job of that.

Ahsoka's cocky behavior is clearly a byproduct of Anakin's teachings I think, but I'd have liked to see Luminara be a little more forceful, and teach Ahsoka rather than the other way around.

[Phantom-like Menace]

I think it goes deeper than the time constraint issue. George Lucas needed to describe the Jedi as having a flaw that would mean their downfall. He decided it would be arrogance, and he proceeded to show us how their arrogance allowed them to fall prey to a labyrinthine plot that unfolds over decades and involves whole governments moving to the plans of a master manipulator. While Lucas certainly made mistakes with some plot holes and continuity errors within Sidious's plan, he put in the effort to show that it took a very, very elaborate deception to get past the Jedi.

Now, however, it seems writers use this arrogance as a crutch for lazy writing. If they don't feel like putting forth the effort to show an elaborate plot, they'll have the Jedi fall for anything. If asked they simply say, "The Jedi are arrogant." The Jedi can do any stupid or callous thing convenient to the plot simply because, "Well, the Jedi are arrogant, you see." And what's best is we don't even expect something elaborate or creative, because we just accept this arrogance. In fact, the greatest disservice is to the Jedi. The Jedi now come off as so arrogant, so completely removed from reasonable behavior, that it seems less like a tragedy that they were wiped out and more like a good thing that the galaxy was rid of the inexcusably criminally negligent. This episode wasn't too bad. Luminara didn't come off as a complete loss, but I think her situation here does reflect some of the exaggeration of the Jedi's flaw that has allowed nearly every background Jedi to go to the Darkside and/or completely bungle simple activities.

[Jesse James]

I agree, I'm just saying that a 22 minute episode leaves some obvious time issues to squeeze it all in, believably.  If that makes any sense...  I liked Luminara, especially her voice, but it's tough to squeeze in all those flaws and deeper plot points for the Jedi in the overall CW storyline, when you've only got Luminara and Ahsoka for such and such ammount of time...  In this case, about 22 minutes.

I try not to jduge the toon much because of that flaw...  They'll always have too short a time to really get too deep with it, in believable segments.  An hour long format would improve that situation...  Ahsoka/Luminara's time together could've been made deeper with more time obviously, but because of the fast pace of the show, we're left watching Luminara go from all-powerful to flawed in 22 minutes.

[Phantom-like Menace]

No, your time constraint point is certainly a valid argument, and I'd even agree with it. I just think there's a lot more to it.

[Nicklab]

I don't think the lack of character exploration with Luminara is due to the length of the episodes at all.  Right off the bat the series explored multi-episode story arcs.  The Malevolence story spanned 3 episodes.  And there have been ongoing story arcs for a number of the Jedi as well as the Seperatists.  Luminara might be a Jedi master, but she isn't so significant that the producers are spending a lot of time getting to know her.  The "Cloak of Darkness" episode was much more about Ventress, Ahsoka and Nute Gunray.  Not Luminara.

[Jesse James]

Exactly though, that's my point...

Luminara doesn't get much time simply because she's Luminara...  I think they conveyed her character well enough so it's not even a complaint on my part, I just think characters aren't always going to get much attention.  Fisto, Koon, Luminara and others won't get a ton of play basically.  The series will almost always inevitably turn to Obi-Wan, Anakin, Ahsoka, and to a lesser degree the villains...  Ultimately I think you'll get more out of Rex/Cody too than you will out of these secondary Jedi Masters...  I think that just all is easily chalked up to it being a half-hour series of shows though. 

Multiple story-arcs are probably going to be reserved for "more important" characters ultimately...  More episodes may come up for these other Jedi, but ultimately it seems to me the team creating the series would like to squeeze more into one episode for secondary characters than giving them more time.

That keeps it similar with the original 2D toon as well, giving a Jedi an episode here and there, and those uber short episodes conveyed some of the Jedi's personality even, but they didn't give them too many multiple episodes (if any) at all.  The series will focus on the important people mostly though, and that's what should ultimately be expected, but what I'm saying is that the half hour your'e given means you're going to get some of these secondary Jedi's stories crammed in there due to the time constraints.

[Jesse James]

Bah, guess we're a couple weeks from new episodes.  Bummer...  I didn't realize it was repeats this week and next (if anything is on).

[Brian]

I know we've all seen all the episodes, or close to it, but for those interested - the Official Site (and I think CartoonNetwork.com as well) has all of the aired episodes available to watch online for free from today until the end of the year (I believe).  Nice way to catch up on things leading into the next new episode on Jan 2.  I noticed that CN also seems to be airing a lot of CW (out of order and at various times) during the next couple weeks.

[Keonobi]

So I'm about a month behind on the show, I'm catching up on the last three episodes this week. 

Going back to the Duel of the Droids episode from November.  Anyone catch that Ahsoka cuts of Grevious' right hand, but that's the same (intact) right hand he uses to support himself when he jumps into his fighter?  I know its a little thing, just bugged me a bit.  Or maybe its a nod to all the little things like that in the OT   Though I was a bit confused, because the hand the falls to the ground only has 4 fingers, but I haven't gone back to check if his hands only have four fingers throughout (simplified animation perhaps, I know in ROTS he had 6 on each hand, which divided into three on each hand when his arms split...

Anyway, I've been trying to avoid spoilers, but I wanted to comment on that little thing.  Overall I love the series.

[BrentS]

We watched the Clone Wars Movie on Blu-Ray last night.  It was fun to go back and watch the movie after seeing the first episodes of the series.  A question for you, was the Rodian in Palpatine's Chamber the same Rodian senator that Padme goes to visit later in the series?  I think it may have been but I wasn't sure. 

[Brian]

TheForce.net has a nice interview up with Henry Gilroy and Dave Filoni discussing the Clone Wars series.  They mention some things that got cut (Panaka, Plo vs. Grievous, etc.), some characters that may be appearing, the "OT connections" and more.  Kind of an interesting read, and most of the spoilers seem to be taken out.  They also talk about changes from the EU stories, Lucas' involvement, and more.

[Phantom-like Menace]

Pretty cool read. The section about Ahsoka and Plo in Episode III was a good laugh, and it's really cool that they try to be creative in working around contradicting stories like Grievous's origin. The teasers for upcoming episodes were great, but the word deleted was starting to give me conniptions. What?!? What was deleted?