In order to celebrate this occasion, I'm going to talk about the Star Wars: The Clone Wars TV Show! I never gave a shit about it as a kid and I still didn't until a few months ago. After a few characters from this show appeared in Star Wars: Rebels, a show I really enjoy despite unpopular opinion, I felt the need to go back and see what I missed, plus I just needed to know how the hell Darth Maul isn't dead. I mean, he was cut in half for gods sake! Since I had nothing to do, I figured I might as well watch all 129 episodes of Star Wars: The Clone Wars, or as the logo calls it: "STAR THE CLONE WARS WARS"
The show can be good. Sometimes it can even be really, really good when it focuses on the right things. However, the show is often times plagued by the bad stuff from the prequels, like politics, weird writing, the existance Jar Jar Binks stuff like that. There are entire episodes that focus on nothing but Jar Jar Binks, and they are so bad. No one deserves to watch entire episodes of nothing but Jar Jar Binks and his ear piercing voice, that's just cruel, not to mention this happened in the show for gods sake!
If I had to see Jar Jar Binks being smooched by some random queen lady, so do you. To be honest, I didn't even start enjoying episodes that much until around the second half of the series, when the Mandolorians start becoming relevant, along with those witch chicks. It stopped being a show mostly for stupid children and actually plots that made you think a bit.
Season 4 episodes 7-10 are by far my favorite episodes in the series. If there's one thing the prequels can do well, they can do some pretty damn nice war battles. In this arc, they focus on actual battles with the clones, and the struggles they have to deal with during the war. There was betrayal, twists and actual character conflicts. The opening scene of them riding down on the transport ships and then charging into the battle without any music and just the sound of blasters firing is one of my favorite moments in the entire show. Anything that focuses on the Clones are always my favorite episodes, I'm surprised there aren't more episodes that focus on them, considering the show is called "Star Wars: The Clone Wars". Christ, the word "Wars" is twice in the title, you would think there would have been more battles and war and less talk about "deregulating the banks" or whatever.
By far my biggest complain about the show is something very, very simple, but bugs me to no end: consequences. Characters die a lot in this show, and I do mean a lot. Killing off a character is something that can change the dynamic of an entire show. Death affects everyone related to the characters around them, it gives motivation to their enemies and devastates their friends and loved ones. However, in this show, basically 90% of character deaths happen in one episode, have some emotional tension and then are never brought up again. Obi Wan's long time love interest murdered by one of his greatest enemies? Pshh, no big deal! Jabba the Hutt's son murdered and decieved? Never brought up again, of course! What about the brother of--oops, don't wanna get too spoilery here, but let it be known that even the death of a few major villains are brushed off. If the show doesn't care about character death, why should the viewer? Heck, it's not even just death that has no consequences, characters can get limbs cut off, but they immediately get replaced with robotic replacements with no struggle or anything of the sort.
But hey, let's be positive here!One thing that really impressed me about the show was the animation. While I don't think the animation and art style itself is all to nice to look at, what did impress me was the set pieces. Most episodes have huge worlds as their setting and they almost never reuse the same location twice. The amount of money and dedication that went into this show is insane. The combat could be better, but everything only got better as it went on. By season 6, it had become the nicest looking CG show I've ever seen. One thing I don't like is the character designs. Maybe it's just me, but something about their faces looks... Wrong. Asoka's face in particular looks really weird to me.
I feels like her face has like 50% mace than it should have. I'm just glad she learned about shirts later on in the series, that was a welcome addition.
And thus, I conclude this overly long post. Overall, I enjoyed Star Wars: The Clone Wars. While I may have personally thought it was a very flawed show, I still enjoyed what it had to offer and it let me get a bit of insight on a part of the Star Wars franchise I never truly got acquainted with. I can definitely see why people enjoy it, but it just wasn't for me. However, what is for me is the 2003 Clone Wars mini series, the 2D one. I can watch them over and over, It's probably the best 2D action show I've ever seen, and I highly recommend you check it out. But hey, I could make another post about that. Maybe. Who knows.
Oh, by the way, not only is it Star Wars day, but...
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