"Star Wars: The Clone Wars" (television show) - season 1, episode 10 - Lair of Grievous - June 2023 review

"Star Wars:  The Clone Wars" (television show)

season 1, episode 10 - Lair of Grievous

"Most powerful is he who controls his own power."

Jedi Kit Fisto is tracking Gunray.  Hmm, that name sounds vaguely familiar.  But he falls into Dooku's trap.

Grievous was cut in half during a battle, but he returns to his lair, where he has a droid who can fix him.  The repair droid sure has an attitude and seems to be the only thing that can talk that way to Grievous.

There's a mechanical creature that fights Kit Fisto, a former padawan of his and a trooper, and the trooper dies, which sends the former-padawan into a rage.

Dooku had let the Jedi into Grievous' lair as a test to Grievous, and when Grievous figures that out, he is not happy.  The Separatists all turn on each other at some point or another, it seems.

Kit Fisto's former padawan takes on Grievous, trying to avenge the troopers death, but he falls to Grievous instead.  Fisto manages to escape though.

"Star Wars: The Clone Wars" (television show) - season 1, episode 9 - Cloak of Darkness - June 2023 review

"Star Wars:  The Clone Wars" (television show)

season 1, episode 9 - Cloak of Darkness

"Ignore your instincts at your peril."

These last few pre-episode declarations have been super fortune-cookie not-fortunes.  And then the husband and I got sidetracked and started discussing Jedi fortune cookies.  The factory would be on Coruscant, and those poor younglings would be made to do the labor of making the cookies and sticking the fortunes in there.

Master Luminara Unduli and Ahsoka are tasked with taking Nute Gunray to Coruscant for trial.  Oh, *that's* Luminara, who I'd only heard about because her lightsabre was being sold at Dok Ondar's on Batuu.  Turns out she was voiced by Olivia D'Abo.  Interesting.

Darth Sidious tells Dooku that Gunray needs to be rescued or at least silenced so that he doesn't give up all the information about them and their plans.  Dooku sends Ventress and tells her that this is a test for her, given that she has not performed well previously and Sidious is not pleased with her.

Luminara is interrogating Gunray, and Ahsoka jumps in and threatens to kill him if he doesn't talk.  Ummm, that's not how the Jedi are supposed to work, Ahsoka, even if you were only threatening and weren't meaning to hurt him.  And why is Ahsoka with Luminara when she's Anakin's padawan?  They can just pass them around?

Ventress has freed Gunray and they're trying to escape, but they run into Luminara and Ahsoka.  The two of them fighting Ventress was pretty cool.

Turns out that one of the troopers is actually working for Dooku to get Gunray.  And hey, he's voiced by James Marsters, Spike from "Buffy the Vampire Slayer", who by name I always confuse with James Marsden, Cyclops from X-Men.  Cocky traitor trooper gets taken care of by Ventress, who escapes with Gunray.

"Star Wars: The Clone Wars" (television show) - season 1, episode 8 - Bombad Jedi - June 2023 review

"Star Wars:  The Clone Wars" (television show)

season 1, episode 8 - Bombad Jedi

"Heroes are made by the times."

OK, I don't know why this particular bit of info has stuck in my head, and I'm not sure I should publicly admit to it, but as soon as I saw the episode title, I knew that "bombad" was a Gungan word because I remember Boss Nass, the head of the Gungans, using it.  So I was thinking we might see more Gungans, but it turns out, the title is in reference to the one Gungan already in the picture.

Padme is on some kind of diplomatic mission, with apprentice Jar Jar and 3PO accompanying her.  She's going to the Rodians to get them to stay loyal to the Republic.

Hello, Ahmed Best!

Unfortunately, Padme's old family friend has turned on her to save his own people, and he's already made a deal with the Separatists to turn over Padme to Nute Gunray.  It's a trap.

OK, so why is there a Jedi robe in Padme's ship?  Presumably that's Anakin's?  Does he have more than one robe?  Where do they get it from?  Is there a special Jedi clothing and accessory store for Jedi like there are for Boy Scouts?  Somehow, Jar Jar ends up wearing the robe, and the Separatists think that there's a Jedi lurking about.

Jar Jar makes friends with some kind of giant worm that looked like the thing that was menacing the clone troopers from the last episode and also reminded me of the sand worms from the 1990s "Dune" movie.

"Star Wars: The Clone Wars" (television show) - season 1, episode 7 - Duel of the Droids - June 2023 review

"Star Wars:  The Clone Wars" (television show)

season 1, episode 7 - "Duel of the Droids"

"You hold onto friends by keeping your heart a little softer than your head."

The Jedi know that the Separatists have a secret listening post where they are able to intercept Republic information and are intent on finding and stopping it.  Turns out, that's exactly where the salvage ship dude is going to meet Grievous.

Betrayal - R3 works for Grievous!

Cool fight between Ahsoka and Grievous.

That fight between R2 and R3!!!!  It was like rock-em-sock-em robots.  Good thing R3 wasn't fighting BB8, cause BB8 has a lighter.  R2 prevails in the end.

"Star Wars: The Clone Wars" (television show) - season 1, episode 6 - Downfall of a Droid - June 2023 review

"Star Wars:  The Clone Wars" (television show)

season 1, episode 6 - Downfall of a Droid

"Trust in your friends, and they'll have reason to trust in you."

Obi-Wan tells Anakin to retreat from Grievous' impending arrival, but Anakin won't abandon the people.  So far, I haven't been too happy with a lot of things that Obi-Wan has said and done.  He's pretty quick to just abandon people that they're supposed to be protecting.  Ahsoka agrees with Obi-Wan but she's stuck with Anakin.

Anakin has plans for a sneak attack on the droid forces - they've landed the ground troops on the asteroids that the battle droids think serve as protection against being attacked by ships.  Great plan, Anakin!  But Grievous escapes ... again.

But there's one casualty - Anakin's ship is attacked, and when he wakes up from his rescue, he discovers that R2 is missing.  He finds his damaged ship, but no R2.  Ahsoka convinces Anakin to accept a "temporary" replacement in the form of an R3 droid, nicknamed "stubby" and "goldie", but this droid is pretty incompetent.  Anakin goes to a salvage ship in search of R2 but comes up empty.  He doesn't know, though, that the salvage ship owner has hidden R2 away and has already made a deal to trade him to Grievous.  Anakin hadn't wiped R2's memory banks so R2 has a bunch of information about the Republic that Grievous could use against them.

As Anakin and Ahsoka were making their way through the salvage ship, they came across some assassin droids that R3 accidentally activated.  They had Ahsoka for a minute, but Anakin was able to save her with a Force push.  See, Force push!  Great ability, right?  Would be handy to use more often.

R2 knocks off his restraining bolt by banging it against a wall corner.  Hmmm, that seems pretty easy, and I guess because it's metal, you don't have the same risk of tearing skin like you'd do with human flesh?  Still seemed too easy, though.

"Star Wars: The Clone Wars" (television show) - season 1, episode 5 - Rookies - June 2023 review

"Star Wars:  The Clone Wars" (television show)

season 1, episode 5 - Rookies

"The best confidence builder is experience."

Because of the war between the Republic and the Separatists, the clones are being forced into joining the battle before they have completed their training.  Great, so not only are they created for the purpose of being cannon fodder anyway, but now, they're being tossed in there without being properly trained.  And they don't even have life experience to fall back on to know how to handle situations.  This is getting worse and worse.  No one told me that I'd be so triggered by clones!

Hmm, different kind of battle droids and not super battle droids.  Commander droids, they say?  Grievous' droids infiltrate the station where the clones are bored and complacent.  Wait, how did they cut the door open like that?  What weapon do they have?  Cause that looks like what a lightsabre would do but they don’t have a lightsabre.

This is just the first step for Grievous.  He wants to take over this station because then he'll be able to attack Kamino so that no more clones can be made, and the Republic won’t have new troops to join the fight.

Captain Rex and Commander Cody (That means Rex is in charge, right?) happen to have an inspection scheduled for the station.  That whole interaction with the droids pretending to be clones sure sounded like an homage to the scene in Star Wars where Han pretends to be a stormtrooper and telling the officers that they're all fine, here, now, thank you, how are you <wince>.  The masquerading droid ends the conversation with "roger roger".  Umm, clones shouldn't be saying that, so that should have been a bigger clue to Rex and Cody that something is off, but they probably haven't had conversations with Separatist droids or heard them talking to each other, so they wouldn't know that.

4 clones managed to survive the attack and escape to the outside.  They see Rex and Cody arriving and want to try to warn them.  The clones trick the droids into opening the door by pretending to be a droid in a clone trooper outfit.  When the droid wants them to remove their helmet so the droid can see their faceplate, the clone trooper ducks and then we see a droid head, and then we see that one of the other clone troopers is pretty much holding the head on a stick in front of the camera.  One of the other clone troopers puts his face in his hands and laments that this is never going to work.  Ahh, but they underestimate how dumb a droid, especially a battle droid, can be.  We laughed so much at this scene that I had to pause it, rewind it, and watch it again!  Brilliant idea!

When the one clone stayed behind to try to fix the detonator to destroy the base, I knew he was a goner.  He sacrificed himself to the very end to fulfill his mission, for the good of others.  This show is killing me with how they're portraying the clone troopers.  I might not know them individually, but I'm sure feeling each of their deaths.

 

"Star Wars: The Clone Wars" (television show) - season 1, episode 4 - Destroy Malevolence - June 2023 review

"Star Wars:  The Clone Wars" (television show)

season 1, episode 4 - Destroy Malevolence

“A plan is only as good as those who see it through.”  I feel like they’re channeling Hannibal from “The A-Team”.

Oh, and this episode starts right after the end of the last episode, so the ship is still there, albeit in flames.

So his name is Plo Kloon, but they call him Master Plo, not Master Kloon.  But they refer to others as Master Windu and Master Skywalker.  Does that mean that “Plo” is his family name.  (Shout out to Din Djarin.)

Someone mentions Master Luminara.  I think their lightsabre was one of the ones released at Dok Ondar’s in Black Spire Outpost.

The Malevolence is ginormous and can withstand the barrage of firepower from *three* star destroyers?  Wow.

Padme & 3PO get lured to the area on some kind of fake diplomatic mission and instead get tractor beamed into the Malevolence

In a random segment inside the Malevolence, I laughed when I heard the repeated “mind the gap” announcement.  Ah, London Underground humour!

Anakin and Obi-Wan go to rescue Padme and 3PO, but Grievous escapes.  Anakin rigs the Malevolence’s hyperdrive to blow, destroying the ship.

"Star Wars: The Clone Wars" (television show) - season 1, episode 3 - Shadow of Malevolence - June 2023 review

"Star Wars:  The Clone Wars" (television show)

season 1, episode 3 - Shadow of Malevolence

“Easy is the path to wisdom for those not blinded by ego.”

Malevolence is the name of the Separatist battle ship.  Ahh, ok, that’s what they’ve been referencing in the episode titles.

Shadow Squadron - Hmmm, I feel like I’ve heard of them from other things.  Maybe books?  They have yellow ships with dual pilots, almost like the speeders on Hoth, where the pilots are facing away from each other.

The Separatists have decided to go after a medical facility outpost near Naboo where injured clones are taken for treatment and recovery.  They figure that means there are fewer clones to come back into battle, but you can always tell the super bad guys because they go after the wounded and injured, like The Capital did in “The Hunger Games”.

Anakin and Ahsoka and Plo Kloon are going to try to defend the outpost.

Plo Kloon’s ship is blue, and he has a hyperspace ring.  *sigh*  Everyone has a hyperspace ring but me.

Of course, the folks from Kamino are the ones running the medical facility.

As a sort of short cut, Shadow Squadron are going to go through a nebula to get to the facility to get there sooner while Obi-Wan takes the star destroyer.  However, they discover that the nebula is a nesting ground for giant mantis, so they run into some trouble there.

Battle droid - “I’ve got a bad feeling about this.”  I was going to say I think this is the first time a non-humanoid says it, but then I think 3PO has said it too, though I don’t remember when.

They manage to overload the ion cannon, causing the Malevolence to erupt in flames.

And here comes Obi-Wan and three star destroyers.  Yeah, still getting used to that.

At the end of this episode, I was thinking, wait, does Grievous escape with the ship?  What happens?

"Star Wars: The Clone Wars" (television show) - season 1, episode 2 - Rising Malevolence - June 2023 review

"Star Wars:  The Clone Wars" (television show)

season 1, episode 2 - Rising Malevolence

"Belief is not a matter of choice, but of conviction."

I know the name Plo Kloon but I don't know that I've seen him before, or at least I didn't know that's who I was looking at.  He is sent off to find a devastating Separatist weapon.  He runs into problems so calls Anakin and Ahsoka but can't tell them much before he's cut off.  Ahsoka wants to go to him, but Anakin says they must continue to follow orders and stay where they are.

General Grievous is working for Dooku, and he destroys Plo Kloon's ship but some manage to escape in life pods.  The new weapon has a lot of similarities to how a Death Star operates initially.

The Republic won't send a rescue mission after Plo Kloon's crew because in the past, there have been no survivors when the Separatists have used their weapon.  Ahsoka objects but is shot down.  Turns out, Anakin goes out there anyway.  He explains to Ahsoka that it wasn't what she was suggesting, it was how she was suggesting it.  Interesting that Anakin was as impulsive and hot-headed as Ahsoka is, but he's learned to work within the system.  I expect he learned that more from Qui-Gonn than Obi-Wan, and as a general, he also has more ability to do that now.  It's a pretty good lesson to teach Ahsoka.

When Grievous is told that life pods escaped, he instructs his crew to find them and take care of them.  The battle droids track down their pods, cut holes in the pods and then just send the survivors to die in the cold vaccuum of space.  Wow, that's pretty brutal.

Ahsoka explains to Anakin that she's so connected to Plo Kloon because he's the one who found her and brought her to the Jedi temple.  She wanted to return the favor and find him.

The clones who are with Plo Kloon are sure no rescue is coming because "we're meant to be expendable".  Plo Kloon responds, "Not to me."  This hit me pretty hard, seeing as how I've already noticed that the lives of the clones are not valued at all.  Even the clones know that, and the sentiment wasn't said with sadness or anger, just statement of fact.  And Plo Kloon is the first one we've seen who has openly disagreed with that.  I'm already feeling this way about the clones, two episodes in.  I have a feeling this is going to be a rough ride for me.

Plo Kloon and the clones end up getting rescued by Anakin and Ahsoka.

The devastating Separatist weapon is an ion cannon - basically an EMP - that knocks out all power to a ship, and with no shields and no weapons, they're blown to pieces by the Separatist ship's weapons.

So Samuel L. Jackson and Christopher Lee did the voices of Mace and Dooku, respectively, for the movie but I guess not for the series.  Oh well.  Too much to ask, probably.

"Star Wars: The Clone Wars" (television show) - introduction and season 1, episode 1 - Ambush - June 2023 review

"Star Wars:  The Clone Wars" (television show)

My journey has now taken me to a road not previously taken - "The Clone Wars" animated television show.  I know almost nothing from the series, though I've heard some of the characters mentioned over the years.

I welcome your comments on each episode, but I ask that you not include any comments that reference anything that happens in later episodes of this series or in any of the other animated series.  I would like to try to avoid "spoilers", if possible, for a show that's been out for many years.  Thanks for understanding.

season 1, episode 1 - Ambush

"Great leaders inspire greatness in others."

It took me until the third episode to realize that each episode begins with a fortune-cookie-style pithy saying.

In the war between the Republic and the Separatists, Yoda has a meeting with the king of the Toydarians to enlist their help to allow the Republic to build a base on Toydaria.  But Ventress and Dooku intervene and pitch the case for the Toydarians to align with the Separatists instead, proposing a challenge for the battle droids to capture Yoda, a challenge which Yoda accepts, the outcome of which will decide which side the Toydarians will align with.

"supreme leader Ventress"?  That's what a battle droid called her.  I don't think I've heard the title before.  Isn't Snoke also a supreme leader?

The Separatist vehicles can't make it into the foliage, so the battle droids have to enter on foot. That seems pretty lame that they can't cut through it, but then, that's Yoda's plan.

The clone troopers feel outnumbered by the battle droids, but Yoda says that's not a problem because they're smarter.  Make 10 men feel like 100, right, Cassian?

Yoda gets the battle droids to shoot each other by flipping from one to another.  So the battle droid programming is so dumb that there's no instruction not to shoot each other, some kind of safety protocol kind of like a variation on Asimov's three laws?

Yoda picks up a super battle droid, turns it around, and has it shoot the other battle droids.  He can move the droid with the Force, but he can also control the firing mechanism?  That seems odd.  Once the droid realizes it’s shooting its own fellow droids, wouldn’t it just stop shooting?

Then Yoda force-pushes the rest of the droids.  So if it's that easy, why not do that in the first place?  Yes, I'm still and will continue to be obsessed with the rules for Force pushing.

Uh oh, then the droideka arrive.

Yoda can tell each of the clone troopers apart because they each have a different Force energy, and he knows what focus each of them have.  He recognizes them as individuals.  Which the clone troopers are not used to, it appears.  Tiny stab to the heart.

A clone trooper uses their last rocket shot to take out a mountain side, crashing rocks down on the droideka.  Smash.

When the battle droids fail to capture Yoda, Dooku and Ventress go back on their deal and intend to kill the king, but Yoda saves him, cementing the alliance between the Toydarians and the Republic, with the king agreeing to let the Republic build their base.  So now the Separatives have lost Jabba and the Toydarians in the same way, by being deceptive and traitorous.  Honor among thieves.  Ventress escapes.

I really like the Republic clone transports.  I don't think I bought any of those toys.  I wish I had.  They kind of remind me of a bus with their handhold to make sure you don't fall out since there are no walls on the sides.