'Star Wars: The Clone Wars' is coming back!

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Harbinger O Great Justice
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It's definitely a punch to the heart emotionally.

I think that of all of the things, there was one line that REALLY rings in my head, and I think that it's something that sticks with Ahsoka for a long time, but it also rips to the very core of the character who says it as well,

"You WANTED this chaos!"

One of the most interesting things about all of this has been the reveal in the Revenge of the Sith novelization that the concept of the Force Dyad was supposed to be a balance between the light and dark, and that that's related to why the Sith keep the Rule of Two. Maul was genuinely on the very cusp of having a real link with Ahsoka, and there's a reason that that moment mirrors Kylo Ren reaching out to Rey in The Last Jedi – it's the Force Dyad of Anakin's Legacy & Palpatine's Legacy slowly shifting sides. Anakin's is turning towards Darkness, and Palpatine's is shifting away from it. This is why afterwards, we see Maul obsessively pursuing both Light & Dark, whereas Ahsoka pulls back from either – they're two different forms of Balance within the Force. Ben was buried deeply in the push-and-pull of both side, whereas Rey was a nobody who wanted to back away from her part in the legacy altogether. I think that's why Anakin's old Lightsaber calls out to her over Ben in Episode VII. This is one of the things that's slowly helped me to settle in to a perspective on Episode IX that I actually enjoy, though I have yet to rewatch it again still.

They really managed to hit the emotional core of all of that spectacularly well. Additionally, showing the moment of the Empire discovering the wreckage is important, since I fully expect the Mandalorian's artifact in the holding cells to be recovered by them, and currently be in possession by Moff Gideon post-RotJ.



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Ite

Ite

Save your valediction (she/her)
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Ite
I haven't seen Season 7, wasn't sure if I wanted to. My trusted friends have all recommended it, though, so I will give it a go. Here is my big hesitation:

I loved the way the show left off with Anakin and Ahsoka at the end of Season 5. The tragedy was so understated, and human. Circumstances have forced these characters apart, but you know that for Anakin, it's his biggest fear. Losing Ahsoka is such a perfect, relateable, believable step for the main villain's arc. It made everything in Star Wars feel so inevitable. I'm a little worried that by having Anakin and Ahsoka cross paths again it will undo the impact of her absence. To me, it's vital that Anakin has a "this is the end of history" mindset, and knowing that his relationship with Ahsoka can change as time marches on... it adds a sense of hope that isn't there if she stays gone. That's really it.

However, I thought the end of Season 5 was the perfect way to end the show, and then Season 6 came along and was awesome. As this show is probably my favorite SW property, and it's the same team, I must say that I trust the team to deliver. Hold my Force Disperser, I'm goin in!

*edit: mixed up season #s there
 
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X-SOLDIER

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Harbinger O Great Justice
AKA
X
The format of the final 4 episodes of Season 7 essentially being a single film that runs in parallel to Revenge of the Sith is what really makes the final season something incredible. The way that you see everything happening and know that it can't and won't ever be enough to change what happens, the missed opportunities, the tragedies, and the lessons that get learned from the experience – both for good and not are what made it work for me so well.

I would highly, HIGHLY recommend rewatching Revenge of the Sith before watching the final 4 episode of Clone Wars. Just that alone is one HELL of an experience.

Also, I wholeheartedly agree that the shot of Ahsoka walking away from the temple is hard to beat – but I think that the final shot of season 7 manages to do exactly that, while also definitively representing the end of the Clone Wars.




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X-SOLDIER

X-SOLDIER

Harbinger O Great Justice
AKA
X
Oh man, I'm very curious where they're gonna go with this, especially with them trying to find a place during the rise of the Empire since that's very much putting them in the uncomfortable role of the bad guys.



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Shademp

Shademp

420
I swear. Several seconds went by where I read that huge text as "THE BAD BITCH" and I am far from alone in this.

I was like, "Man, Disney is in a really edgelord mood right now what-with reopening Disneyland during the pandemic and then announcing a Star Wars show with the word 'bitch' in it".
 
Ite

Ite

Save your valediction (she/her)
AKA
Ite
So I took the opportunity to binge all 7 seasons in order of chronology, not episode release. While doing so, I compiled a list of the episodes in terms of their relevance and entertainment value. Obviously, the latter rating is subjective, and what comes across as a dud to me might be your favorite episode.

It was very interesting to see how three different studios handled what they believed to be the final season of this show. As I said above, Clone Wars is my fave SW entry, and even rewatching dud episodes didn't feel like a waste of my time. When binging straight through to Season 7 (and having never seen more than an episode of Rebels) the Mouse's sudden handprint is so clear and jarring that I was immediately turned off. Character animations took a turn from Dreamworks style to Pixar style -- what I mean by that is that Dreamworks animations use a kind of expressive tableau style to show characters active inside of their bodies without a lot of movement. Pixar characters are comparitively weighty and poised, with characters assuming a relaxed position between lines of dialogue. In Laban terms, Ahsoka went from punch to flow, which was really strange to see because the voice performance didn't change. Anakin's altered body language, however, was incredible to see. They somehow found a way to split the difference between Anakin and Darth Vader, adding a stillness and gravitas to him that I've felt has been missing from ALL pre-Vader Anakin appearances.

Maul was sublimely executed, a beautiful blend of his Episode 1 self and the development from the earlier epsiodes of CW. In the episode where Ahsoka is escaping the Pikes and she sees his hologram for the first time, the way his eyes appeared beneath his hood looked like Ray Park had stepped from the real world into the cartoon. His movement, voice performance, and combat were all thrilling. I was over the moon when I saw him with the double-blade again, and the fight choreo was -- I can't praise it enough. The action sequences in Season 7 are just brilliantly directed overall.

I said in my last post that I was worried, and it wasn't an unfounded worry: I feel like Anakin being on good terms again with Ahsoka really undercuts his knighting as Lord Vader. Like, his sudden flip from "Don't kill Palpatine I need him" to "Let's kill children" is really, um, fake? to begin with. Like, I'm not convinced that what I'm watching in RotS is a real result of things in-universe and not just George needing Anakin to become Darth Vader really really badly, and like, right now. The only thing that justified that plot twist was to think that Anakin has nothing except his wife, that in his eyes even his best friend is on 'team traitor'. But with Season 7, that's just not true anymore, he has another best friend -- more than that, his own clone battalion is currently helping her bring justice to his enemies. Their relationship is strained, sure, but he's not a guy who has nothing, as he would have been had Ahsoka ghosted on him, a la Season 5. So, the impact of Seasons 7 is as expected here: I'm even less sold on RotS. It's not a huge problem, I suppose, since the CW is simply a better property than the prequel movies -- I vote that the last four episodes of Season 7 replace the prequels in the Machete order.

There's more to the Mousification on Season 7, but they're small gripes. The "comedy bit accented by silly music" was in every episode, whereas it was used sparingly even in the early seasons of CW and not at all in the Netflix season. It's something that reminds me of the Aladdin cartoon show or other Disney TV efforts. Scenes are shorter with meaningless cliffhangers, dialogue is slower, with all the important nouns drip-fed and repeated by the perspective characters so the audience is never left behind. I wanted to like the smuggler sisters but something about them triggered my "agenda radar" in a way that the myriad of female characters in "Legends" and previous seasons of CW didn't. Likewise, during a particularly badass Ahsoka moment around the 20 minute mark of S7E09, fuckin' Rey's Theme plays, which is so reductive, Disney is using two rights to make a wrong here. It was weird enough when Yoda's Theme played when she got her blue sabers (why doesn't Ahsoka have her own theme??) but by using two bars of Rey's Theme they're essentially turning one of Williams' most inspired leitmotifs into generic Girl-Hero(TM) music. It's paradoxically anti-feminist in a way that, well... people don't want to hear about because there are enough ACTUAL anti-feminists poisoning the SW fandom soooo maybe I should just take the ham-fisted fake Disney wokeness and shut up.

Well, that's the first pass of my critiques and adorations. I'm probably less convinced than ever to watch Rebels, but I really enjoyed S7 overall.
 
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