Star Wars: The Clone Wars – 4x05 - 07
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tori_reviewsStar Wars: The Clone Wars – 4x05: “Mercy Mission”
Well, that was a waste of twenty-dd minutes.
You know what, that's pretty much all I have to say about it, It wasn't good, it wasn't bad in an interesting day; it wasn't even uninteresting in and interesting way. It was a nothing episode.
I guess Wolf doesn't care about droids, That may be the most interesting part of it. Although I do still wonder why Anakin's droids are here but not Anakin.
Star Wars: The Clone Wars – 4x06: “Nomad Droids”
Well, having been so disappointed in 4x05 I went right on to 4x06. I was hoping I wouldn't be left with quite as bad a feeling as I got from the one episode. Unfortunately this was, at most, mildly better than the previous episode, meaning I now have double bad feelings.
However, as this was at least interestingly bad, it will get a somewhat longer review.
The thing about this pair of episodes is I don't know under what circumstances I could have been expected to like it. And somehow that is actually less annoying than the opening arc of the season where I know I was supposed to like it but I pretty much hated it. Or at least, when I feel nothing for these episodes, that seems almost...successful at making me not hate them. But again, for the big action flashy episodes, where I still feel nothing for them, that feels unsuccessful because I at least want to like them but don't.
But these episodes are so dumb and poorly conceived that I feel like the writers have to know that they're bad. I know that's probably not true, since they wouldn't set out to write bad episodes. I guess a better way to put it is that they knew these will only appeal to a small slice of people (probably about five years old) but did succeed at being inoffensive to the rest. And at this point I'm just searching for a better way to say the same thing. It makes sense in my head.
I never could make up my mind whether they were going for a Wizard of Oz thing, or a Gulliver's Travels thing, but they were clearly going for something like that. That I'm not sure what it was doesn't speak to them succeeding very well, but again, it's fine if I'm grading on a very low scale.
I did really expect this story to end with the droids' memories getting wiped of the last few days. That somehow they go off and have these crazy side adventures, but they don't remember them. And from that I did wonder a bit about wiping Threepio's memory at the end of RotS, so he's not going to remember this anyway. I also kind of expected Hondo to actually show up with his people; show the droids getting into all kinds of trouble on their own. But mostly, I just keep expecting them the run into the Noghri at some point. I know the chronology that was originally used in the books is shot to hell, but at some point Anakin needs to find those guys so that Heir to the Empire can happen. I don't care that now it's not canon; when these episodes were written it was, so make HttE still work.
Star Wars: The Clone Wars – 4x07: “Darkness on Umbara”
Hmm... That was...maybe...good...kind of...and provisionally. I have a lot to unpack here, so after a couple short reviews, we're back to babbling.
I can't quite tell if this episode is actually good, or my expectations have just gotten so low that moderate success feels refreshing. And for the first third or so of the episode I leaning heavily towards the latter. I was bored by the first assault, it was just fighting and more fighting and lots of lasers flashing, but not a single thing to care about. Succeed, fail, I don't care, I'm probably going to do another rant about how the Republic only cares about planets like this when they side with the Separatists and get in the way of the Republic's war effort. You know, a good reason for planets to decide the Republic doesn't care about them so maybe they should join a group that wants them.
But Krell brings an actual plot and story to these events, and it got better from there. And I think that's for a few reasons. At the base level there are actually stakes now; there are characters being revealed in how they react to something more than mindless action. And also, I have a lot to talk about with Krell's behavior, because that it relevant to plenty of my regular points.
The thing, to me, is that Krell takes away the artifice I feel the Jedi often have regarding the clones. Not all the Jedi exactly, and Krell is worse, but he's also not a hypocrite the way I feel the Jedi have been throughout this. The show goes out of its way (including in this episode) to show that our heroes are nice to clones, and treat them like people instead of just resources; and I think on a personal level most of them probably do abide by that. But in a broader sense...I usually don't buy that they feel the same responsibility to the clones outside of their personal few. And it's definitely the case with the higher ups, I've always felt that they viewed the clones as a resource to be spent.
Now, one can argue that there is always a distinction between generals and common soldiers. And as I got on a WW1 train of thought a few eps back, I definitely can't say it doesn't happen in real world situations. That a commander might care about his sergeants or lieutenants, but not spare a though for the conditions of soldier who don't have a high officer's favor. But I've been discussing the whole series how this war being fought by clones keeps the cost of the fighting from being felt by the population at large. Krell just sees them the same way in person as most people think of them in the abstract.
And, because it being Krell frees the writers from needing to show the Jedi as heroes, I actually feel like this should be a fairly common way for non-favored clones to see the Jedi. That said, I really wish they hadn't given him such a monstrous look. I might be forgiving of that if the point was to give him the unusual lightsaber style; but it mostly feels like the writers want him to be easily seen as evil. If they had made him a twi'lek or something, distinct among the clones but still mostly humanoid, I think what I'm picking up from it as a wide reaching problem would have been a lot clearer. This way it's easier to say Krell is bad; but, I think if he didn't look like a bad guy at first glance and instead we came to realize that he is a bad guy, it would have been more of a sign of how...normal his behavior actually is once you strip away the artifice Yoda puts on his terrible attitudes.
In any case, after that first charge (that I didn't like, and didn't quite realize how much I didn't like because I was too checked out to care that it was dumb) the episode had some real successes. The tension is actually pretty palpable, and the conflict feels earned (granted I'm biased since I think it's long-earned), I want to see where it goes. Will this be an arc that actually sticks the landing? The last few haven't, and this has time to disappoint me, but I'm...not un-optimistic for now.
Well, that was a waste of twenty-dd minutes.
You know what, that's pretty much all I have to say about it, It wasn't good, it wasn't bad in an interesting day; it wasn't even uninteresting in and interesting way. It was a nothing episode.
I guess Wolf doesn't care about droids, That may be the most interesting part of it. Although I do still wonder why Anakin's droids are here but not Anakin.
Star Wars: The Clone Wars – 4x06: “Nomad Droids”
Well, having been so disappointed in 4x05 I went right on to 4x06. I was hoping I wouldn't be left with quite as bad a feeling as I got from the one episode. Unfortunately this was, at most, mildly better than the previous episode, meaning I now have double bad feelings.
However, as this was at least interestingly bad, it will get a somewhat longer review.
The thing about this pair of episodes is I don't know under what circumstances I could have been expected to like it. And somehow that is actually less annoying than the opening arc of the season where I know I was supposed to like it but I pretty much hated it. Or at least, when I feel nothing for these episodes, that seems almost...successful at making me not hate them. But again, for the big action flashy episodes, where I still feel nothing for them, that feels unsuccessful because I at least want to like them but don't.
But these episodes are so dumb and poorly conceived that I feel like the writers have to know that they're bad. I know that's probably not true, since they wouldn't set out to write bad episodes. I guess a better way to put it is that they knew these will only appeal to a small slice of people (probably about five years old) but did succeed at being inoffensive to the rest. And at this point I'm just searching for a better way to say the same thing. It makes sense in my head.
I never could make up my mind whether they were going for a Wizard of Oz thing, or a Gulliver's Travels thing, but they were clearly going for something like that. That I'm not sure what it was doesn't speak to them succeeding very well, but again, it's fine if I'm grading on a very low scale.
I did really expect this story to end with the droids' memories getting wiped of the last few days. That somehow they go off and have these crazy side adventures, but they don't remember them. And from that I did wonder a bit about wiping Threepio's memory at the end of RotS, so he's not going to remember this anyway. I also kind of expected Hondo to actually show up with his people; show the droids getting into all kinds of trouble on their own. But mostly, I just keep expecting them the run into the Noghri at some point. I know the chronology that was originally used in the books is shot to hell, but at some point Anakin needs to find those guys so that Heir to the Empire can happen. I don't care that now it's not canon; when these episodes were written it was, so make HttE still work.
Star Wars: The Clone Wars – 4x07: “Darkness on Umbara”
Hmm... That was...maybe...good...kind of...and provisionally. I have a lot to unpack here, so after a couple short reviews, we're back to babbling.
I can't quite tell if this episode is actually good, or my expectations have just gotten so low that moderate success feels refreshing. And for the first third or so of the episode I leaning heavily towards the latter. I was bored by the first assault, it was just fighting and more fighting and lots of lasers flashing, but not a single thing to care about. Succeed, fail, I don't care, I'm probably going to do another rant about how the Republic only cares about planets like this when they side with the Separatists and get in the way of the Republic's war effort. You know, a good reason for planets to decide the Republic doesn't care about them so maybe they should join a group that wants them.
But Krell brings an actual plot and story to these events, and it got better from there. And I think that's for a few reasons. At the base level there are actually stakes now; there are characters being revealed in how they react to something more than mindless action. And also, I have a lot to talk about with Krell's behavior, because that it relevant to plenty of my regular points.
The thing, to me, is that Krell takes away the artifice I feel the Jedi often have regarding the clones. Not all the Jedi exactly, and Krell is worse, but he's also not a hypocrite the way I feel the Jedi have been throughout this. The show goes out of its way (including in this episode) to show that our heroes are nice to clones, and treat them like people instead of just resources; and I think on a personal level most of them probably do abide by that. But in a broader sense...I usually don't buy that they feel the same responsibility to the clones outside of their personal few. And it's definitely the case with the higher ups, I've always felt that they viewed the clones as a resource to be spent.
Now, one can argue that there is always a distinction between generals and common soldiers. And as I got on a WW1 train of thought a few eps back, I definitely can't say it doesn't happen in real world situations. That a commander might care about his sergeants or lieutenants, but not spare a though for the conditions of soldier who don't have a high officer's favor. But I've been discussing the whole series how this war being fought by clones keeps the cost of the fighting from being felt by the population at large. Krell just sees them the same way in person as most people think of them in the abstract.
And, because it being Krell frees the writers from needing to show the Jedi as heroes, I actually feel like this should be a fairly common way for non-favored clones to see the Jedi. That said, I really wish they hadn't given him such a monstrous look. I might be forgiving of that if the point was to give him the unusual lightsaber style; but it mostly feels like the writers want him to be easily seen as evil. If they had made him a twi'lek or something, distinct among the clones but still mostly humanoid, I think what I'm picking up from it as a wide reaching problem would have been a lot clearer. This way it's easier to say Krell is bad; but, I think if he didn't look like a bad guy at first glance and instead we came to realize that he is a bad guy, it would have been more of a sign of how...normal his behavior actually is once you strip away the artifice Yoda puts on his terrible attitudes.
In any case, after that first charge (that I didn't like, and didn't quite realize how much I didn't like because I was too checked out to care that it was dumb) the episode had some real successes. The tension is actually pretty palpable, and the conflict feels earned (granted I'm biased since I think it's long-earned), I want to see where it goes. Will this be an arc that actually sticks the landing? The last few haven't, and this has time to disappoint me, but I'm...not un-optimistic for now.
