Well, we get two big genre premieres today, Doctor Who and this, and... well... Doctor Who was great. The story was okay, I guess, but I can't get over how bad this show looks. I've been complaining about the cel shading for a while now, but now that I get a longer look, I can tell that the main problem is that the contrast is just turned up too high. The bright parts are too damn bright and they wash out detail and make the colors too garish. But it's not just the cel shading. The character models are awkwardly designed too. The arms and legs are these rigid tubes that seem too long and make the characters look like wooden dolls or something when they bend their arms or walk. It's bizarre that the animation here is so much worse than on the previous two SW animated series.
The animation is excellent. The story... a bit too childish to start. Way more so than Rebels was, but I still laughed and enjoyed it.
I loved everything about it except for the lead character, Kazuda Xiono. Constant cringe. It's really bad when he's talking. How did they draw inspiration from Jar Jar Binks for their lead? Being clumsy, etc. Makes Ezra seem much more mature for his age by comparison. Do we want to watch this guy get tortured by the First Order? I guess Kaz is meant to reflect a new character archetype in Star Wars, the privileged. A theme in the premiere was using his senator dad as leverage to "get out" of unpleasant situations. Wonder if his dad dies in the Hosnian attack. When I think about how much Ahsoka and Ezra improved over time - it's possible Kaz would eventually become more bearable. They have to get Kaz out of the mechanic role as soon as possible. There's a lot to be excited about besides that. The time frame is compelling. We are finally exploring the ST period and maybe we'll see the First Order rise over time. I am totally invested in what Poe wants to find out about. Starkiller Base? The Supremacy? Snoke? The setting - that refueling base is interesting. More Leia is always a bonus. I'm guessing we'll be seeing her sparingly, as will we Phasma. It's interesting about Phasma, I would have sworn that she'd be back in Episode IX because her character was 'killed off' in The Force Awakens and again in The Last Jedi so I though it might be a running gag - she ends up 'dead' in each film but always comes back. Anyway, with Phasma to be featured in this series it seems clear to me that she AIN'T coming back in IX. Which is fine...
This series is six months prior to TFA, so I suspect it's probably Starkiller. The fact that Gwendoline Christie isn't in Episode IX's cast list should make that clear.
Poe said it outright -- the Resistance believes the First Order is planning an attack on them, and they're trying to find out what kind of attack.
Which is likely in reference to the attack on the Hosnian system. I'm sure it took more than six months to plan.
I'm not a big fan of the animation. It looks weird. It's very soft looking. The animation on Clone Wars and Rebels got better over time so I hope this does too. Those little gorg creatures look too gross to eat. Jar Jar liked them so they are probably too gross.
Interesting. I'd say it's just the opposite of soft-looking. The overblown contrast between light and shading makes the characters' skin look metallic, and the bizarrely rigid limb animation has characters posing their arms like they're C-3PO.
So Kaz is probably so going to get fucked up when Hosnian goes boom and the First Order steam rolling everything in the chaos.
He almost invariably is. Just about the only times he hasn't played Threepio are in video games, and parodies like Robot Chicken. I've always appreciated what a trouper Daniels is, always there to play the part no matter what it's for.
When they bring Orka his lunch and it flips around on the table. Is he going to eat it later whole, live? That's kind of dark.. but it helps make the mystique of the Colossus station happen. I was wondering where I'd heard the name Gorg before, it seemed familiar somehow... http://muppet.wikia.com/wiki/Gorgs On second watch, they reference the First Order planning a major attack on the New Republic, so yes, this must be it. We are finally getting to see some ST broad strokes. As for the cast list for IX, I'd noticed and felt Christie's omission was misdirection. This was my feeling up until realizing she would be in this animated series Resistance because somehow I felt we wouldn't see the last of her in The Last Jedi.... I felt like there was "more" to Phasma than Disney let on. You know, Disney is very proud of this strong, unique character who doesn't really do anything but fail when she's in the ST films. If there is a slight chance she gets to finally kick ass in this series... now is certainly the time for it. Plus, it's clear she has no more story to tell in episode IX at this point anyway. I hope she isn't (secretly) in it as I used to think she would be. That would be some heavy shit. I do hope they go there. One nice thing about this series is it has no restrictions on the time frame. The ST to date, VII and VIII happens in such a short period of time, Star Wars Resistance might push the playhead for Episode IX ahead by a few years, once the events of the ST are surpassed in Resistance. We don't seem to know Kazuda's age yet. Seems Luke Skywalker A New Hope age or younger.
Watched episodes 2 & 3 last night... Spoiler: Spoilers fun episodes, but this is definitely more kid oriented than Rebels and the Star Warsishness has really been kept to a minimum. Still haven't been introduced to a lot of the cast. They're certainly taking their time with setting things up. Animation is still excellent, but you can tell they cut corners here and there. Hopefully that's fixed as time goes on.
Not much to say at this point. Definitely skewed a little younger than even Rebels. Some of the goofiness didn't land for me and felt a little clunky. But that said, overall I'd say this is a much stronger first episode than either SWR or TCW had. I see a lot of potential here. I love the art style and design aesthetic of the world and the ships. It has just the right mix of Flash Gordon sleekness and gritty lived-in feel of a western that's quintessentially Star Wars, with a little of Miyazaki's vivid and frenetic style. As far as the story goes; at this point I'm much more interested in getting to know the extended cast and the world building stuff about the Colossus and it's inhabitants than I am about the spy plot...because we already know what's going to happen, it's only a question of who the First Order toady is going to be. Prediction: Captain whatshisface with the luxury tower is the FO collaborator, willingly or otherwise. Partly because he's the logical choice but most especially because his daughter looks to be a major supporting character going forward and will probably end up flying in a Resistance squadron along with the rest of the Aces by the end of the season, and that has the most potential for drama. Prediction the second: At some point the Colossus will be occupied by the First Order, destroyed and/or will lift off and become a mobile base.
Watched the premiere episodes and it was alright but didn't really grab my interest with the characters, story or art style. I'll give it a few more episodes maybe.
I saw episode 2 via On Demand, and wow, Kaz is an idiot. You’d think Poe would’ve given the guy some actual training in espionage before assigning him to a spy mission. Like, say, don’t keep walking around talking loudly to your droid about how “WE HAVE TO DO OUR SPY MISSION NOW BECAUSE I'M A SPY!” I suppose this is another symptom of Poe’s overconfidence as seen in The Last Jedi. Alternatively, I heard a fan theory today that BB-8 is the real spy and Kaz is his cover. On the plus side, the darker lighting makes the cel shading work a bit better, but the arms and legs are still weirdly long and stiff. And are Kaz’s pockets dimensionally transcendental? That big trophy and several large bars of cash created no bulge in his jacket. I could buy that if it had been a lower pocket of a big, loose coat, but not a chest-height pocket like that. As for episode 3, all I can say is, whoever finally invents safety railings in the Star Wars universe is going to make a fortune. Am I right that the droid Bucket is basically a skeletal R2 unit?
Bucket appears to be an R1 unit. So even older model (different from the usual R1 units we've seen before, but the one we've seen might have just been an R1 unit's processors in another droid body (a reactor droid of some sort I seem to recall...seen on Tatooine with the Jawas selling R2-D2 and C-3PO.)
I've seen the first three episodes. This is so far not a good show at all. There are certain elements that are good, such as some of the outdoor shading and the modeling. The voice cast is pretty good. But it is not enough. I wouldn't even mind that it is clearly aimed at a younger audience than either TCW or REB, and even also that we must have the lead learn lessons, but as has been mentioned by others Kaz is very annoying. I also can't really place a lower bound on the number of people in the galaxy who should know by now that Kaz is a Resistance spy, given how easy it would be for someone to overhear him talking about it in a world where he can easily overhear the private conversations of others that were safeguarded with care similar to what he has shown.