Star Wars Clone Wars Season Premiere

[Mr Light]

I think "Clone Cadets" is actually my all time LEAST favorite episode of the show so far. It convinced my GF she's not interested in watching the show anymore. I kept telling her the second episode was much better but she refused to come out and watch it!

A) it stars a bunch of clones, which I'm never crazy about in the first place. B) it's just training with no actual threat. C) it's about the most unoriginal story you could think of. So a group of guys hate each other and are failures but learn to work together in the end and win? Wow! I've never seen that before!

The second episode, "ARC Troopers", was another great typical episode. Great action, an event of actual importance, Anakin vs. Ventress, Obi-Wan vs. Grievous... I really liked the squid ships, very cool design and movement.

And thank you so much, when fighting Grievous, Obi-Wan actually thought to use a Force Push against him!

 

[Mr. Adventure]

Clone Cadets was not too great and the pay-off wasn't too effective IMO. I really liked some of the visuals in the latter episode, especially some of the lighting of the red corridors with blaster bolts and lightsabers. Somehow Asaaj Ventriss (sp?) in that white room looked really spectacular. Having the voice artists on the commercial bumpers was a lot of fun.

 

[Mr Light]

It just absolutely boggles my mind that THAT is the episode they chose to open the season with, spending all this ad money. They should have just had the "ARC Troopers" episode as the opener and could have had "Clone Cadets" aired later in the season as an after-the-fact prequel which they've done twice before. God forbid somebody was lured into watching this show for the very first time only to see an episode with no enemies, no Anakin, no Ashoka, no Obi-Wan...

 

[Temis the Vorta]

Probably in a few months, I'll start a thread where I ask for recommendations on what to watch this season. It will take me that long to catch up on S1 and S2. I'm determined to get over my Trekkian disdain for Star Wars villains.

I really think it's the Sith/Dark Jedi and not the clones, has been my problem with getting into this series. I see someone like Dooku or Ventress and think about Dukat, Damar and Weyoun, and the Sith just seem intolerably absurd and campy and impossible to take seriously.

Even the names bug me - Dooku? Grevious? Do they have five year olds making up the names? Why not just call them PooPoo and Doodyhead? Why can't Clone Wars at least attempt a character like Weyoun??? Do they ever even come close?

 

[Mr Light]

I'm afraid the vast majority of Clone Wars episodes are going to have cartoonish villains, Temis. Cad Bane was really the only major villain who wasn't silly to some degree (not counting his ridiculous hat).

 

[Mr. Adventure]

The episodes with the duchess of Mandalore weren't too cartoonish.

 

[Christopher]

B) it's just training with no actual threat.

That was what I liked about it. One of the good things about this show is that it's willing to do a change-of-pace episode like this and tell a story that focuses purely on character. Although I'll agree it wasn't the most original story they could've told. And it is an odd way to open the season. Even odder to show this team coming together and then immediately follow it up with a sequel set months (?) later after the death of the team leader we just saw marching away in triumph minutes earlier.

My favorite part of the duology was Shaak Ti. She's a new one as far as this series is concerned, though I know she was in the movies and I remember her playing a significant role in the final few episodes of the Tartakovsky Clone Wars series. Nice vocal performance by Tasia Valenza, and an appealing character design. She's actually kind of hot in a weird way.

My least favorite part was the debris just "falling" out of orbit, straight down and in a matter of seconds. I know I shouldn't expect anything resembling realistic physics from Star Wars, but nobody in TV or film ever gets orbital mechanics right, so it kind of gets on my nerves.

 

[Nowhere Man]

Probably in a few months, I'll start a thread where I ask for recommendations on what to watch this season. It will take me that long to catch up on S1 and S2. I'm determined to get over my Trekkian disdain for Star Wars villains.

I really think it's the Sith/Dark Jedi and not the clones, has been my problem with getting into this series. I see someone like Dooku or Ventress and think about Dukat, Damar and Weyoun, and the Sith just seem intolerably absurd and campy and impossible to take seriously.

Even the names bug me - Dooku? Grevious? Do they have five year olds making up the names? Why not just call them PooPoo and Doodyhead? Why can't Clone Wars at least attempt a character like Weyoun??? Do they ever even come close?

I like Clone Wars, but I see what you mean. Star Trek Vilians have more deapth to them. I mean Vader of course is great and the Emperor, but I don't think I hate niether of them as Dukat. DS9 is not even my favorite series, but I think Dukat is my most hated Star Trek villian. Even Khan is charasmatic and I understand where he comes from. With Dukat, he's just a cocksucker. I know it has nothing to do with the topic, just wanted to point that out.

 

[Admiral_Young]

I didn't mind the clone centric episode...nice quiet way to open up the season and establishes more clones, caught the THX-1138 reference which brought a smile to my face. Seeing Shaak Ti for the first time in the series is awesome and having her the general in charge of training the clones is interesting, she's one of my favorite Jedi from the prequels.

Teletoon here in Canada had snippets from Celebration V with voice actors and the creative team regarding Season Three, Matt Lanter said that this season will see Anakin start to slide into the dark side more which will be good to see. The failure on the attack on Kamino obviously sets up the introduction of Savage Opress now which I am kind of interested in seeing how he fits into everything.

 

[cylkoth]

Darn, forgot completely it was starting tonight and didn't set the recorder. Thank goodness for encores...Sat AM @ 9:30est, Sun @ 9pm est, and Tue @ 9 again.
Timeshifting is going to be a bear again this season.

 

[Admiral_Young]

Actually I did forget...I saw Mr. Light's thread and rushed to the TV...it hadn't aired yet on the west coast so I didn't miss them lol.

 

[Mr Light]

Odd bit of programming; Clone Wars repeats a bunch of times, but the new Batman Brave and the Bold episodes are only airing ONCE at Friday 7:30pm and then never again. Thank god I got home in time!

 

[P0sitr0nic]

I liked the first episode. This series, at its heart, is about the clones and their struggle to find who they are. The Jedi and the war itself, is secondary.

 

[Dac]

What the fuck.

After that moody epic trailer for season 3, we get this cliched and hobbled together POS (both eps), and next week with got a Jar Jar ep the freakin' announcer took the piss out of.

I really got into this show with season 2, but seriously, what the hell was up with these eps?!

 

[DarKush]

I liked both episodes, though after reading more about them on Wookieepedia, I think its odd that they would have a prequel show ("Clone Cadets") for a season one show ("Rookies") in season three. And I guess the following show ("Arc Troopers") is a sequel to "Rookies". I liked the first show a little better than the second, even though the second had a good amount of action. The second show had more of a been there, done that feel to it.

We've seen Anakin v. Ventress before and I think it was better done in both the microseries and in the Republic comic books. Grevious and Obi Wan was blah as well. I wish Grevious would just stand his ground and fight for once without running. I don't get why they had to puff up this guy to be such a badass Jedi Killer but so rarely show it.

I liked the first episode better because I hadn't seen "Rookies" beforehand and was interested to see if how Domino squadron would fare. Also, getting the update in "Arc Troopers" was nice and sobering. If I had seen "Rookies" though, I probably would've been scratching my head about why they decided to go with that show instead of just opening up a two-hour premiere focused on the assault on Kamino. Once again, I think the Republic comics handled their battle of Kamino better as well.

I'll skip the Jar Jar show and see what comes on after that.

 

[Christopher]

Oh, I had no idea these were the same clones from "Rookies." I can't tell them apart. The subtle costume and facial details to distinguish the clones are hard for me to keep track of, as are the nicknames.

Interesting that Anakin was willing to execute Ventress in cold blood. It's a foreshadowing of his descent to the Dark Side, and I wonder how much more of that we'll see this year.

 

[issreliant]

I enjoyed the CW premiere, "Clone cadets" was a little slow but i loved that they brought back the clones from "rookies", and thought that 99 was such a sad character. "ARC troopers" was awesome, want to see more of fives and echo later in the season!

 

[Whofan]

Regarding Temis's point, once you get into the novels there's Grand Admiral Thrawn, a fairly complex villain.

Spoiler: Thrawn trilogy

He actually studies the artwork of his enemies in order to gain insight into their culture-and their weaknesses. Might sound silly but it works in the book.

 

[Mr Light]

Yeah I barely remember "Rookies" and I just saw it again a few months ago. I certainly don't care about individual clone characters. I know they're trying to develop them a little, but they're just too interchangeable. Visually and character-wise.

 

[DarthPipes]

I really enjoyed both episodes. I liked the clones so any chance to see an episode that focuses on them is a plus to me. I agree the story told wasn't close to original but I think it worked here. The visuals alone were amazing and we got the intro to Shaak Ti. Clone 99 was no doubt based on the hunchback in 300.

Second episode was even better. Invading Kamino always seems to lead to good stories, whether in the original Republic comic or hear. Nice to see the return of Ventress, who is always an entertaining character. Her dropping sexual innuendo with Grievous was amusing. Not the first instance of this on the show.