Full Series Theatrical Film - "The Clone Wars" - Discussion

Ok I wrote my review and my browser crashed on me so this one might be kinda abridged.

I gave it 8, was really a score of 7.5, but was feeling generous as I'd just finsihed it.

Things that were great:

Christopher Lee as Dooku - really gave something that I hadn't realised was missing from the series to Dooku. Worth an entire point on his own!

Ventress vs Obi Wan - look on his face when she takes off the cloak is priceless. plus I love a good ventress fight or two. Others won't like it but I thought the droid humour was funny - and not overdone too much to be offputting.

"You're outnumbered" "wait, one, two..." Dumb but funny.

Christophsis is an amazing battle and a fantastic intro to both the movie and series.

What I didn't like - Ahsoka's nicknames.... they get a bit much. Padme's appearance is a bit blergh... kinda sets the tone for her future appearances. The electronic music that makes its way in every now and then is also completely out of place and ruins the tone of a couple of scenes for me, and I forgot that they had toyed with it at the beginning of the show. I'm glad that it got the boot fairly quickly.

The animation quality took a bit getting used to coming from Season 3's quality, and the young Ahsoka, but after a little bit I got over it.

Overall its a great intro to the show, I really enjoyed it in the cinema when I saw it and still really like it now.

7.5/10 or 8 for the purpose of the poll!

 

I went with a 5/10. I find it to be a rather average film with plenty of flaws but some cool moments to even that out. I remember the biggest thing that bothered me about it were the line readings at the beginning. Especially Anakin's "Great, they don't even know we're in trouble." Three years on, the character voices have certainly become more natural for the actors, but here even JAT's Obi-Wan seems exaggerated.

I actually think the opening has the weakest parts in the film. The action is great, with Obi-Wan and Anakin leading the defense at the beginning, but after Ahsoka arrives things start to get a little forced. There dialogue after Anakin's under the box plan up to the lowering of the shield especially doesn't flow quite as well as one might have expected. Later, Ahsoka's little story to the clone troopers never sounded quite right to me either.

I think Teth is where things start to turn around for the movie. I like the banter between Anakin and Ahsoka more there, and moments like the pilot telling the troops "welcome to paradise, rock jumpers!" is a nice touch that I think adds some realism, or at least Hollywood's version of it. The ascent is one of my favorite parts of the movie and in the theater I loved the shot of the droids on the STAPs flying by the camera. The whole temple plot is pretty drawn out, but it has some of my favorite sequences, especially the Obi-Wan/Asajj duel. The back and forth between those two characters has really been there from the beginning.

The humor doesn't always work in the film, but I'll admit I laughed after Padme gets captured by Ziro, he threatens to kill her, we hear an explosion, and of all sentients 3PO is the one who pops his head around the corner. And then the clones come in and kick ass. Nice sequence.

So yeah, a lot of the movie's second half redeems the movies flaws for me. Hence the in the middle, average score, basically canceling each other out. I think it's a decent way to start the series.

 

Interesting i find first half much better than second half....

 

Actually I noticed that as well at the beginning.... some of those opening lines with Anakin and Obi-Wan are forced... and especially silly is the part where Ahsoka has to remind Anakin that they can use the shuttle's transmitter to contact Yoda.

 

Gee I wonder Nope, first-time viewer (or I would have popped into LACWAC more often

I agree with whoever said that the plot started to drag a little as time went on. I think it might have been better to just have them broken into episodes rather than smooshed together as a movie.

 

Yeah, that was me, hehe. I agree!

 

I gave it an 8, but was seriously leaning towards a 7. I've watched the movie a ton of times with my son, and I still find some parts extremely watchable. I feel GL had delusions of grandeur thinking he would be successful releasing the movie in theaters. If they were released as three separate episodes during season 1 I feel there wouldn't be as much backlash against it/them. One of my bigger complaints about the movie, is it feels too much like 3 separate episodes and not one cohesive movie.

 

...maybe that's because they're 4 separate episodes?

(I agree though)

 

Giving it a 5 and I think that's being a little generous.

IMO the worst part besides the animation was Ahsoka. Her dialogue felt so forced, Eckstein did a pretty bad job of voicing her(though she just started off voicing her so I'm willing to let it slide) and her beating 3 Magnaguards makes me mad. I can take her beating one but 3? Yuck. Skyguy, Rexter, Rtwooey.... Thank goodness they got rid of all that.

The animation though after witnessing the Trando episodes is just so bad. Christophsis looked the best out of all the animation. There were so many animation errors though with clones holding wrong guns, missing things and Cody missing during the 2nd half of the Christophsis battle. I wouldn't mind if we got another prequel to Christophsis though, as I really enjoyed that planet.

There were positives though. Rex was a complete badass. Anakin's dedication to his troops, and we haven't had much of this sense of frustration like we did during Christophsis and Teth with the Republic. I would like to see more of that. The entire scene when Ahsoka reveals herself to be Anakin's padawan was pretty funny too, his reaction along with that classic Obi-Wan smile made the scene. I actually laughed at the battle droid humor as well, "Sector 1187...what was that again?" and "Should I tell him they got away or what?" Padme and C3PO didn't feel thrown in either, their small roles felt justified.

Overall the animation really makes it hard to watch after Season 2 and 3. It's hard to believe how good this show can be compared to what we got in the movie.

 

After debating between 7 and 8 I ultimately went with 7, mostly because I think season three raised my standards on what to expect. The story was sufficient and even had some cerebral components with all the trickery and manipulation going on, and as someone pointed out we get more hooded Force-users than seemingly any other time in the series, which is something I'd like to see more of. And yes, I too am really glad they dropped most of the corny nick-name stuff.

 

I really cannot agree with that it was not "forced" i can understand if it was frustrating and all but not really forced- i didn't like her character first but never felt her voiceacting would be bad at all.... in fact Anakin was much more forced actually and even Obi-Wan.....that's of course my interpretetion only..... and Cody really disappears funnily on Christophsis never noticed that before- that it's just Rex there during second droid assault....

 

Also, originally the Christophsis episode was intended to be a "flashback" episode, and its production number was 1.18, so she didn't necessarily begin voicing Ahsoka.

 

That might explain why Christophsis looks much better than the rest of the movie IMO.

 

I still have issues with monotone Anakin and sarcastic Obi-Wan. JAT is good voicing Obi-Wan, but he sometimes goes over the top with trying to sound like Ewan.

 

Well i have to agree about "sometimes over the top"- part his english gentleman -style is sometimes more like some caricature- usually i like him but few sentences sound like sarcastic jokes really while they supposedly are not...... but anyway i love the teascene

 

The Movie!
(Relive the memories)



"A long time ago in a galaxy far far away..."
****

Okay, we are bored and there is no new TCW until January. Lets go back to the beginning and rewatch the movie then discuss it. This will be done just like the regular season 5 episodes threads and such. Discuss the movie and ONLY the movie here. Since it is a movie I'll put up the voting next weekend.

P.S. Join me for a viewing party on Wednesday and again on Friday night at 10:45pm EST in the live chat: http://lacwac.com/letschatlacwac/

 

This movie has not aged well at all. And it's only four years old. That's a bad sign. I mean, good lord is it bad, from a structural standpoint, from a script standpoint, from an animation standpoint, from any standpoint you could stand to stand on, this thing just flops so hard.

 

I'm down for Friday.

I agree, even compared to season 1 it was pretty bad IMO.

 

I should be there on Wednesday, but Friday is a no go.

Last time I watched the movie I still really enjoyed it.

 

Compared to Season 1, most TCW is a letdown. I was seriously shocked when I saw the difference that a good script can make. When it is written to fit the format the story was intended for, you can come up with gold, like Rookies or Trespass. But this movie is written like three episodes, then jammed into a movie. The scenes do not flow into each other at all, and you're left dumbfounded by the lack of internal logic that permeates the film. Why yes, run forward and punch that droid with your bare hand! It's not like your blasters do anything!

 

I decided I'll suck it up twice and give a couple of opportunities. I might add another showing if needed. Unfortunately on my current shift I'm not able to do one earlier. I enjoy the first 3 quarters of the movie. That last quarter is a bit of snooze fest.

 

Ha, I was just thinking about the movie today actually. I'll have to watch it again. From what I can remember, I don't think it's as good as the TV series, but I remember thinking it was really good when I saw it at the movies. I thought Grievous was going to play a larger role in it instead of just standing on a ship for a few seconds in the opening narration, because of the franchise line for the movie, and I think it would have been much better if he had been in a fighting scene.

 

The movie was pretty cool

 

One of the reasons I didn't get into the series until last year was because I was always told the movie was so bad by friends. I think it helped that I watched it after I had caught up with the series at the end of season 3.