Full Series CW Grade the Episode: S05E11: A Sunny Day In The Void

Those of you who have been around a while know the drill, for those of you new to LACWAC during a regular season run, here's the scoop:

Each Tuesday or Wednesday in the week after a given episode airs, we post a poll thread where you rate the episode from 1/10 to 10/10.

Please include your rating in your post, and feel free to give a BRIEF reason why it earned that rating, but remember, we've already got a thread devoted to full discussion of the episode.

Poll results are available by clicking on the number of votes next to each score.

 

+Trying something new
+Looked good
+Raising interesting droid/sentient existential questions that really ought to have been raised earlier in TCW/the EU/elsewhere
+bird scene was cool
+hyperspace comets were cool

-boring
-characters got annoying, and the suicide jokes were ill-placed
-raised a string of questions and didn't satisfactorily address any of them

6/10

 

Seerow's bombshell. Total 10/10. I think its actually my favorite of the season so far. There are some subtle yet deep themes that prop up the goofiness of the episode which really adds to the charm of it. The surreal ice comets and look of the planet set a really depressing tone. This would be emo as hell without the goofy side. It was a clever way to contrast the immortality of droids (unless your a battle droid apparently) with the certainty of death for a living being. I felt real pity of Gascon who went pretty much insane after he ran out of water with fear of death and the droids can't relate to him at all. Made me reflect on that old human fear of dying alone. WAC even tells him to commit suicide. There were also lessons about training and programming vs real wisdom, knowledge, and adaptability. WAC grew on me alot in this episode, the metaphoric sun in the void. The desert was a metaphor for life itself. Its rather poetic how as soon as Gascon is able to pull himself out of his own personal void he is able to see life in the desert. The music was great. Some interesting Jurassic Park, Owls of Ga'hoole (Legend of the Guardians), and Disney homages as well.

 

7/10. Good, but not the best. I felt that it didn't really get anywhere, but that didn't really matter because it's part of a four part arc, and not a lot could have happened then with this storyline. I love the characters though, WAC-47 would be my favourite, and even one of my favourite characters of the season so far. It left me quite excited to see the next part, which is always good. But overall, it was a good episode.

 

10/10 thank you

 

4, yuck.

It got that much because LAC entertained me with the suicide comments.

 

I put 2 instead of one because of the hilarious moment when the colonel went absolutely bananas

 

We might disagree on many episodes but I agree with the score. For what the episode was, it gets a 10/10 from me too.

 

Thought-provoking, unusual... and judging by the poll results, deeply polarizing.

 

We'll go with 8/10.

A very deep, philosophical episode. That was the main thing it had going, though, so once you've form your opinion on the subject matter, re-watchability goes down a bit, I think. Still, enjoyed the comet scene, enjoyed the deep thinking. Gascon's reflection in WAC's visual lens (or whatever the term is) was subtly powerful.

Overall, decent.

 

This has been the most difficult episode to grade for me. On one hand, is this something I'd want to see or expect in Star Wars. No. But did the episode do what it was intended to do. Yes, and fairly well. So I guess I can only grade on what I did not like.
-1 for suicide promotion by WAC-47.
-1 for plot convenience of weird birds popping out of nowhere (void) at just the right time.
I'd also mark off for WAC-47 being somewhat annoying, but I've already done that in the previous episode, so I can't really justify continueing to do so.
8/10.

 

1/10, I was not amused.

To be clear, I am not a fan of "art", aesthetics or metaphysics, I find them shallow and of little to no value.

I was going to compare this episode to dry masturbation with no finish, but this episode wasn't nearly as fun.

I can't quite pin it down, but I consider myself some combination of uncultured, philistine and poshlost....throw in some apathy and nihilism and I think that's accurate. I really wouldn't want it any other way.

 

I want my 30 minutes back.

 

1/10

 

1/10

 

I posted THIS in the discussion thread as soon as it was over.

 

Pretty poor episode, gave it a 4/10.

 

Please stop insulting members for disliking the episode or show. Everyone is welcome to their opinion. Thanks!

 

7/10.

This past week has been far too crazy for my family and I for me to have been able to take the time to consider and then type up my thoughts on "A Sunny Day in the Void" in any depth, thus my non-appearance in the episode thread. So, I thought I'd wait and take advantage of this topic, instead.

Keeping it short-ish, I felt that the opening act was filled with a bit too much of the goofiness left over from the (mostly poor) prior episode. WAC's "good news, bad news" nonsense and such. Stunning visuals, as always.

The remainder, I felt, put the characters in convincing enough a dilemma for some interesting, deep questions to be raised. Unfortunately, given TCW's 22 minute time constraints and it's general approach, there was little more than a cursory examination of these questions. Well, such is the nature of 30 minute television, I suppose. The answers the episode did offer were jst enough to get by and satisfactorily reinforced the core values George Lucas has cultivated over the years.

It was nice for WAC to have finally stepped up his game a bit by the end and Gascon seems to be coming around following his ordeal.

The crashed ship with the Lepi skeleton and broken-down droids was a nice, creepy touch which sold home the danger our heroes faced, mirroring their possible fates.

The cinematography was top-notch. Just one example which stood out to me was the vertigoic, tilting horizon during Gascon's melt-down, which righted itself the moment the Colonel did the same. Nice touch.

While this wasn't the greatest example of what TCW is capable of producing, I am interested in the concept of the void in general and have studied, for example, Buddhist traditions including Sunyata. Toss in the fact that I am, of course, a giant SW fan, and I'm fairly predisposed to enjoying an effort such as this. It had to have taken an inspired Lucas to suggest the idea in the first place, not to mention some semblance of guts and self-confidence by the prodction team to step up and try to pull it off. The idea of exploring 'nothing' in a Star Wars setting was, for me, worth an episode of TCW, though it's too bad Filoni didn't try to snag Jerry Seinfeld for a guest spot.

Still can't wait for Gregor to make his appearance. I sure hope the payoff is able to approach the build-up in my mind.

 

Please stop insulting members for disliking the episode or show. Everyone is welcome to their opinion. Thanks!

I still laugh out loud every time I see him hopping around and dancing like a loon.

 

Quoted deleted posts. Next time don't bother responding to them please. Thanks, bro!

 

Ouch! You hurt me with such accusations....

I just figured you'd pick a different episode to watch if you're actually going to watch one. I liked it but it was definitely a weird one...

 

Well, it's not an accusation if you questioned me like that. I've seen this plenty of times before here.... You're trying to start a fire and allowing others to contribute.

And I had time to watch this episode, but I don't think that would be the case in the future.

 

Sorry if this was taken as an insult, i will leave you alone now.