Full Series For Discussion of Old TCW episodes...

Do you question the Naboo sense of fashion?

 

The Naboo have the same amount of fashion sense as the Sith. From we've seen Sith are stylish and rad as hell therefore Naboo are secretly Sith fashion designers with campy lisps.

 

Hostage Crisis was decent.
Hunt For Ziro was very fun. Pretty messed up but fun. More Hutts, and Quinlan Vos.

 

In Hostage Crisis, I thought Anakin was actually doing pretty well until he decided to give her his lightsaber.

 

Landing At Point Rain. It's good to get back to an episode I know I'll enjoy.

The Republic launches a huge fleet to Geonosis, one of the largest gatherings of capital ships I've seen from them. Strangely, no CIS fleet is there to repel them.

I have to say, I've always found the kill counts stupid and out of place.

I loved Luminara's line. "Gentlemen, if you're done measuring *****, we have a battle to begin". She just seems above anything petty.

The gunship approach really got me up, made me think "this is where the fun begins".

I love the Y-Wings going on bombing runs. It's relatively rare to see air support of any kind.

The Geonosian pilots love spinning for absolutely no reason, they must think it's a neat trick.

The clones were totally obedient in this episode, even when ordered into what will be certain death for many of them. It just makes everything go so much smoother for the Jedi and the episode's pacing. Sure is quite a contrast to the clones hesitation throughout the Umbara arc.

Oh hey, Rex is using pistols on a huge, open battlefield. Someone pin a medal to this guy's chest.

The kill count really got annoying and at some points just served to drag down the pacing.

The Geonosians' ability to fly was used very well, making the battle more three dimensional.

The flamethrowers themselves looked cool, but the effects were kinda crappy. We have better flamethrowers here on Earth. I was wondering why Mundi brought the flamethrowers up front at the end of the cave, and not before. It seems like they would work better in tighter confines, probably would have been very effective at pushing back and clearing out the Geonosians. I suppose the flames might have burned up all the oxygen in the cave if they were used in the middle, though.

I wonder what Filoni and Co have to say about the Republic using flamethrowers on the Geonosians. Does anyone know?

Just a fun episode with a ton of great action. 9/10

 

Are you going through the whole Geonosis arc?

 

Yep. I might just go through the rest of S2. I'll be skipping most of S3 though, no point in revisiting most of that.

 

I still need to finish the Citadel arc and then I'm probably going to move on to that Ahsoka duology. Seeing as I have the whole boxset on me I might as well do the whole of Season 3. Looking forward to revisiting Mortis and Mandalore.

 

2 more episodes or so until the Nightsisters, Mortis and Citadel trilogies. So excited to see what happens

 

Alright, part 3 at last. Not going to lie, the first two were severely underwhelming. I hope this one is a bit better.

Citadel Rescue

- Fives, what the **** kind of limp-ass jump was that?

- Oh boy, another call from Dooku. "I was hoping to surprise you with good news." "Good news would indeed be a surprise..." Sick burn. And of course, the obligatory reminder of how important these Nexus route coordinates are. Dooku even says "I need not remind you that you must get these coordinates back mang."

- Yep, I knew it. Three B1s. Dat consistency. Seems like the number of clones is right though. Wait, nevermind, they keep losing a pajama guy in every other shot.

- More Ric Olie lines from Ahsoka. "They're boxing us in!"

- Damn, Cody's getting his badass on.

- That Anooba scene with the crates is awfully familiar...

- Dat Ahsoka eyeroll.

- Anakin's speech probably would have been better if they had gone into more detail, but he says the exact same lines as he did last episode. "We're not soldiers, we're peacekeepers. The Jedi Code often prevents us from going far enough to achieve victory." Please say more than that. Mace said that in AOTC nearly ten years ago when this ep was first aired. What in the Jedi Code prevents you from realising victory? What is "far enough"? A rather simple point of view, indeed.

- So now they've got 2 Pajama guys even though one of them died a few minutes earlier (along with the final 212th redshirt) when their cord was shot. Okay. Actually you know what, it's different in practically every shot, I'm not going to comment on it any more.

- Dat triple backflip. Bonus points for style, Anakin.

- That's funny, Anakin gets an Anooba on him and the first thing he does is recall his lightsaber and stab it through the face. Maul gets an Anooba on him and struggles for about a minute before finally wrestling it off. Obviously they can't kill off Embo's dog but still.

- You know, Piell really didn't get mauled that badly. Don't know why he's dying.

- Oh my god, Ahsoka confessed! She lied! But it's okay because she's now the "most important part of the mission". Instead of preaching about how amazing Ahsoka is he should just tell her the bloody information.

- I don't know what part of his death was honourable, or dignified. But whatever, they're just paying their respects.

- This sendoff really isn't very emotional. Kinda boring. Also I bet the clones are loving the fact that no-one gave a crap when any of them died but the Jedi gets a little ceremony.

- By the way, getting burned to a crisp is in no way a guarantee that he's dead. Vader lived. Maul got cut in half and he lived. It's funny that at the time we thought they chose to cast his corpse into the lava to say "this guy is definitely dead, no way is he coming back" but now it almost seems like a bluff, like the more ridiculous it is the higher chance they'll actually survive. Do not despair people, Coruscant Nights is still canon. Piell got out of the lava and shrugged it off because he's a tough Russian guy.

- Right, okay, we see some ARC-170s. But since then hasn't it all been Headhunters instead? What the hell.

- What is the point of this line? "There have not been battles like these since the days of the Old Republic." Wow. Is this the first time you've gone out of the Temple Saesee Tiin? What do you mean, Old Republic? It's still the same thing...isn't it? It's still confusing as hell nearly two years later.

- By the way, if you're hanging a couple feet above lava from a rope you're probably going to catch fire, it's pretty hot.

- Dat Wilhelm scream. This episode needs more space battle, it's about the only entertaining thing on screen.

- Yay, Ahsoka saved the day! She saved Tarkin, even though she hated him. What a trooper.

- Where the hell did those crab droids come from? They didn't actually emerge out of the lava did they?

- Uh, apparently they did. Bloody hell that's a load of crab droids. There's like fifty of them on this tiny island.

- I won't pass comment on Plo Koon saving Ahsoka's ass like that.

- Chalk up Nexus route coordinates to the list of unresolved issues that will never be addressed again. Even though something this big really needs to be brought back up. They spend the entire trilogy reminding us of how crucial these hyperspace lanes are to the war effort, and then just...nothing. Nothing gets resolved, both Tarkin and Ahsoka are super stubborn and refuse to divulge their halves of the information to anyone other than the Chancellor and the Jedi Council, respectively. All that's said is Yoda will meet with Palpatine to discuss what to do next. Really anticlimactic, though I guess they made these things too powerful to actually be used by either side as the war needs to be prolonged as much as possible. Presumably that's why Palps wanted the information for himself. So, this mission was completely pointless.

- ****ing Imperial March everywhere. That was one evil handshake. So many Vader moments in this show.

- And we end with another Paragon vs Renegade debate using the exact same lines as before. Weak.

So, final thoughts: this trilogy was crap. What was the point? Nothing happened as a result of the mission aside from killing off a couple choice characters and Ahsoka was really annoying. There was clear potential to get into an ideological debate but it was squandered and we didn't get any further in than entry level complexity.

I've decided on Mortis next.

 

Except The Wall is enjoyable.

 

I most certainly will never watch Mortis again.

Weapons Factory

Luminara has another "If you're both finished with your little discussion, we do have a factory to destroy". Nice, she's just not putting up with petty arguments.

The tactical droid sets a trap for the Republic forces. It's always nice to see droids, even the villains in general, actually have a plan.

The Jedi use the same terrible tactics they used in AOTC, except this time it was intentional. But apparently the CIS forces can't even hold their own against Republic forces marching across a bottleneck in parade formation with no cover or any tactics of any kind. Basically the Republic beat the CIS at its own game, zerging. How sad.

I have to mention how terrible the "camera" work was in this episode. It was all over the place, they messed up the framing in some pretty important character moments and just constantly used sub-optimal shots. I thought they might have been going for shaky cam, but it's like that even when there's no action.

I think the super tanks are cool. I just love superweapons, they're very Star Wars, and it makes sense for the tech driven CIS to be constantly trying to come up with a war winner. It's really not that far from the tech races of WW1 and WW2.

Well, the tactical droid appeared reasonably competent for most of the episode, until its demise. It's standing next to a super tank when someone (Ahsoka I think) throws a grenade that sticks to the tank, and the droid just stands there and laughs, "Ha ha ha the super tank is impervious" BOOM. Look, the Stephen Hawking laugh is pretty funny, but it's just soul crushing that the droids don't know to get away from live grenades.

Not sure how relevant it is to the current arc, but Luminara was not unaffected by the possible loss of her Padawan. She even explicitly says she cares for Barriss, that she will mourn her, but she just isn't going to completely snap and go on a murder spree over it. The pain is in her face and her body language, immediately after the explosion she goes to her knees, shuts her eyes and her face sinks, I'm pretty sure that's an emotional reaction.

I couldn't have cared less about the Anakin/Ahsoka drama in this episode. 8/10

 

Finally!

I so agree!

 

Watching Witches of the Mist. Loved the First 2 episodes of this trilogy. Monster is probably my 3rd favorite episode ever.

 

The Nightsister trilogy was really good except that Witches of the Mist was a letdown. They ended the Savage Opress trilogy too quickly. They should have kept Opress as Dooku's apprentice a couple episodes more.
On the Mortis trilogy now

 

Legacy of Terror. I remember not being too fond of this episode when it aired, didn't really enjoy the zombie aspect of it. I think the zombie craze that was exploding at the time was getting old and I didn't like seeing Star Wars get into it.

There are some really nice shots of cap ships sitting on their landing pads.

Geonosis is a desert planet, and though it may seem obvious, it was still really smart common sense to involve a sandstorm. And they actually put it to good use by using it to separate Luminara from the rest of the Jedi. Anakin and Obi-Wan are worried for her, while Mundi was not. I thought that was great, it showed the emotional control of a Jedi Master, there really wasn't much use getting all worried and panicky at the moment. Anakin is ready to go blindly stumbling through the storm, while Mundi preaches patience. I thought it was a great moment.

The blank white stare of the zombie eyes was a great choice and really helped sell the whole thing.

I LOVED seeing Luminara roundhouse everything in sight while she was in handcuffs. Seriously, she did like 10 roundhouses in a row, like she's Van Damme.

The zombies seem a bit OP, I think Anakin and Obi-Wan should be able to hold them off indefinitely. Compare them to the battle droids, we saw Anakin and Obi-Wan hold off entire hordes of them, and the zombies are less effective combatants and certainly no more numerous. Though I definitely see the reason to retreat, the clones can't handle them because blasters are ineffective.

The clones looked great in the dark. Illuminating bits of the zombies with the clones' flashlights, having their white eyes shine, while leaving plenty of shadow just really worked. The whole dark catacombs thing really worked well and had a great creepy vibe going. Really, the fear of darkness was just used really well in this episode.

I actually like the Geonosian Queen and the catacombs, they're obvious Aliens references but they're not 100% copies, plus the Geonosians actually are bugs so it's all completely logical and the whole thing just works.

Kenobi wanting to talk and Anakin wanting to smash was a really smart choice. That's who they are.

You know what, it was nice just to see Cody.

Kenobi's "you think with your lightsaber" line was great.

The Queen sounds silly, but I didn't mind it too much. For some reason I thought it had a bit of a voodoo vibe to it, which totally adheres to the theme.

The worms are suitably creepy, you know they'd give you that creepy crawly feeling if they even got near you. They emerged from eggs, like the facehuggers, another totally creepy creature from Aliens.

lol at Kenobi dragging out the rescue to troll Luminara. "Come now, the nose or the ear, which do you think it will enter". Awesome.

Having the clones blind the bugs with bright lights was great, they do live underground in total darkness. Even if it doesn't make perfect sense because the bugs should be totally blind, I still like it.

During the escape, we see Anakin and Obi-Wan quickly and simply dispatching the zombies, the choreography was actually quite elegant in its simplicity.

lol "study the bottom of my boot". Great dialogue in this episode.

The glowing blasters due to the underground darkness looked great.

Hmm, bug hives aren't usually so fragile, they're usually much more sturdy. They're usually built with excellent redundancy to prevent total structural failure even after significant structural damage. In this case the entire structure was supported by two weak looking pillars, which doesn't really match bug designs. It's not at all a big deal, they've just done such a great job keeping the Geonosians authentically insectoid that I noticed what I thought was an inconsistency.

The Queen was smashed and the Encyclopedia on the OS said she was dead, but with TCW there's always the possibility that she survived. Not that there's much point to bringing her back, but it is TCW, and the Aliens always come back.

You know, I noticed something at the end that I appreciated, even though I'm almost certainly reading too much into it. During the escape, the Jedi start climbing first and leave the clones to cover them. In terms of ability, the Jedi should have stayed behind, because their lightsabers are more effective and they're able to climb the hole more quickly with their Force powers. BUT, the Jedi are simply more important in military terms and Generals should absolutely escape before lower ranks, so I liked it. Similarly, as the Jedi are running out of the Temple, they just run right by a fallen clone, leaving the only other surviving clone to pick him up. It wasn't really very Jedi and that's why it tickled me so.

This episode was ******* great. I enjoyed it way more than I did the first time around, having a different perspective on the zombie theme really helped, it's now one of my favorite episodes of the series. There's really no noticeable flaws and I think it's even better than Landing At Point Rain. 10/10

 

I hope I come away similarly satisfied with Overlords later tonight.

 

Oh boy, Mortis.

Overlords

- So, is this a dream, or what? Did the signal send them to two different coordinates? Man I don't want to think when I watch this show, give me more mindless action. Lightsabers, battle droids, pew pew! I don't think this is leaving it up to the viewer's interpretation so much as it is being as surreal as possible and not ****ing explaining anything. But that's probably semantics.

- "Something's blocking the signal." Apparently Ahsoka was getting her Ric Olie on before the Citadel arc. Lovely. And they keep coming! "It's pulling us towards it!" No kidding.

- I'm less than two minutes in and my brain hurts already. What the **** am I watching? This is too abstract.

- Oh hey, floating rocks, never seen that before.

- So Daughter just showed up, and Anakin pulled this face, I think it's very apt. I'm glad that now even the guys on screen are confused as ****.

- I'm at least enjoying Anakin's sarcasm. "Glad she cleared that up for us."

- I like the Anakin/Obi Wan portrayals in this, showing the former as headstrong and the latter more cautious and wary.

- Some more quality dialogue from Ahsoka and Obi Wan. "The ship's gone!" "Yes, I see that." "It was here, no question. And look - everything's dying."

- Oh hell, it's the Son. Before he turned into a whiny bitch I thought he came across as kinda cool. A physical manifestation of the Dark Side of the Force. I'm choosing to believe that these guys are some kind of Force gods. That's certainly how they come across, even though I find the notion utterly abhorrent.

- Oooo, he has the power to turn off lightsabers at the wave of his hand, kewl.

- What kind of answer is that? "Yes and no"? You either are a Sith, or you aren't. And you aren't. You're just some kind of Dark Side gargoyle bat freak. I don't like you anymore.

- First scene with the Father. My brain is full of wut.

- The three visions just happened, I don't think I'm in the right state of mind to be watching this arc. If you could see a graph of my brainwaves it would be flatlining. It's doing the opposite of making me think. I guess it's neat that they got the voices of Qui Gon and Shmi back to reprise their roles.

- Skipping ahead a few minutes, the Father's idea of balance seems to run contradictory to Lucas' idea that the Dark Side is a cancer that must be killed.

- "Anakin will not be easy to deceive." Ahaha, ahahaha, aha. Good one Kenobi.

- This whole test thing...I don't like it. I never liked the idea of divine providence bringing about Anakin's conception, I never thought much of the idea of the Jedi having some kind of quasi-religious prophecy about the Chosen One (lame trope), I don't like the concept of having these supernatural god beings through and from which the entire Force is channeled. I don't particularly like the premise of this arc. Maybe that has something to do with the fact that aside from in this arc we never see anything reflecting Anakin's status as Space Jesus. Or is that the point, that this is all so preposterous that it cannot possibly be real? You know what, I'm going with that, it makes everything so much easier to follow.

- "ON YOUR KNEES!" That is all.

- So we finally get an answer; the Father is dying and claims Anakin has to replace him because apparently the Chosen One prophecy isn't about destroying the Sith to bring about balance but to babysit two kids for all eternity. Really? Well that's disappointing after all this space magic malarkey.

If I were to sum up Overlords in one word, it would be pretentious. It's trying too hard and goes way too abstract and off the walls weird to finally arrive at a rather simple and crappy conclusion. If we take it at face value at least. In terms of wider implications, it's raising way too many questions at once and I can't make sense of any of it, other than I know from hindsight that the things it makes you consider are all moot points since Anakin ends up fulfilling an entirely different prophecy in the films to what's suggested in this. It seems kinda pointless to present this whole other side to the Balance and the Chosen One if it's wholly irrelevant to the rest of the saga and is entirely self-contained in this one arc. So yeah, I'm going with this is all a dream, none of it makes sense, if it was supposed to be a Force vision to warn Anakin it didn't really work.

Man, **** Mortis.

 

*** damn that was hilarious, Fanboy. You have more energy for this than I do.

When I'm watching these old crappy episodes, my eyes eventually cross and I just keep telling myself "okay".

 

All that's on my mind now is bloody Mortis. I need to write down my thoughts somewhere to clear my head but at the same time there's so many things it asks you in such rapid succession that I can't form answers to anything.

 

Just finished the Mortis trilogy. What did I just watch? Too much for my brain. Overlords and Alter of Mortis were amazing. Ghosts of Mortis was good as well but I would have liked it better if it was longer. Keep Anakin evil longer. Throw in Darth Bane and Revan as well.
The way I understand it is that Anakin has the potential for Light and Dark and to bring balance he has to do both. I have no idea if its more complex than that or if I am missing something. If it is can you explain it to me? I'll watch this arc again sometime later.