Full Series The Clone Wars: Episode 409: Plan of Dissent Discussion Thread

Wow, I couldn't agree more. The monotonous voices were so much better. Now they're just way too goofy.

Anyway, wow great episode.

I liked how they painted a clearer picture of Krell, lots of characterization for the clones, and wow... they're taking their sweet time to build up this thing up.

Also, this episode helped a lot in establishing that what Fives, Hardcase and Jesse are doing is something very unusual. It somewhat eases the pain of the last episode, when I felt a little let down by the almost mutinous attitude of the clones.

I really love how they're taking three episodes to establish all this. With only two episodes, there really wouldn't have been enough time to create this much suspense.

@ Tarkas: I do not agree that the second episode was unneeded. The first episode first showed us how Anakin commanded his clones; shoulder to shoulder, taking suggestions, thinking as a team, then it introduced Krell to establish his character. The second episode focused on intense action, and created a lot of excitement and suspense for the situation. Lots of characterization for the clones, a really intense episode that made us root and empathize with the clones. This third episode shows even more characterization and explains more about Krell, how the clones feel about him, and explains and justifies the actions and positions of the rebelling clones and Rex. This is the turning point. I imagine that if you take out the General, you wouldn't care as much for Hardcase nor Fives, who were both given a lot of development in The General (especially Fives).

Let's just hope it's not going to be a huge anti-climax after this huge build-up. The final episode had better deliver! I'm still so worried that it will be a let-down though.

 

I agree - it is a balance, and it's an excellent one. I would object to calling Rex an "obedient clone at heart." That sounds like Rex "back in the day," actually. . Rex is the first clone in TCW who's disobeyed an order (by not turning in a deserter). And when he argues with Fives, it's clear he's torn - he's trying to believe that this is the right thing to do.

Rex is an independent man at heart, but he's struggling intellectually, weighing duty and honor. He wants to believe they're the same thing. But he's finding out that that's not always the case.

Thankfully.

I think Seerow pointed this out as well, but it's worth repeating - the vast majority of the clones aren't rebelling against Krell. They're just doing there jobs, and following orders like good soldiers. The focus of this arc is on a handful of hardened veterans (and a few shinies along for the ride), men like Rex, Fives, and Jesse. They're the only ones speaking out, and they're the ones who are insubordinate. Out of an entire battalion, it's not hard for me to believe there's three men who won't tow the line, especially when they have valid reasons for doing so.

 

Hard to figure what to rate this episode. I'm wondering if the fun battles from The General couldn't have gone in Darkness and this could have been the 2nd episode?

What I liked: the space battle was unbelievable, I liked the dialogue with the clones and even Krell tried to explain things. Also Umbaran holograms FTW.

What I didn't like: the episode was 100% predictable except I guess I didn't see the droid control ship from TPM making an appearance. As Gry and others noted, the very appearance of the battle droids was enough to make me cringe, and the scenes with the battle droids added nothing.

I wish they had established that the Umbaran fighters usually were crewed by 2 or 3, so Krell's decision that to attack would be using clones he couldn't spare. Or something. It's little things like this that's often missing in the writing for this show that prevents it from being truly classic in my mind.

I thought Hardcase almost crashing the ship was funny to start but lasted too long for a 22 minute episode.

As far as Rex goes, don't forget that he has to lead troops and that has to factor into his decision-making.

Finally, I understand this arc is about Krell v. The 501st, but we didn't even see an Umbaran this episode. I wonder if we'll get other episodes telling Kenobi's side of taking the capital.

 

Yeah, that was probably an overly harsh way to word it on my part. I was just so psyched by DoU and felt such suspense to see what would happen next, that an entire episode with little or no plot development was a huge letdown. I mostly said that because I feel that the intro the narrator did for this episode would have fit just as well following DoU as following The General, which made me feel vindicated in being disappointed with it. But that's all based on my own perspective, I know there are others who love action episodes and for them of course The General was not unnecessary or unneeded. Today I watched all 3 episodes of this arc we have so far back-to-back, and, honestly, already I'm starting to go easier on The General. It has its place since PoD was mostly intrigue, so now that I got what I wanted I can appreciate other things. But you're damn right: the final episode better not let us down!!!

Very well put. I wanted to say something to debunk the notion that these episodes mean that most clones disobey orders they don't like routinely or that none of them should/would have followed Order 66, but I knew I couldn't do that good of a job.

I disagree on that, I thought the way they had it set up made it perfectly frustrating. When he told Rex that the first time I watched, I was thinking "It's only risking three people and might do the whole job!" so loud I was almost screaming it at my television, and it did a great job of illustrating just how futile trying to reason with General Krell is. Rex knew it was pointless so he just stopped talking. Taking all 3 episodes into context, it was an act of relative graciousness just to hear out Rex's alternative, actually giving it thought is still out of the question. If each Umbaran ship required risking multiple clones, then General Krell would actually have a pretty good point and be somewhat justified in not wanting them to risk it and that whole dynamic is either dead in the water or weakened to the point where it might as well be.

 

Well in the beginning we saw clones leading away a prisoner.. and in the space battle an Umbaran pilot shooting down a clone.

But I see your point. xD

 

Well this arc brought back TCW I was used to think as entertaining while little disappointing show- Start of this season was rather horrifying in quality but now they are back in normal- DoU was above normal but now quality is steadily lowering towards normal and next episode may ruin entire arc to be "standard TCW"..... which unfortunately is not meaning very high quality....TCW does good and almost excellent episodes sometimes- but by far they haven't done a single excellent arc- few good ones though..... this may be one more good arc a lot is depending on Krell in final episode....

 

Just saw it.

Loved it. Miss Hardcase. Am now sad. But can't wait for next episode.

 

This arc has really grown on me, and the idea of showcasing the same clones really is interesting. I never liked the episodes that focused on clones before, but after watching so many of them, I'm beginning to like them more than ever. In fact, I'm going to go back and watch all of them, so I get to know them by names and personal markings.

 

I really liked all the homages this episode made to Episode I when anakin blew up the droid control ship

 

What was with the lack of Kix in this one? All he got was a two second cameo in the hanger. Very disappointing.

But besides that, I thought this was a spectacular episode. The character development was great, IMO. There were times in this episode where the characters were so different, I almost forgot they were clones.

Jesse really stood-out to me in this one. Man, he really is not fond of Krell.

 

I disagree on 2 points: 1.) For me the arc hasn't steadily declined, it was a big decline from the from the first to the second but then a big boost back up with the third. 2.) I know I may not have a lot of folks agreeing with me on this, but I really like the Force-witch arc. I like Overlords more as an episode, but as a full arc I thought the Force-witch trilogy did a good job. Also I like every episode in the Domino Squad arc and the Geonosis arc.

 

Yeah, it's good that they finally referenced a Star Wars movie that wasn't from the OT.

 

I agree, we should of gotten a scene of him patching up some of the wounded.

 

Imagine if the supply ship was manned by Umbarans or any beings other than battle droids

 

I think the B1s were an important reminder that this isn't some frontier war between the Republic and some Umbaran insurgents. This is one small front of a grand pan-Galactic conflict.

Yeah, they were a bit cringe-worthy, but only for a couple of lines (the silly "break" scene). The rest of the time, they did their job well and proved more effective than the Umbarans were during the last episode at containing the threat of the stolen fighters.

 

Alright, here is my review on it.

Pros:
-action was good like the last two eps.
-very detailed space battle. It was short but nice.
-Hardcase actually had a good death
-Rex, Fives, Jesse, and Dogma were characterized nicely
-Intense story

Cons:
-this isn't a big con but seeing this as a re-run of ANH wasn't that awesome....
-Why do the starfighters look different from earlier episodes? What was the point of that?
-Battle Droids. Seeing them in this amazing arc made me realize how stupid they are....

Overall, it was another fantastic episode! I am giving a 9.5/10 The Battle Droids ruined the perfect score.
Since these episodes have brought so much more to the table.....I have to expect more.....

I didn't buy Season 3 on DVD cuz I hated the whole season but since Season 4 has some gems.....I'm already sold.

 

Not much to add that hasn't been said.

Two things worth noting:
I like the fact Hevy and Hardcase are so similar, it makes me wonder whether clones trained in the same specialities/heavy weapons (eg. z-6 rotary blaster cannon) are trained slightly differently to standard clones and it makes me wonder whether you can trace similar personalities like Dogma and Echo, or Wolfe and Cody back to some common element in their training.

As for the discussion earlier in the thread about the supply ship not making any sense; the importance of supply lines was demonstrated at least twice against Germany in WWII. During the North Africa campaign Field Marshal Erwnin "the Desert Fox" Rommel led a hugely successfully campaign against the allies capturing almost all of North Africa. But his success very quickly turned to defeat when the allies started attacking his supply lines. Several years later in Holland during the Battle of the Bulge, Germany was so low on fuel that their plan was to hop from allied fuel dump to allied fuel dump, just so they had enough fuel to keep driving. When they failed to capture the first fuel dump, the German tanks ground to a halt and the entire armoured division was forced to surrender. In both of these cases it wasn't that the Germans didn't have supplies available (although they were extremely limited in Holland) the problem was that the supplies weren't there when they needed them. This is essentially the same situation we have on umbarra, sure they may be other supply ships but as soon as the umbarrans stop firing waves of missiles at obiwan hes is going to storm the capital.

We hear in this episode that Obi-Wan is being pinned down by the capitals long range missiles so it stands to reason that the main supply the capital requires is more missiles for their launchers. The missiles were originally being sent down to the capital via the air base. Obi-Wan knowing that the supply ship is too heavily defended orders the capture of the airbase to cut the capital off from resupply of missiles. But with the airbase captured the Umbarrans simply send the supplies directly to the capital. Assumably the airbase has the facilities to land more transports and unload supplies at a much faster rate than they can at the captial (Hence why they were going there in the first place), so the capture of the airbase has helped a little. I think this validates the importance of both episodes and shows that Obi-Wans military strategy not just Krell's is flawed.

 

So, we finally get Fives motivation for how he acts. He doesn't want to be a number, he wants to be more than a clone, he wants to be an individual.

The only thing anyone saw in him was his designation, giving him the nickname Fives. He lost his best friend and didn't have time to mourn him due to the clone's expendable nature.

Finally some reason for the character development.

And the rest of the episode was pretty good too, if not quite as awesome as the last one.

Also, wow at the GG flame war. Learn to respect others opinions people.

 

A hundred-megaton yield? I don't think Lucas knows anything about what that implies.

The most powerful explosion ever created by man was the detonation of the Tsar Bomba, which had a 57 megaton yield.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LxD44HO8dNQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HOMsvuPUMTU

The thing destroyed everything within a 16-mile radius. If they're attacking Obi-Wan's troops within a few miles of the capital... they're going to blow themselves sky high. And I'm pretty sure Obi-Wan's position is within a few miles of the capital.

 

Loved Fives talk about how General Skywalker told him when he was a kid he blew up a droid ship by flying inside it while the force theme played, freaking awesome Since the way they and Anakin blew up the droid ships and the way the rebels blew up the second death star is the same, and the death star looks like its based on the sphere droid ships, I like to think it's a Geonosian design flaw that you can fly into the center of their ships, since maybe their ship designs are based on hives and they are flying insects so they need to be able to fly into the center? haha. Maybe Ackbar learned about this design flaw by studying Anakin or maybe he told Ackbar the story too?

 

But do we know if OOU megaton = IU megaton?

 

What's the point of using a real world measurement if you are going to disregard what it entails?

Battlestar Galactica got away with this by making up its own units of measurement for In-Universe explanations.

 

Maybe Fives was exaggerating.

 

Eh. Perhaps Umbaran weapons are far more focused than our nuclear bombs. That could be a result of an arms race between weapons and defensive shields---put as much energy into as small an area as possible, in hopes of overwhelming the shields.

100 megatons isn't outlandish for Star Wars technology. The turbolasers on an Acclamator have a maximum firepower of 200 gigatons, after all...

 

That was exactly my thoughts on that issue. Shields are ubiquitous in SW military tech. So offensive weapons have to pack as much of a punch in the smallest possible space.

Relax, it's only a problem if you're looking to hate the episode.