Full Series The Clone Wars: Episode 418: Crisis on Naboo Discussion Thread

I guess this was the influence for Vader's trap for Han Solo 20-odd years later.

 

Holy flying forks Batman ! Now we know why Master Obi Wan would be "very grumpy" if he saw Anakin floating his dinner , definitely dark side table manners.

Which sort of blows that whole Anakin cares more for individuals than principles, in a way. Usually that sort of person is loyal regardless, so if he did care for Obi-Wan, he would not have turned against him.

Of course, anyone can be shoved, and when push came to shove, it was Padme before any other individual.

I think Anakin's attachment is better characterized as attachment to people he feels care for him. If they turn away from him, stop supporting him ("Obi-Wan") he discards them into the "don't care for me; I don't care about them" category.

Oh, of course. Just why, again, Anakin, did Obi-Wan need you? The plot was foiled. You needed him to need you, perhaps?

I'm sure if he wanted, Anakin might come up with a reason that sounds valid to him of WHY Obi-Wan needed him, say, the Chancellor might never have been abducted, or whatever his logic might dream up, but the way Anakin expressed it was pure knee-jerk reaction and very consistent with his character throughout the movies: "it would have gone better with me" - wrapped up more quickly, ended with less casualties, blah blah blah.

"Things go better with__" is an out-of-GFFA ad jingle, not an Anakin mantra.

 

The episode wasn't nearly as explosive as I imagined the arc was gearing up to be, but it was entertaining and fun nonetheless. It tied up the issues of Anakin's emotions and the Council's deception well, despite having some pretty glaring plot holes.

The good:

- Padme's dialogue was still annoying, but at least she was confined to a cameo role. And her new outfit makes her look more realistic than many others she has worn.

- Palpatine's speech offered some nice new facts about Naboo, and even some that tied into a certain recently-released novel...

- The duel between Anakin and Dooku was expertly choreographed. The lighting, the movements, everything was perfect.

The bad:

- The Holographic Disguise Copout. I found this to be even worse than the hologram tracker or "Information Retrieval". Cato Parasitti's holo-outfit at least made sense. Are we supposed to believe that projected light has the ability to latch onto a person and function even when it is no longer projected? I would have preferred having the mercenaries just wear the guard outfits.

- What was the point of the kidnapping? No demands for the release of prisoners were made, and the idea of Palpatine somehow knowing that this elaborate chain of events would lead to Anakin fighting Dooku is extremely convoluted. One way of looking at this is that the writers wanted to showcase Palpatine's manipulative skills, but it's more likely that they needed a MacGuffin to be kidnapped and they picked Palpatine without bothering to think of an actual objective for the CIS.

- Once again, Mace does nothing.

On it's own this was a fairly good episode, but it's a pretty lousy way to end a quadrilogy that started out so promising.

 

The hostage negotiation never happened. The kidnapping plan was infiltrated by the Jedi. They stopped it from happening. Hence: no hostage negotiations. You don't announce that you're going to kidnap someone & lay out terms...and then kidnap the victim! What part of this really obvious story point are people not getting?

The mission was infiltrated because the Jedi found out about it. They found out about it because it was never really meant to happen. It was meant to put Anakin under pressure and to pit him against Dooku. It was nothing more than a ruse created by Sidious. He's got everyone -- Anakin, the Jedi, Dooku -- jumping through hoops. That's what makes him dangerous & brilliant. He was playing the same game as the Jedi, i.e. he set it up to look "real" and the Jedi took the bait. It was actually really clever & fun to watch.

 

Palps needs to get better plans than just Anakin hacking at Dooku. The conflict between them isn't personal, but business as usual. Why would Anakin get so angry and enraged at fighting him rather than...someone who almost brutally kills Ahsoka/Padme?

 

I hope we get confirmation on the exact intent of the kidnapping plot. Sidious is obviously the most powerful and manipulative being in the galaxy, but I find it hard to believe that even he could know that the Council would fake the death of Obi-Wan of all Jedi, sending Anakin into a rage that would culminate in him fighting Dooku. There were so many variables in the events that Palpatine couldn't have known and couldn't have conceivably manipulated. The intent being to free Separatist prisoners would make the evenis in Crisis pretty weak but at least the situation would be somewhat feasible.

 

Its not hard at all for me to buy that the whole plot was a ruse by Palpatine, that he is that tuned to what is going on and he has that much ESP. Dave Filoni said himself on his most recent ForceCast interview that Palpatine knows pretty much everything that goes on. Really I don't think its that hard to guess that Obi-wan would be the one who would go undercover. You would need someone who is both an elite Jedi, great actor, a great negotiator, highly flexable, and high enough value to make headlines. Really the timing of Obi-wan's supposed death by a sniper would be rather suspicious. There are plenty of ways Palpatine could of found out along the way or had this confirmed to him as well. I think he created the plot, allowed the Jedi to find out, moved everyone like he was playing The Sims, and it all rolled from there.

 

I don't believe Palpatine knew that much.

Have to complain again about the Sith being overpowered. Hard to believe the Jedi ever won a war against them.

I'm still not convinced the flickering on the disguises actually happened in-universe. If it did, that's lame, but I think it was purely for fan identification.

I was thinking about the Palpatine switcheroo and here's an example of a classic missed opportunity by the TCW crew - I wish they had written it so the audience didn't know about the switch, it would have been far more dramatic, especially when Palps starts throwing punches.


This seems to be more or less where the series is at - the better episodes are entertaining but either the plots/writing aren't as good as they used to be or I'm honestly just getting tired of this show again.

 

This.

TCW writers give away too much, too easily, too often. They need to learn to keep the audience in the dark more. At least let us have a possibility of a twist.

 

What a mess... And thus an arc that started sort of ok, evolved to a cool 2nd part, and faltered on a pointless filler eventually collapsed on a jumbled mess of an ending. This really DID NOT deserve 4 episodes, specially since the actual bounty hunters kidnapping plot ends up playing second-fiddle to Dooku's showdown in the grand finale.

- So one of the main dramas in the arc, Anakin finding out Hardine is really Obi-Wan, got handled off-screen?! Bravo!

- The hologram plot. I know there's always someone who'll say "oh, it's a fictional universe, anything can happen", but again I repeat "INTERNAL LOGIC! Dammit" Cato Parasiti needs a holo projection suit to project an image around her. Now all of a sudden you can step into a hologram and keep wearing it without any projector in sight. And what's more, the hologram is actually able to turn invisible anything that would stick out of it, like Embo's huge hat. Hey, if it can do that, why not just make your entire body invisible?! Or why not just hire 4 human/humanoid bounty hunters and give them senate commando armor? Heck, Bane did just that with his commando droids in Hostage Crisis! Plus it was ludicrous to see Bane disguised as a Neimoidian, the single species most detested by the Naboo.

- So Embo and Twazzi's role in the plot was to act as decoys, attracting the Jedi while Bane and Moralo escaped with the real Palpatine. I wonder how well that went during mission briefing: "So, Embo and Twazzi, disguised as Palpatine, attract the Jedi's attention and surrender to them. While you're arrested, Bane escapes with the real chancellor." "We're arrested?! **** that!" "Well, I did say you'd never have to work again after this mission..." Seriously, did they actually intend on escaping while attracting attention like that? And if they did, why didn't Embo try anything? They really massacred his badass reputation in this arc. Now he's just another thug...

- And what was Hardine's, the great Jedi killer, part in the plot? Stand on a balcony and fire a single shot at someone?

I could go on, but I have better things to do. This was quite a disappointing arc, being that it had such great potential. Am I right that now all that's left of the season is the Maul arc? Man, that means the ONLY great thing in season 4 was the Umbara arc, most everything else was from meh to underwhelmingly poor...

 

Pretty dull episode.. mostly because it just seemed to repeat things that have been done already, with Anakin, Palpatine, Mace, Dooku, and the foreshadowing..

I guess the best thing from this episode was just seeing the bounty hunters actually putting their plan into action and capturing Palpatine. And Padme's outfit actually looking quite nice. I guess the Anakin distrusting the Council is worth a plus too..

Looking forward to the Maul episodes.

 

Thanks for agreeing with me Gry.

 

I thought this was an excellent end to the story arc, and another chance to see Sidious' manipulations is always welcome. I love the tie-in with ROTS, planting more seeds for Anakin to doubt the council, and believe them capable of keeping huge secrets from him.

I don't see why people are complaining about the holo-disguise bit. Go back and watch again, it was obvious to me that the devices all the bounty hunters were given which had their roles in the plan described on them also projected the disguise once they received a copy from the central holographic template. Watch when the disguise deactivates too. Of course, fanboys will find something to bash no matter how good an episode is, it's in their blood.

 

"The Box was designed by me to simulate certain situations that might happen on the job."

Yeah, wasn't it great in this finale when they had to climb stuff and jump around, and find secret passages inside gas-filled chambers, and find out which person wouldn't be affected by a certain toxin, and had to use their amazing sniper skills?

No?

 

I agree with your entire hologram point, Gry, and I thought of this point too.

 

I'd have to disagree here. Embo was playing this rather smart. It was Bane that acted like an idiot for not putting Embo's skills to good use.
Embo's job was to play decoy so Bane could escape with the Chancellor (Just a summization of what you said).
He knew he'd be arrested because Embo wouldn't be so quick to give in.
He also had no weapons on him so the Jedi would not be forced to kill or injure him.
The Bounty Hunters knew the Jedi wouldn't let Palps get away over two dangerous Bounty Hunters so they waited for Anakin and Mace to give chase. If all worked out, they'd get paid.
Dooku not showing up ruined the plan and there would be no reason for Embo to act.

They didn't massacre Embo's badass reputation....they just stretched it by delaying him action. If I'm not mistaken, Embo was the only Bounty Hunter that made it out of this mission in one piece without going to prison. Heck, he mays as well have walked off into the sunset whistling.
To top it off, Bane won't be a problem with competition either.

 

I really enjoyed the last six minutes, or so.

The preceding minutes had all the gravitas and believability of an episode of Scooby Doo, with the holo-suits being the worst offender. Oh, and as has also been ably pointed out; They leave the crucial part of the Anakin-reveal unshown?

I'm not a one for bashing the series, but this episode appears to have been written on a Friday afternoon after everyone's returned from the pub. The end segment is enough to make up for it (for me, not for many others, I'm sure), but I know TCW can be better than this.

 

I liked the way they did at least provide some closure. It was more than I thought they would give us. There was a conversation between Obi and Anakin.

By the way, I see people complaining about Dooku and Anakin fighting again...they haven't fought much in this show?

The first time they fought each other in the show is 'Shadow Warrior'. Season 4! In fact, I'm beginning to see more of Palpatine's plan thanks to this arc. The first year or two was getting Anakin prepared. The entire Clone Wars, a training ground for Anakin Skywalker. Once the end of year 2 comes/year 3 he starts being pitted against Dooku regularly. When he can kill him, he's ready.

Interested though, what do you guys think about Dooku in the duel. I thought he was in trouble when Anakin started choking him, but Dooku says that he was 'unworthy'. Was he in trouble? It seemed like a stupid thing for him to say is all.

 

^Anakin and Dooku's fights just seem boring by now, probably because they always seem to fight the same way: lightsabers, and Dooku zapping Anakin. They could at least put something new into it, a different location or situation that would call for them to duel differently.

 

His powers also doubled since the last time they've met.

 

How did you figure that Embo escaped this whole affair? Last time we saw him, Twazzi and him were staring down the huge rifles of a couple of shock troopers, as Anakin and Mace went after Bane. By all laws of logical narrative, that means he was arrested. Or are you saying that Embo finally opened a can of whoop-ass on those shock troopers, but it happened to take place off-screen?

So there's really only two alternatives, none of them pleasant:

- As you said, Embo knew he'd be arrested, it was part of the plan. He was to be a decoy for the plan to work and surrendered without a fight. That's great if it didn't mean that he willingly agreed to a lifetime in prison as his great reward for this daring operation. In this case he's an idiot.

- Embo somehow didn't expect to be arrested, but things didn't go as planned. When the Jedi and shock troopers cornered him, he turned himself in without a fight, even once the Jedi left, leaving only a couple of troopers in charge. In this case he's a wuss.

Either way, Embo comes out of it diminished as a character.

 

There wasn't anything this arc didn't diminish.

 

Here are my answers to your points:

-Anakin found out that Obi-Wan was Rako Hardeen at the end of "Friends and Enemies".

-There's nothing wrong with devices that accomplish the same purpose. It's the same thing here in our world. Also, invisibility is something you would use to assassinate someone. The bounty hunters are suppose to kidnap the Chancellor and the best way to do that would be to disguise themselves as the Chancellor's own guards.

-Of course, Twazzi and Embo weren't suppose to get arrested. Twazzi was suppose to disguise herself as Palpatine and have Embo take her away so that the Jedi wouldn't suspect that the real Chancellor was disguised as a senate commando. Also, they were making their way for the speeder. Another thing, if Embo went up against two Jedi, and not just any Jedi, but Jedi like Mace Windu and Anakin Skywalker, he would be toast. Not to mention, the Jedi were too close to him. Embo would be cut in half before he could do anything.

-Seven minutes into the episode, Hardeen says, "I'm suppose to immobilize the Chancellor, not kill him."

 

No he did not. That was definitely left as ambiguous. Nothing pointed that he actually knew Obi-Wan was Hardeen at that point.

 

Eh... since Obi-Wan flat-out told him to "stop following me" in Friends and Enemies, and then Anakin concluded Obi-Wan was alive immediately thereafter, I didn't think it was meant to be ambiguous. But that's just me.