Full Series Discuss/Regrade the Episode: S03E13: Monster

==Episode 3.13 // Monster==
Savage makes the scene​

"Evil is not born, it is taught"​

When Count Dooku calls upon the Nightsisters seeking a replacement for Ventress, she and her kin seize the opportunity to exact revenge. Ventress visits the far side of Dathomir and the males of the planet seeking the most brutal and powerful warrior among them. Talzin has Asajj secretly select a warrior from the distant Nightbrother village:Savage Opress. With the power of dark magic, Talzin transforms Savage into a hulking warrior ultimately loyal to Asajj. She then delivers Opress to Dooku, where he will serve as his secret Sith apprentice in a plot to overthrow Darth Sidious.

http://starwars.com/explore/the-clone-wars/ep313#!/about
Now that you've rewatch the episode lets regrade it. Feel free to discuss as much as you like.​

 

This was a pretty good episode and a good debut for Savage

 

This was my least favourite episode of the entire series, 5/10.

 

This is the episode with the Ventress upskirt.

Is there a trophy for maintaining a 0.5 creep ratio? I feel like there should be. I'm going to keep working on it in hopes of receiving a trophy retroactively.

Point Given how about a trophy for Team Creepy? DantheJedi, beezel, VLM and I sorta deserve it for our dedication to creeping people out. I know VLM loves trophies of any kind.

 

I really felt that Monster was a very quality episode, amping up the 'darkness' further from Nightsisters before it. It introduced us to the Nightbrothers clan, a culture of Dathomirian Zabrak/human hybrids entirely subservient to the whims of the Nightsisters. I know the idea came from the desire to market a new Darth Maul successor, who ironically would be superceded by the man himself later on in TCW.

Mother Talzin promises Count Dooku a new apprentice from the Nightbrothers clan, citing a favor that she owes Dooku after the latter had at one time aided her. I get the feeling that Talzin really hates being indebted to the Sith Lord. Anyways, this episode really allowed Asajj Ventress to shine. IMO, this is Ventress at her darkest and most vile in TCW, giving us quite to the contrast to her earlier, more sympathetic portrayal in Nightsisters. I liked it, as this is probably Ventress at her most evil since Cloak of Darkness. Her brutal beatdown of several Nightbrothers during the Selection only proved that she really meant business and was taking the task of selecting an apprentice to train under and betray Dooku very seriously. She is still very much guided by her hatred of her former Master, and you can see it in the way she beats down and kills several of the Nightbrothers.

I was pleasantly surprised by a lot of the violence in this episode, particularly during the Test of Fury when Ventress catches a blade from one Nightbrother and impales him with casually by throwing it back, as well as the Test of Night where she cuts down the remaining Nightbrother with her sickle, leaving only Savage and Feral left. She was truly badass in this episode, not unlike her depiction in the comics, which was very welcome to see, as I felt too often she wasn't shown to be as powerful as we know her to be. Speaking of which, the Crucible arena in the Nightbrother village provided some excellent visuals of Dathomir.

Which brings me to the titular character, Savage Opress. I personally thought Savage was a pretty good character, if a little bland personality-wise. Still, we are introduced to him alongside his brother Feral, to whom he shares an apparently tight fraternal bond, a bond that would come to define Savage's character throughout his time in TCW. His strength is emphasized in this episode, not just his physical prowess but also the strength of his brotherly bond. Look no further than the fact that he was willing to give himself up to Ventress in order to save his brother from the Nightsister's wrath. I definitely felt sympathy for the character, and knew that he was doomed from the start to become nothing more than a pawn in Talzin's incomprehensible game.

Once Savage surrendered himself to Ventress, the Nightsisters perform a ritual that transforms the Nightbrother into a fearsome warrior, standing over seven feet tall. Thus, from a cloud of green mist, Randy was born. His first test after awaking with his new powers was to kill his own brother, Feral, in order to test his loyalty to Ventress. He does this without hesitation, calling his brother a weakling before snapping the latter's neck. Chilling. Thus, Savage seemingly discards his former persona and becomes the titular "Monster" from which the episode refers (just look at the fortune cookie at the beginning of the episode). After producing an enchanted poleaxe for Savage, Talzin offers him to Dooku as his newest apprentice.

The episode concludes with a brilliant battle scene on Devaron, where GAR forces are desperately trying to defend the Temple of Eedit from Separatist forces. I liked how Savage savagely (sorry for the pun) tosses battle droids aside as he fearlessly charged the clones' frontlines, shrugging off a direct blaster hit on his torso, protected by enchanted armor. He not only effortlessly slaughters the clones with nothing but his poleaxe, but also dispatches Jedi Master Halsey and his young Padawan Knox with relative ease. Hence we witness the full extent of Savage's power, however unrefined it may be. This scene in particular showed the full potential Savage had to be a truly deadly foe to the Jedi. It is unfortunate that we do not see much more of this following the conclusion of the Nightsisters trilogy.

At the end we finally see Dooku admit for the first time his ambition to have Savage as his Sith apprentice and overthrow his Master, Darth Sidious himself. Again, it is unfortunate that this particular plot point went nowhere fast, but it was cool to see Tyranus fully embracing the ways of the Sith.

All in all, while this episode certainly wasn't as good as the one preceding it, it was still very enjoyable and it introduced us to one of TCW's better OCs. I gave this episode a 10/10, rounded up, so not perfect, but close. Definitely within my top 10.

 

You missed the one in Witches of the Mist?

...But ANYWAY. I didn't enjoy this episode as much as Nightsisters upon my first viewing, but hey, it's Savage's debut ep, so I just can't hate it. Like Brothers, it's slightly more tolerable when your favorite character is in the starring role.

 

This episode raises the question of what (if any) other characters are possessed by Talzin.

 

On its own like I watched it back in the day, this was the first villain-centric episode with no heroes in it. It was a big deal for me and I liked it and Savage... A 8/10 for an awesome episode, but it is a 8 cause it really is a middle of a "movie" and it has no real climax. The battle on Devaron is fun, but that is it. It just stops there and we waited for the next part (anybody who did not go to the special screenings that is).


But today, seeing how and where Savage ended up... YEAH.... I would give this episode a 3 for wasting a lot of time about a worthless character that only showed his lack of worth with the passage of time. Clancy Brown did a great job in the episode, but sad he was used for such a character.
This episode, if it was not about Savage's promising start to a worthless "growth", could have been used to deepen the relationship between Dooku and Sidious. Showed how Sidious's training of Dooku is different to Yoda's teaching of Luke... and maybe it would have been too amazing to have Sidious critique each lesson of Yoda by putting his own Dark Side spin on it.

3/10 - battle of Devaron saves the episode, but in the grand scheme of things kinda.... it deserves this weak grade!

 

7
The weak link in the trilogy. It was good but some things annoyed me like a huge chunk being the Test Battle. Made up points for Savage, this was the one episode that he actually has character.

 

I really really liked this episode. Savage Opress had soooo much potential, he was by far the most interesting villain at this point of the series for me. At the time and the hopes I had for this character I gave it a 9/10. The battle was epic and the monster he became at the end of the episode was great. In retrospect however I think this episode was just a tease, one that never lived up to what I and many thought it would be. I'm still mad at how Savage went out, I hated that.

 

True, true... bringing Maul back was the cheap way. Making Savage his own thing would have been the better way and it would have not pissed me off so much by the end... the end caused by Sidious.
I would have loved if he was just a developed Separatist commander with training from Dooku and have link to Maul, nothing else.

Too easy!

 

Basically describes Savage

 

Both Savage and Vader, actually.

 

I think the only problem with Monster was the cruelty of Ventress during the ceremony. Making Savage kill Feral was not the behavior of someone on the path which she was on at the time; it was a wholly Sith gesture, and I think she should have been rebelling against those Sith tendencies now more than ever, realizing that this sort of "anarchic hate" should have had nothing to do with her very specific, targeted hatred of Dooku. I feel like she never really paid the price for that moment in the narrative, and for me, it kinda taints the awesome path she wound up taking.

 

Ventress was fine. She was still the Separatist commander that throws droids off cliffs. I was not shocked that she had Savage kill Feral. He was there just to die a pointless death so we could be shown that the sisters have complete control over Savage. Something he proved was not true very quickly. I think one should care less that Ventress made Savage do what he did, but be more annoyed at Savage for being too dumb not to resist. He killed Feral.

And if you want a price to be paid for her deeds, Ventress paid up. Her and Talzin did. That happened when Grievous in all his glory massacred and brought down the hammer of the CIS on those stupid witches. When Ventress lost everything on Dathomir and was left alone, I think that is the moment she paid for her acts of cruelty from before.

 

- I... don't buy into the whole lifelike loyalty to one fictional organization over another, so that argument (and many that you make, as I'm sure you understand) are lost on me. Sorry dude.

- She was not still the Separatist commander, and droids are droids. I wasn't shocked that she had Savage kill Feral, but it was inconsistent and hamfisted.

- No sympathetically-portrayed lifeform should just be "there to die a pointless death."

I didn't think it was a huge deal, and now I'm making it sound bigger because I have to defend my thoughts... but I'm speaking in terms of narrative structure, so we may not want the same thing here. I like Ventress as an anti-hero, but every good anti-hero has dues to pay, and I just don't see the Massacre stuff as her paying the price; that, I attribute to Talzin. I just think the whole thing could have been much more prescient if it was something she went along with reluctantly, in defiance of her reservations. Then I'd think it was her who paid the price, and not just Talzin.

 

Lifelike loyalty??! What does that mean? Do explain.

Ok... Lost I do not know why, but ok.

Droids ARE droids... so!? By a Separatist commander I meant that she is still the ruthless killer that worked for Dooku. The difference is that now she could use her skills and knowledge against him and his forces.
If you know what she did before this point in all of the comics (both EU and TCW comics), you will understand why I am not shocked she wants to kill some worthless alien like Feral.
She kills the alien in "Bounty" for no reason so what is your point about pointless killings from Asajj?!

Well, I can think of a dozen SW characters in this show alone that have been killed off just for the sake of killing them. Adi Gallia comes to mind. So Feral is just the next in the line for pointless SW deaths.

From season 3 onward, Ventress was a nightsister and wanted to be with her sisters. Dathomir is where she was born on Dathomir. Dathomir was her home in the series. Grievous owning all the witches and burning them alive, burning Ventress's home is actually paying her dues in a big way. He made her pay for her betrayal - that was Dooku's idea + killing her, but that did not happen.

 

I disagree; the only path Ventress was on at that time was the path of vengeance: she wanted Dooku dead for betraying her and she was ready to do whatever it required to reach that goal. IMO it’s not until ‘Massacre’ that she slowly begins to let go of the hate and anger that ruled her for such a long time, so I felt her actions fitted well with her personality at that time.

 

Dan, I meant the whole glorious hammer of the CIS thing, elevating Separatists... I mean, I just don't get it. I wouldn't get it if it were the Jedi, or Black Sun, or any of it. They're just part of the set piece to me. I don't tend to side with any of these fictitious groups, but prefer to watch how they interact. If there's judgement to be made, it's on an isolated character-by-character basis.

Anyway...

(1) Droids are droids. They're not alive.
(2) Throughout this, the obvious thing would be for her to realize that, not just the use of the dark side, but Sith practices are what lead to her abandonment, and shy away from similar brutality-for-its-own-sake.
(3) Worthless alien? That's so creepy. You must have missed the part where he and Savage have a sympathetic relationship before the ceremony. If you're one of those "CRUSH THE WEAK!" dark side fans, I just... I can't reason with you, because that stuff is messed up, and misses the whole point of Star Wars. Have you ever killed anybody? No? Then why celebrate the killing of a sympathetic fictional character? A good story has conflict and tragedy, but it's not generally celebrated; it just provides an arc.
(4) Ventress killed a scumbag who was hitting on her, who knew the rules, because he was a mercenary. That's some Han Solo stuff, not darksider stuff.
(5) They attempted (albeit in their surfacey way) to give Adi Gallia a tragic death. The Feral thing was handled poorly, and should have had a bigger impact on Ventress; they proceeded to humanize her, so this was an inconsistency in her character arc, simple as that.

To illustrate, it's like something from the last Bond film: There's a lady who they establish to have been a former sex slave... but then Bond slips onto her boat and gets in the shower with her, like ya do, but it's so not cool, it's icky, because he just figured out that she was a former sex slave. All they would have had to do to make that work was leave out the part about her having been a sex slave, or leave out them gettin' it on, but both is gross. Same with the Feral thing; either don't establish him as a sympathetic character, or at least show that it has some emotional effect on this new side of Ventress.

Point is, I'm sorry if you don't see how killing an innocent slave makes even an anti-hero totally unlikable, but in terms of traditional storytelling it just does. It was a moment of bad writing, end of story.

Even then, it's a missed opportunity at best. Accountability for your actions is a huge part of Star Wars, and what you're describing isn't karmically paying the price for killing someone innocent while trying to accomplish her goal; it's just Dooku responding by trying to kill her because she tried to kill him, wiping out the Nightsisters because he can. That ain't karma, it's just intentional, logical revenge.

 

No I'm not pissed, if anything she did Ventress a favor. She let her go and do her own thing, which is what Ventress has needed to do for a long long time. I guess at the moment it was messed up and cruel of her to just dip out on her like she did, but in retrospect, she did her a favor wouldn't you say?.