PT Question about Clone ages

Just rewatching some Clone Wars and the ages of the Clones confuse me.

The first clones were created around the time of TPM so by the time of AOTC the oldest clones should appear 20 (actually 10 but age double normal time)

If that is the case why do the younger clones appear 20 (the ones in the dining hall) and the older clones appear more like Jango Fett's age (40?)

In ROTS Cody looks 40 but should only be 26 (double 13)...am I missing something?

 

Do we ever see any "Jango lookalike" clones in AOTC, or only in ROTS?

I think the ROTS clones look a little younger than Jango, but I'd agree that the actor should have worn a bit more "ageing makeup".

Assuming that Jango and all his clones "age badly" - looking a bit older than they really are biologically, might just about make it passable. Both bounty hunting, and war, are very harsh and stressful occupations - might also contribute to people, even Jango himself, ageing overly rapidly.

 

I don't recall seeing any Jango lookalikes in AOTC - just Jango himself.

 

The guys in the dining hall might also actually be "biologically 16" or so, rather than "biologically 20" if you like the idea of fudging it a little - so they'd not actually be part of the first generation of clones.

 

So Cody in Sith is meant to look 26?

We see Jango clones in AOTC putting on the helmets IIRC

 

Roughly, yes. It's not unheard of for actors to have to play someone who's supposed to be quite a bit older (or younger) than the actor's own age though. Still, I'd agree that it might push suspension of disbelief to some extent when the gap is sufficiently large.

 

Cody at least has a fair amount of scarring to justify his older look.
The other clones are a bit more ambiguous, though I imagine fighting a war can ware on you a fair bit.
It has also often been said that war "turns boys into men". The fact that they're clones makes it a bit less justifiable, but I can't help but think of all those movies and books where a soldiers parents barely recognize them when they return home.

Doesn't explain AOTC though.

And its also notable that the comics make a point of showing physically distinct "younger" Jango Clones who are new to the front lines.

 

Cody (and the rest) is meant to look like Jango to once again remind the general audience that these soldiers are clones.

But if one wants to rationalize it all, while it's established that clones do grow to maturity in half the time, we don't know the rate at which they age. It could be exponential.

 

Given that Rex is still around and reasonably healthy in Rebels, it can't be all that exponential.

It can't be "physically 20 in AOTC, physically 40 in ROTS 3 years later, exponentially older in the years after that."

For that matter, if he aged 20 years every 3 years after AOTC (linear, rather than exponential, aging), then 21 years later (fairly late in Rebels - the year before ANH), Rex would be physically 160 (40 in ROTS, then 20 years for every 3 years after that).

Does not work.

 

Within the context of the movies, it can.

 

Within the context of the newcanon, it can't. Within the context of Legends, it can't.

"The movies" on their own, just can't cover the Star Wars Universe as a whole - they account for only tiny slices of time.

"Clones age at an exponential rate after reaching maturity" can be a headcanon - but it can never be "newcanon" "Legends canon" or even "movie canon".

There are fans who insist that, based on the movies alone, clones age at exactly the same rate as regular humans, past the age of adulthood:

And that's not movie canon either - it's a headcanon, an interpretation - that both Legends and newcanon contradict.

Simplest just to put it down to "This is what happens when the same actor is used to play characters of radically different physical ages" - and not jump to conclusions about what whether it means anything in-universe.

Or, as you put it:

The Star Wars movies - being movies - are bound by the limitations of the medium.

 

Hence why I said in the context of the movies, all of which come from the same person. The person who created the works that the OP's question is related to.

And I provided a possible explanation that doesn't contradict the movies, which are the source material for this question. A possibility, not a conclusion or statement of fact.

Not that I see this "issue" as something that needs an in-universe explanation.