Tag Duchess Satine

The Essential Clone Wars: “The Lawless”

Rob Siebert 1 Comment

***I must confess that, despite being a huge Star Wars geek, I have yet to see the landmark Clone Wars animated show in its entirety. I’m aiming to rectify that to a large extent here, as we look at pivotal episodes of the series in, “The Essential Clone Wars.”

Satine death, Star Wars the Clone Wars, The LawlessSERIES: Star Wars: The Clone Wars
EPISODE: S5:E16 – “The Lawless”
WITH THE VOICE TALENTS OF: James Arnold Taylor, Anna Graves, Sam Witwer, Ian Abercrombie, Katee Sackhoff
WRITER: Chris Collins
DIRECTOR: Brian Kalin O’Connell
PREMIERE DATE: February 2, 2013
SYNOPSIS: Obi-Wan travels to Mandalore to save Satine from Maul’s forces.

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By Rob Siebert
Fanboy Wonder

Wait, Satine has a nephew named Korkie? Why is that funny to me?

So now we have not only have Mandalorians with red armor, but Mandalorians whose helmets have horns like Darth Maul. You just know the artists and designers had fun with that one.

Having received Duchess Satine’s desperate transmission for help, Obi-Wan travels to Mandalore to save her. Question: Did Yoda and the Jedi Council know about him going to Mandalore, or did Obi-Wan do it on his own? If so, does he face any consequences for that? Just asking…

After they are captured by Mandalorian forces, Obi-Wan is forced to watch as Satine is executed by Maul. Needless to say, this makes their feud even more personal than it already was. I wasn’t necessarily surprised to see Satine die. But I was surprised to see her simply executed the way she was. She didn’t go out in a blaze of glory or anything. They just got everybody in a room, and Maul killed her. Simple as that.

Sensing what’s happening, Darth Sidious personally travels to Mandalore to confront Maul. And again I have to ask, does anyone know where he went? He is the chancellor of the Republic, and they are in the middle of a war. He can’t just go off without telling anybody, can he?

I understand these kinds of details aren’t necessarily important in the context of telling the story. The important thing is that Obi-Wan and Palpatine ultimately end up on Mandalore. But it’s fair question, isn’t it?

I noticed that just before the two-on one duel starts with Sidious, Maul, and Savage Opress, Maul does the “Obi-Wan pose” (shown below). I can only assume that was intentional. The Obi-Wan pose wasn’t as much of a thing yet. But the show had done it before. And of course, we’d see it in Revenge of the Sith.

Ian Abercrombie, who voices Palpatine/Sidious, has the character’s evil laugh down pat. That makes his fight sequence with Maul and Opress that much more effective.

There are a lot of “echoes” in this episode. You’ve got Obi-Wan luring that Mandalorian on to his ship and stealing his uniform, much like they did in A New Hope. Then, seconds before he sees Palpatine, Maul says he senses a presence he hasn’t felt since… Again, like in A New Hope. Then, after it’s revealed that Bo-Katan is Satine’s sister, Obi-Wan says “I’m so sorry,” much like he says to Padme in Revenge of the Sith.

Star Wars does love it’s callbacks, doesn’t it?

To Maul’s shock and horror, Sidious kills Savage Opress. Thus, possibly my least favorite character in all of Star Wars is put down. Whatever shall we do without him?

Email Rob at primaryignition@yahoo.com, or check us out on Twitter.

The Essential Clone Wars: “Shades of Reason”

Rob Siebert 1 Comment

***I must confess that, despite being a huge Star Wars geek, I have yet to see the landmark Clone Wars animated show in its entirety. I’m aiming to rectify that to a large extent here, as we look at pivotal episodes of the series in, “The Essential Clone Wars.”

SERIES: Star Wars: The Clone Wars
EPISODE: S5:E15 – “Shades of Reason”
WITH THE VOICE TALENTS OF: Sam Witwer, Jon Favreau, Anna Graves, Julian Holloway, Clancy Brown
WRITER: Chris Collins
DIRECTOR: Bosco Ng
PREMIERE DATE: January 26, 2013
SYNOPSIS: Maul and Pre Vizsla each jockey for control of Mandalore.

***New around here? Check out our Star Wars review archive!***

By Rob Siebert
Fanboy Wonder

Well of course the bad guys are secretly plotting against each other. It almost wouldn’t be Star Wars if they weren’t. In a way it’s kind of stupid. But it also makes sense. Star Wars shows us that greed and a lust for power, i.e. the dark side, are all-consuming. And once you start down that path, you can never have enough…

Pre Vizsla gets in front of the crowd and says that Death Watch is here to save them from the gangsters. The crowd buys into what he says very quickly, despite the group ominously having the word “death” in its name. Not exactly easy from a marketing standpoint, is it? You’d think the Empire would have run into the same thing with the Death Star.

One of the things that interests me about this episode is that none of our heroes are in it. There’s no Obi-Wan, Anakin, Ahsoka, Yoda, etc. Not every show can pull that off. It’s a credit to the quality of the writing and the patience said writers have in crafting this story.

The animators did a great job with Satine’s face in this episode. You can feel her worry, despair, even pain at the situation she and her people find themselves in.

Pretty epic fight between Maul and Vizsla (shown above). Maybe my favorite one-on-one confrontation of the entire series thus far.

Ultimately, Maul decapitates Vizsla with the Darksaber and takes his spot as leader of Death Watch. The whole “he who holds the Darksaber rules Mandalore” thing is obviously what they’re preparing to invoke between Din Djarin and Bo-Katan as head toward season three of The Mandalorian. This was a handy episode to watch in that respect.

Email Rob at primaryignition@yahoo.com, or check us out on Twitter.

The Essential Clone Wars: “The Mandalore Plot”

Rob Siebert 2 Comments

***I must confess that, despite being a huge Star Wars geek, I have yet to see the landmark Clone Wars animated show in its entirety. I’m aiming to rectify that to a large extent here, as we look at pivotal episodes of the series in, “The Essential Clone Wars.”

Star Wars The Clone Wars The Mandalore Plot, Duchess SatineSERIES: Star Wars: The Clone Wars
EPISODE: S2:E12 – “The Mandalore Plot”
WITH THE VOICE TALENTS OF: James Arnold Taylor, Anna Graves, Jon Favreau, Corey Burton, Greg Proops
WRITER: Melinda Hsu
DIRECTOR: Kyle Dunlevy
PREMIERE DATE: January 29, 2010
SYNOPSIS: Obi-Wan reunites with an old friend to solve a mystery on Mandalore.

By Rob Siebert
Fanboy Wonder

Episodes like “The Mandalore Plot” expose a problem with the show: Obi-Wan’s costume. For whatever reason, characters like Obi-Wan, Anakin, and Ahsoka appear in the same singular outfit episode after episode. That’s not a drastic problem, as they’re Jedi and virtually always wear similar outfits. But for Obi-Wan it’s a problem, as they opted to put him in battle armor for his singular outfit. That works fine for battle sequences. But this episode starts with a diplomatic mission to Mandalore. As such, the armor is inappropriate. Obi-Wan really should have been in Jedi robes, akin to what he wears in all three prequel films.

Making the Mandalorians their own society of super commandos presents a problem: It devalues Boba Fett and Jango Fett, as we now virtually have a planet full of characters that all have similar costumes and gadgets. Considering what pivotal roles Boba and Jango have in the saga at large, I would have deemed that unacceptable, regardless of whether that’s how the Mandalorians were originally conceived.

Star Wars The Clone Wars, The Mandalore Plot, Pre Vizsla

What’s more, it’s a problem that Star Wars wasn’t able to even try and solve until more than a decade later, when we got to The Mandalorian. When we get to “The Tragedy” in season two, we’re able to see how Boba Fett’s fighting style is much more brutal than Din Djarin’s, and presumably the rest of the Mandalorians. I’d still prefer Boba and Jango had the whole helmet and jetpack M.O. to themselves. But that helped.

On the subject of The Mandalorian, the man who would become its showrunner, Jon Favreau, plays Pre Vizsla. I’m not enamored with that casting choice, though. Maybe it’s the stark contrast of his nasally American accent against the ones James Arnold Taylor and Anna Graves give to Obi-Wan and Satine. (I say that as a guy with a nasally American accent. It’s not an insult, I promise.)

The Clone Wars is a kids show, right? At least in theory? I say that because it’s not often you see a suicide on a kids show. We hear the sound of his body hitting the ground and everything. I ain’t mad at it. I’m just saying you don’t see it often. If ever…

Before strapping Obi-Wan into that Adam West Batman style death trap, the Death Watch soldiers thought enough to take Obi-Wan’s lightsaber. However they apparently didn’t think to check him for communication devices. Bad form, gentlemen.

Email Rob at primaryignition@yahoo.com, or check us out on Twitter.