Another step towards the obliteration of the Star Wars legend.
Nostalgia is everywhere these days and it's easy to fall into its trappings. Sometimes it even rewards you with hints of those warm and fuzzy feelings you remember from childhood. Transformers
is a good example, a big, bombastic ride bringing those cartoon robots from childhood to life in live-action form. It was no masterpiece, but that geeky kid inside you probably got a few goosebumps the first time Optimus Prime transformed and Peter Cullen's familiar and comforting voice boomed throughout the theater. "Autobots move out!"
On the other side of the spectrum, there are the many and varied failed attempts to recreate what once was, succeeding only in tarnishing the original material's happy associations. And no one has felt this trend in more extreme fashion than fans of the Star Wars universe. For years fans eagerly discussed even slightest mention from George Lucas of the ominous prequel trilogy. The 16 years between Return of the Jedi and Phantom Menace felt like an eternity. When the time finally came for more SW, try as they might have to love it as much, it simply wasn't the same. Attack of the Clones came along a few years later and only made things worse. Revenge of the Sith was a partial redemption, but in the three years that have passed since, the prequel trilogy has been largely forgotten. The original trilogy lives on just as it did before, if only a little less shiny and infallible, forever attached to inescapable memories of Jar Jar and the epically terrible "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"
Although there was certainly no great demand for more Star Wars at this point, never underestimate George Lucas' proclivity to make an easy buck when the opportunity presents itself. Enter the Clone Wars television series and pilot movie. Directed by Dave Filoni from a script by Henry Gilroy (and some undeniable influence from Lucas, it would appear) the movie and series centers around the epic Clone War battles covered only briefly in the prequel trilogy. In the Star Wars timeline, this takes place between Episodes II and III.
As the story goes, once Lucas saw footage for the television pilot feature, he felt it was just too good to debut only on TV -- it deserved a theatrical release. Too bad he didn't get a second opinion. If it was free, perhaps fans wouldn't judge it so harshly. They'd also be able to change the channel.
Clone Wars follows the same characters from the prequels, including Akakin, Obi-Wan, Mace Windu, Count Dooku, Padme, Yoda and a host of other familiar faces. Only Sam Jackson, Anthony Daniels, Frank Oz and Christopher Lee returned to voice their respective characters. There are three primary new characters: Ahsoka Tano, a wise-cracking, tough-gal tweener who serves as a Patewan learner to Anakin; Ziro the Hutt, Jabba the Hutt's uncle, who is sort of like a fatter, more slug-like take on Nathan Lane's character from The Birdcage; and Asajj Ventress, a Sith apprentice originally conceived for Attack of the Clones. None of the new characters is particularly memorable, but Ventress wins out as the least grating.
In terms of animation, Clone Wars is stiff and listless. Remember the original Resident Evil video games where characters constantly moved in odd ways while they were standing still? It's kind like that, only a little less human-looking. Lips are inexplicably out of sink with the words coming out of them and humanizing touches like blinking and changing facial expressions are nowhere to be found. I'd say it looks like a video game, but even the upcoming Star Wars: The Force Unleashed video game from LucasArts looks more lifelike. It's hard to imagine why Genndy Tartakovsky (Powerpuff Girls, Dexter's Laboratory), who directed the critically acclaimed Clone Wars shorts in 2003, wasn't brought back to work on this new series.
In terms of story, Clone Wars is just plain boring. I just saw it and I can barely remember what the plot was. Something to do with Jabba the Hutt's son (who Ahsoka nicknames "Stinky") being kidnapped and a clever blackmail scheme by Dooku and the Sith to pin the kidnapping on the Jedi. Whatever.
As the saying goes, if you can't say something nice, you shouldn't say anything at all, so here goes... There are some cool ships, some nice background shots of the Star Wars universe and nothing as bad as Jar Jar or the "NOOOOOOOOOOOO!" Aside from Ziro the Hutt and Ahsaka's endless clever quips, Clones Wars isn't completely intolerable. Kids should find it amusing enough and parents should at least find it generally inoffensive.
ReelzChannel Rating: 