May The Nineteenth Be With You: Star Wars: Clone Wars

Not to be confused (but very easily confused) with ‘Star Wars: The Clone Wars’, which is a different cartoon (and movie), this series of animated shorts aired between 2003 and 2005 and aimed to ‘fill in the gaps’ between Episodes II and III of the prequel trilogy.

And it’s as bonkers as it is brilliant.

Before I get into it though, please enjoy this spoiler alert:

Spoiler Alert: Nothing I could write would spoil this animated series for you. There aren’t too many surprises in terms of plot and, actually, there really isn’t a lot of plot full stop. It’s just a lot of spaceships, lightsabers and violence. Which is a good thing.

I’m not sure there is much to say about this series beyond the fact that I loved it. After the disappointment of ‘The Phantom Menace’ and ‘Attack of the Clones’, this series was a breath of fresh air.

Technically it’s no longer considered ‘canon’ as the similarly named 2008 series also deals with the same time period and tells a different (and much more in-depth) story, but during the build-up to ‘Revenge of the Sith’ this series was the definitive version of the clone wars.

And the only negative I can really offer about this iteration is that everyone is just way too cool.

Which is no criticism at all.

But, alongside an Anakin Skywalker we can all finally get on board with, we see all of the Jedi doing incredible things. Mace Windu and Yoda are particularly impressive, with the former probably getting my vote for ‘most awesome’. Samuel L Jackson is the definition of cool, but his version of Mace Windu is essentially a librarian (who are also cool in a different way) in comparison to the depiction in this cartoon.

The clone troopers look like a well-oiled military machine, and even the battle droids have a more menacing air in this than they ever managed to convey in any other on-screen depiction.

Alongside Count Dooku and Palpatine, there are three main bad guys, only one of whom made it to Episode III. The one is General Grievous and he’s so much better in this than he was in the movie.

The other two are General Durge, who to be fair, would have been a nightmare to try and recreate for a live-action movie (but he’s very cool in this) and a nameless assassin, who would go on to appear in the subsequent Clone Wars cartoon and be known as Asajj Ventress, and who is the closest thing we get to a Darth Maul type (given that at this point in the continuity he was still officially dead and wouldn’t be resurrected until the fourth series of the later cartoon).

The early episodes were bite-sized at under 4 minutes each. Later episodes were longer, but still only 12 minutes. This really was a series for people with limited attention spans, but the brevity meant the focus was far more on the action and far less on ponderous dialogue.

And after the first two prequel movies, this was exactly what we needed from Star Wars.

Best character – Mace Windu

It’s really a toss of a coin between him and Yoda, but as Yoda is cool in quite a lot of other Star Wars stuff and Mace is often not as cool as we’d like him to be, he gets the nod. He’s basically superman in this. But with a purple lightsaber.

Worst character – Anakin Skywalker

It’s a sign of how much I loved this cartoon that I couldn’t think of a bad character. Anakin is actually fantastic in this, but he still has a slightly winey voice. And when the competition is as fierce as this, he still ends up bottom of the pile.

Unsung hero – The Jedi who looks like a wolf

Because he looks like a wolf! And he’s a Jedi! He’s only in two episodes of this, but that’s two more appearances than he’s made in any other Star Wars movie or TV show. Which seems like a huge oversight if you ask me.

And that’s it for ‘Star Wars: Clone Wars’. Tune in tomorrow when I’ll be writing about something else Star Wars related. Which might also be a cartoon.