As I was watching the ending credits for Star Wars: The Clone Wars, I was talking with my boys about the movie. All of us had enjoyed it and found it exciting and entertaining, but I had a nagging question: what would I have thought about it if I wasn’t a huge Star Wars fan? While I am pretty sure I wouldn’t have enjoyed it nearly as much, the bottom line is that it has been more than 31 years since I first paid my own money to see that opening crawl in a movie theater and I can no longer dissociate myself from Star Wars to the extent required to be truly objective about this movie. That might say to you that my opinion is biased, and it probably is, but too bad – I’m a Star Wars fanboy so deal with it … but that doesn’t mean that I can’t find quite a few negative things to say about this commercial … um, I mean cartoon … no, movie. Yeah, movie.

The Clone Wars are that mystical past war alluded to by Obi-Wan in the original Star Wars in his talk with Luke Skywalker, and occurred between Episode II and III. They are also the latest bag of cash that George Lucas has found by the roadside just waiting to be tapped. And in that regard it really doesn’t matter how much money this movie made or even that it was all that well received – the overarching purpose seemed to be clear: get people ready and aware of the upcoming Cartoon Network series coming in the fall. In that regard the movie is probably a success … but by every other measure it is somewhere between mediocre and a failure.

My first thought about this movie is ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me’, the awful movie that was supposed to wrap up everything about the wonderful Twin Peaks TV show. Sadly the movie was ponderous and felt like a shameless attempt to bank on the popularity of the TV series by using the ‘weird’ factor and sensuality that marked some of the show’s cool moments, but those were twisted and perverted to the point of feeling crass. The story about The Clone Wars is that George Lucas was so thrilled with the upcoming series that he thought it should be introduced in theaters … but the underside is that in order to make that happen was that three episodes of the cartoon were merged and shipped to theaters as if they were an actual feature film.

So what did I like?

I loved the visual style of the original Clone Wars cartoon shorts back in 2005, so I was thrilled from the moments I saw still images from the CGI interpretation. They have kept Geddy Tartakovsky’s angular style of presenting the characters and moved it nicely into 3D. I immediately accepted and identified with the characters of Obi-Wan and Yoda and Anakin as being extensions of the ones developed in the films and the animated shorts from 2003. I also thought it was interesting – and risky – to integrate that style with near-realistic looking ships and environments and so on. Given the rising level of CGI effects and scenes in the prequels, particularly Revenge of the Sith, this could have ended up looking like ‘Episode III with blocky cartoon characters’. Yet the look works well – the characters have an iconic feel, and the nicely flowing CGI for the action elements lends itself nicely to the battle focus throughout the movie.

The battles themselves are another highlight. Episode III gave us some wonderful battles both in space and in person to person lightsaber combat, and the original Clone Wars cartoons continued that trend. The Clone Wars features detailed strategic battles on various scales without losing the personal touch of the various Jedi and the humor that managed to emerge even in the most frenetic battles of the ultra-short first series of Clone Wars cartoons. The battles are also longer than anything seen before in the movies and continue to focus on the actions of the Clones as well as the Jedi. While Episode III and many of the books and games showed us what happens eventually, they also showed that the Clones developed individuality and independant personalities as they aged and that many became friends and trusted colleagues to the Jedi.

Hopefully this is something they will explore in more detail in the TV series. One thing books like the Republic Commando series (and, um, the original Star Wars) have shown us is that it is possible to have a compelling narrative that is not completely Jedi-centric. So far all we have is a few different haircuts and one or two clones who distinguish themselves by their creative and heroic actions. There is a long way to go before we get the sort of character development Karen Traviss pulled off in the Hard Contact book.

The movie also continues to focus on the evolving relationship between Anakin and Obi-Wan, as they move from master and apprentice to colleagues and friends. That relationship and the implications to the nature and callings of the Force has been central to the entire series, and it is nice to see it get continued play here. It was also nice to see Obi-Wan and the Council putting action behind their ‘he’s not ready’ concerns by giving him a Padawan. While I know there was significant angst in the Star Wars fan community about this (can someone tell me what that community *doesn’t* have severe angst about?), the way it was set up and handled in the movie was subtle and significant. That is especially striking in a movie that is all about brute force and heavy-handed storytelling. Getting a Padawan forces him to look inside of himself and his way of doing things, and is therefore one of the successes of the film – especially since setting up the Padawan as a major character is critical to the success of the TV series.

And no … what did I dislike?

Quite frankly, pretty much everything else. The movie suffers terribly on in-depth analysis. I have heard it repeatedly compared to a Saturday morning cartoon, and that is really a fair comparison. The way to get the most frmo this movie is to disengage your critical thinking and just enjoy the thrill ride. Because it is a thrilling ride through a familiar universe … but not a very deep one.

The first thing that bothered me is that it is apparent that this is not cut from the same technical cloth as Pixar or Dreamworks animated movies – which isn’t a problem for a TV show but is an issue for a full length feature film. The character movements and detail of the animation just don’t hold up to current standards – as I said before I liked the style, but the execution of the characters in patricular is lacking.

I loved the use of dry humor and irony in the original movies and prequels, but disliked the way C3PO was made into a comic foil in Episode II (“I am beside myself”, “oh what a drag”, and so on). His usual way of doing things made him humorous so this heavy-handed approach really felt out of place. But compared to the battle droids in this movie that stuff looks like comedic genius! In one of the best scenes of the movie – the vertical assault on the fortress – one droid is relaying orders to concentrate fire on a particular sector and rattles off the number. The other droid starts to recite the number and can’t remember it all, so the other one gets exasperated and tells him ‘just shoot down there’. It is supposed to be funny, and perhaps looked that way on paper, but it just really breaks credulity to have robots who are unable to precess a series of numbers. And that is just one example out of many. It seems that rather than subtle quips from Obi-Wan (of which there are a few) the writers decided that slapstick battle droids sounding like they are part of the latest anime was the way to connect with their target audience. And while it might work to an extent, it misses the critical point that these kids already love Star Wars so there is no reason to dumb it down to this extent.

I have always agreed with George Lucas’ assessment that one of the great characters of Star Wars was John Williams music. The maestro is not composing the music in this movie, nor in the TV series, but that isn’t necessarily cause for concern. There has been some great music written by others for Star Wars video games through the years such as Dark Forces, Republic Commando and Knights of the Old Republic. Sadly this is more like the mundane music from Lethal Alliance. It is decent background music, but Star Wars fans want and expect more, and this soundtrack simply doesn’t deliver a single stirring or memorable theme.

All of that would amount to superficial criticism if the two most important things worked: that the story was good and that Ahsoka Tano was established as a solid central character. But sadly it is with these critical areas that the movie falls flat. The story centers around a crisis in which Jabba the Hutt’s son has been kidnapped just as the Republic is negotiating use of space traffic corridors through the Hutt-controlled Outer Rim territory. There are underpinnings to the story that tie in the Separatists and the Sith, and also involve Ahsoka and Anakin working together as master and padawan. But that is about as detailed a summary as you need for the movie – the rest is battles and poorly written dialogue.

Honestly, the story would have worked well enough for a 30-minute episode of the show, but cannot hold up under the weight of being a feature film. The baby is sick and smelly like Hutts are known to be, but also cute enough to be a sympathetic pull between the Jedi master and apprentice. But the attempts at political wrangling are cringe-worthy in their transparency – if Jabba is falling for all of this then it is truly amazing that he has become so powerful. There is no real suspense or drama – we have to accept that much tension is lost because we know who is alive in Episode III and that Ahsoka is supposedly the star of the new series, but the whole movie wraps up nice and neat like the end of a 30-minute sitcom.

As for Ahsoka Tano … I didn’t hate her as much as I thought I would as a character. But as a Jedi, I hated her even more, and it is that feeling of disgust that has me concerned for the upcoming series. I had remarked to my kids when she first appeared that she had ‘anime eyes’, the sort of overly large eyes that you expect in the lastest series of Japanese anime. And that makes sense, as her character would fit in with the petulant and argumentative teens found in shows like Naruto. She would also fit in on pretty much every tween-centric show on Disney or Nick or any of the other networks. In other words, she is pretty much a normal 12 year old. Or rather, pretty much UNLIKE what you would expect from a potential Padawan. I mean, simply reading the stories about Obi-Wan thinking he was going to end up on a farm somewhere putting his Force skills to use in that capacity because of his brash and impulsive nature puts the whole thing in perspective: in the context of established Jedi lore, she should never have been a potential Padawan.

My kids liked her and thought she was fun and spunky and really cool. Then I asked them, “based on what you know and have read in all of the Star Wars books about younglings and Jedi Temple training, is it appropriate the way Ahsoka is behaving”? That pretty well stopped them in their tracks. Because they have read pretty much all of the books I have bought through the years and realize how out of place she would have been in Luke’s New Jedi Academy, let alone the one of the Republic. It makes even less sense in the light of how much time was spent discussing how much of an exception Anakin was in so many ways, and that allowances were made for him almost entirely because of his potential as ‘the Chosen One’ and his considerable Force powers.

It is clear that they have done this in order to make her attractive to the target tween audience, and it actually works pretty well since all of the fictional characters they identify with are smart-mouthed kids who disrespect everyone, listen to no one, and end up doing OK regardless. But this irritates me in that it flies in the face of everything they have spent the last 31 years establishing in terms or order and traditions. It is like too much of the Expanded Universe, the New Jedi Order in particular, where they choose to ‘reimagine’ major concepts for the sole purpose of continuing to pump out product.

You might get the impression that I didn’t think too highly of The Clone Wars, that I would rate it perhaps 2 stars out of 5. And you would be correct. Yet I don’t regret seeing it in the theater, but that is because while my wife was working I got to spend a couple of hours seeing a movie that we all thought was light fluffy fun and were able to share on a number of levels. We had a great time, and we will likely watch the series together when it comes out in October – and know enough to not try to force it on my wife who likes the movies but disliked the cartoons because they were too battle heavy.

But don’t take it as a recommendation to see it – there are clearly better movies out there, even if you are a Star Wars fan. The DVD will clearly be out before Christmas, and it is not as if you really need the background provided in the movie to be prepared for the TV series. What I am not sure about is whether this will backfire and cause fewer people to bother tuning into the TV series. My thoughts on the series are still conflicted – they have a great opportunity to tell the stories of the Clones, to go into places that are not part of the small group of main movie characters, and to bring some depth to areas brushed over in the films. But Ahsoka is constantly nagging me, telling me that rather than truly expans the universe of knowledge around the Clone Wars, we will be getting a sort of ‘Star Wars anime’ to support the push of action figures and other new toys and games. Oh, and in case you missed the movie, more than once it drops into ‘first person shooter’ view, making it feel even less like a feature movie.

Kid Factor: parents should use caution with this movie for the same reason my wife hates it – there is almost non-stop violence and we see many deaths of Clone warriors throughout the movie. It is not bloody, but it is brutal.

Tags: Movies with Children