The Mandalorian

[Benny]

I know this isn't really the Clone Wars thread, but I've been very impressed with the quality of its visual style - so many of the action sequences are far more creative and actually easier to follow than any of the madly chaotic crap in the prequels or recent trilogy.

 

Spoiler

Like a zero g action sequence that was genuinely cool.

 

Although then I have to laugh when I remember that this is apparently aimed at 6 year olds and

 

Spoiler

there's a scene where a loads of clone troopers with flame throwers burn some bug people to death

 

[womblingfree]

1 hour ago, JPL said:

Maybe you’re right. I’ve just never thought of it that way.

The Prequels were criticised at the time for racial stereotyping. Jar-Jar is a not very good Jamaican stereotype, Watto is a sneaky Jewish stereotype and the Neimodians are stereotype Chinese. Probably some more I’ve missed.

[Vulgar Monkey]

Im also now going through TCW due to Mando.

Only discovered by accident that disney+ had them all - the way they're listed made me think they only had s7 (I assumed due to a licensing thing or summat).

[drob4]

5 hours ago, womblingfree said:

The Prequels were criticised at the time for racial stereotyping. Jar-Jar is a not very good Jamaican stereotype, Watto is a sneaky Jewish stereotype and the Neimodians are stereotype Chinese. Probably some more I’ve missed.

If anyone hasn’t heard it, this interview clip with Peter Serafinowicz sums things up pretty well (worth listening to the end for the Terrance Stamp anecdote):

 

 

[IcEBuRN]

On 19/11/2020 at 11:01, Darren said:

I've tried Clone Wars twice at least and never got into it at all, but I think I never got past the dodgy first couple of series and on to the stuff that everyone raves about. I really ought to give it another go using that reddit guide.

It's excellent. But yeah, use a guide to skip the crap filler. It can't be oblivious to anyone that most of the recommended episodes are at the start and end of each season... 

[redbloodcell]

9 hours ago, Benny said:

I know this isn't really the Clone Wars thread, but I've been very impressed with the quality of its visual style - so many of the action sequences are far more creative and actually easier to follow than any of the madly chaotic crap in the prequels or recent trilogy.

 

  Reveal hidden contents

Like a zero g action sequence that was genuinely cool.

 

Although then I have to laugh when I remember that this is apparently aimed at 6 year olds and

 

  Reveal hidden contents

there's a scene where a loads of clone troopers with flame throwers burn some bug people to death

 

 

Give this a watch when you have made your way through it:

 

Spoiler

 

 

Tl:dr - the show really pulls no punches!

[IcEBuRN]

Well there you go. I never knew they used a real model.

 

 

 

 

[superfunk]

Why...

 

Spoiler

...were the kids in the classroom all human? New Republic Apartheid?

 

[Pob]

21 hours ago, womblingfree said:

Looks like Filoni is doing the same for the Sequels with The Mandalorian that he did for the Prequels with Clone Wars and Rebels. That is, make a coherent and compelling story-arc from the rubble of incomprehensible nonsense.

 

Yeah this is what I like most about his work. Like it or not, the story of Star Wars is now that the Emperor did not die when Vader chucked him down a bottomless pit but simply enacted a long-gestating plan for immortality. To be fair it's well set up in Revenge of the Sith, if you accept Star Wars in the round rather than rejecting everything outside of the OT, so I'm starting to warm to it despite the crappy execution in TROS.

 

These days Palpatine is much more integral to the Clone Wars era than he is the OT era. Ultimately, he's the overarching bad guy across all three trilogies, much more so than Vader. It should be called the Palptatine Saga not the Skywalker saga!

 

In hindsight I think that Palpatine going for some bastardised Sith version of the 'force ghost' thing is ultimately a better story for the Star Wars saga as a whole than some brand new super-baddie (Snoke) appearing out of the nowhere sometime after ROTJ.

 

I'm looking forward to seeing the mythology fleshed out in the Disney+ stuff. I do agree that it makes good background world-building rather than being the focus, though.

[And]

22 hours ago, Benny said:

I know this isn't really the Clone Wars thread, but I've been very impressed with the quality of its visual style - so many of the action sequences are far more creative and actually easier to follow than any of the madly chaotic crap in the prequels or recent trilogy.

 

  Hide contents

Like a zero g action sequence that was genuinely cool.

 

Although then I have to laugh when I remember that this is apparently aimed at 6 year olds and

 

  Hide contents

there's a scene where a loads of clone troopers with flame throwers burn some bug people to death

 

We’ve just got to that episode, it’s a real step up in action, it’s like the kids tv show became a brutal war film. 

[Garwoofoo]

1 hour ago, Pob said:

In hindsight I think that Palpatine going for some bastardised Sith version of the 'force ghost' thing is ultimately a better story for the Star Wars saga as a whole than some brand new super-baddie (Snoke) appearing out of the nowhere sometime after ROTJ.

 

Yeah, the main problem with the whole Palpatine thing was the terrible way it was handled in TROS - and the way it appeared out of nowhere, in an intro crawl of all the fucking things, after two movies suggesting the story was something else entirely - rather than the plan itself. If it had been built up properly and handled better it wouldn't have been half as jarring as it ended up being. If the Mandalorian ends up being that missing bit of exposition and world-building then it'll be doing the whole saga a service (as well as, hopefully, continuing to be a wildly entertaining series in its own right).

[Boothjan]

It's been really tough to avoid this thread as I've only just binged the 4 new episodes this weekend - what an excellent season this is turning into, particularly the first and third episodes.  As a huge fan of the New Canon books as well as the Clone Wars/Rebels series, I'm really impressed with the way they're building things up, dropping in subtle references etc.

 

Cannot wait til Friday's going by the episode title....

[Pob]

2 hours ago, Garwoofoo said:

 

Yeah, the main problem with the whole Palpatine thing was the terrible way it was handled in TROS - and the way it appeared out of nowhere, in an intro crawl of all the fucking things, after two movies suggesting the story was something else entirely - rather than the plan itself. If it had been built up properly and handled better it wouldn't have been half as jarring as it ended up being. If the Mandalorian ends up being that missing bit of exposition and world-building then it'll be doing the whole saga a service (as well as, hopefully, continuing to be a wildly entertaining series in its own right).

 

Maybe JJ Abrams can retcon a post-credits sequence into The Force Awakens where we see a mysterious red-tinged area of space, zoom in on a gothic planet and suddenly a manky Palpatine head pops out of a gooey bacta tank, like that bit at the end of Masters of the Universe.

[Curtis]

That bit with the red & blue wires was soooooo good.  

 

[And]

2 hours ago, Curtis said:

That bit with the red & blue wires was soooooo good.  

 

 

reminded me very much of Rocket trying to explain the button  : 

 

 

followed later by :

 

[hebejebe]

On 22/11/2020 at 12:37, womblingfree said:

Looks like Filoni is doing the same for the Sequels with The Mandalorian that he did for the Prequels with Clone Wars and Rebels. That is, make a coherent and compelling story-arc from the rubble of incomprehensible nonsense.

I’m a big Filoni fan but isn’t this Jon Favreau’s baby? He’s the shows creator and main writer. He’s written all the episodes so far this season. 

[monkeydog]

7 hours ago, hebejebe said:

I’m a big Filoni fan but isn’t this Jon Favreau’s baby? He’s the shows creator and main writer. He’s written all the episodes so far this season. 

 

The behind the scenes roundtables really suggested to me that Filoni's a compass of 'good Stars Wars' for the show (not to take anything away from anyone else, including Faveau). 

[Matt Defis]

Filoni directed Favreau during the Clone Wars where he played Pre Vizsla, I imagine Favreau knows exactly what he has in Filoni and keeps him very close by.

[FiveFootNinja]

From the behind the scenes stuff it looked to me like Favreau was the big man spearheading it with Disney and doing most of the actual scriptwriting, while Filoni seemed more part of the overall story development/writing room and essentially playing young George Lucas bringing loads of detail and lore together. Hearing him talk about his relationship with George was really interesting, he is the padawan.

[Stoppy2000]

59 minutes ago, FiveFootNinja said:

From the behind the scenes stuff it looked to me like Favreau was the big man spearheading it with Disney and doing most of the actual scriptwriting, while Filoni seemed more part of the overall story development/writing room and essentially playing young George Lucas bringing loads of detail and lore together. Hearing him talk about his relationship with George was really interesting, he is the padawan.

It does make me wonder how the team of Favreau, Filoni and Lucas would have approached making EP 7,8,9 if they'd been given the chance. Ah well. At least we have this! 

[Matt Defis]

That's the big problem with 7,8,9, we're being shown what could have been had Disney chilled their boots a bit, Filoni still says he's a few years away from making a movie but he will do it.

 

The Old Republic seems like an obvious place to go, I do wonder if they're holding onto it for Filoni, he was the guy that made Revan and Bane canon after all. 

[drmick]

2 hours ago, Stoppy2000 said:

It does make me wonder how the team of Favreau, Filoni and Lucas would have approached making EP 7,8,9 if they'd been given the chance. Ah well. At least we have this! 

 

If Lucas was still about I doubt we would have got Favreau, and Filoni would have been suppressed to being a simple yes man.

[IcEBuRN]

 

[Steven]

On 21/11/2020 at 18:22, Waggo said:

Looking at Star Wars in it's entirety though who is the bigger fool Obi Wan or Yoda?

 

 Clearly Obi Wan - Yoda's fucking well short.

[JohnC]

This week's opening 

[Matt Defis]

Well that's made my Friday. 

 

So much good stuff in there

 

Spoiler

Lady Tano

Loth cats

HK units

Thrawn

Tython

 

I guess Ahsoka is still looking for Ezra then. 

I'm a happy Defis

[JohnC]

Spoiler

Grogu! We have a name.

 

Thrawn namedrop.

 

[Jammy]

These guys continue to knock it out of the park.

 

 

Spoiler

Filoni managing to get me to care about a cartoon character in the first place is a feat in itself. I was sad at the end of Rise Of Skywalker when I realised that Ahsoka was one of the force ghosts that spoke to Rey. To see her in this was...strangely emotional. And then obviously the big name drop, which leads into questions about where other characters are.

 

[Boothjan]

That was the best episode of The Mandalorian so far - just fantastic stuff.  Some proper western vibes mixed in with awesome action, some beautiful camera shots and so many nods and references for us uber nerds.

 

Spoiler

I was grinning like a loon when Ahsoka finally appears on screen - kicking ass in that intro.  Having waited for so long to see her in a live action show, having watched both Clone Wars and Rebels and having read the excellent Ahsoka novel, it was a superb moment for me and TBH I don't think they could have revealed her any better than that.  

 

Too much to ask for a 3 hour season finale where Mando, Grogu, Ahsoka, Sabine and Ezra battle Moff Gideon and Thrawn? 

 

I really enjoyed the first season of this, but this second season has blown it out of the water so far.  The best Disney Star Wars output so far has been Rogue One but the way this is going, I think it could overtake it by the end of this season. 

[PK]

That's the first episode I've been a bit bored by.

Spoiler

 

I can imagine it was great seeing a character (characters?) from Clone Wars etc but with no reference point for that stuff it was on the dull side of Star Wars for me; people standing opposite each other exchanging stilted dialogue about the force, and then a Jedi bouncing around like a superhero killing everybody. 

 

I think what I've been enjoying about this is that it feels like a 90s/2000s sci-fi TV show that happens to be set in the Star Wars universe. I hope it doesn't lean into the grand epic stuff too frequently because it leaves me a bit cold.