Needless is probably the best word for this animated feature installment in the Star Wars franchise. I don’t say that because the last three Star Wars films weren’t very good or because I think Star Wars as a franchise needs to either be done big or not be done at all. I say this because fans of the franchise may actually be looking forward to a Star Wars film that shows them what happened with the much talked about Clone Wars, but every time you think it’s going to happen it never does.
I thought Attack of the Clones was going to be the Clone Wars. It wasn’t.
I thought Revenge of the Sith would definitely be the Clone Wars since now we had clones and wars. It wasn’t. Oh the shit was going down, but all the hub-bub was about Anakin and his transformation to the Dark Side, not the actual war.
Then I thought Star Wars: The Clone Wars would be about the Clone Wars because it had “Clone Wars” right there specifically in the title. Nope, wrong again. The Clone Wars may in fact be the most uninteresting battles in science fiction history as only small stories within them seem interesting enough to tell. Either that, or George Lucas realizes a battle spanning a massive galaxy doesn’t work as well as one played out on one planet alone.
So here we are, hip-hopping from planet to planet in this should-be-30-minute-animated-episode of the forthcoming animated Star Wars series and war is hardly what’s on the menu. Instead a bit of slug-napping is in order.
Jabba the Hutt’s son has been ‘napped by the baddies and the Jedi are out to find him in an effort to please Jabba and in turn gain access to his territory in space for trade routes during the war. Of course the baddies know this and are trying to frame the Jedi to get them into trouble with Jabba. Nanner nanner! And that is just about all there is to it.
Sure, there are blasters and light sabers, but guess what, we have seen that before… many times. Oh wait, but this time they are animated and weilded by bobble-headed dolls! Well, damn, I guess that makes it super-stupid. My bad.
The one thing this film does bring that is new to the table is nicknames. I am not talking about a one-time reference to someone being a scruffy headed nerfherder, nope, this goes deeper than that. Anakin has his own pupil now and instead of calling her by her name he calls her Snips. You know why? Because she is “snippy”. Snips in turn refers to Anakin as Sky Guy and the two of them refer to Jabba’s son as Stinky. You know why? Yup, because he smells. You are catching on.
So Snips and Sky Guy snatch up Stinky and take on the Dark Side. You also have Mace Windu, Count Dooku, Palpatine and a drag queen version of Jabba named Zero that speaks like Truman Capote. Based on this information you should realize my recommendation, but will you heed it? Die hard Star Wars fans will likely enjoy seeing the world they love on the big screen once again and kids will enjoy the pretty lights, but this is not in any way a good movie. It doesn’t forward the story along (especially since we technically have gone backwards, but not all the way back, yet again) and it does nothing more than offer up a prolonged episode of the new animated series. One question, if you are going to go animated why not animate the future as opposed to the past?
Star Wars: The Clone Wars is actually a feature film length commercial for what is to come and unfortunately it doesn’t do a very good job selling its product. Hopefully George Lucas will soon realize he needs to put this baby to rest, it’s about time Star Wars came to an end, at least as long as Lucas is in control.
C-
