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The Clone Wars: Refocused [COMPLETE] + Subtitles for season one! — Page 2

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I would personally start with a smudgers version of the first TCW movie, without the long introduction (the first part of the story is really boring and irrelevant, i mean the mission where anakin Goes to Christophis) centered on the battle of the planet itself with introducing Ahsoka.

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Here’s another thing I’m working on right now, just to help direct my focus whilst I do my first pass review of the episodes:

What is the core of the story? I think it comes down to a few things, in two categories.

Firstly and most importantly, those characters and events which have the most development and add value beyond just the show itself, into the current and future state of the franchise:

  • Ahsoka, in particular her growth and her relationships with Anakin, Bariss, maybe Lux Bonteri, and the Jedi Order as a whole
  • Maul, and to a lesser degree the Dathomiri characters
  • Mandalore, in particular Deathwatch and Bo Katan
  • Key clones like Domino Squad, the Bad Batch, Fives, and Rex

Secondly and less importantly, the characters and events who bridge Eps 2 and 3, or add value for other elements of the franchise, such as:

  • Anakin’s development and fall
  • The ongoing mystery of the clone wars themselves (Sifo-Dyas, Order 66, both sides being played, etc)
  • The fall of the Republic and rise of the Empire
  • The ebb and flow of the war itself (relatively unimportant - implied throughout)

^^ PLEASE CHALLENGE THE ABOVE. I’D REALLY APPRECIATE FEEDBACK ON THIS. ^^

One unexpected thing I think I’m coming to realise from thinking about this is that a lot of the characters have content which is relatively unimportant to the QUALITY of the show. And I suppose that’s because the show exists in a place where it was filling in gaps rather than needing to carry all this weight for itself. That’s not to say that existing characters don’t get valuable development, so much as an acknowledgment that not every appearance of a known named character is necessarily valuable. For example:

  • Anakin himself. Where we’re not getting more context for his fall, or developing his relationships, we don’t gain much from following him too closely. (Though we’ll probably still end up with loads of him for obvious reasons, so I wouldn’t worry too much about this one if you disagree.)
  • Padme. She does get some development around her political competence and other skills, certainly rounding her out more than in the prequels themselves, but she does have some painfully dull episodes which shouldn’t be included just because she’s known.
  • Obi-Wan, Dooku, Grievous. They’re all over the show but their A and B are relatively close together, so their journey from A to B is small, if touched on at all.
  • Bail Organa, Yoda, Mace Windu, Plo Koon, Commander Cody, Saw Gererra, Hera’s Dad… All important SW names, and all present to varying degrees in the Clone Wars, but not all necessarily with strong stories in every appearance, even if they do reappear elsewhere.

Very, very interested in feedback on this one, folks.

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szopman said:

I would personally start with a smudgers version of the first TCW movie, without the long introduction (the first part of the story is really boring and irrelevant, i mean the mission where anakin Goes to Christophis) centered on the battle of the planet itself with introducing Ahsoka.

Yeah, I’m looking at exactly this at the moment. Anakin needs to meet Ahsoka on Christophsis right at the start of the show, and it makes a load of sense to start with the Domino squad arc which really leans into clone culture in such a clone-heavy show. I think it’s neat. But I’m still going to query which elements need to be retained, and whether or not it is right to interlace these two arcs. It might be that our episode one is Christophsis and our episode two is Domino squad. Or that I produce a lightly or extremely lightly edited version of Smudger’s.

This is certainly going to be one of the biggest challenges of the project - when is it best to combine content, and when is it best to leave it separate? Leaving it split gives basically just a slightly polished version of the original presentation, whereas combining things can result in the problems other editors have encountered when moviefying things. The answer must be simply ‘do whichever is best to make a good episode narrative within the broader show structure’, but getting that right is going to be hard.

For example, Cat and Mouse, which is the first episode of the Christophsis arc, introduces some interesting things. It shows Anakin meeting Yularen - but do we care? It shows Trench being quite competent, and he shows up a couple of times near the end of the show - but do we care? It also features our first appearance in the show of Bail, doing good works, which’ll lead nicely into his appearance in the formation of the rebellion in Ep3 - but do we care?

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sade1212 said:

I really like the idea to include the recent Star Wars TV intro from the Mandalorian - would be nice if it included TCW characters, but I guess R2 and Threepio count. Have you considered doing a sort of cold-open? I feel like the Mandalorian has used them very effectively - every time the music swells and the logo and episode name appear, it’s hype. Seems like a good way to give a little signal to the viewer to pay attention (and/or a trick to cut bits of the episode). Of course, you’d have to put the introductory text before the cold-open, but Solo gets away with doing that.

I’ll review this structure. I don’t want to do anything which limits my options, and every cut is a challenge so breaking to insert credits may add more trouble than the advantage of story it gives us. But I’ll certainly explore it.

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I agree - working backwards from the finale, Ahsoka has to be the main character; Maul the key villain, and Mandalore the key location. Arcs advancing the plot of those three are the “main story” of TCW, I suppose. Prior to the revival, it wasn’t as clear - maybe Anakin or Obi-Wan could’ve been argued to be the main protagonists, with Ahsoka being a side-character, but I don’t think Season 7 leaves much doubt. You wind up getting a lot of Obi-Wan content in Maul’s story, and you get a lot of Anakin’s development in Ahsoka-centric episodes, so that makes things a bit more convenient.

Unfortunately Maul isn’t even introduced until Season 4 so this doesn’t help give a great deal of structure to those first few seasons. Perhaps a focus on the clones early on would help. Domino Squad, Rex, and the Order 66 chip conspiracy all play a significant part in the finale, so it’s necessary to include all of that as some sort of show-long side plot. Personally I like to watch Clone Cadets, Rookies and ARC Troopers back to back, since I forget which Clone is which otherwise…

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Well, the first few seasons have some good development for Ventress, which leads nicely into the Maul content. And the Anakin/Ahsoka relationship, which also develops on Mandalore.

The major arcs beyond that which usually get moviefied are often major battles, but these don’t always have a valuable emotional core. So I think defining the arcs on those major metrics- Vital, optional, skippable, and great-but-not-vital, is going to be important.

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Right. I’ve now created a record of every single (relevant) character appearance per episode, so as I review each episode I can be mindful of character arcs. For our central characters, I’m tracking the details of their development in each episode too. I’m also tracking any specific mentions of chronology, in case I later come to rearrange things. For example, The Deserter mentions the guy deserting after the battle of Ryloth, but his kids look four years old, so to me that really should be near the end of the clone wars, not up near the start of the show.

I’m now reviewing each episode, with a five-rank ‘VIDEO’ system -

  1. Vital - Core of the show
  2. Important - Not core, but adds value to either the show or the wider franchise (think good character development for a main character, or someone like Saw Gerrera)
  3. Desirable - will include in a way that incorporates it as well as possible
  4. Excludable - At best, no value add, other than for more Star Wars. Probably will include but mark as skippable
  5. Objectionable - Actively hard to watch / offputting for whatever reason. Won’t include at all.

And I’ve just walked through a couple of episodes:

S01E06-E07 - Downfall of a Droid / Duel of the Droids - Objectionable

GOOD: The idea that Anakin’s decision to disobey protocol and never wipe R2 is why R2 has such a creative and quirky personality is interesting and serves both characters well. However, the execution is awful. Also, seeing some of Anakin’s anger as he fights to save another ‘one he loves’ is also a decent step on the journey of his fall, but ultimately doesn’t nearly make up for the bad.

BAD: The animation and lighting is absolutely horrible throughout. It also features that weird rock music that a couple of early episodes had. The rival droid is just a weird villainous plan, and it makes Grievous feel small as a villain. Ahsoka being so competent a duelist she could survive Grievous is not great development for her early on, and conversely the decision to face Grievous is way too foolhardy (even for her).

Back in the day I got excited about the IG droids, but I think I’ve come to realise that easter eggs absolutely do not equal quality**, and I’ll apply this principle throughout. This edit has to be about the resonant emotional core. We should feel how we feel when we watch the Mandalorian. That’s the goal to strive to, however achievable.

This episode is also one of those that TCW has early on which features Grievous and ends with absolutely no change in status quo, making him feel neutered as a villain***. He talks villainous nonsense, achieves little, and flees from battle. There’s no threat.

There’s nothing to salvage in this episode.

S02E09 - Grievous Intrigue - Excludable

This episode is absolutely fine, but achieves nothing. The start has some good genuine menace from Grievous, which I might find a way to use elsewhere. Otherwise, this can remain as a fine example of ‘more Clone Wars’. Grievous captures Eeth Koth, a bunch of Jedi go to save him and succeed, nobody gets harmed. It ends with Grievous crashing, which sets up the next episode, but you certainly wouldn’t waste these 22 minutes just to establish Grievous crashing.

S02E10 - The Deserter - Desirable

Famously a great episode, though one which I think belongs later in the show’s chronology since the deserter clone has kids (and I feel like ‘clones have variety’ belongs later). It’s an episode of two parts - one featuring a crashed Grievous getting pissy with droids and then escaping from Obi-Wan, and the other about a wounded Rex finding a deserted clone who’s got a family. You don’t need the Grievous stuff, and I think you could cleanly cut around it. That’d give you about twelve minutes of self contained gold, and is one of reasons I’m leaning toward little ‘Tales from the Clone Wars’ anthologies (even though one of the reasons this project exists is to have multiple smaller episodes). Unless it can neatly fit into another episode, of course.

** For this reason I might be relatively brutal to the Tartakovsky show, which I know is kind of sacrilege. But I’m reminded of an army of IG droids with lances, and that just… doesn’t feel like it really belongs in this canon.

*** I might even look at really minimising him in RotS. I just feel like the vast majority of the time, he barely adds value.

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I believe less Grievous is more. He’s supposed to have a fearsome reputation both as a fighter and as a tactical leader, but the show (especially the earlier seasons) doesn’t deliver on that. So by cutting the episodes where he doesn’t do crap (like Duel of the droids) you can make Grievous feel more like a mysterious presence, building more of a mystique around him that pays off whenever he does something badass or crucial (i.e. wiping out the Nightsisters, attacking Kamino, masterminding a terrorist attack on Coruscant, etc.).

Don’t know if you’re in need of feedback for your ranking system but off the top of my head I can think of these:

  • Vital: Mandalore, Nightsisters/Maul, Ahsoka’s trial, Order 66
  • Important: Citadel, Umbara, Onderon, Sifo-Dyas, Yoda’s trip to Moraband.
  • Desirable: Zygerrian slavers, Obi-Wan undercover, Heroes on Both Sides (probably one of the better-executed political episodes and lays some groundwork for the Onderon arc and Lux Bonteri’s story, but the follow up episodes pale in comparison)
  • Objectionable: Duel of the droids, D-Squad, The Disappeared (JarJar and Windu).

I’d like to se the Malevolence arc included; it builds on the early relationship between Ahsoka and Anakin, it establishes Ahsoka’s bond with Plo Koon which is a nice touch, Grievous is a decent enough antagonist that actually gets away with destroying some medical ships, etc. Maybe the last episode where everyone infiltrates the cruiser could be abridged, but it’s overall one of the better arcs of Season 1.

I guess including Ahsoka’s walkabout is necessary for her character development, but that arc has terrible pacing (not enough story to fill up four episodes). It should be framed as a typical Mando side-quest story where the protagonist meets the character of the week, agrees to help them, then right to business. Hopefully avoiding detours like the rogue droid on Coruscant and the entire third episode.

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EddieDean said:

For example, The Deserter mentions the guy deserting after the battle of Ryloth, but his kids look four years old, so to me that really should be near the end of the clone wars, not up near the start of the show.

Are they actually his children? Isn’t he more realistically the step-father. Especially considering he’s only about 14 himself.

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Artan42 said:

EddieDean said:

For example, The Deserter mentions the guy deserting after the battle of Ryloth, but his kids look four years old, so to me that really should be near the end of the clone wars, not up near the start of the show.

Are they actually his children? Isn’t he more realistically the step-father. Especially considering he’s only about 14 himself.

That’s a good question. They do appear to be half human half twi’lek, though that isn’t necessarily conclusive. I’ll check what’s canon, though I won’t necessarily stay beholden to canon if it’s not explicit in the text. Story quality must come first- and this is probably one of the episodes which will find it’s place last, when I come to pace the whole.

Edit: Canonically, the kids do have a human father but it’s not Cut.

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I’m not sure how much I’ll include yet, but I’m just thinking about the rough Tartakovsky chronology.

As far as I can tell, there’re three main parts:

  1. The opening salvos of the Clone Wars, up to Anakin being knighted. This fits before Ahsoka is introduced in the Christophsis arc.
  2. The Nelvaan arc, near the end of the war, where Anakin gets a vision of Vader. This is interlaced with the following arc but I think it works better standalone.
  3. The Capture of Palpatine arc, which may be harder to fit into the new canon, I forget. But either way, comes right at the end, around the Siege of Mandalore.

There’s also the scene where it’s implied Luke and Leia are conceived, which is cute enough and not too overt. This belongs about eight to nine months before the end of the clone wars. I think this fits nicely after Ahsoka leaves the Jedi order (since in TCW there has been tension between Anakin and Padme, but the loss of Ahsoka could well force him to seek Padme’s comfort), and before the Clovis arc, where things really start to deteriorate. Since it’s just one brief scene I might make it the capper to the Nelvaan arc, which would fit well here. In that placing, we also get these hints at Anakin’s darkness just as we get the further Order 66 mystery, plus Yoda’s doubts and investigation into the dark side, so I think that works nicely as things escalate.

There’s also the scene where Dooku trains Grievous. Initially it’s set near the end of the clone war, where Sidious then appears and says “let’s go capture Palpatine”, but cutting that I think it works earlier on, during the opening salvos, to establish a bit more of Grievous’ place in the war, and get that threat in up front.

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If you place the Nelvaan arc + Padmé right after Ahsoka’s departure; you’d only need to cut Padmé’s reaction to Anakin’s scar. Either way, her embracing Anakin could be seen as supporting him after losing Ahsoka.

The scene of Dooku and Grievous I’d say it should be kept later in the war. TCW didn’t include a lot of Grievous in its later seasons because of the untimely cancellation. It also makes a reference to the Outer Rim Sieges. Or you could split it in two:

  • the first half with Dooku and Grievous sparring could be a part of the opening, after Grievous’s first victory against the Jedi.
  • the second half with Sidious could be placed after Nelvaan (maybe right before the battle of Coruscant), because it establishes the context of the last year of the war: the Separatists purposefully retreat into the Outer Rim to lure the Jedi away from Coruscant.
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After those couple of out-of-order episodes in the last couple of days, I’ve now gone ahead and composed all of my sources in chronological order, and am starting a full review of each episode in order.

TARTAKOVSKY’S CLONE WARS (The Battle of Muunilinst Arc, transitioning into the Battle of Hypori Arc) - Important

Important because it gives some good context for the start of the war, introduces Ventress and Grievous, and knights Anakin. Stripped of the other arcs, it sets the stage well, and is more focussed than people probably remember this show being.

It’s great fun. One thing I wish the main show had leaned into more is the clones’ silent hand signals that Tartakovsky’s uses to such effect. I’m not entirely comfortable with Dirge, due to his unique body type and unconventional shields, the IG droid lancers (cute but not referenced again), and Ventress’ apparent shapeshifting. All fun, but I don’t think they serve the whole. I might just put the first scenes of Ventress right at the start of this arc, just to solidify her position as a key character in the clone wars (in which case this is probably vital).

TARTAKOVSKY’S CLONE WARS (The Battle of Mon Cala Arc) - Desirable

Just more Tartakovsky, but this is entertaining the whole time.

TARTAKOVSKY’S CLONE WARS (The Battle of Dantooine Arc) - Desirable

Totally OP stuff from Mace here, but I think everyone loves this, and I think we can get a little OP in the cartoon.

TARTAKOVSKY’S CLONE WARS (The Attack on Ilum Arc) - 3. Desirable

There’s some nice jedi texture in here, and we also see Barris finishing her training, and some Padme sass. Not an important episode, but good fun.

These last three, I think, make a very good argument towards the inclusion of decent little bits, however small. And I’m leaning towards a grouped anthology format. For example, if we end up with seven seasons of roughly five to eight episodes each, it’d be nice to have an episode each season which collects these shorter tales. You can’t really justify keeping that Ilum arc on its own (it’s about six minutes long), but it’d be fun to have them peppered throughout. Especially the Tartakovsky arcs, since that way the return to them in a more major way in the later half won’t be as jarring.

The more I try to view this show as its ‘best whole’, the more I’m convinced that keeping our core elements well paced rather than grouped is the right approach. Compare again to The Mandalorian - you wouldn’t want to group just the Navarro episodes just because of the setting, nor just the Moff Gideon episodes because that’s where the plot is. These elements are far more enjoyable because they’re allowed to be growing slow burns.

Maul should be one such slow burn. We get the Nightsisters which end with the Maul reveal, then we should pace before Savage goes to find him, then we should pace before he takes over Mandalore, then we should pace before he’s broken out of Sidious’ prison, then we should pace before his return for the siege. The war shouldn’t feel like a series of battles, it should feel like an escalating series of moments that matter to our characters, to best set up an emotional finale which absolutely delivers. (And, back to my point of the little ‘Tales’ anthologies, these should be included for that same reason - where they help build to the best whole.)

Ultimately there’s only one metric - do I want to watch the next episode? If you read that Mandalorian was doing an anthology episode you’d be excited, if you read that it was doing a two-hour season finale you’d be excited, and you get excited about this week’s forty minute episode too. You need to want to watch the Clone Wars “this week” because you know you’re about to get a good quality self-contained episode, whatever it features.

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Knight of Kalee said:

If you place the Nelvaan arc + Padmé right after Ahsoka’s departure; you’d only need to cut Padmé’s reaction to Anakin’s scar. Either way, her embracing Anakin could be seen as supporting him after losing Ahsoka.

The scene of Dooku and Grievous I’d say it should be kept later in the war. TCW didn’t include a lot of Grievous in its later seasons because of the untimely cancellation. It also makes a reference to the Outer Rim Sieges. Or you could split it in two:

  • the first half with Dooku and Grievous sparring could be a part of the opening, after Grievous’s first victory against the Jedi.
  • the second half with Sidious could be placed after Nelvaan (maybe right before the battle of Coruscant), because it establishes the context of the last year of the war: the Separatists purposefully retreat into the Outer Rim to lure the Jedi away from Coruscant.

Completely agree again.

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One other thing we have to contend with is that there’s barely any jeopardy. We know exactly what happens to so many of these characters, and we know how the Galaxy ends up. There will be an important balance between things like showing more of Anakin’s fall (valuable) and things like hinting that maybe Sidious wants to do experiments on Zillo Beast armour because it might make armoured things better armoured (?) (worthless). I feel like this train of thought is taking me down a path where I’m going to be more critical and cut much more than expected.

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S03E01, S01E05, S03E02 - Domino Squad Arc - Important

We all know this is a great arc, but it’s pretty important too. We see clone training, some good variety in clones, almost all of the unique named clones that’re relevant to the story (Rex, Cody, Fives, Echo, and Hevy), Ninety-Nine and the concept of a ‘Bad Batch’, the introduction of the more competent and threatening commando droids, and an interesting and high-stakes attack on Kamino itself.

The first episode, Clone Cadets, is pretty perfect, though you could maybe do without Cutup being quite such an arsehole. The second, Rookies, is a little weaker but not bad. You could maybe cut the worms. This is yet another Ventress/Grievous episode where they achieve little, so they could be minimised. Arc Troopers is really great and uses Ventress and Grievous far better, with a competent plan.

The only issue here is that there’s clearly quite a big time jump between the first and second episodes - they talk about at least one battle in between. You could cut around the line, but there’s still implied time, so presentation is the question. Similarly, two sets up the opportunity for an attack and three follows up on it, but I’d maybe like to give it an episode’s grace to allow for fleets to mobilise. Smudger intercut between Christophsis and this arc, but the more I think about it, the less I want of Christophsis. One solution then might be limited Christophsis padded by this, which does work as a wrapper - a sort of Smudger-lite - but I don’t know, I think I’d still rather have time jumps betwen episodes than within them. This could be one that’s kept split into three, if the pacing is better that way, and if we can preserve the feeling of their importance. It does come relatively early though, since Grievous and Ventress refer to it being their first meeting. I’m interested in thoughts on this.

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S03E03 - Supply Lines - Objectionable

Heavy on Jar-Jar, including an absolutely egregious scene where he dances on a table that’s as goofy as anything else that he’s done. But even beyond Jar-Jar, there’s a lot to not like here, notably the Toydarians and Neimoidians, which were some of the other worst parts of episode one. The plot is fine, playing to Bail’s strengths and well introducing Cham Syndulla with a decent introduction to the resistance on Ryloth. That said, this doesn’t add any value to anything else, so even with careful pruning, the best it would end up as would be 4. Excludable.

S01E01 - Ambush - Objectionable

Now canonically a follow-up to Supply Lines, this episode has a ridiculous plot where Ventress and Yoda play a silly game to win a base on a Toydarian planet. Early poor animation problems and a bland setting make this dull to watch. There’s one cute moment where Yoda tells some clones they’re unique, but other episodes do it better, so there’s nothing here worth preserving.

It hopefully also goes without saying that almost all battle droid chatter, and especially all of their goofiness, will be minimised as much as possible in these edits.

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S01E19 - Storm Over Ryloth - Excludable

I skipped ahead a little to check out the time jump between Supply Lines / Ambush and this. A skippable rating may seem low for this, since it is fairly decent, and it does contain a bit of development for Ahsoka (an early failiure in a leadershop role). But ultimately it doesn’t add too much value beyond this. Excludable is still fine though! I’ll review options for the best inclusion of the entire Ryloth arc, but I don’t think you’d consider it core if you just wanted the meat of the show. I’d also minimise as much of the Neimoidian stuff as possible.

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Having now reviewed all of the individual elements that comprise Smudger’s first movie, which merges Christophsis, Grievous Intrigue, and Domino Squad (plus one scene from Assassin which you wouldn’t miss). It really is brilliant, if you’re willing to merge arcs - and gets away with it because it merges them so elegantly that it appears to all deliberately tie together as it goes. All of the moments I’ve enjoyed whilst doing my original reviews have been included, and Grievous’ plot is enhanced to make him appear very tactically capable. Both of these arcs deserve to be placed right up front, too.

I think, with all much deserved respect to Smudger, that it could do with a little tightening of a couple of elements which we don’t need to linger on where it does slow down a little (a bit less stealth ship, none of the traitor clone this early), plus the inclusion of two very short scenes (one where the council ask Ahsoka to stay out of the next battle, and one from Rookies where it’s made a bit clearer that we’re dealing with familiar characters, since they become more important later).

That all is, if it does remain sensible to present it in this way as opposed to split. I’ll leave this to mull over whilst I get a feel for what the rest of the show needs.

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