The part where he’s killing people should either have no music or be left alone.
Yeah, I almost feel like Vader telling the troopers to “Stop” might help with the audience head scratching. It easier to digest Vader choosing not to pursue rather than not being able to. You could argue Vader wants him to flee with his allies in hopes of it leading to other surviving Jedi, and those that are helping them hide.
On a more personal level, maybe Vader is just a little disappointed by the encounter. I imagine Obi-Wan was not in the condition he was expecting, beating him was much easier than he thought it would be, so a part of him wants to enjoy the hunt a little more.
Yeah that’s the only thing I can think of that I can actually support. I really hate the cliche that comes up in stories all the time where the villain has been trying to kill the hero, they’re about to kill them, they were already fighting and trying to kill each other, and then the villain has the ability to kill them and they decide “no I want them to suffer” or torture them. It’s just as frustrating as heroes or antiheroes who have no problem killing bad guys deciding to not kill them, just so that they escape in a couple scenes later.
If they think they can torture them for information, or they can follow them somewhere, or they’re personally conflicted about it, or they’re trying to turn them to their cause (comes up a lot in Star Wars), or they need them alive for access to something, or any of a bunch of other reasons, then great. But just suddenly twisting from methodically trying to kill someone for revenge to some weird obsession with torture just makes them look dumb.
Okay…
« Years ago you served my father in the Clone Wars. Well not really but a bit. Now he begs you to help him in his struggle against the Empire. You also helped me 9 years ago when I was kidnapped by inquisitor weirdos. I regret that I am unable to present my father’s request to you in person, but I have been sent on a battlefield even though the plans could have been beamed from a distance. So Vader totally saw us and now I’m about to have a strange dialogue with him where both of us are going to pretend we were not in the heart of a battle literally 5 minutes ago.
Anyway help me and stop thinking about continuity. And I think you had a droid once btw »
Exactly lol
“I haven’t heard the name Obi Wan in a long time… about 9 years, maybe a little less actually.”
I’m still struggling with primary concept idea. I have no idea why Bail needed Obi-Wan to go find Leia. He’s a part of the Empire technically. A senator couldn’t send soldiers to get his daughter?
Did I miss something?
I think it was because Bail didn’t want to draw attention to his family, in order to avoid any risk of people finding out the truth about Leia.
Yeah it’s this. I think that part at least makes sense, except that there’s a lot of attention drawn to her anyway, probably more because they know she’s with Obi Wan.
I’m legit angry. I was willing to go along with the show for 2 episodes and then most of this one, but it’s enough. It’s only marginally better than Book of Boba Fett which is not saying very much.
I don’t know why - I didn’t have high expectations. Maybe it’s because there’s enough stuff that I do like that was unexpectedly good. Any time Obi Wan is actually on screen ranges from decent to great.
But like everyone here is saying, everything looks cheap. Not cheap like the original Star Wars where they’re doing the most with a lower budget, but where they’re doing the least with a higher budget. All the inquisitors look goofy, and not in a good way. The sets are substandard. The directing is straight up bad. I feel bad saying that because Deborah Chow sounded really promising and respectful of the source material, but there’s no other way you would get this kind of sloppy chase sequences and setpieces and parts that drag on for too long.
Other than the editing which is also abysmal. I want to scream at the people making the show to STOP CUTTING AWAY FROM OBI WAN. JUST STOP IT. I don’t want or need to see Leia or Reva or whoever moving through a tunnel, or doing parkour, or walking, or talking, or anything at all. Why, WHY, when you have a show about Obi Wan and Vader meeting again for the first time, and you went to all the effort to bring in Ewan and Hayden, do you think it’s necessary to devote around half (more?) of the screen time to NOTHING? To characters that aren’t even supposed to be there, or exist!
The music is awful. Just so generic it would be better if it weren’t there at all. It’s sad because that’s one of the things Star Wars is known for and they literally had John Williams make an Obi Wan theme for it, and they somehow couldn’t bring themselves to make use of any of the large library of existing music to good effect.I want to believe that this can be cut down into a good movie. There are certainly enough good things in it, it’s just that they’re surrounded by inquisitors (which I have never liked,) repetitive dialogue, poor chase scenes, and an overall lack of focus.
“Like you trained his father?” Such an awesome scene. Vader being scary, having a castle, and terrorizing the innocent. Great. Obi Wan’s flashbacks and trying to connect with Qui Gon, great. Nar Shadda-esque planet, pretty good. Clone Vietnam vet, cool. Some of the dialogue between Obi Wan and Leia, decent. Obi Wan taking out a bunch of stormtroopers, badass. There are so many nuggets of good things here that have to be dug out, but they shouldn’t have to be.
How does it look cheap? I can’t see that these are obviously sets. The designs are very Star Wars. They aren’t wobbling. So how are they cheap. Is it because they aren’t all crowded with stuff? Not every place in the universe is crowded. I just really don’t get the hate being heaped on this series.
And the pacing is pretty normal series pacing. So I don’t know why you are expecting movie pacing in an extended series. If they wanted movie pacing they would have made a movie. Making a 6 part series gives more time to explore more while telling the same story. It seems some of us like that and some don’t.
I can’t say the music is outstanding, but it also does not interfere. Good incidental music sits in the background and is only noticeable when called for.
No I mean the lighting, the materials used in the costumes and buildings, and the effects. Maybe also the caliber of actors for all the non-Obi Wan, non-Owen, non-Vader characters.
I’m not talking about pacing, I’m talking about what they choose to show or not show, and the way they cut it together. You can have a 6 part series and still have it be focused and interesting. In fact I think that would actually be easier than what they’re doing. (Every show now is trying to be a “prestige” show where there’s many vying factions and individuals with their own agendas, which is where I think the inquisitors come in.) For what it’s worth they did want to make a movie, they only turned it into a show after Solo underperformed and they canceled further spinoff movies.
I did think this episode was more interesting than the last two, but yeah, overall I’m blown away by how cheap this show looks. It genuinely feels like one step above a fan film. I don’t know what it is. The production design budget? The cinematography? The lighting?
I think a good comparison is the way the Vader/Krennic scene looks in Rogue One to the scene of Vader speaking to the hologram of Reva in his castle. The lightning in the show is just, weird. So even if the writing on this show was amazing, I still would be let down by the lack of production value.
Some people mentioned it feeling weird that Vader would randomly torture/kill civilians, but to me, it felt like as soon as Vader sensed Obi-Wan was near, he began to torture the villagers in order to draw Obi-Wan out. It was ruthless but with purpose, which fits Vader’s MO. I did like this moment, and the music actually was not grating for a change. Thought it fit the eeriness of the scene. Generally, though, the music is pretty generic.
I didn’t care for the “duel” too much. In my mind, I try to see how we should be getting closer to their duel in ANH. This made me think of that Scene 38 fan film thing that I don’t really care for, more so than the original duel. Hopefully in their next duel, we see Obi-Wan fight with a little more control like we saw in 77, so there is a natural progression of the way they fight across the movies/shows.
I did like a lot of the dialogue scenes. I’m still enjoying the interactions between Leia and Obi-Wan. Even Reva was somewhat better in this episode (but then one line/shot too many ruins it for me). I still think a less is more approach would’ve been better when it came to the inquisitors.
I’m enjoying it more than Boba Fett, but for as long as I had been anticipating the Kenobi movie/series, it’s definitely more on the disappointing side of things.
Yes, it’s the lighting, but I think it’s also the plastic-y kind of look to everything, especially the inquisitors’ costumes and the texture of all the buildings.
Yeah Vader killing people was great, it was absolutely to draw Obi Wan out, but I like that they didn’t have to verbally state that.
Thank you. I really hate SC38. I wouldn’t compare that to this so much, though I think it was going for the same kind of feeling, and the final duel will probably be more like it. Mainly I don’t like that this one doesn’t have the strengths of the duel in the original, or the “strengths” (speed) of SC38. I suppose it’s not supposed to be very impressive just yet because it’s showing Obi Wan being afraid and overwhelmed.
I’m legit angry. I was willing to go along with the show for 2 episodes and then most of this one, but it’s enough. It’s only marginally better than Book of Boba Fett which is not saying very much.
I don’t know why - I didn’t have high expectations. Maybe it’s because there’s enough stuff that I do like that was unexpectedly good. Any time Obi Wan is actually on screen ranges from decent to great.
But like everyone here is saying, everything looks cheap. Not cheap like the original Star Wars where they’re doing the most with a lower budget, but where they’re doing the least with a higher budget. All the inquisitors look goofy, and not in a good way. The sets are substandard. The directing is straight up bad. I feel bad saying that because Deborah Chow sounded really promising and respectful of the source material, but there’s no other way you would get this kind of sloppy chase sequences and setpieces and parts that drag on for too long.
Other than the editing which is also abysmal. I want to scream at the people making the show to STOP CUTTING AWAY FROM OBI WAN. JUST STOP IT. I don’t want or need to see Leia or Reva or whoever moving through a tunnel, or doing parkour, or walking, or talking, or anything at all. Why, WHY, when you have a show about Obi Wan and Vader meeting again for the first time, and you went to all the effort to bring in Ewan and Hayden, do you think it’s necessary to devote around half (more?) of the screen time to NOTHING? To characters that aren’t even supposed to be there, or exist!
The music is awful. Just so generic it would be better if it weren’t there at all. It’s sad because that’s one of the things Star Wars is known for and they literally had John Williams make an Obi Wan theme for it, and they somehow couldn’t bring themselves to make use of any of the large library of existing music to good effect.
I want to believe that this can be cut down into a good movie. There are certainly enough good things in it, it’s just that they’re surrounded by inquisitors (which I have never liked,) repetitive dialogue, poor chase scenes, and an overall lack of focus.
“Like you trained his father?” Such an awesome scene. Vader being scary, having a castle, and terrorizing the innocent. Great. Obi Wan’s flashbacks and trying to connect with Qui Gon, great. Nar Shadda-esque planet, pretty good. Clone Vietnam vet, cool. Some of the dialogue between Obi Wan and Leia, decent. Obi Wan taking out a bunch of stormtroopers, badass. There are so many nuggets of good things here that have to be dug out, but they shouldn’t have to be.
It feels weird for me to say this because I’m generally extremely critical of how Luke was done in TLJ, but I think the way Obi Wan is being portrayed makes sense. It’s not really cowardly, more practical. If he completely abandoned his duty then he wouldn’t be watching over Luke and letting Owen know the expectation that Luke would be trained later. He tells the Jedi to bury his lightsaber and go into hiding because he doesn’t want him to get caught and killed (which is what happens) and he especially doesn’t want to draw any attention to Luke. He’s taking his charge very seriously and living out a boring, mundane life even when he wants to fight injustice, all because he cares so much for Luke. Bail Organa says that Obi Wan is refusing because he’s stuck in the past or something, but he’s just saying that - he obviously is going to say whatever he has to to try to persuade Kenobi to help get Leia. And as we find out, Obi Wan was right to be reluctant and the whole situation was a trap specifically for him. (side note - it would be really cool to see if Bail took his suggestion and used the vast wealth of Alderaan to hire elite bounty hunters to rescue Leia instead)
He’s playing the long game which is exactly what works in the end, and exactly what him and Yoda try to teach Luke later on in ESB. Adventure and excitement and daring rescues are great, but they make you vulnerable and exposed for people to take advantage of you or manipulate you. He’s had his entire life going on adventures and fighting in exotic places in the Clone Wars, thousands of missions heroically charging into battle with a lightsaber, and for what? It turns out that was the biggest trap of all, it was all setup for the Emperor. Sometimes the harsh but correct thing to do is patiently wait in a cave in the desert.
I don’t like Reva or a lot of the stuff with Leia but I think everything with Obi Wan is just rock solid.
Yeah, the inquisitor’s speech would make a lot more sense if it were just to other inquisitors, which is what the trailer made it seem like lol
So far the main things I don’t like about it are Reva and the quippy dialogue, mostly around Leia. Generally I don’t like Leia being in it all that much, especially the psychoanalysis “wise beyond her years” stuff.
Other than that I think it’s pretty good. Reva is definitely going to be one of those kids shown at the beginning and that’s how she knows Vader is Anakin, and she might also have some kind of personal connection to Kenobi in some way. It’s not super unreasonable for Kenobi to not know Vader is alive as it seems like he’s not really the public face of the Empire, and he never was in the OT either. Any Jedi who would have run into him would be dead or at least wouldn’t be able to contact Obi Wan.
It would have been nice to save the lightning for the end of ROTJ, in as much as it makes Palpatine’s attack on Luke all the more crazy and horrific if you’ve never seen it used before. It would have been far better, IMHO, if Palpatine had never been involved in any combat at all until ROTJ.
Exactly.
But why? Does it really need to be an ability unique to him?
Yeah, I don’t really see how the OT implies that only Palpatine can use force lightning. It feels like Tantive just made some personal assumptions about how things work after seeing the OT for the first time, and then got mad at the prequels for “contradicting the OT” when they really just contradicted his own personal headcanon.
First of all, he didn’t even say that. He just expressed a perfectly normal preference that people have, the same way many editors cut Yoda fighting altogether or limit it to the one strike he makes during order 66.
It doesn’t imply anything either way. No one knew to call it “force lightning” yet either. This was before all the “force powers” were codified into limited video game/RPG spells. (Nothing against the games of course.)
As of ROTJ we have no idea what masters of the Force are capable of. For all we know, Palpatine could have been throwing fireballs or breathing poison gas or causing nightmare visions or raising up stormtrooper zombies. Technically according to expanded universe canon he probably could have done all of that.
Force lightning doesn’t have to be a unique ability to Palpatine, but it would be more interesting if other characters used other abilities. As it stands with the prequels, apparently the only direct visible appearance of the Force is with force lightning, and that seems a little disappointing.
There’s no reason anyone’s particular headcanon has to be worse than the actual movies. That’s what this whole website is about.
Yeah. I love Star Wars. But the OT is just never going to be modern. No matter how many multiverses George Lucas is cutting away at it in his basements.
Good, it shouldn’t be
Oh yeah, “From my point of view…” is a notoriously silly line, but personally I don’t think it really contradicts his character too much at that point (he does have reasons to hate the Jedi even outside of the coup, like their lies and endless distrust of him, and general heartlessness towards his mum/Padme/Ahsoka, even if calling them ‘evil’ is a bit hyperbolic), it’s just Lucas-tier dialogue. I was trying to limit myself to removing just the one line that stood out to me as being detrimental for the audience’s understanding of Anakin’s motivations, since this is for a reasonably light-touch edit focused on making Anakin seem less stupid.
While you certainly can justify Anakin’s behaviour towards the end as the dark side jumbling his mind up so much he can’t remember what’s actually true, I’ve always thought that was a bit of a cop out. I do think there’s genuinely enough substance there in the save-Padme-and-himself plot thread of the movie to motivate each step towards his fall without resorting to him just going insane, or forgetting that Palpatine is the Sith Lord that orchestrated the war.
It’s not necessarily that he can’t remember, just that he doesn’t want to remember. Just like anyone else, he wants to think that he’s being principled even though deep down he knows he’s not. He’s trying to justify himself to Obi Wan.
Also I think people often miss that the dark side is supernatural evil and it exerts a supernatural influence. That’s Palpatine’s main ability, to use that influence and temptation. When people fall to the dark side, it doesn’t have to make complete sense in real life terms. It goes a lot faster than someone “falling” in real life would. It has an addictive quality and affects people’s sanity. If Anakin’s words and actions seem a little baffling, that’s the point.
“From my point of view the Jedi are evil!”
I think this line was put in just to be a parallel to Obi-Wan’s “certain point of view” line from Return of the Jedi.
It is but it’s just a really funny context to use those words.
What if Anakin didn’t bring up the Jedi plot against Sidious during the Mustafar fight? This is a way overly-laboured change to excise a single line that bugs me (“I should’ve known the Jedi were plotting to take over!!!”).
Every instance in this movie of Anakin appearing to sincerely believe the Jedi were unjustified in their actions against the Sith Lord that lied to and endangered him and his family/friends for years gets on my wick. The whole 'the Jedi betrayed the Republic!" big lie works fine for me as what Anakin and Palps conspire together to tell the galaxy (and Padme) to justify their coup, but only if Anakin is in on the lie, otherwise it just makes him look stupid. I believe a lot of this stuff is debris from the pre-reshoots version of the script where Anakin’s turn was more to do with politics/feeling the Jedi had been lying to him, but since in the final movie Anakin personally sends Mace to stop Darth Sidious the evil SITH LORD they’ve been looking for, having him later behave as if he truly, earnestly thought Mace was there to take control of the Republic in some kind of top secret anti-democratic plot against the totally innocent Chancellor just gives the impression Anakin’s brain is dribbling out of his ears.
Arguably the rest of the dialogue that I’ve left in here is also carrying the exact same sentiment, but I think without the context of the previous line, you can read it as a more general criticism of the Jedi as being just as evil as Sheev (because of not helping him with saving Padme or whatever), rather than him having amnesia.
I think the idea is that in a sense his brain is actually dribbling out his ears. The dark side has made him insane to the point where he believes his own lies. Mace Windu didn’t do what he expected or wanted him to do which is to capture Palpatine so that he wouldn’t be a danger but he could hypothetically still tell Anakin the life saving secrets. Instead Mace wanted to kill him (understandably) over Anakin’s protests. When Anakin tells Padme that he “saw Master Windu attempt to assassinate the Chancellor,” that’s technically true even though he’s leaving out the context. Because he wants to save Padme so badly, he allowed this kernel of truth to make him believe more lies. Deep down he knows the full truth, but consciously he’s forcing himself to believe that Palpatine really is just a politician that the Jedi don’t like and want to depose. Yoda warned the Jedi that the idea of overthrowing Palpatine could take them to a dark place, and it’s exactly that ambiguity that lets Anakin rationalize it to himself.
With that said I think “from my point of view the Jedi are evil” is a really silly line and it’s a meme for a reason.
I really like your ideas and concepts. Unfortunately, I just don’t think the AOTC footage will ever have enough to work with. By starting with Geonosis there are a lot of things that don’t line up.
I like the transitions in the arena fight that cut out Yoda and the clones, but they’re too jarring. They don’t fit with the idea that the Republic doesn’t have an army, unless those are supposed to be Jedi landing craft. Having Anakin, Obi-Wan, and Padme about to be publicly executed by monsters, with a massive Jedi rescue operation and direct combat between the Jedi and Separatist droid armies, means that there is absolutely no reason for Padme or whoever else to argue against war. War already started. They would know for certainty with no ambiguity that it’s Dooku trying to kill Padme because Obi-Wan has literally already overheard Dooku promising to kill her to Nute Gunray.
It’s also really jarring to go through that entire Geonosis sequence and then have no recovery or debriefing afterward. No one talks about what they just went through or the consequences. It’s like it never happened. You can compare it to the opening sequence of ROTS and the stuff on Coruscant immediately afterward.
The main advantage of staring with Anakin and Padme already together is to cut out some of the worst parts of AOTC, their romance scenes and the forbidden love subplot. I thought that was where it was going at the beginning and I would have liked Padme to just say “I love you” and leave it at that. It’s confusing to start there and then have them go through the “dating” process out of order.
I would like a link if that’s alright.
You’re right, though the Sith are a group of Dark Jedi, so from an outsider’s perspective they’re effectively the same. Vader is also a former Jedi himself anyway.
It should be stated that all Sith/Dark Jedi we’re former Jedi’s.
I don’t think that’s necessarily true. The Emperor wasn’t.
The concept of the Sith is a good idea but all the details that Lucas outlined about them should be ignored.
In ANH when Tarkin says “The Jedi are extinct, their fire has gone out of the universe. You, my friend, are all that’s left of their religion”. This implies that Vader is meant to be a “Dark Jedi” or a Jedi who uses the dark side of the force, so the word Sith shouldn’t be used in the PT.
Things like the Rule of Two were just made up as an explanation for why Vader and Palpatine were the only ones in the OT.
When Obi-Wan says to Vader “Only a master of evil Darth” this implies that this is the first part of his name and not a title that was given to him, so all other Sith/Dark Jedi shouldn’t have Darth in their names. Palpatine should just be known as Palpatine, Count Dooku should just be known as Count Dooku, and when the name Darth Vader comes up it shouldn’t be revealed that it’s referring to Anakin.
You’re right, though the Sith are a group of Dark Jedi, so from an outsider’s perspective they’re effectively the same. Vader is also a former Jedi himself anyway.
These forums give me the impression that a lot of people here don’t actually like Star Wars at all. Literally every character, concept, scene, and second of screentime has been scrutinized and found wanting due to vague complaints often invented out of nothing.
If Lucas always intended the Jedi to be a certain way, and Lucas made the movies, AND Lucas went back and changed the movies many times, why are you worried about Lucas not being true to his own intent? Why should the original movies have to comply with newer, worse movies made 20-40 years later?
Luke, Vader, and the Emperor being on the death star while there’s a battle to destroy the death star is entirely the point. They are not physically relevant to what’s going on. It’s a spiritual battle for Luke’s soul and Vader’s soul. That’s why Luke says that, it’s not just expressing his character’s defiant outlook. The idea that their conflict is materially relevant to the battle belongs to the Emperor. He wants Luke to focus on the battle outside and imagine that he could end it by killing him or at least take revenge. As the audience we want Luke to survive and we want the Jedi to continue, but it’s entirely possible that he could have died with Vader on the death star even with Vader redeemed, and the story would be complete.
I’m sure you’ve seen this video already but it’s important here. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NvlWSsZwLn0
One idea he brings up is that this might even be a good reason that there’s two death stars, to highlight this contrast.
fanediting was a mistake
StarkillerAG said:
The term “Skywalker Saga” may have been officially embraced during the marketing of TROS, but it’s been around since the prequels: This thread called the movies the “Skywalker Saga” all the way back in 2005. No matter what it’s called though, there’s always been a sense of inflated importance given to the mainline “saga” movies, and I feel removing the episode titles would help reduce that.
So some of the people here called it that unofficially on occasion, in quotation marks because they knew it was a nickname and wasn’t actually what everyone called it. People say it now like it’s a normal thing because of the marketing.
Who are you worried about having this inflated sense of importance? Do you think that there are hypothetical people out there that are afraid to watch Rogue One or something because it doesn’t have an episode title? (I was going to say a number in the name but it does have one lol)
Also they probably should have greater importance. That’s where everything comes from, after all. I think the main thing that frustrates of all of us is that the sequels attached themselves into the 7, 8, and 9 slots that didn’t need to exist in the first place, and seemed to drag everything else down with them. And the contrast gets heightened when you see how poor they are compared to Rogue One and Solo coming out at the same time as mere spinoffs (plus The Clone Wars and The Mandalorian of course.) But we don’t have to accept that. We can just ignore them. No one had any problem before saying “okay, The Clone Wars is set in between episodes 2 and 3.”
The idea of episode numbers in general may have been inspired by serials, but I don’t think Lucas ever intended to not make Episodes 1, 2, and 3: Although his plans for post-ROTJ movies fluctuated constantly, he always said that he would make a trilogy set before the OT later on. He even specifically told the EU writers not to set any of their works before the rise of the Empire (except for the Tales of the Jedi comics), since it would contradict his upcoming trilogy covering those events. It was only with the advent of high-quality CGI in the mid-90s that Lucas decided it was finally feasible to show his concept of the Clone Wars in live-action, with the Special Editions being used as a tech demo for some of the things he was planning to do.
I don’t think this is really true, but it’s hard to tell with Lucas. There were materials (the Thrawn books for one) that introduced certain concepts about the Clone Wars and other things that got contradicted later. Tales of the Jedi itself shows the Jedi much differently (superior in my opinion) from what the prequels do.
Yes everyone would do well to keep in mind that the first time that anything was called “episode” was with the release of Empire Strikes Back in 1980, where it was abruptly called Episode V with no explanation. Lucas claims to have planned out 6 movies, 9 movies, 12 movies, or whatever, but the other main purpose of it was to hearken back to the experience of going to see serials like Flash Gordon in the theater and starting in the middle with whichever one you happened to catch - if you missed a previous episode, it was just gone. That was also the purpose of having title crawls, to catch you up on any exposition that you probably missed.
The idea of having something missing was intentional. Strictly speaking, the prequels are just as unnecessary to the structure as anything else. They were themselves a fun thought experiment, there was no reason to expect that they might get made.
I sometimes think it would be better to just remove the episode labels from all of the movies.
That sounds almost treasonous, but when I think about it, it’s actually a brilliant idea. Removing the episode titles would both reduce the inflated importance of the “Skywalker Saga” that caused the sequels to feel so disappointing, and allow for animated and TV content to be incorporated into the movies (like I was suggesting with my “Expanded Saga” idea) without it feeling too jarring.
You know you don’t have to call it The Skywalker Saga, right? That was a cynical marketing term created to advertise/justify episode 9. It seems like everyone here bought it hook, line, and sinker but you literally don’t have to. Just call the movies whatever you want and ignore the sequels.
I can see how that could work.
On a related note, apparently the idea of slavery being immoral was completely unheard of in the ancient world, even among people who had been slaves themselves, so you could make the Separatists the ones against slavery. Might not work as well though.
What does the real life ancient world have to do with anything
The Republic is fairly analogous to ancient Rome.
In some ways yes, but then what are the Separatists analogous to?
The Republic is much more of a “modern” government and gives a lot more sovereignty and representation to each of the provinces/countries/planets than Rome would.
Most importantly, the Republic is supposed to be mostly sympathetic to the audience. Otherwise we don’t care at all when it gets destroyed and we don’t really want the Rebels to bring it back.