jedi_bendu

NeverarGreat said:

Thrawn in Rebels has all the resources of the Empire and he and his underlings still manage to lose regularly to a far weaker rebel group. So it’s not really the same character to me.

When Thrawn loses in Rebels he always plays the ‘we lost the battle but not the war’ card. It’s the same deal in Heir to the Empire. If I remember correctly he loses his first big attack on the shipyards. He scores some big victories in the following 2 books but that’s the same case as in Rebels - at Atollon he destroys most of their fleet and destroys the entire strike force attacking his Tie Defender factory.

Sideburns of BoShek said:

Has Ahsoka always had Psychometry (aka ‘force echo’) as a force power or is it a new ability of hers for this show? (in episode 2).

I thought it was something you were born with, and that it was a power that couldn’t be learned or achieved through training. Only a few individuals outside the Kiffar have it?

I’m fairly sure this is the first time we’ve seen her use it but I definitely could be wrong. I love the ability, honestly even if she’s able to use it out of nowhere I’m happy.

I actually loved the third episode and thought it was the best so far. 1 and 2 were decent but the pacing dragged - not a problem here.

Vladius said:

6. Rebels, Book of Boba Fett, Obi Wan Kenobi

Seeing Rebels equated with these 2 hurts my soul.

He was so full of energy on stage at star wars celebration. This is a huge shock. An amazing actor.

Emre1601 said:

I love and respect the positivity in this thread jedi_bendu. How well do you feel the High Republic project has done now we just over half way through with the main novels? Or anyone else who has read the novels so far?

And did you enjoy new Qi’ra stories?

Thanks! I’m slightly embarrassed to admit that not too long after making this thread, I dropped off books and comics a little. Partly due to being busy and partly due to the cost, I stopped reading a good few comic runs while Crimson Reign was coming out, and since that removed me a little from the world of comics and the comic fandom I haven’t actually finished the Qi’ra trilogy by reading the Hidden Empire miniseries yet. Similarly, I absolutely loved phase 1 of the High Republic initiative and it was one of my favourite times in the fandom, but there were so many delays with phase 2 and so little hype around it compared to phase 1 that I’ve struggled to get myself into it again when there are so many other things I want to read.

I would definitely recommend both the Qi’ra comic trilogy and the High Republic phase 1, though. To save yourself a lot of money, you could at least start with just getting the essentials - War of the Bounty Hunters IS a crossover event, but I think you can get buy with just reading the introductory War of the Bounty Hunters one-shot comic and the 5 issues of the miniseries. Likewise for the Crimson Reign and Hidden Empire miniseries. For the High Republic, the first two main novels - Light of the Jedi and The Rising Storm - can be understood without reading anything else, but the third main novel of phase 1 The Fallen Star includes a few characters from other sources (its one of my few, but major criticisms of that book). To totally understand it, I would read Into The Dark and the main High Republic comic series by Cavan Scott. Luckily, both are very good and well worth your time.

I think the leak is probably made up. I also want to trust that Dave Filoni wouldn’t appropriate a beloved legends title like that, but that’s a bit harder since he’s already kinda done it with Tales of the Jedi.

Finally catching up on Visions volume 2. Watched all but the last 3. Holy hell. Overall this is stronger than volume 1, and I really liked volume 1. Screecher’s Reach is probably the scariest and saddest onscreen Star Wars story I can think of. And The Spy Dancer was excellent, interesting premise and a strong emotional heart. Those are probably my two favourites. The animation style of Sith floored me, I love seeing the medium used to its fullest potential like that, and many aspects of Journey to the Dark Head were right up my alley.

I hope Mandalorian season 4 goes ahead despite the writers’ strike because I’m curious to see how much worse the writing can actually get.

Keeping Andor going in these circumstances helps no one. Not the writers campaigning for fair pay, not the crew left to continue without writers and now their producer, not the fans, and not Disney execs when Andor s2 gets rushed out with multiple writing and production problems and fan backlash. Agreed with Omni and RicOlie here. Fuck Disney. Hoping the best for the WGA. It’s good that this means more publicity for them.

fmalover said:

Villeneuve’s version was like “look how badass she is”.

Unless you wanted Kynes to realise the folly of humans trying to control the environment while addressing the audience in a long monologue, or to have a couple minutes of the godawful voiceover narration that plagues the 1984 film, I really don’t see how Kynes’ book death would have worked on film. I also don’t see why it makes a difference whether Kynes is a man or a woman.

Dune part one simply doesn’t have the runtime to delve in depth into Kynes’ dream of a terraformed Arrakis, it only touches on it, meaning a conclusion to movie Kynes’ story where she accepts humans cannot control nature would not have been narratively justified or satisfying. Villeneuve’s version deals with the aspect of Kynes which IS a big staple of her character in the film, her commitment to the Emperor and seeming refusal to pick a side. In her last moments she denounces the Emperor and embraces the Fremen part of herself entirely, which makes far more sense for this version. And yes it is the one of the most badass ways to go out. That’s no bad thing in my eyes.

I have no idea how good this movie will be, but I’m really looking forward to presumably seeing Thrawn on the big screen.

Unless Jon Favreau is writing for him, in which case I hope he dies in the Ahsoka series.

I have a feeling Cassian will kill Luthen. Maybe a wild theory, but Cassian has to start working for Mon Mothma instead of Luthen at some point - I imagine he will help her escape when the Empire puts out a warrant for her arrest, which will lead to him being brought under her Rebel cell, the growing Rebel Alliance. Meanwhile Luthen is much closer to Saw in being an extremist figure and we know in Rogue One, Saw believed for a moment that the Rebellion might have ordered an assassination attempt on him. It’s not inconceivable that Mon could order that for Luthen, and use an old ally - Cassian - to get to him.

More than anything I think this would fit with the show’s themes. Contributing to Cassian’s Rogue One line about doing terrible things on behalf of the Rebellion, and playing into the idea that figures like Luthen and Saw are necessary to get a revolution off the ground, but are then discarded by the new leaders once it has advanced far enough (“I burn my life to make a sunrise I know I’ll never see…” etc). It would also provide interesting context for why, when Saw sees Jyn again, he suspects she might be there to kill him - if he knows that already happened to Luthen.

It’ll be sad to watch but I really hope this happens now.

Updated the thread to include comics as well as books. Not that I have any comics to review at the moment - I’ve stepped away from buying them for a while, although I might have to get the trade paperback for Charles Soule’s Hidden Empire miniseries when it releases. I’ve heard good things about it.

Don’t lose hope in Star Wars folks, we have Visions coming up next and it’s a wonderful project, Andor season 2 and The Acolyte looked nothing short of spectacular in their Celebration exclusive trailers and call me delusional (I am) but I think Ahsoka still looks very, very promising. This season may have been the final nail in the coffin for my investment in Din and Grogu but it’s far from killed my love for the franchise. Better times are ahead.

rocknroll41 said:

Yeah I checked out ages ago. Didn’t finish bad batch season 2 and didn’t even bother with Mando season 3. Sounds like I didn’t miss much…

Don’t bother with mando season 3, but as a longtime bad batch hater, I recommend you finish season 2. It gets surprisingly good.

timdiggerm said:

I have to say, having someone say the words “Heir to the Empire” is a little on the nose

It’s definitely not as cool as her next line, “I can sense a dark force rising, we have to stop Thrawn before he can issue the last command.”

Anchorhead said:

jedi_bendu said:

I have to take a bit of issue with this wording. Animation always seems to get looked down upon as an “inferior” medium, and although it’s totally fair for someone to prefer one over the other, neither animation or live action have any bearing on the quality of a story. They’re simply the vessel that brings that story to the audience.

I have to take a bit of issue with your statement as I’ve compared this to live action a few times. Feel free to point out where I’ve said animation is inferior. To be clear, and I believe I’ve stated this before, I originally became interested in this series because of the animation. For Christ’s sake, I’m watching and enjoying a series that exists in the Prequel world.

You don’t have to be on here for very long to know I’m not familiar with the prequels and don’t know who most of these characters are or what the story is. I just know the Bad Batch characters and I’m enjoying this show. When I say this feels like live action, I mean the depth of characters and the quality writing.

Before you go off half-cocked on that being an animation slight, it’s fair to point out that there is no shortage of animation that’s light on depth. The same can be said of some live action entries; Book Of Boba Fett and The Mandalorian season three being a couple of examples.

I could make this same post on the Visions discussion because it applies there as well. I had little interest in it as advertised (wasn’t an Anime fan) and it ended up being the animation that drew me in and depth of characters that kept me involved.

I apologise to both you and Juno Eclipse if I came across as condescending, I definitely felt the phrase “live action standard” implied the best that animation can do is be on par with live action content which didn’t sit right with me, but it’s true animation has built up a bit of a reputation for lighthearted stories. I can see where you’re coming from.

Personally I love what Mandalorian season 3 is doing, since in including Rebels references like the purrgil and zeb while becoming absolute dogshit at the same time, it’s pushing mando fans away and encouraging them to watch Rebels instead. Awesome work Jon, keep it up.

Juno Eclipse said:

The quality has been more of a live-action standard

I have to take a bit of issue with this wording. Animation always seems to get looked down upon as an “inferior” medium, and although it’s totally fair for someone to prefer one over the other, neither animation or live action have any bearing on the quality of a story. They’re simply the vessel that brings that story to the audience.

A great example is how The Bad Batch, has been blowing The Mandalorian - a live action show - out of the water every week it’s been airing. Maybe The Mandalorian should start aspiring to be animation standard…

(I’m aware this is a very pedantic thing to point out but as a massive fan of animation I see this kind of treatment of it a lot)

WitchDR said:

Episode sucked. But at least this was a good cameo.

The Mandalorian in a nutshell?

I have to give them credit for leaning less into beloved character appearances this season than they did in season 2. And obviously no one will be surprised that I loved seeing Zeb again. He looks great in live action and I agree it’s a massive relief they didn’t try him with a practical effect. I love the magic of practical effects but sometimes they won’t quite cut it.

fmalover said:

If it wasn’t obvious by now, I thoroughly dislike Star Wars Rebels because it presents the franchise at its most sanitized, play-it-safe version where everything is smooth sailing fo the good guys.

spoilers:

It’s as smooth sailing as it is for the heroes of the OT, which is the vibe the creative team were aiming for. They have the defeat of the Battle of Hoth. The Rebels have the defeats of Atollon and the attack on the Lothal factory, where they suffer equally heavy losses. The OT has Han getting frozen in carbonite. Rebels has major plot arcs where Kanan and Hera are captured and tortured, with many other characters meeting the same fate in standalone episodes. Personally I’ve always found the idea that Rebels never had the good guys struggle to win to be a pretty ridiculous notion.

Also, you may not like the show but I think you should still hide finale spoilers since this discussion was started by someone who hasn’t watched Rebels.

Omni said:

But I also love to bits one of the most widely criticized ones - “Fighter Flight”. Ezra slowly becoming more selfless and less self-centered (never really selfish), his relationship with Zeb, you know, I just love hanging out with them, could do it for two extra season of the so widely hated “fillers”. I kept an eye out for actual, true filler episodes that add nothing to the overall story and out of 75 there’s maybe two or three, so not a lot, huh?

Absolutely agreed with you Omni. I feel like the idea that Rebels is largely made up of “filler” is a pretty big misconception. Every episode has character development at its heart, taking the time to focus on a particular character or just the relationship between a couple of them, giving each member of the Ghost crew - even Chopper - the attention they deserve. You can pick out any minor episode, bar 2 or 3, and something that was established at the beginning - be it an insecurity, a rift in a relationship, anything character-related problem - will have changed by the end. That’s not filler, that’s good storytelling, and I think it’s something most of the other Star Wars series forget to do.

And I’ll always stick up for Fighter Flight. Ezra and Zeb never get on well in the previous 3 episodes, but they bond through a failed mission and their shared desire to help others, and they’re like brothers from that point on. It’s an important episode. And it’s fun!

Season 1 gets a ton of hate for being more lighthearted and arguably less plot heavy but I’d argue it’s actually really good. Part of me thinks Rebels was better being a more pure, standalone kids show before they brought in elements like Thrawn, who - while portrayed very well in the show as far as performance and screen presence goes - feels like he’s more suited to more complex stories like Timothy Zahn’s books and represents a pull for the show to become something it’s not. When Thrawn’s part of the story, the more lighthearted elements of Rebels stick out like a sore thumb rather than being a charming and integral part of the series.

I’m biased as I absolutely adore Rebels, but I wouldn’t avoid any episodes. It does have its misses here and there but pretty much every episode is important in some way, be it establishing traits of the characters or setting up something which will be utilised in some way further down the line.

And yeah, I’d say it does mature as it goes on, keeping pace with the younger viewers (like me) who grew up watching it live. It remains a kid’s show at heart, though, so as long as you’re not expecting any Andor-level storylines you should be able to appreciate it for what it is.