Lucasfilm Now Destroys Our Second Childhood With the Cancellation of The Clone Wars
It would appear that George Lucas is a man never content with doing wrong.
Yeah, sure, I’ve heard him say hundreds of times that he’s only interested in telling the stories he wants to tell within the Star Wars Universe, and I’ve always supported him in that regard. After all, he created it. Why not monopolize it all he can? As if the lucrative franchising rights weren’t enough, he went ahead and created the Prequel Trilogy – a series of stories he’d always promised fans that he’d tell, and, having been there since the beginning, I can assure you that he’s always contended that the Prequel Trilogy was never going to be a carbon copy of what he accomplished with the Original Trilogy. It was always going to be necessarily darker. It was always going to be necessarily more political in nature.
Did that mean it was always going to be so woodenly acted?
Meh.
And, like so many of you, I was never all that thrilled with the Prequel Trilogy. Granted, I never hated it as much as most, but I cut George some slack. It was his swimming pool, and, if he wanted JarJar to pee in it, then so be it. Who was I to say I could do any better?
Still, the bright spot was always The Clone Wars.
Yes, the Clone Wars.
Both versions, in fact, though, as of late, I’ve grown much fonder of the current version, though I’d welcome a continuation of the older one.
Watching these (CGI) animated adventures centering on Anakin, Obi-Wan, and the ever-impetuous Ahsoka Tano – all of them marching into conflict against Count Dooku and the rising Sith threat – was a delight. Sure, there were some arcs that weren’t as interesting. Of course, there were some characters that could’ve used a bit more fleshing out on the drawing boards. All right, already, we even had to endure a few episodes with the aforementioned blight known only as JarJar Binks.
There was always ‘the new hope’ that these fledgling years of an ObiWan and an Anakin finding themselves – building these two singular Knights into the Jedis they were destined to be – would remain center stage, and, for the most part, they did. Others joined in their tales, including Yoda, Mace Windu, and Plo Koon. Heck, even Padme was given more to do than stand around in some bizarre evening gowns lookin’ good (or just bizarre) for all of the fanboys. R2 got some quality screen time. A young Tarkin even turned up for good measure!
And to all of the naysayers who wondered why it was that Anakin Skywalker never mentioned his padawan Ahsoka in Episode 3: Rise of the Sith? Well, it looked like the writers were heading quickly in that direction in the season 5 finale, at least trying to engineer some logical reason why the girl’s name couldn’t and wouldn’t have been spoken amongst the Jedi Order. It may’ve not been a perfect answer, but it looked like it was an answer being given, and that’s nothing to scoff at.
Which brings us to the sad day of March 11.
It would seem that the Empire struck back as Lucasfilm announced what essentially is an even darker command than Order 66: the cancellation of Star Wars: The Clone Wars after only five fun-filled seasons.
Alas, the press release reads:
“After five highly successful and critically acclaimed seasons of Star Wars: The Clone Wars, we feel the time has come to wind down the series. While the studio is no longer producing new episodes for Cartoon Network, we’re continuing production on new Clone Wars story arcs that promise to be some of the most thrilling adventures ever seen. Stay tuned for more information on where fans can soon find this bonus content.”
Damn you, Lucasfilm and Disney. And damn you, George Lucas.
It wasn’t enough to rob some of their first childhood. Now you’re taking our second?
Yes, I knew going into it that Lucas and showrunner Dave Filoni had agreed to 100 episodes. When it was clear they were going a bit beyond it, those of us following the scoops of TV land read that a sixth season was definitely in the offing, but that sale of Lucasfilm to Disney threw that welcome news into conflict with what we were hearing elsewhere.
March 11, our darkest fears were realized.
Because some of the remaining stories for a sixth season have already been produced, Lucasfilm was quick to put out a video blurb from Filoni himself, clarifying that there were yet stories that would be told within the Clone Wars universe. Despite the shuttering of the doors, it looks like The Clone Wars will survive in some other capacity, be it direct-to-DVD releases, possible telefilms, or maybe even some limited-run theatrical releases.
At this point, only Palpatine himself knows.
From what I can tell, they’re just halting the production of those storylines as a serial animated television series, but it sounds like it’ll likely still be continuing in some format.
Also, even if the show was outright cancelled, would that be Lucas’s fault at this point? I’m under the impression he handed the reins of the company off to Kathleen Kennedy/Disney.
Side note: It’s frankly a bit strange to me that The Clone Wars enjoys a better rep than the Prequel Trilogy. While I enjoy the show just fine, it’s pretty wildly hit and miss, and even at its best very reminiscent of the aesthetic and narrative decisions made in the PT.
Side Side Note: Episode III’s title is “Revenge” of the Sith.
The last few seasons have been really good, and the Season 5 Finale was Great.
I would rather they go out on top than last long enough to suck.
Meh. The Clone Wars was never that bad, but it was always only just good enough to keep me from turning it off. I won’t miss it. The original miniseries was many times over better. The writers of this show never really “got” Star Wars on many levels and did moronic things like try to make the clone troopers individualistic when the entire point of their existence was to not be. And then there’s crap like bringing in Darth Maul’s brother to have a Maul-like character, then bringing Maul himself back with the lower body of a fucking spider, and then giving him his old bi-pedal body back so we have two Mauls that are just different colors, then having Maul himself prattling on all the time when his definitive trait was taciturnity, and finally having him grovel like a sissy little punk and beg the Emperor for mercy. Darth Maul….groveling for mercy. And that’s how The Clone Wars destroyed the only truly cool thing about The Phantom Menace. Still, there have been some really inspired moments like the Seven Samurai homage and a few new characters whose names I can’t recall (female Boba ftw) to balance out the lameness of villains with names like Cad Bane and Savage Oppress. Ooh, let me do some! How about Meanie Killbad! Ugly McColdsore! Jerk Wound! If anyone at Disney or Cartoon Network is reading this and needs new ideas for a reboot/continuation, call me, kay?
@trashcanman, yet again we’re on the same page. You truly are a gentleman and a scholar. I really didn’t care enough about the CGI Clone Wars to even watch it past season 3, as it was all getting far too bland and didn’t at all have that sense of unique space fantasy that _GOOD_ Star Wars media has about it i.e. Knights of the Old Republic, and need I even mention Genndy’s Clone Wars? That. Was. Amazing. In under the length of a whole season of the new CW the old one delivered some crazy badass new villains (they keep the corny name trend, though *cough*Grievous*cough*) and action so intense they couldn’t afford to make the episodes longer than 15 minutes, lest our minds exploded and they gave a lot of cool side characters the spotlight for a bit. Something the new one couldn’t pull off in 5 seasons with a total of 100 something episodes.
This is not a surprise. Disney would not want a competitor to make money off their property. The good news is that they already have produced tons of content that wraps up the main story and will be getting it out to the public because they like money. The clip at the end proves that they have invested too much money in the next season, and so not want to risk the ire of the fans, to not complete the major story arcs.
It is a great series and I hate to see the end of it get treated like this. Still, they have had plenty of time to tell the story they set out to do but instead wasted many episodes with over the top kiddie fare (I’m looking at you robot mission story line). Wrapping up the Maul story and the fate of Asoka is a must and I’m sure it will happen.
The good news to all of this is that we don’t have to suffer the release of Star Wars Detours. That thing looked like a piece of shit. I like Robot Chicken and other stuff by Seth Green, but that just looked awful.
PS-I like that they brought Maul back and thought that they did a good job constructing the reason behind it all. That said, Maul would totally get his ass handed to him by the Emperor and would grovel for his life. Yes, he’s a bad ass but the Emperor is the biggest Bad Ass of them all.
After watching that clip of the yet unseen clone wars stuff and the start of order 66-is it me or is the timing way off?
I havent watched it in a while but ep3 heavily implies that order 66 starts way after dooku is dead, yet the spider guy tries to contact him in the clip. (oh its possible he didnt know of dooku’s death but unlikely)
And isnt Anakin gutting younglings when order 66 is just given? not in fight with droids and other jedi somewhere?
Whatever happens, I want to see Vader hunt down Asoka, have a bad-ass lightsaber fight and then kill her, just as he reveals his former identity… 🙂
I was with you, for the most part, until you put Genndy’s Clone Wars on par or less than the Clone Wars that followed… The “tweenlek” jedi was too much for me to handle. I took my kids to the movie and appreciated the violent opening but, then, they started talking. I saw some of the TV series they watched, too, but it never grabbed me. I suppose it’s fair to consider that having seen all the prequels ahead of the second Clone Wars means having a lesser tolerance for Anakin but that’s as generous as I can be.
Mr B, in the clip it is showing how the military programing of that one clone is defective and that the subconscious hate for the Jedi is there just below the surface. The stress of the battle causes that one clone to go into Order 66 mode before it is actually given. Thus the time line is correct with Dooku being alive.
Beorach, if you have only caught a random episode and the first movie then you really are missing out. Season one was uneven but season 2 found it’s footing. The following seasons, with the exception of some story arcs aimed at bringing in younger viewers, has been great and well worth watching.
Dude, who cares? Star Wars is not less satanic than Disney. Screw them all. Lucass, failoni, Disney and the whole bunch of that dumbnuts
I dont think you could put the blame on Lucasfilm or Lucas. It’s clear that this was a corporate disney decision and that the CW production crew (no being disbanded by disney) was very enthusiastic about continuing the series.