Star Wars: The Clone Wars: Movie Review

Directed By: Dave Filoni

Voices: Matt Lanter, Ashley Eckstein

Star Wars: The Clone Wars is somewhat complicated. The movie itself? No. But reviewing it compared to the live-action Star Wars Saga is. When at first preparing to view The Clone Wars, the audience must make a heavy footnote - that this isn't going to be the giant Star Wars you wanted it to be - before you buy your ticket. No, this movie is heavily annotated by The Clone Wars TV series released on Cartoon Network three years ago (which was actually better than Episodes I and II.) And another huge note; The Clone Wars was not directed by George Lucas, so it had it's shot to be great.

Star Wars: The Clone Wars is a minor adventure in the Anakin story-line that takes place between Episodes II and III (notice Anakin's scar is already visible, and hair is beginning to change), in which Skywalker is assigned to take Ashoka Tan, a Jedi Padawan, under his teachings. If you wish to talk about the film's major flaw, there it is. Ashoka, through almost the entire movie, is unbearable. She preens the attitude of an American teenager with an ideology of "anything you can do I can do better." In any matter of speaking, she's just annoying and doesn't fit the fictional universe well. The two are assigned to rescue Jabba The Hutt's son, who was kidnapped from the Tattoine crime lord, under conspiracy plans by Count Dooku.

The film does have it's share of bright spots, however. The action, while at sometimes overshadowing story, is joyfully relentless, like how you would figure a war in the Star Wars galaxy should be. And the dialogue is tweaked away from whining and terrible rational, to almost normal and understandable verbiage. The one real shining quality though were the Clone Troopers themselves. Instead of the CG stiffness they received in the prequels, the troopers received a bit of personality this time, and you actually enjoy seeing them on screen.

The film runs short - about 100 minutes long - and doesn't really give the viewer much of anything to interpret into the big picture that is Anakin, Obi-Wan, and the rest of the story. That being said, while you can note the film had no downgrading falls other than Ashoka, there's nothing that really amazes the viewer either. It's nothing special to the casual fan, and it may come off even worse to someone who knows little to nothing of Star Wars. It's for serious fans only. And even then it's somewhat lost.

Score: 7.1 out of 10.