Star Wars Month 2 - The Clone Wars Season 7 Arc 3 - The End

It’s Star Wars Month 2

OK, it's a few days late, sorry about that... anyway

And so far I’ve been pretty harsh on both the stories the Clone Wars incorporated into its seventh season, but in truth both of these episodes provide an important piece in the setup for the big finale. The Bad Batch arc had a heavy focus on Rex, his determination and loyalty coupled with his survivor’s guilt this late in the game.

Naturally the other piece is Ahsoka, who needed an arc to transition her from leaving the Jedi order to her place in this arc. It probably should have played out a little slower, across multiple arcs but they have 12 episodes so we’ll take what we can get. It really had to be these two that the focus was put upon, of the main cast of the Clone Wars we know how Anakin and Obi-Wan end up, along with most of the Jedi Order, and we know how most of the clones end up. The big bads like Grievous and Dooku are dealt with in the films, which is why they don’t appear in this season beyond a quick cameo.

As for Darth Siddeous with Ian Abercrombie no longer with us and Tim Curry… I think retired from voice acting, bringing him back beyond a cameo would be unnecessary. Indeed, they just use archived footage of Ian McDiarmid. Not that he would’ve been beyond getting to return since he voiced Palpetine not only for his incredibly forced appearance in Rise of Skywalker but also for season 4 of Rebels.

I think we’re getting off-topic. Basically, each of the main characters of this finale have had an episode to re-establish themselves and now it’s time for the big showdown.

Star Wars Month 2 - The Clone Wars Season 7 Arc 1 - The Bad Batch

It’s Star Wars Month 2

One of my reviews from the original Star Wars Month was The Clone Wars. Whilst season 5 had a good ending and season 6 sewed a few seeds for Revenge of the Sith, there were definitely some loose ends that could be picked up on. There were a few more stories that were in production but not completed, but were released as lost stories online.

There were 2 main stories released as such, the Crisis on Utapau, featuring the location where Obi-Wan fought Grievous in revenge of the Sith, featuring the debut of Anakin’s revised hairstyle to match the aforementioned film and was the first time I’m aware of that they mentioned the plan to harvest Khyber Crystals, something that’s referenced repeatedly now. The other was the Bad Batch, which we’re going to cover as it was remastered for the Disney+ Season.

Other works related of note include Son of Dathomir which sees the revelation that Darth Maul is in fact the son of Mother Talzin and his capture at the end of the s5 episode Lawless was part of plan to finally end her, which unfortunately does happen. Something else that happens is Maul’s crime syndicate starts backing out after facing repeated separatist attacks, not sure if that part’s still canon given what happens in his story this season.

Another is Dark Disciple, which was released as a novel, probably would’ve been the show’s most ambitious storyline featuring another attempt to assassinate Count Dooku by Asajj Ventress, this time with Jedi Quilan Vos. Ventress dies in this storyline although there was some ambiguity there if they wanted to bring her back.

As for Mandalore, a lot of it was up in the air, but it was revealed in the Ahsoka novel, and hinted at during Rebels that Ahsoka was directly involved in a Siege of Mandalore by the Republic and we find out in Rebels that she saw Anakin not long before the events of the film. Ahsoka’s future in the Clone Wars was less certain, with one rough-cut animated scene of her crashing a speeder bike.

OK, but let’s get to business, I don’t know what the rights deal was with Cartoon Network, who originally hosted the show but evidently, it’s been resolved as all of The Clone Wars is available on Disney+, and, exclusive to that streaming service, a final season of 12 episodes to cap off the show’s run. 12 episodes is not massive so a few stories that were planned still didn’t make the cut. Cad Bane, a long-running antagonist of the show, wouldn’t show up again until The Bad Batch spinoff show. There was an episode planned with him and Boba Fett. Plus, we aren’t getting adaptations of Son of Dathomir or Dark Disciple. Crisis on Utapau will also remain in its current form, no upgrade for that one.

Were these episodes always planned out to be the way they were, I don’t know. Maul’s control over the underworld post the war was only ever established in Solo and I think that may have caused them to backpedal on Maul’s underworld crumbling like it was doing in Son on Dathomir. But one episode that was planned from the beginning was The Bad Batch, why did this episode get a remaster, well because it has rampant spinoff potential. As of writing this, The Bad Batch has had one season and has been renewed for a second. It’s actually occupying a fairly unique period in Star Wars history, the stage of transition between the Republic and the Empire. Most stories in this period begin with the Empire fully realised.

But I’ve just spent a whole page of my review with preamble and usually this bit is only a line or two, let’s take a look at the first of these stories and see how Star Wars bids farewell to the Clone Wars for the third time.