Category: Film and TV

We’ve been hearing about the Clone Wars ever since Alec Guinness first mentioned them in the original Star Wars movie back in 1977.

But we’ve never seen them.

Even now we probably won’t really get to see them on the big screen. The first clone war begins at the end of Episode II and the last is reported to end in Episode III, probably (this is speculation on my part, so don’t spoil it, anybody who has specific knowledge) early so that the story can focus on the fall of Annakin Skywalker.

But we have the unique chance to see the Clone Wars on the small screen, either TV or computer. Lucas contracted to have a clone war cartoon series made by cartoon action-master Genndy Tartakovsky (known for such action-oriented toons as The Powerpuff Girls and the visually-stunning Samuari Jack) for Cartoon Network.

The results turned out well enough that Lucas asked Tartakovsky to go back to the drawing board and do a sequel clone war cartoon series that would lead directly in to Episode III. In fact, the final shot of the last animated clone war toon is supposed to be the same as the opening shot of Episode III (immediately after the roll-up).

Events in the second clone war toon series also directly set the stage for the Episode III roll-up, which refers to events occurring in the second animated series, conferring on this at least a semi-canonical status (unlike the rest of the "Expanded Universe" materials).

This presents Episode III spoiler-avoiders with a unique dilemmaopportunity. Watching the antimated clone war series ain’t really spoiling Episode III for oneself if Lucas has put the material out there specifically to set the stage for Episode III, so you could watch them in good conscience.

If you wanna do that, how do you go about doing it?

Well, chapters 1-20 are now out on a DVD called Star Wars: Clone Wars, Volume 1.

You can also read a brief, spoiler-light summary of them here.

Chapters 21-25, the ones that immediately set the stage for Episode III aren’t on DVD yet (and I haven’t been able to find out when they will be) BUT, for a limited time only, you can

WATCH THEM ONLINE HERE.

For those who care about such things, here is my non-spoiler review of the two series:

The first twenty chapters were produced as 3 1/2 minute segments which, together, form a story 69 minutes long. The need to have each 3 1/2 minutes form a self-contained chapter severely hampers story development and tilts the series too heavily toward action rather than plot or character development, though Star Wars fans will still want to see the series. In my opinion the series gets better as it goes, with more plot and character development occuring as it progresses. The action also gets better, and the climax of Annakin’s personal arc is particularly effective, as it is clear he is still moving toward the Dark Side.

The second series of five episodes has chapters that are twelve minutes long (for a total of an hour), and this makes a night-and-day difference. Suddenly there is far more room for plot and character development, and the second series is far superior to the first. The series is more richly-drawn, both metaphorically (better character development) and literally (better animation). The backgrounds are particularly good (even though I saw them on a 2" x 3" screen). There are significant bits of Jedi lore that are filled in, and the climactic battle that sets the stage for Episode III really has some surprisingly dramatic action, including intense and creative light saber work that I’m hoping they copy (or even surpass) on the big screen.

Okay, remember that Valorum guy from the Star Wars films who was chancellor before Palpatine and who was "mired in baseless allegations" and was thus forced to resign, leading to the election of Palpatine as the new chancellor?

Yeah, him.

Okay, here’s the deal: His full name is allegedly Finis Valorum according to Star Wars gunk I was reading on the Web. (PRE-PUBLICATION UPDATE: Verified it from the official site.)

If so, tThat’s interesting. In the films he represents the last, virtuous leader of the Republic who is brought down through the machinations of evil, leading to the rise of the Empire.

So what’s his name’s connection with that?

In Latin finis valorum means "the End of the Valorous Ones."

Go fig.

Wonder how aware of that Lucas was.

Just in case there happens to be any Star Wars fans here….

GET THE QUIZ.

No, they’re not a new kind of fruit snack. (To my knowledge, that is.) They’re the opening words that you see crawling or "rolling-up" the screen at the front of Star Wars movies.

As the date for the release of Episode III: Revenge of the Sith draws nigh (it’s just over a month away), Lucas has let slip (minor) spoilers for what is to come. (Major spoilers are also available all over the Internet for those who are inquisitive.)

One of the things he has let slip is the roll-up for Episode III, which is posted on the official site. It has minor spoilers (the crawls tend to set up the movie but don’t give away much of what happens in it), but for the spoiler-timid, I’ll post it here in white-on-white so you’ll need to Select All or swipe to see the text:

Episode III

REVENGE OF THE SITH

War! The Republic is crumbling under attacks by the ruthless Sith Lord, Count Dooku. There are heroes on both sides. Evil is everywhere.

In a stunning move, the fiendish droid leader, General Grievous, has swept into the Republic capital and kidnapped Chancellor Palpatine, leader of the Galactic Senate.

As the Separatist Droid Army attempts to flee the beseiged capital with their valuable hostage, two Jedi Knights lead a desperate mission to rescue the captive Chancellor. . . .

ORIGINAL SOURCE. 

GET THE STORY.

ALSO: IT’S NOT FOR SMALL CHILDREN.

The movie Million Dollar Baby walked away with far too many Oscars this year, what with it bein’ a pro-euthanasia flick an’ all.

The Passion of the Christ deserved best pic, not this flick.

(EARTH TO HOLLYWOOD!!! HELLOOOOOOO!!!)

Some try to defend Million Dollar Baby on the grounds that, despite its problematic euthanasia message, "It’s just a movie."

Not Ed Peters.

GET THE STORY.

What do you do for an encore if you’ve made The Passion of the Christ?

I read one interview where Mel Gibson talked about making a film version of the books of Maccabees. (Lotsa blood n’ gut in that saga.)

But now a British magazine is reporting that Mel’s next film is slated to be about

THE THIRD SECRET OF FATIMA.

Specifically: It is reported to be an adaption of the novel Stealing from Angels, which came out late last year. The novel is a fictionalized account of a man from New York who gets swept up in European intrigue and comes into contact with the Third Secret and the assassination attempt on John Paul II’s life back in 1981 (presumably the novel is set back then).

In-teresting. Could be a good movie. Mel might still changes his plans, though, (or the report might be wrong) but this sounds like it could be both right up his alley and a commercial success (though not on the same level as TPOTC).

GET THE STORY. (Cowboy hat tip to the reader who sent this.)

Want spoilers for the movie?

GET THE BOOK. (Caveat emptor: I haven’t read it.)

What do you do for an encore if you’ve made The Passion of the Christ?

I read one interview where Mel Gibson talked about making a film version of the books of Maccabees. (Lotsa blood n’ gut in that saga.)

But now a British magazine is reporting that Mel’s next film is slated to be about

THE THIRD SECRET OF FATIMA.

Specifically: It is reported to be an adaption of the novel Stealing from Angels, which came out late last year. The novel is a fictionalized account of a man from New York who gets swept up in European intrigue and comes into contact with the Third Secret and the assassination attempt on John Paul II’s life back in 1981 (presumably the novel is set back then).

In-teresting. Could be a good movie. Mel might still changes his plans, though, (or the report might be wrong) but this sounds like it could be both right up his alley and a commercial success (though not on the same level as TPOTC).

GET THE STORY. (Cowboy hat tip to the reader who sent this.)

Want spoilers for the movie?

GET THE BOOK. (Caveat emptor: I haven’t read it.)

While we’re talking about Trek, lemme mention something that many may remember but many may have forgot or never known about.

There’s a sixth Star Trek series that is seldom discussed today except in fearful whispers.

Despised and shunned more than Voyager, it is Star Trek: The Animated Series (TAS).

It ran for two years (22 episodes) in the 1973-1975 seasons.

To quote H. P. Lovecraft: "It was horrible . . . blasphemous . . . loathsome . . . abnormal."

Or was it?

The series did indeed have clunker episodes, and a disproportionate number of them. But then so did The Original Series which ran 78 episodes and, in the words of Phillip J. Fry were "About a third of them good."

TAS had the advantages of having the original cast members (Bill Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, etc.) doing the character voices. It had the advantage of Star Trek veterans and mainstream sci-fi writers doing scripts (Larry Niven, David Gerrold, D.C. Fontana). Its animated format allowed the creation of aliens, including crew members, who could never have been done in a live-action series at the time. It also introduced the holodeck technology that reappeared and became a fixture starting with Next Gen.

Some of the stories were very well done, including one (Yesteryear) set on Vulcan during Spock’s boyhood that was so well done details of it later became canonical on live-action shows despite the fact that the animated series has generally been ejected from continuity.

Yes, the series is regrettably considered non-canonical by most. Thus (except for events mentioned in Yesteryear) it is not included in Michael and Denise Okuda’s Star Trek Chronology. This is a pity because the two-year animated series could serve as a nice completion of the Enterprise’s famed "five-year mission" which only ran three years in the original series. Instead, the Chronology treats the five-year mission as having begun two years before TOS and ejects TAS from the timeline.

Admittedly, the series wasn’t up to the same standard. It had more clunker episodes, and even the good ones suffered from being only twenty-one minutes long (as opposed to about fifty for TOS) and aimed to a greater degree at children. Still, I have a fondness for it and, as bad as Trek has been on other occasions, I incline toward including it in the canon.

The series is currently out on VHS. Hopefully it’ll be out on DVD.

In the meantime,

HERE’S A SITE WHERE YOU CAN LEARN ALL ABOUT STAR TREK: THE ANIMATED SERIES.

Folks may know that DS9 veteran Manny Coto is serving this year as show runner on the now-final season of Star Trek: Enterprise.

He’s doing good stuff.

What folks may not know is that a slot as executive producer on the show was offered to Joe Michael Straczynski (JMS) of B5 fame, but he turned it down.

He did, however, collaborate on a work that was sent to UPN about how to revitalize the Star Trek franchise.

In the wake of Enterprise’s cancellation, just after midnight, he sent out

THIS NOTE TO B5 AND TREK FANS IN WHICH HE OPENLY LOBBIED THEM TO ASK UPN TO LET HIM AND DARK SKIES’ CREATOR BRYCE ZABEL CREATE A NEW STAR TREK SERIES.

Among other interesting things, he wrote:

Bryce Zabel (recently the head of the Television Academy and creator/executive producer of Dark Skies) and I share one thing in common. We are both long-time Trek fans, from the earliest days, who felt that the later iterations were not up to the standards set by the original series. (I’m exempting TNG because that one worked nicely, and was in many ways the truest to the original series because Gene was still around to shepherd its creation and execution.)

Over time, Trek was treated like a porsche that’s kept in the garage all the time, for fear of scratching the finish. The stories were, for the most part, safe, more about technology than what William Faulkner described as "the human heart in conflict with itself." Yes, there were always exceptions, but in general that trend became more and more apparent with the passage of years. Which was why so often I came down on the later stories, which I did openly, because I didn’t feel they lined up with what Trek was created to be. I don’t apologize for it, because that was what I felt as a fan of Trek. That’s why I had Majel appear on B5, to send a message: that I believe in what Gene created.

Because left to its own devices, allowed to go as far as it could, telling the same kind of challenging stories Trek was always known for, it could blow the doors off science fiction television. Think of it for a moment, a series with a forty year solid name, guaranteed markets…can you think of a better time when you take chances and can tell daring, imaginative, challenging stories? Why play it safe?

When Enterprise went down, those involved shrugged and wrote it off to "franchise fatigue," their phrase, not mine.

I don’t believe that for a second. Neither does Bryce. There’s a tremendous hunger for Trek out there. It just has to be Trek done *right*.

Last year, Bryce and I sat down and, on our own, out of a sheer love of Trek as it was and should be, wrote a series bible/treatment for a return to the roots of Trek. To re-boot the Trek universe. Understand: writer/producers in TV just don’t do that sort of thing on their own, everybody always insists on doing it for vast sums of money. We did it entirely on our own, setting aside other, paying deadlines out of our passion for the series. We set out a full five-year arc.

He said that, though he had lots to keep him busy until 2007, he’d set it all aside for the chance to do the Trek series he had in mind.

A few hours later (JMS stays up crazy late at night) he sent out

THIS POST BELAYING THE REQUEST AS HE HAD LEARNED THAT PARAMOUNT PLANS TO LET THE STAR TREK TV FRANCHISE LIE FALLOW FOR A YEAR OR TWO.

He expressed hope, though, that when Paramount is ready to reactivate the franchise that his schedule will be clear and he’d get a shot at doing the show.

I don’t necessarily agree with JMS about the quality of Trek declining after Next Gen. My current impression (this may change after the DVD release of Enterprise) is that the Trek series are to be ranked from best to worst in this way:

1. Deep Space 9
2. Next Gen
3. Original Series
4. Enterprise (if the fourth season is counted)
5. Voyager
6. Animated

I thus feel DS9 rather than TNG was the highpoint.

Nevertheless, I think JMS doing Star Trek could be awesome.

I’m a little cautious about his use of the term "re-boot" in connection with the Star Trek universe. I’d like to see existing Trek continuity stay intact, though I have to admit that I’ve pondered where the franchise might go next, given all that has been established. They’ve written such an extensive backstory that writers may be boxed in creatively. After Voyager closed, their best chance for finding new creative room was in doing a prequel, and they botched that (until the current season). This prevents them from doing another prequel to TOS. If they go further into the future than VOY, they run the risk of having so much technological wizardry that it overwhelms the story. ("Activate a trans-warp conduit! We’ve got to get to the other side of the galaxy before the next commercial break!") So I’m at least theoretically open to the idea of a re-boot.

I suspect that most fans are not, however. Jettison all their beloved stories and intricate continuity and chronology debates and they will be far less understanding than comic book fans were when DC rebooted its universe.

On the other hand, I suspect that JMS may have been using the term "re-boot" in another sense: Just a reinvigoration rather than a complete restart from scratch.

Either way, I’d like to see him get his shot.

I think he could do for Trek what Ron Moore did for Battlestar Galactica. (Though I’m not entirely satisfied with the latter, it’s still several Quantum Leaps [pun intended!] above the 1970s version.)