The saga has come to an end: reviewer Hugh Verheylewegen has a look at the final season of Star Wars: The Clone Wars.
The final season of The Clone Wars has concluded, finishing a beloved, long running series that had rough beginnings but a solid finish. This is a bit different from my normal reviews as I’m actually grading the season in two parts. This will also be a NON-SPOILER review of the season, but I will discuss some things in depth.
Before getting into specifics about the episodes it’s worth noting that the animation for this whole season was flawless. Absolutely flawless. The series has consistently improved in animation quality over the years, but it was at its best here, with excellent visuals and incredible motion capture work by the actors.
The music is also fantastic, having original content and reprisals of themes from across all films in the Skywalker Saga (Rey’s theme even makes an appearance in this).
Now to get into the episodes. The season is divided into three arcs, with 4 episodes each. Episodes 1-4, aka The Bad Batch arc, is a Clone Trooper focused arc, bringing in familiar faces like Captain Rex, and introducing new clones called The Bad Batch, a shoot first ask questions later team that you’d consider polar opposites to Rex’s own strategies and wisdom.
This is an action heavy arc that I thought was very thrilling and fun. The performances and banter of all the characters was great and it definitely made for some great moments of humor and tension.
Episodes 5-8, aka The Sisters arc, has been the most scrutinized arc of the season. Some of the reasons are understandable, but others are just plain toxic. For me this arc was not offensive by any means, but it certainly was a weak one. It offered some good development for Ahsoka as well as opened up other view points on how the Jedi are very flawed in the eyes of lower class individuals, in this case the sisters. For a while I found that part interesting, but then once that’s out of the way the story began to drag, and I found myself bored for most of it. (Except for Ahsoka of course.)
Again it’s not awful by any means but I feel like it really acted like one large filler that really didn’t need to be there.
But then we get to Episodes 9-12, aka the Siege of Mandalore arc, and things jump to absolute fucking perfection. Absolutely top tier Star Wars territory here. This arc weaves in the plot of Revenge of the Sith smoothly while also keeping focus on the characters and emotion of this arc.
Ahsoka truly blossoms in this arc as she is given her own clones to command and must face the Sith Lord Darth Maul, resulting in a duel of epic proportions. This duel is perhaps my favorite duel in all of Star Wars media. Not just for the action, which was done with Ray Parker through motion capture, but the emotional drive between both characters.
We have grown attached to these two characters in our own way through years of watching the series, and while we do know what ends up happening to them both, the stakes are still there and emotional weight is present at all times during the fight. And the performances by Ashley Eckstein and Sam Witwer are fucking phenomenal here.
And of course, the other part of this arc that I think most have dreaded was the inclusion of Order 66. When this happens it is just as heartbreaking as the event was in other forms of media. It is just as personal here as it was in Revenge of the Sith and Jedi Fallen Order. And again, we knew this was going to happen, but even so it still affects viewers on a emotional level due to years of connecting with these characters.
Everything gets all tied up in a beautiful bow in these last 4 episodes, having a beautiful and haunting final scene that couldn’t have been a more perfect ending for the series. It really affected me on so many levels.
And this season proves two major things that people should take to heart. The first is that this shows that Disney is capable of making good future Star Wars content, going by this and The Mandalorian. The second is that Dave Filoni is the true champion of Star Wars storytelling. He has a great passion for this franchise, its characters, and the worlds surrounding those characters. He came a long way from where he started and he delivered an extremely satisfying final note. I’m going to give Episodes 1-8 of Clone Wars Season 7 a B+ and I’m going to give Episodes 9-12 an A+
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