The charm is back!

ping411

I just got back from an advanced screening of Clone Wars, and I was pleasantly surprised. The movie was definitely for the younger crowd, but how is that any different than the rest of the prequels? There were some great action sequences, and the storyline had a few concurrent branches to it, in true Star Wars fashion.

Dare I say it, the characters almost had more depth in this cartoon than they did in the movies. There was more banter between the main characters, and even the more elite clones had developed personalities.

The art style was pretty cool. Everything looked "painted" and not as polished as most CGI movies. Star Wars pioneered the weatherbeaten look in science fiction, and that aspect carried over to the CGI adaptation. My only complaint animation-wise is that the mouth movements of the characters didn't look quite natural, and at times I noticed that it didn't even appear to match the dialog.

As a fan, I didn't have that "what were they thinking?" feeling throughout the movie. There weren't any "yippee" or "nooooo" lines in there that made me roll my eyes. The closest thing to it was that the droids were more like the episode 3 goofy variety than the episodes 1 and 2 foot soldier variety. But I was willing to overlook it, and overall their lines were funnier and less annoying than episode 3. The beginning of the movie opened with a narrator, which was a complete departure from the Star Wars model, and it was a little cheesy. It sounded a little too "WWII Newsreel." But I was more than willing to forgive its minor flaws in exchange for it being JAR-JAR FREE! Overall, I was pleased. As a stand-alone movie, it was good. As a kickoff to the TV series, it was excellent. I'm looking forward to the season premiere!

score 9/10

ping411 9 August 2008

Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw1928037/