Star Wars: The Clone Wars

This is an animated movie in the Star Wars series, in this case dealing with events between Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith.

The Good: The dialog between Anakin and his newly assigned padawan, Ahsoka, is entertaining almost throughout the film, growing tiresome only a couple of times. Graphically, the movie is well executed, with a distinctive style to the drawing and an almost filmed quality to the animation.

The Bad: The basic plot—someone has kidnapped Jabba the Hutt’s baby, and Anakin and Ahsoka are sent to rescue him, so that the Republic can negotiate a treaty to fly through Jabba’s sector to resupply and move clones for the war effort, but Count Dooku wants to cut a deal with Jabba instead—is at the same time thin and overly convoluted. String together an increasingly pointless series of clone vs. droid battles on that thread, and 1 hour 38 minutes starts to feel more like 2 or 2 1/2 hrs. In a word, the movie is tedious.

Final Thoughts: I watched this tonight as the first of a drive-in double feature, matched with The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, and I’m glad this one ran first. If it had run second, I’d have felt obligated to stick around to the end, to get my money’s worth, and to take in the entire story, and I’d have been frustrated at the poor payoff for that commitment. But given that it showed first, I was able to end the evening with The Mummy and leave feeling satisfied. Sort of like starting the evening with a forgettable warm-up band but leading into a great set by your favorite group so that you go home feeling satisfied with the concert overall.

God, what has happened to the Star Wars franchise?!