So I have the new Clone Wars stuff

[Darth Onasi]

Well, yes. It is logical, rational. It is also wholly morally bankrupt, though; children are children, even if they are trained as living weapons.

By our standards, certainly. But it's always seemed to me that Jedi operated on their own kind of morality. I'm not sure our society would be much different if presented with a group of people who are superhuman since birth.
But it's certainly a grey area - and probably contributed to the population's acceptance that the Jedi were evil traitors to the Republic post-Order 66 (Palpy's propaganda machine no doubt went into full gear on the Jedi's child soldiers and baby-snatching).

Well, that might be a reason as good as any to desist.

But really, do not accord her stupidities that much attention. Her so-called criticism of the Jedi is as preposterous as it is unsupported by the facts. The saddest thing, perhaps, is that her atrocious example makes legitimate anti-Jediism all that much harder to present.

All too true.

Gotta climb a half a mile of vertical cliff to get there. Makes you wonder how the folks who live there get around. A road? No, that's just silly. Anyway, this is defended by 2 battalions of droids, so what do you do in those cases? Have a fun time race. How do I know this? They keep repeating it over and over and over, like a fucking LOL cat meme. 4 times on two pages. And the ascension cables are attached to the guns, not the clone's waists or anything. They must have one heck of a grip. But they are still safety conscientious. For example, the AT-TE gunner must be wearing a seat belt. I mean, he is just sitting, there perfectly calm, completely upside down.

That's.. just.. I mean, I'm not a military man.. but how the hell are they even supposed to aim their rifles like that?
I guess the idea is that rifles have their own grappling hook and are lolversatile, but yeah... now I know why the clonetrooper broke his hand when he decked the droid - it was ultra-fatigued from holding on to those grappling rifles all day!

They're not smart, but they're not supposoded to be. Rather, battle droids are simple, sturdy machines designed to overwhelm enemies through sheer numbers. Estimates put the number of droids destroyed in the quintillions. But however many battle droids the Republic destroys, more are always on the way.

And on that note, lunch!

That's the spirit! Take that, Traviss!

Never! Those 3 million clones took out all of those droids with awesome Mando'a power!

[Crazedwraith]

What's that about Greivous into the top right of mini-hooker's page? She isn't doing something ridiculous like fighting him one one one is she?

[NecronLord]

What's that about Greivous into the top right of mini-hooker's page? She isn't doing something ridiculous like fighting him one one one is she?

I wouldn't think so. This is Clone Wars. Home of ubergrievous. Though perhaps she does, and this is why she isn't in RotS...

[Darth Hoth]

By our standards, certainly. But it's always seemed to me that Jedi operated on their own kind of morality. I'm not sure our society would be much different if presented with a group of people who are superhuman since birth.
But it's certainly a grey area - and probably contributed to the population's acceptance that the Jedi were evil traitors to the Republic post-Order 66 (Palpy's propaganda machine no doubt went into full gear on the Jedi's child soldiers and baby-snatching).

I have no doubts that were superhumans to spring up in our world, we would turn into the stereotypical comic-book oppressive empires posited by such settings (well, perhaps not an Imperium of Man, but definitely Marvelverse); the threat they would pose would necessitate the rest of humanity either submitting to them or fighting them. Bare survival of independent national governments would become a basic priority such as it has not been for some time, at least not in the civilised world. Any means would be justified towards those ends.

(This is, for the most part, also how I understand the Inquisitorius to work in the Empire: Identifying young Force-sensitives before they become a threat and either co-opting them or neutralising them.)

For their part, given the sometimes nigh-obscene Jedi wankery, the Jedi mostly show admirable restraint in not simply taking over the galaxy for the Greater Good (except when Mace Windu tried to, but he is an exception to the rule). It also goes some way towards justifying the child-conscription, though not all the way; the major problem with this explanation would be that they only take in the youngest children, when the older are more dangerous. There are at least some self-serving motives there.

Never! Those 3 million clones took out all of those droids with awesome Mando'a power!

But of course! That was why General Grievous fled in the cartoon: He feared that once the Jedi had delayed him, he would have to face the Clonetroopers!

[Ender]

Oh good, we are up to 3 fuckwit scumbags on the board who think war crimes are nifty things as opposed to atrocities.

What's that about Greivous into the top right of mini-hooker's page? She isn't doing something ridiculous like fighting him one one one is she?

Yeppers! Don't worry, we'll get to that and the rest of Star Warcraft soon enough.

[Darth Hoth]

Oh good, we are up to 3 fuckwit scumbags on the board who think war crimes are nifty things as opposed to atrocities.

Who? I can - perhaps - understand child conscription, given the situation, though even that is reprehensible, but who would actually support the use of child soldiers? This is one of the areas where Jedi morals are off the board, not that it is the only one, though probably the worst.

[Darth Onasi]

Oh good, we are up to 3 fuckwit scumbags on the board who think war crimes are nifty things as opposed to atrocities.

Do you mean me? I certainly don't support the use of children as soldiers, but can understand why the Jedi under their unique circumstances (and critical shortage of fighters) would. It's certainly not moral to us, or most likely to the Republic at large.

[Darth Hoth]

Oh good, we are up to 3 fuckwit scumbags on the board who think war crimes are nifty things as opposed to atrocities.

Do you mean me? I certainly don't support the use of children as soldiers, but can understand why the Jedi under their unique circumstances (and critical shortage of fighters) would. It's certainly not moral to us, or most likely to the Republic at large.

By extension, that would be apologia towards almost any regime using child soldiers; das Reich, for example, was critically short on manpower when it sent out Hitler-Jugend fighters on bicycles against the Soviet tanks. I know this is not what you mean, but that is how it sounds.

The Jedi child-soldiers may have more of an impact on the fighting, but that does not change the moral aspects of the situation, merely the cynically practical omes. And indeed, committing untrained children to the field was not only morally bankrupt, but also militarily unnecessary, when they had an unending stream of mindless clones to pour forth instead. It was a tragic and criminal waste, in all.

[Darth Onasi]

Oh good, we are up to 3 fuckwit scumbags on the board who think war crimes are nifty things as opposed to atrocities.

Do you mean me? I certainly don't support the use of children as soldiers, but can understand why the Jedi under their unique circumstances (and critical shortage of fighters) would. It's certainly not moral to us, or most likely to the Republic at large.

By extension, that would be apologia towards almost any regime using child soldiers; das Reich, for example, was critically short on manpower when it sent out Hitler-Jugend fighters on bicycles against the Soviet tanks. I know this is not what you mean, but that is how it sounds.

I suppose it can sound like that, but I do put that fact together with the fact that they are superhuman, not ordinary children.

The Jedi child-soldiers may have more of an impact on the fighting, but that does not change the moral aspects of the situation, merely the cynically practical omes. And indeed, committing untrained children to the field was not only morally bankrupt, but also militarily unnecessary, when they had an unending stream of mindless clones to pour forth instead.

Well I wouldn't call them untrained - they're certainly no match for a Knight but aren't the barely armed human-shields used by the various fuckwit regimes of our history; Zett demonstrated the capabilities of a child Jedi in RotS.
Also, are these child Jedi compelled to fight, or are they volunteers? It's possible also that they're meant to have battle experience at a young age under the supervision of their masters.
Again, none of that is right or moral. But it's not the same situation as Hitler Youth or any of those gutter-states who send kids out to die.

[Darth Hoth]

I suppose it can sound like that, but I do put that fact together with the fact that they are superhuman, not ordinary children.

Their powers are irrelevant for the moral case; they are still children.

Well I wouldn't call them untrained - they're certainly no match for a Knight but aren't the barely armed human-shields used by the various fuckwit regimes of our history; Zett demonstrated the capabilities of a child Jedi in RotS.

Scratch untrained; you are right, they are not. That still does not change the moral position. Nor were all H-J pure cannon fodder; some fourteen-year-olds were decorated for destroying ten tanks or even more with Panzerfausts.

Also, are these child Jedi compelled to fight, or are they volunteers? It's possible also that they're meant to have battle experience at a young age under the supervision of their masters.

As a child, you can legally and by definition not give your informed consent for such actions (though to be nitpicky, the rules may not apply that way in the Wars galaxy, but the principle remains the same). No matter what you excuse it with, they should not be there, and if the Jedi institutionalise it peacetime as well, they are morally bankrupt to an even larger degree.

Again, none of that is right or moral. But it's not the same situation as Hitler Youth or any of those gutter-states who send kids out to die.

But it is, morally; is there any difference in this sense between sending out a Hitlerjunge without military training and an African soldier-slave from a hellhole such as Zimbabwe or Liberia who has been drilled to fight since he could stand? Both are still children, though one is likely to be much more traumatised and more effective in combat.

[Dillon]

I suppose it can sound like that, but I do put that fact together with the fact that they are superhuman, not ordinary children.

Question: In your mind, what exactly makes child soldiers unethical? Is it because they are mentally or physically inferior to adults?

If you answered mentally, then it's quite simple. You are being inconsistent with your own ethical beliefs.

If you answered physically, then you are being consistent. However, it would mean your premise is flawed. As others have pointed out, children are not mentally competent to make such decisions. Why? Because... Well, they're children. Does this even need any further explanation?

[Ender]

Lunch was chicken wings, if anyone cares. It was more interesting then what is to come.




Sooper-dee-dooper battle droids! Apparently they serve as NCO/officers compared to the regular B-1s. They don't need the central computers like B-1s, though we've seen B-1s running around sans control computer. Perhaps this is support for the old Bob Brown model of droid organization? Rather nasty execution photo there, and statement that they heavy armor is "acertron armor". Might be a trade name. To counter all this, we are given the insipid tidbit that they forget about foes who are out of visual range. That's right, SBDs can be fooled by peek-a-boo just like infants.




This bitch again. In the novel she seems to stand in for Traviss as the voice of justified criticism again. Rather then making her less annoying then the delusional mustache twirler from the comics, the inconsistent characterization makes her more annoying. But I digress. Just so we are clear, that isn't a belt, it is a "Rattataki sash". See my earlier comments about Mini-Hooker's style of dress. It says she is ambitious and Grievous' rival. Me, I'm thinking of this being more like Johnny Snow trying to be Dr. Horrible's nemesis. Kid, you just aren't int he same league. Couple of series reveals - Gunray will be arrested at some point and need rescuing like how Wat Tambor was. And she has to face down Yoda with the King of Watto's folks. Remember, when you have a strike mission, you send a highly valued high ranking officer in to do it by themselves! Same for diplomatic negotiations, you send an assassin!




Prototype of the spy droids ISB uses on the Death Star is used by the Separatists to do Bill O style "gotcha" to the Jedi. Having read this part of the novel, I will say that that writers (and thus Dooku) came up with a pretty clever trap here.




Count Dooku is apparently a Jew now. Also, beyond the huge nose, yellow eyes are now a Jewish trait. Not much here, the art is ugly, and he plays Anakin like a violin. Also, like Grievous he has his own personal Magnaguards.




Jabba gets an upgrade here. He isn't just a crime lord, he is the head of his clan, which is either in charge of Hutt space, or at least a big enough player that he deliver passage through Hutt space. I guess that makes him and Tatooine a bit more important and explains why it keeps returning, but that runs counter to the idea that Tatooine bumfuck, nowhere of the galaxy.




Splash page! 3 way fight! Try to make Mini-Hooker a credible character! Fail utterly!




Hey look, ANOTHER rancor in a pit in a monastery with a Hutt in it. Well, the same originality present in Legacy of the Force is still strong here.




Fleet porn. Star destroyers are now the anchor of the task forces. Mention of the Imperator and Tector again. V-19 is now no longer a Siener product but Slayn and Korpil. The crappy cruisers from TPM are now "valuable parts of the fleet" due to its combination of speed and firepower. The irony of claiming they matter at all when it is utterly dwarfed by a medium sized ship right next to it apparently flew by Mr. Fry. Nu-class shuttle deploys torrps from space similar to how LAAT/i does in atmosphere. Presumably this is later replaced by the HEAT or whatever the fuck it is in ROTS.




Description here in "Air Support" suggests that the Venator is a carrier first, a destroyer second. They are the "backbone" of the Republic fleet. GIven what we already know and the previous page, I guess that means they are just numerous as hell. Again, we get the disconnect of the bridge having square windows when we see it from the outside, but trapazoids from the inside. I guess no one decided to correct that mistake from ROTS then. Gun barrels on the HTLs look shrunken in this art style, sensor readout in the corner that I can't make heads or tails of. Incoming Ion Cannon hit, these are about to get popped by the Malevolence.

[VT-16]

I'm surprised they bothered to mention Imperators and Tectors at all. When's the Mandators gonna come? ;)

[Darth Hoth]

I actually like the little Hutt - Jabba's son, is he not? He reminds me of Slimer from Ghostbusters... Why no comment on him?

[Ender]

I'm surprised they bothered to mention Imperators and Tectors at all. When's the Mandators gonna come?

They aren't. This appears to be a push back to "st@r destroyers iz teh b3st3st!"

I actually like the little Hutt - Jabba's son, is he not? He reminds me of Slimer from Ghostbusters... Why no comment on him?

I'm conserving my hate for the Jar Jar pages, where apparently he now throws shit. Literally. Like a monkey.

[Darth Hoth]

I actually like the little Hutt - Jabba's son, is he not? He reminds me of Slimer from Ghostbusters... Why no comment on him?

I'm conserving my hate for the Jar Jar pages, where apparently he now throws shit. Literally. Like a monkey.

#¤%+*&#-@¤£#!!!!

[VT-16]

I guess LFL just had a meltdown that day. :P

Oh, and even WOTC has something bigger than a regular Star Destroyer lead fleets in the Living Force campaign story. No biggie. (Pun not intended.)

[NecronLord]

"To counter all this, we are given the insipid tidbit that they forget about foes who are out of visual range. That's right, SBDs can be fooled by peek-a-boo just like infants."

I'm going to assume by this they mean 'forget about infantry opponents who are over the horizon'

[Ender]

Vulture fighters! They can patrol for a maximum of 3 hours, though higher power operations burn through fuel faster. Remind me, how long does the Space Shuttle stay in orbit? Wow, out done by us in the 80s. Impressive. They use Magnetic Imaging sensors to see. Well that makes sense, I mean why would a fighter use radar or a telescope instead of an MRI machine to see? They are little match for Jedi or Clones in space, so clearly the whole thing in ROTS of them carving through the clone squadrons and shooting down Obi-wan didn't happen. They can fire energy torpedoes at ground troops. This is the caption beneath a picture showing them firing lasers, not torpedoes. I wonder if Mr Fry thinks this is a chicken. Gotta love the whole 'Huttlet as a papoose" thing Anakin is rockin there.




Obi-wan hates flying. Obi-wan hates flying. Obi-wan hates flying. Obi-wan hates flying. Ok, thank you, I got the gist of it. Would you like to remind me that we are racing to the top again? Two things in interest - a direct view of a Delta-7B in a Hyperspace ring making for easy scaling, and Padme sporting some kind of weird 3 pip rank badge, which gets a little bit of explanation later.




Droidekas... and absolutely nothing of interest. Its a splash page.



Goddammit, be careful what you wish for. This is the Anakin piloting page, and we are told how he inventively stole some STAPs to help win his, you guessed it RACE TO THE TOP. Huge 3 meter predatory bugs can be found on multiple worlds... that barely made sense with Bantahs being a domesticated farm animal. With random creatures doing it, much less gigantic random predators, it simply becomes stupid. Anyway, it appears that, rather then fight a war in military craft, Anakin will be spending most of the series cavorting around in a beat up old freighter. One that he also crashes into a planet. Because things that hit the ground at terminal velocity are salvageable and better then precision war machines, right?




Said hunk of junk. It is named the Twilight. Get it? Get it? It's SYMBOLIC. No weapons (though they are being fixed), no shields (those will be fixed after the weapons)... yeah I can see why you would take this into a war zone. Damn thing can't even take off if it is carrying cargo - and its a fucking freighter! Also, LAATs are used to cross interstellar space now. Who cares if it has air breathing chemical engines and is open to the outside through its gunslits, it is space worthy! Brilliant. I'll test that logic and use a Cessna to go visit Proxima Centauri.




Hyperspace. I'll put money right now that in the movie, this scene cuts between Anakin and Padme both traveling at the same time, focusing on their faces, as soft sad music plays.




Spider droids are about as smart as domesticated animals. They are also poor artists, which is why the have a "tracing antenna" for copying things that others draw. Me, I'd have given them a tracking antenna, so they can track the enemy around and shoot them. But what do I know. Also, the Octuptarra droids go around spraying bio weapons. I can see how that is much more sensible then given them more guns and using missiles and artillery shells to deliver WMD payloads. Outdated thinking like that is followed by the army, which is why we are losing in Iraq.




Another useless splash page. Obi-wan fights the dumb bitch. dumb bitch will make it out alive. Yawn.

[VT-16]

I'd appreciate a splash-page of the CIS ships, if only to have something semi-non retarded to oogle. :P

Why the hell use a "baby episode" as a feature film? All baby-centric episodes in most series suck.

[Illuminatus Primus]

It looks like they spent all of the night before it was due, while drunk, throwing this POS together. The fucking captions are inconsistent on the same page.

[Ender]

Who's the man?





YODA man! Yoda is great. Yoda is wise. Yoda is old. Yoda wields a small lightsaber. Thank you for explicitly pointing that out. Yoda assigns Mini-Hooker to Anakin to teach him control. Good call there sparky. Really wise. And the head commander of the GAR fights on the front lines. Well yeah, Ike was the first one ashore at Normandy, remember? Let's see here "Yoda accepts a wager from Asajj Ventress: If the Jedi Master beats her troops, the Toydarians will join the Republic; if not, they'll cast their lot with the Separatists". So that's a wager? Because "if your troops beat mine, you win" sounds an awful lot like a battle to me




Chancellor Palpatine. Not much of note here. The black text over the magenta background is a bitch to read. "The Chancellor's office on Coruscant is the site of debates between Jedi, military leaders, and Senators about how to win the war." Which is further proof that the Jedi were not the only or even major source of officers. The Sidious page plays it up like Dooku isn't a Sith himself and has no idea what is going on.

But Sidious sometimes seems oddly unconcerned by these losses, telling Dooku that the war is going very much according to his master plan. What is that plan, and how can Jedi victories bring it closer to completion? Dooku can only wonder.

Are you fucking kidding me? Even if he doesn't know the details, Dooku fucking knows that the plan is bring down the Republic and replace it with an Empire. What the fuck is this shit? Publius, got some patch for this?




Ziro the Hutt, the new fishing lure, available at Bass Pro Shop and Dicks Sporting Goods near you! Seriously, the fucking raver is covered with Day-Glo strikes and has feathers sticking out from his head. He is a fucking fishing lure. He is also yet another Vigo (aren't there only 9 of these fucks?), but he is still Jabba's bitch - which says a lot about how powerful the Black Sun is relative to the Hutts. The guy trying to wipe out the children of the clan makes use of a droid named Kronos by the way. How fucking clever.




Hey, Torpedo-Tits is back, in all her overly sexed up glory. Right down to the pokies in her skin tight body suit. Why is it always so cold when the bad guys capture you? I wonder how she convinces them to let her get away. Anyways, that is a "Senatorial Rank Badge" and is 3 red circles on a raised metal backing, with two small metal blocks on top. It is kinda similar to those worn by the alliance, but they never put them all in a row, they staggered them. Also, Onaconda Farr now turns Padem over to the Separatists in addition to diverting ships away from the Battle of Duro. So corruption that inadvertently aids the enemy gets you tossed out of the Senate, but not actively kidnapping and turning over others to the enemy. Gotcha.




3PO and Jar Jar. Out-fucking-standing. Who doesn't love slapstick? Apparently 3PO doesn't sound the alarm when the Spearatist grab Padme because he doesn't want to damage his new gold coverings. That is Superman level dickery right there. And down in the corner is the shit throwing I mentioned. Though reading it again, it might not be Jar Jar who throws the shit, but his friends.




Splash page. Anakin fighting Jewish Count Dooku. Wait a second... Dooku is a Jew... Anakin hates Dooku... Anakin is a Christ figures... Jesus Hates Jews! It all makes sense now! :eng101:




JEW MAGIC!

[Illuminatus Primus]

It looks like they spent all of the night before it was due, while drunk, throwing this POS together. The fucking captions are inconsistent on the same page.

Also, LAATs are used to cross interstellar space now. Who cares if it has air breathing chemical engines and is open to the outside through its gunslits, it is space worthy! Brilliant

Jesus. What exactly does it say in the fluff, I can't read it. I'm not sure I want to know. They're not even trying to make it seem like they're trying now.

[Ender]

It looks like they spent all of the night before it was due, while drunk, throwing this POS together. The fucking captions are inconsistent on the same page.

I take offense at that. I wrote most of this in one night while drunk, and I feel I did a far superior job.

Jesus. What exactly does it say in the fluff, I can't read it. I'm not sure I want to know. They're not even trying to make it seem like they're trying now.

Searching for R2-D2, Anakin, Ahsoka, Rex, four clone troopers, and R3-S6 pile into the Twilight for the voyage to Skytop Station. The old freighter will hold them all comfortably, and attract a lot less notice in Separatist space than a Republic Gunship would

BTW, if anyone here is offended so far... good. I'm lampooning some of the passive racism and sexism in this thing so far, I'm holding out for some homophobia as well so we can complete the trifecta. This is chock full of passive "all X are the same", "women are only for oogling" sad shit, so hopefully my active bullshit will prompt you to bitch out about the passive shit you can see in the pics.

[Imperial Overlord]

Ender, do have a masochistic disorder you haven't told us about?

As for homophobia, we do have Travis's "Mandos are vitreous family men" idiocy, and "family values" is usually code for "gays are the evil". It's a bit of a stretch, but not as much as a huge numbers of all male clones raised together and going through adolescence together and none of them ever having any of that nasty, immoral, soul destroying homosexual activity.