Clone Wars season 2

[The Romulan Republic]

Saw a new episode last night, in which Ashoka tries to find her stolen lightsaber before Anakin finds out she lost it. Some points of interest:

1. The chase scenes through Coruscant strongly reminded me of the beginning of Attack of the Clones.

2. I liked the old Jedi who helps her in this episode. Clever old guy, to the point that after all of Ashoka's efforts, he could probably have solved the entire case single-handedly with the same amount of effort and in the same amount of time.

3. Coruscant uses droid policemen.

[Thanas]

And there are species out there who can physically match the Jedi without Ysalamiri. Well, at least when it comes to jumping.

[The Romulan Republic]

Yeah, they're called Terellian jango jumpers, according to Wookiepedia, and they're probably a new species because I couldn't find any more information on them. Even Googling the name only got seven results.

[Drooling Iguana]

I suppose with all the Kurosawa influence in the films it was only a matter of time before they made an episode like this one.

[Knife]

It was an ok, take a break from the action, take a break from the sepertists and Sith, little story. It was predictable and silly, but fun.

Edit: Wanted to add; the only time I felt it went too far, to cliche, was the old man driving too slow on the freeway bit.

[Srelex]

Bit late for this, but I liked the non-minamalist mention of 'thousands of droid armies' in one of the recent episodes--even being extremely conservative and assuming that there's just one million per each army, that's still around a billion droids. Something for Traviss fans to smoke.

[VT-16]

Clip up with a new voice actor, some clips and some controversy. Spoiler

"Fall of the Old Republic" - I assume this is the New Sith Wars period.
Black lightsabre. Um... It's a light-absorbing weapon? A black body?

[Srelex]

That black lightsaber looks odd--more like a physical sword.

By the way, on a more unrelated note, am I the only one that feels that, like in the new ST film, there doesn't seem to be much in the way of shield presence in space battles? Physical objects cuddle right up to hulls quite often, from pods to shuttles.

[VT-16]

Isn't that how the buzz droids work? They speed down next to a vessel and the shields don't react to them, so they can perform their sabotage.

[Srelex]

Isn't that how the buzz droids work? They speed down next to a vessel and the shields don't react to them, so they can perform their sabotage.

That's not quite what I meant--in the recent Grievous episode, for instance, Anakin's shuttle quite casually latches on to his Recusant, and IIRC in previous ones we had boarding pods hitting a Venator with no sign of hinderance. Furthermore, in battles we often see explosions detonating on hulls with similar lack of evidence for shielding--now, of course, this could be attributed to hull-hugging shields that the bolts are detonating on, but that's not easily apparent to the average viewer. Although to be fair I think we were quite obviously shown shields in effect on capships in a season 1 episode.

[The Romulan Republic]

Isn't that how the buzz droids work? They speed down next to a vessel and the shields don't react to them, so they can perform their sabotage.

That's not quite what I meant--in the recent Grievous episode, for instance, Anakin's shuttle quite casually latches on to his Recusant, and IIRC in previous ones we had boarding pods hitting a Venator with no sign of hinderance. Furthermore, in battles we often see explosions detonating on hulls with similar lack of evidence for shielding--now, of course, this could be attributed to hull-hugging shields that the bolts are detonating on, but that's not easily apparent to the average viewer. Although to be fair I think we were quite obviously shown shields in effect on capships in a season 1 episode.

This is hardly new. Some other examples:

The Empire Strikes Back: The Falcon latches onto the back of an ISD's tower.

The Revenge of the Sith: Grevious's flagship trades fire with a Republic ship with no shields apparent except over some gun ports. Chunks are blown out of both ships' hull if I recall the scene correctly.

[Srelex]

This is hardly new. Some other examples:

The Empire Strikes Back: The Falcon latches onto the back of an ISD's tower.

The Revenge of the Sith: Grevious's flagship trades fire with a Republic ship with no shields apparent except over some gun ports. Chunks are blown out of both ships' hull if I recall the scene correctly.

I guess so, but it's something that can bug me nonetheless. But at least in regards to the TESB, we can rationalize that the ISD's shields weren't necesserily on anyway.

[The Romulan Republic]

I guess so, but it's something that can bug me nonetheless. But at least in regards to the TESB, we can rationalize that the ISD's shields weren't necesserily on anyway.

Well, I'll have to check, but doesn't one of the officers on the ISD shout "shields up" about five seconds before?

[Srelex]

I guess so, but it's something that can bug me nonetheless. But at least in regards to the TESB, we can rationalize that the ISD's shields weren't necesserily on anyway.

Well, I'll have to check, but doesn't one of the officers on the ISD shout "shields up" about five seconds before?

It depends if we're supposed to interpret whether the Falcon latched on immediately afterwards, I guess. Or if the order was enacted in time.

[VT-16]

The Hong Kong CW broadcaster has some character, world and vehicle descriptions up. Some interesting news, including Spoiler

what is probably an enlarged Providence in a future episode, as well as a Republic stealth ship.

[Srelex]

Classifying the Providence as a Dreadnaught...odd...

Btw, have there been any other mentions of Republic stealth craft previously in the EU?

[VT-16]

No, but there has been in ESB: "No ship that small has a cloaking device!" I assume this ship is entirely a reference to that in turn. Wonder about its size, though.

Like the reference to the light cruisers being the Republic's oldest ships, brought out of mothball. Since the Consulars are part of the navy, and they go back to the end of the New Sith Wars, does that mean the LCs are relics from that conflict?

Also, with Grievous's command ship being on that page, I assume the upcoming Providence probably won't be the same as the movie version.

[Srelex]

No, but there has been in ESB: "No ship that small has a cloaking device!" I assume this ship is entirely a reference to that in turn. Wonder about its size, though.

Like the reference to the light cruisers being the Republic's oldest ships, brought out of mothball. Since the Consulars are part of the navy, and they go back to the end of the New Sith Wars, does that mean the LCs are relics from that conflict?

Also, with Grievous's command ship being on that page, I assume the upcoming Providence probably won't be the same as the movie version.

The New Sith Wars? I'd imagine them being from some time not long before the Stark Hyperspace Wars. As for the Providence, I see no reason why it'd be different--as it's a third party site, maybe they just screwed up the name.

I am curious as to that 'mobile super laser'. Hopefully they'll show it's power appropiately.

[VT-16]

Well, Grievous's Recusant-looking command ship was over 2,2km long, based on the episode it was in, so therefore I'm keeping off calling this a Providence destroyer. Bear in mind LFL did state the aforementioned ship was based on the Recusant, not that it was a Recusant itself.

[VT-16]

Strange that this week's episode hasn't spawned any discussion at all. Either people liked it too much or didn't care enough to comment.

Plenty of EU references and some new stuff, the aforementioned black lightsabre and the "Fall of the Old Republic" being the two most prominent.
I also spied a KOTOR-era Mandalore in the cubist-style painting in Pre Viszla's dinner room. Nice touches all around the Mandalore buildings, especially liked the cube architecture in Sundari and the inverted city concept. Gonna be fun to see how the next two episodes pan out. The interplay between Obi-Wan and Satine was also nice, a lot more subtle version of Padme/Anakin.

[Srelex]

Mandos were in it? Was there any signs of Travissism?

[VT-16]

They put in some Mando-isms when a Death Watch terrorist commits suicide, but other than that, there's naught. The Mandalorian prime minister even dismisses Jango Fett as a bounty hunter and wonders to Obi-Wan how he ever got hold of Mandalorian armor in the first place. Though that might be deliberate downplaying of the warlike factions in general on his part.

The Mandalorian capital Sundari is like a boxed version of Coruscant. Beautiful and cube-like in architecture and there's nice references to previous EU-based conflicts, even if none are really named. Like I said, there's a Picasso-like painting of a KOTOR-era Mandalore cutting down Jedi knights in Viszla's dinner room. Obi-Wan also commented on how Mandalorian commandos fought in many wars, often against the Jedi.

Also, the area around the domed capital has several bomb craters in it. They seem to encompass several kilometers each, based on the comparison to the huge city, so they must have been nuclear in origin. The planet is said to have had a civil war in recent times, though I can't remember the source.

[Srelex]

Wonder what the Fandalorian, and most important, Traviss's reaction to this will be. Seeing as it seems that they're no longer Mary Sues who wipe out armies of Jedi with their dicks, no wonder she quit.

[VT-16]

Pre Viszla, using an ancient stolen lightsabre and backed up by three armored guards, can't defeat Obi-Wan without resorting to missiles. That's how they are matched.

Some interesting images from the ep:

Sundari (internal)
Sundari (external). Those structures on the bubble, form the spaceport, not individual skyscrapers.
The darksabre
Darksabre details

[Darksider]

Is it just me or was Obi-Wan made of win and awesome in that episode?

Barring the initial incident of getting captured by a pair of Mandalorians, (everyone has a bad day) he completely owned everyone.