My Star Wars Weekend Update

Hello, and happy weekend, dear readers and Star Wars fans!

So I’ve finally done my first podcast, and it turned out…not bad, I guess, lol. I put it up last Tuesday, and I’ve had 14 listens so far. More than I thought! If you’ve taken a listen, I thank you. I’m going to do what I do with the blog, and just be patient with it: just keep doing what I love, putting it out there, and see what happens. I think it may naturally evolve over time, as the blog has, and hopefully for the better. So we’ll see. I’m planning on doing one a week; the next book I’ll cover is the Legends book Kenobi, by John Jackson Miller.

I’ve finally finished the Aftermath series and will be posting a review of Empire’s End sometime this week. It took me a long time to get through these books, even though I loved them. For one, they’re big books, at least for Star Wars, 400-500 pages each. And I’ve just been busy in every day life, too, as we all are. I’ve been trying to redo my daughter’s bedroom, and spent a day putting a bedside table together, lol. And I only made a couple of mistakes–the worst one was nailing the back onto it, and then realizing I put it on the wrong side…and then spending another hour pulling out all 20 tiny nails again. It was sweaty work, lol. And tomorrow I’ll be working on putting new curtains up. It’s an understatement to say that curtains aren’t my thing. Tacking up blankets was my usual go-to. But my girl deserves real curtains, and so curtains I shall put up, lol. Wish me luck.

At any rate, once I finished Aftermath, I picked up Clone Wars: Wild Space, by Karen Miller, a Legends book. This one focuses on a mission with Obi-Wan and Bail Organa, and I can’t wait to see what it’s all about. It takes place almost immediately after the Battle of Geonosis.

17) Star Wars: The Clone Wars: Wild Space by Karen Miller

I’ll also be posting my usual review on the latest Bad Batch episode. These shows continue to be excellent, and it’s hard to wait for the next episode every week! I’m also about halfway done with Season two of Resistance, and I have to say it’s pretty darn good. The stakes have gotten higher, it’s starting to sync with the first two movies, and the characters have been challenged more, and so have gained a bit more depth. I’m actually kind of sad there are only two seasons.

That’s really about it this week. I haven’t had much time for any non-Star Wars indulgences, as I’ve been trying to do. Believe it or not, there are other movies and entertainments besides Star Wars I enjoy, lol. And I think it’s important to find balance, and look up and away from the galaxy far, far away once in a while so I don’t get completely swallowed up, lol. And so my dreams don’t start looking like this:

r/PrequelMemes - My Friend: I had a dream I was dating my crush My dreams: — Ever have any weird Star Wars dreams? I’m surprised I haven’t yet, lol.

Oh well, maybe next week. I’d LOVE to watch Halston on Netflix (but does that count, as it has Ewan McGregor in it? Lol). What non-Star Wars stuff have you been watching? Let me know in the comments!

The Genndy Tartakovsky Clone Wars

Disney+ has added a few “Vintage” Star Wars content recently, including the Ewok movies “Caravan of Courage” and “The Battle for Endor,” something called “The Story of the Faithful Wookiee” and an Ewok cartoon. I’m not particularly interested in any of that.

What I am interested in is the “Genndy Tartakovsky” Clone Wars animated series that ran on Cartoon Network in 2003. Back then, it was just a cartoon that I didn’t care about, for kids, a spin-off of the prequels that I didn’t like. I wasn’t a kid, didn’t have a kid, and had no use for Cartoon network, lol.

Now, of course, my eyes have been opened to the wonderful, imperfect prequels, and I adore Dave Filoni’s Clone Wars. How could my curiosity not have been aroused? So I watched it (the original 15-minute shows are grouped into two hour-long “volumes.”)

At first, it seemed so alien to me, I didn’t think I was going to like it. There was very little dialogue, a whole LOT of battles, explosions, and shoot-em ups, and I thought, yeah, 8-10 year-old boys (or girls) would eat this stuff up, lol. Even the Clones didn’t speak too much; they communicated through hand signals, which was actually pretty cool.

In the first volume, we see how Dooku and Ventress meet, and how Anakin pursued Ventress, battled her, and defeated her. Mace Windu goes up against some battle droids, and just seems like Superman he’s so amazing. Kit Fisto does some battle underwater, while Obi-Wan leads the Clones in battle in an unnamed city (perhaps Christophsis?). Typically, I felt there wasn’t enough Obi-Wan. There can never be enough Obi-Wan, lol. Towards the end of Volume One we meet General Grievous, who goes up against Ki-Adi-Mundi and other Jedi.

In Volume Two, there are still a lot of battles, but much more dialogue and actual storytelling. Yoda and Padme go to the rescue of Luminara and Bariss Offee, who have done battle with droids in the Illum Temple and become trapped. Eventually, the whole things coalesces into an over-arching story arc that is reminiscent of the plot of the book Labyrinth of Evil (which, published in 2005, probably took its cue from this series). Grievous is sent to attack Coruscant and kidnap Chancellor Palpatine, while Shak-Ti and two other Jedi are tasked with protecting him and getting him to a bunker deep within the city. Anakin and Obi-Wan, meanwhile, are sent to a planet to help the natives get their warriors back from the Separatists, who are transforming them into gruesome monsters (I’m not sure why? But I’m glad this little side-plot didn’t make it into the novel Labyrinth of Evil, lol). It was supposed to be a final test for Anakin, since he didn’t take the Jedi Trials in the usual way. The events of Volume Two lead right up to the beginning of Revenge of the Sith.

In the end, I did enjoy this version of Clone Wars. I like the Manga-inspired animation, and there’s some humor in there, too. The Genndy Tartakovsky Clone Wars is just a lot of fun.

Did you watch this series back in the day? What did you think of it? If you’re watching it for the first time, what’s your opinion? Let me know in the comments, and we’ll talk about it!

Star Wars Fan Art: Satine Kryze

After having a very interesting conversation with Julie G from Darkside Creative about fan theories, OTP’s and odd pairings, I was inspired to look for fan art of Duchess Satine Kryze. There’s plenty of fan art of “Obitine” or the romantic relationship between Obi-Wan Kenobi and Satine, and I think I’ve shared a few on this blog before. But I wanted to find some of just Satine. There’s not as much, and many seem a bit too cartoonish to me. But there were a few I found that I liked:

This one borders on cartoon-like, but it’s also elegant and lovely.

This one includes Obi-Wan, but I liked the style of it and how she might have occasionally indulged in missing him in private, when she showed only strength and serenity to the rest of the world.

This one looks like an official royal portrait or something; the aforementioned strength and serenity show through in dramatic black and white.

I adore this pencil drawing that shows a softer, more feminine side to Satine.