Genndy Tartakovsky's Clone Wars (2003-2005)

For me, the best parts were the battle scenes, especially the one on Coruscant.

 

I never thought about that before. Durge was so incredibly original, the whole idea of armor seeming somewhat humanoid, but containing something more alien than anything ever seen before... I wish they would have brought him back into the canon in TCW.

 

General Grievous trying to capture Palpatine; that whole chase with Shaak Ti was amazing. I was so disappointed with how underutilized she was in the 3D series after that.

 

This series does conflict with established Star Wars: The Clone Wars canon. That's why Lucas declared it non-canon years ago. Originally, the CGI Clone Wars was meant to work around Genndy Tartakovsky's animated Clone Wars. However, Lucas ideas started to drift away and contradict what Tartakovsky had established, so it was scrapped. I'm not sure what conflicts though, and what Lucas & Filoni's conflicting ideas/ events were though.

 

It was a pretty cool show I watched...I'll never forget this one episode I saw where Anakin Skywalker's robotic hand gets blown up or something of that nature and he force chokes someone using whatever stump is left, and there was another episode 9might have even been the same one) where a few top jedi are stuck inside a downed ship and Grievous is picking them off one by one like a horror movie villian.

 

I believe the exploding stump scene, which took place on a snow planet, may have been the last episode. Of season 2.

The crashed ship bit, which was definitely amazing, was from the last episode of season 1, and continued over the first episode of season 2.

 

I think part of what took it out of cannon was that grievous kills a jedi who ended up dying elsewhere- in literature, or ep3 or something.

Also there's the stylized violence and use of force powersm. Lucas probably thought it was a bit hyperbolic. Which it was, but it's still a very enjoyable series.

 

Lucas is also a bit of a pacifist, and may have deemed the show as contradictory to his vision .

 

I just finished watching this 2003 series very closely and have come to the conclusion, that even though every episode after Chapter 21 is downright amazing, they are the only episodes questionable as canon. Chapter 21 ends on a perfect note, creating a perfect opening for the "Star Wars: The Clone Wars" movie. Chapter 21 ends with Anakin becoming a jedi knight, with a very obvious over attachment to Padme and a struggle with anger still shown clearly. Still somewhat immature and new to the life of a jedi knight, the ending arc of Anakin being sworn in as a knight and Yoda cutting off his padawan braid is a perfect spot to start the rest of TCW series. I think it would be fitting that we keep all 21 chapters as canon and scrap the other four as needed. The only change that is necessary to me, would be to change Grevious' voice to match up with the movie. Everything else seems to not mess with canon at all, given my idea to scrap the last four chapters.

I completely agree with this statement Luuke22, and I like your attitude towards this canon issue . If it makes sense, and greatly adds depth and background to the overall story...then to hell what is "canon". I like to view the EU Legends sort of the same way. (Off topic, but...) I tend to view the EU Legend stories as legends and lore WITHIN the Star Wars realm, being told and passed down from one generation to the next in front of a Tattoine desert bonfire. Nobody truly knows of it's "truth" but they still tell the overall story of that person and or era.
I agree that the action in Tartakovsky's Clone Wars is way over-the-top, but thats exactly what I would expect from a Tartakovsky illustrated story. Since this is animated and supposed to be visually stunning, Its a little easier to make an exception and justify it in my head.
The over-exaggerated force powers in the 2003 Clone Wars microseries was probably the most hyperbolic version of any Star Wars story besides maybe "The Force Unleashed". Although it does not seem to be 'realistic', even for the Star Wars universe, it still tells the same overall story.
One might not believe that Windu has the power to take out an entire army of superbattle droids, but if you look at it in much more literal terms, it makes sense and you can begin to justify the over-exaggerations.
Mace fought an army of battle droids alongside the clones and was the key to taking out their squashing superweapon. The action in said battle, is up to the imagination, and nobody has a better imagination of illustrative action than Tartakovsky.

 

The introduction of General Grievous where he wipes out all the jedi should have been in the movies....in tartakovskys show he was a deadly, fearful villain...in episode 3 he was a joke in comparison.

The fight between assaj ventress and Anakin in the rain needs to have a spiritual successor in the new trilogy...that whole fight was amazing.

 

I about poodoo'd myself when I first saw this airing, I was quite young and it was unlike anything I had seen out of the Star Wars universe. I loved it SO much and wanted them to desperately use this animation style for the other series... sadly, I did not get my wish... No idea why it's not canon, but I havent seen it in years, so maybe there are some continuity problems with the other Clone Wars series.

 

Best depiction of what General Grievous should have been feared by the Jedi... I guess it was too close to Vader's characterization.

 

I have only just discovered these, I have got volume 1 DVD and volume 2 is in the post. I loved the animation style, great figures and landscapes. It's important to be visually appealing and this hits the mark. I also like how it is extremely visual rather than dialogue driven. I like the Filoni Clone Wars too. They're obviously quite different and I'm fine with that. I feel this is telling the story that links episodes 2 to 3 whereas Filoni Clone Wars is kind of static in time as a lot of TV series are and extends the story in space setting and character.
The question of canon is an interesting one, for me canon only exists within at the context of Lucas controlled Lucas films as the new Disney movies don't strike me as a convincing continuation of the story or the lore, to each there own. But not being able to relate to the new movies has driven me more fully into episodes 1 to 6, I'm also starting to explore books and comics and after having given up on Rebels after season 1, I have found that I'm liking season 2, the only Disney Star Wars I have enjoyed.
Basically what I'm saying is this series was a delightful recent find for me a treasure I didn't know existed.

 

If you really dig the Clone Wars from 2003, I highly recommend you check out some of the other media that tied into the Clone Wars multimedia project going on at the time. The Republic comics, found in the Clone Wars Omnibus Vol. 1-3 by Dark Horse, are a very faithful continuation of the story and tone from the cartoon series. In some ways, it tells a grittier and more war-oriented story than the 2008 Clone Wars series.

And yes, I completely agree with you on the new movies being an unconvincing continuation of the Star Wars lore. The fact that almost the exact same conflict and events from the OT are repeating themselves in-universe just breaks all immersion and ability to take it seriously. It reeks of poor, nostalgia-seeking writing decisions than any natural, evolving world-building.

 

Thanks for the tip, I'll definitely seek the Clone Wars Omnibus out, comic seem like a good format as Star Wars has always been very visually orientated.

 

I just got volume 2 of this, what a blast, it links directly into Episode 3. I can see myself watching this many times.