Darth Maul returns in Star Wars: The Clone Wars' fourth season

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Star Wars: The Clone Wars – The Complete Season Four

During the 2008 fall television season, the Time-Warner-owned Cartoon Network and Lucasfilm Limited returned to George Lucas’s “galaxy far, far away” with a new animated series titled Star Wars: The Clone Wars.

Set during the intergalactic conflict from which its title is derived, Star Wars: The Clone Wars is a 3D computer-animated follow-up to the 2003-2005 2D Cartoon Network “micro-series” Star Wars: Clone Wars, which bridges the three-year gap between the Prequel Trilogy’s Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith.  

(Supposedly, the two shows are intertwined, with the newer series taking place between Chapters 22 and 25 of the 2D series, even though there are always going to be some continuity issues that hopefully will be addressed as the narrative of  Star Wars: The Clone Wars evolves.)

Although the feature-length film Star Wars: The Clone Wars was not warmly received by many Star Wars fans and media critics, the TV series which it was launching gained a loyal following among viewers of all ages and was one of the most-watched shows on  Cartoon Network.

Like Lucasfilm’s The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles, Star Wars: The Clone Wars doesn’t tell its stories in a strictly linear or chronological fashion.  It is presented in an anthology format, with stand-alone episodes and multi-episode story arcs skipping back and forth across the Star Wars timeline. 

This means that some episodes or story arcs in one season can be either “prequels” or sequels to episodes in a previous season, and that some characters’ costumes and/or hairstyle (Anakin Skywalker’s, for one) will change subtly depending on when the particular story takes place.

Generally speaking, though, Star Wars: The Clone Wars depicts the many battles and other adventures in which the newly-minted Jedi Knight Anakin Skywalker, his former Master, Obi-Wan Kenobi and Skywalker’s Padawan apprentice Ahsoka Tano are involved during the three-year-long conflict between the Galactic Republic and the Confederacy of Independent Systems.

However, the series’ anthology format allows executive producer George Lucas, supervising director Dave Filoni, producer Cary Silver and their creative team of writers, animators and directors to tell stories about other Jedi Knights (Quinlan Vos, Kit Fisto and Plo Koon, for instance) which play minor roles in the movies or have appeared only in other Expanded Universe media like novels and video games.

Star Wars: The Clone Wars, Season Four: Battle Lines

Pong Krell: Time and rest are luxuries the Republic cannot afford.

On September 16, 2011, Star Wars: The Clone Wars’ fourth season – Battle Lines – opened with two episodes (Water War and Gungan Attack) airing back to back on Time-Warner’s Cartoon Network.  Written by Jose Molina, the two stories form two-thirds of a story arc set on Mon Calamari, the water world best known to Star Wars fans as the home of Return of the Jedi’s Admiral Ackbar (who, incidentally, makes his first appearance as a character in the Prequel era here).

Though the fourth season premiere was the lowest-rated in the series’ run (1.93 million viewers watched it), it presented a superb story in which Anakin Skywalker (Matt Lanter), Padme Amidala (Catherine Taber), Kit Fisto (Phil LaMarr), and Anakin’s Padawan Ahsoka Tano (Ashley Eckstein) team up with Capt. Ackbar (Artt Butler) and Prince Lee-Char (Adam McArthur) to prevent a Separatist-backed civil war between the fish-like Mon Cal and the squid-like Quarren.

The Quarren – egged on by Riff Tamson (Gary Anthony Williams) – have long resented the Mon Calamari and seek to end the power-sharing arrangement the two races previously had prior to the murder of King Yos Yolima, the father of Prince Lee Char.  Ostensibly an a Separatist observer, the Karkarodon is actually tasked by Count Dooku to assist Quarren leader Nossor Ri (Corey Burton) in his rebellion against the Mon Cal.

The three-episode arc (which concludes with Prisoners), foreshadows the darker direction in which Star Wars: The Clone Wars is heading. Not only is Molina’s story darker thematically, but its violent content and  murky underwater settings are also visually dark.

This darkening trend, of course, is consistent with the show’s Prequel Era setting; the twilight of the Republic and its Jedi protectors is rapidly approaching.  The Sith, personified by Darth Sidious/Supreme Chancellor Palpatine (Ian Ambercombie) and his apprentice Darth Tyranus/Count Dooku  are manipulating the Clone Wars to hasten the fall of the Republic and the rise of the Galactic Empire, events which are chronicled in Star Wars – Episode III: Revenge of the Sith.

Season Four: Battle Lines features a plethora of very dramatic story threads which require multi-episode arcs.  For instance, the Battle for Umbara (four episodes) delves into the tense relationship between the clone troopers of Anakin Skywalker’s 501st Legion and Jedi general Pong Krell (Dave Fennoy). Krell, a Besilisk Jedi Master and an expert swordsman, is a hard-driving, even sadistic leader who expects success in battle no matter how many clones get killed or wounded. Though at first he is presented as a stricter commander than young Skywalker, Krell has a hidden agenda.

There are also quite a few “carry-over” stories from Season Three, including an episode which features Ahsoka Tano’s friend Lux Bonteri (Jason Spisak), the son of a Separatist Senator who was murdered after she tried to initiate peace talks with the Republic). In A Friend in Need, Lux enlists Ahsoka’s help in his dangerous quest to find justice for his mother’s murder.

The most dramatic bridge between Seasons Three and Four, of course, is the continuation of Katie Lucas’ story of the Nightsisters, Savage Opress and his long-lost brother, Darth Maul.  The revelation that Maul, Darth Sidious’ apprentice in Star Wars – Episode I: The Phantom Menace, had survived after being bisected by Obi-Wan Kenobi on Naboo was hinted at in Witches of the Mist, but it’s confirmed in the two-episode arc of Brothers and Revenge.  (This is not a spoiler; the cover art for the Blu-ray/DVD Complete Season Four set features Darth Maul’s fierce visage.)

That’s not to say that there are no light, kid-friendly among the 22 episodes. There is a two-story arc centered on Star Wars’ R2-D2 and C-3PO (Anthony Daniels), Laurel-and-Hardy team of droids, as well as a semi-comical episode (Shadow Warrior) which features uber-clumsy Jar Jar Binks (Ahmed Best) as he tried to impersonate the Gungans’ current leader, Boss Lyonie (Best, in a dual role) to foil a Separatist plot.

My Take: Though the Star Wars: The Clone Wars movie which launched the series in 2008 was at first dismissed as being too kid-oriented, the TV show has enjoyed both popular and critical acclaim. Even fans who do not like the live-action Prequel Trilogy seem to have embraced the series’ strong narrative sensibility.


 Like many fans, I sometimes wish Lucas, Winder and Filoni had chosen a more linear (i.e. chronological) approach to the story telling rather than showing Star Wars: The Clone Wars as an anthology, but once viewers get used to it they can tell that big arcs often are chronological within the context of the whole saga and that one-shot stories (such as A Friend in Need) are little sideway jaunts that take viewers away from the Anakin/Obi-Wan narrative and allow them to learn about other characters, including other Jedi Knights and Count Dooku’s former apprentice Asajj Ventress (Nika Futterman).

(The anthology approach, by the way, will be dispensed with as Star Wars: The Clone Wars goes into syndication in the fall of 2012. The episodes, which will be distributed by Trifecta Media and Entertainment in the U.S., are going to air in chronological order.)  

Though the series airs on kid-friendly Cartoon Network, it is rated TV-PG for good reason; unlike most "cartoons" where characters can go through battles and other nasty situations virtually unharmed (as in the 1980s' GI Joe series), Star Wars: The Clone Wars features many episodes in which clone troopers and even Jedi Knights are injured or even die.


On Animation:  For first-time viewers, the animation (which was inspired by the British animated series The Thunderbirds) does take some getting used to.  It's rendered in three-dimensional computer style and done in a slightly exaggerated style (Count Dooku, for instance, has a decidedly knife-like look in his face-and-beard) reminiscent of both the 2003-2005 Clone Wars series and anime.

 Once the viewer gets used to the visual style, though, the strength of the writing will win over almost all Star Wars fans Star Wars: The Clone Wars - The Complete Fourth Season Episode List (Blu-ray Edition)

Disc 1:

Water War
Written by Jose Molina
Directed by Duwayne Dunham

Gungan Attack
Written by Jose Molina
Directed by Brian Kalin O’Connell

Prisoners
Written by Jose Molina
Directed by Danny Keller

Shadow Warrior
Written by Daniel Arkin
Directed by Brian Kalin O’Connell

Mercy Mission
Written by Bonnie Mark
Directed by Danny Keller

Nomad Droids
Written by Steve Mitchell, Craig Van Sickle
Directed by Steward Lee

Disc 2

Darkness on Umbara
Written by  Matt Michnovetz
Directed by Steward Lee

The General
Written by Matt Michnovetz
Directed by Walter Murch

Plan of Dissent
Written by Matt Michnovetz
Directed by Kyle Dunlevy

Carnage of Krell
Written by Matt Michnovetz
Directed by Kyle Dunlevy

Kidnapped
Written by Henry Gilroy, additional writing by Steven Melching
Directed by Kyle Dunlevy

Slaves of the Republic
Written by Henry Gilroy, additional writing by Steven Melching
Directed by Brian Kalin O’Connell

Escape from Kadavo
Written by Henry Gilroy, additional writing by Steven Melching
Directed by Danny Keller

A Friend in Need
Written by Christian Taylor
Directed by Dave Filoni

Disc 3

Deception
Written by Brent Friedman
Directed by Kyle Dunlevy

Friends and Enemies
Written by Brent Friedman
Directed by Bosco Ng

The Box
Written by Brent Friedman
Directed by Brian Kalin O’Connell


Crisis on Naboo
Written by Brent Friedman
Directed by Danny Keller

Massacre
Written by Katie Lucas
Directed by Steward Lee

Bounty
Written by Katie Lucas
Directed by Kyle Dunlevy

Brothers
Written by Katie Lucas
Directed by Bosco Ng
Revenge
Written by Katie Lucas
Directed by Brian Kalin O’Connell

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