Star Wars: The Clone Wars - Episode II: A New Threat

Another fantastic addition to Smudger9's Clone Wars saga! This edit contains episodes I tried to include in my attempt at such a project (specifically the Malevolence trilogy and Cloak of Darkness) but the way Smudger pulls them together is fantastic. As I mentioned in my review for Episode I, he does a great job of bringing in dialogue from other episodes to blend totally disparate episodes of the show together into one big arc (one of the only times it stood out in a major way was during the Jedi Council scene).

What blew me away the most were the additional scenes of the Malevolence in action that were created specifically for this. I don't know how Smudger did it but they were flawless and reminded the audience that this was the big threat of the movie even though we didn't really have the characters deal with it until later in the movie (rather like the Death Star in A New Hope - we know it's there from the opening crawl but it's an hour before our heroes actually encounter it).

Throughout this felt like a *real* Star Wars movie, but there were a few minor instances where the episodic nature of the show in its first two seasons popped up - hardly a fault of Smudger's. Boba Fett appearing and then disappearing mid-movie stood out (although we could argue that this is set up for Episode III of Smudger's saga which will deal with the bounty hunters in more detail from what he's said in the forums), as did the story of Kit Fisto and his old apprentice tackling Grievous. That said, they are solid stories which contribute to our understanding of our main villains and the Clone Wars as a whole, and there's no doubt that Smudger did a fine job integrating them into the overall narrative.

But honestly, beyond that, watching this was an amazing experience. Audio-visual editing was fantastic. Transitions between scenes (and therefore episodes) were flawless. While a lot was cut, you honestly don't notice. I looked at his cut list and was genuinely surprised that so much dialogue had gone - you can't tell! While I don't mind the "kiddy-ness" of parts of the early seasons, the cuts improve pacing considerably.

As much as I love the Clone Wars show I feel that Star Wars is best enjoyed as movies and these edits give us just that: a great, well edited story that gives develops both the main characters of the saga as well as focusing on the side characters who will play a role in Revenge of the Sith. More than the Clone Wars TV show, I feel Smudger's edits will make the Order 66 scene hit home because the choice of story arcs he has included.

I liked this edit better than the first one. While the first one was a basic introduction episode to the Clone Wars, this episode builds on the themes of the previous one and gets deeper into it. We saw in Army of the Republic how people viewed armies. There were people who thought the soldiers were just disposable, only mildly better than droids for their strategic and critical mindsets. Others like Shaak Ti saw the clones as people, and gave importance to their empathic, emotional ability, and their sense of teamwork and honor. The view was quite black and white but still compelling enough.

In A New Threat, we go deeper into the minds of the fighting sides. Now it isn’t simply about fighting bad guys together but saving those we love. People criticize Last Jedi for Rose’s lines about this, but corny and spoon-fed (maybe even weakly executed) as the scene may have been, it stuck to the core of what Star Wars is all about. This is clearly seen in A New Threat.

We see what the villains think in the Cloak of Darkness section. All they want is money, power, and control. They don’t care about saving lives, all they want is self gratification. Next in Lair of Grievous we get into the mindset of the Jedi and we see that things are not so black and white. We see Kit Fisto’s apprentice being very aggressive towards and easily provoked by Grievous, and giving into that kind of hate costs him his life. It’s not about fighting those we hate...

In the Boba Fett sections we see that Anakin and Mace are concerned about saving clones, and there is this “no one is left behind” mindset that is reversed when they are in trouble and the other Jedi have to save them. Thematically, Boba is fighting the person he hates, and causes chaos for that. Mace Windu’s response to Anakin about doing nothing about Boba and not seeking him out is the orderly way to do it and ties into this theme well. It is an interesting contrast to how Mace acts in Revenge of the Sith, basically fighting what he hates and trying to kill him, showing hypocrisy with both the Jedi Code and himself (a new character layer not seen before) causing Anakin to completely lose faith in the Jedi and betraying them.

I also can’t stop thinking how this is an interesting contrast to how Mace murdered Jango in AotC causing Boba to cause more damage in the future. Sure he did it because it’s war, but as he said, “We’re keepers of the peace, not soldiers” and fighting a war is not a very balanced thing, necessary as it was. I think it was these kinds of complications of morality and necessary ruthlessness that caused the Jedi in the Prequels to get even more hypocritical and corrupt than they already were, and I love how The Clone Wars subtly explores that. I personally think that the omitted episode “Lethal Trackdown” was also exploring this, especially at the end when Mace is left reflecting on how his brash and imbalanced way he killed Jango because it was war caused more chaos and the loss of lives. It’s great, but plot wise it was the right decision for the editor to omit that. I personally like to view that episode as a bonus to this fanedit, despite the inconsistencies.

Finally, the differing plotlines with one common theme all converge in the awesome Malevolence arc, with the plots having to do with deciding whether or not to save the left behind clones (with the much memed but very compelling “-We’re meant to be disposable -Not to me” exchange), saving an entire medical center from the very evil that threatens the place that save people, and saving Padme from within the Malevolence before it is destroyed. I loved the third act of the movie simply because or this convergence of thematic depth.

The flow was overall still a little slow for me, especially when Padme came in out of nowhere and there were added stakes which I didn’t really feel as well as the medical center part—it just felt redundant and too much plot-wise. However I forgave it because it tied into the themes very well. The villains just kept making things difficult for the good guys, and the Jedi had to decide to make a quick rescue and risk everything in the end. In the end, I have mixed feelings about the actual climax that included Padme, but it worked. However, the overall edit I thought was paced and flowed a lot better than Army of the Republic, so I guess it balances out.

A New Threat is a great edit that improves on the very good Army of the Republic. Can’t wait to see Episode III, Children of the Force!

Star Wars: The Clone Wars tells a universal story of war between good and evil, and in that turmoil the daunting challenge to not become that-which-you-fight in Anakin's efforts to stop the Dark Side. A scope that cries out for feature-length presentation on the big-screen.

Smudger9 continues the daunting task of condensing multiple episodes and storylines into coherent movies.

If you haven't the time to watch the feature film plus 6 seasons, settle in with Smudger9's movies instead.
If you want to find out why (and how) the clones turned on the Jedi, insert these Clone War stories in your Star Wars movie line-up.
If you enjoy animated Star Wars and are sad that Rebels is ending, watch Smudger9's Clone Wars.

Once again, this is a very well put together edit. This one is perhaps slightly more disjointed than his other two edits, the two main plotlines have little connecting them together. The edits were for the most parts seamless and well integrated. However, the dialogue track sometimes would jump from the centre to the right speaker between scenes. This may just be a problem with the Vimeo version. Overall, this is a good edit and I would recommend this.

Disclaimer: I know TCW quite well at this point, so am hyper-aware of where narratives come from and how they interlock. In this sense, what smudger9 is achieving is brilliant - he is condensing the show into accessible films that tell the story, and where necessary he is able to cleverly repurpose a scene for a new narrative.

Unfortunately the problems of the show still plague this edit, but some of the narrative choices are a tad questionable. For example, by the time the film wraps we have seen about 6 plots and subplots introduced, with at least half of them going unresolved. That's a lot of plot for 2 hours 10 minutes, and the first half is very disjointed for this reason.

Overall I can't recommend these edits highly enough if - like many - you'd rather not trudge through the series itself. Smudger's video/audio editing is superb, and if there are problems with the narrative that's at least partly the source - TCW was *very* condensed (some would say ambitious) in the way it told big narratives in short time frames.

Overall, a very very good edit.