Star Wars: The Clone Wars: Season 5 Episode 3: Front Runners
What is it ? : So Obi-Wan, Ahsoka, Anakin and the Onderonian rebels have entered the city of Iziz, and they begin attacking and taking out droids within the city. However they discover that the people don't believe that small attacks like this can have an effect on the occupation force backed by the entire Confederacy. Anakin and Obi-Wan return to brief the Jedi Council, leaving Ahsoka to advise the Rebels.
Deciding to make a larger attack to impress the population and bring their support behind the rebels, they plan to take out the power generation plant, relying on getting the droids to bring in heavy weapons to deal with them, that then can be captured and turned onto the plant to disable it. Without power, the droid army itself will cease to function.
They attack a droid patrol, and Saw Gerrera can't help but taunt Lux Bonteri distracting him and leaving a destroyer droid functional, however Saw's sister disables it. The droids call for help, and an AAT arrives as backup, allowing the rebels to capture it, they then breach the compound where the power plant is and take out the city's power.
They strike at droid forces throughout the city, and win the support of the population, as they celebrate back at their safehouse, Obi-Wan and Anakin get in touch and warn that Dooku will strike back.
The rebels elect Steela Gerrera as their leader, and Ahsoka becomes painfully aware of the developing relationship between her and Lux.
Meanwhile, Dooku orders a Super Tactical Droid to deal with the developing situation on Onderon.
High Points : I commented in the last review how good Iziz looked, and it continues to impress, but especially the view from the palace as the king is briefed on the rebel attacks. Looking down on the city, and beyond it the walls and jungle is an impressive view, and extremely well executed.
The plan that the rebels come up with, to use their smaller more responsive team against the superior numbers of battle droids is excellent, and very clever, I could definitely see such tactics being used in an RPG, and I'd love to see how a similar situation would play out.
Low Points : As Anakin and Obi-Wan are preparing to leave, Obi-Wan offers advice to Ahsoka who is remaining, and offers encouragement, Anakin tells her not to be distracted by personal matters. Way to go Anakin, that's really going to help.
He proves once again why the Jedi Council is completely right to not make him a Jedi Master, he's clearly not ready, and he's clearly blind to his own faults as he's often been in similar situations where he's been distracted by personal matters.
If Anakin had been a likable character, then his fall to being Darth Vader would be far more impactful, with some real weight and emotional investment from the viewer. How could this likable hero become so evil? But Anakin has always been hard to like, and it's not hard to see how he falls to the dark side.
So what do you really think ? : This episode really felt like it was just treading water, with no real progress occuring. Ahsoka still feels about Lux in the same way, Lux and Saw still are squabbling, Lux and Steela still are in the early stages of a relationship. The rebels haven't really grown in size, although their support is up. The episode introduced the King, and the deposed King, but it was a blink and you miss it scene. Almost nothing happens, and it's difficult to care about what little does.
While it looks nice, and there's some decent action, there's no memorable dialogue or character moments, combined with the lack of story progression, it's all a little forgettable.
Final Words : Clone Wars likes it's four parters, and here we are half way through, and I'm getting a little bored of the story already, hopefully things will pick up in the next part, or this is really going to be a let down.
Score : 7/10
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