If old school Star Wars fans become washed in a wave of nostalgia with the rest of the “Malevolence” arc, please forgive them.
As viewers who watched the three-part arc’s first episode last week
know, Grievous (Matthew Wood) and Dooku (Corey Burton) are terrorizing
the galaxy in a new ship, the Malevolence, with a new weapon, an Ion
Cannon. They also are killing any survivors of their attacks.
Jedi General Plo Koon (James Arnold Taylor) is sent to investigate, and
is ambushed. When he doesn’t respond to inquiries, Anakin (Matt Latner)
and his padawan Ahsoka (Ashley Eckstein) “defy” Council orders and
investigate. Good thing, too. Our heroes save Plo Koon and three of his
clones from a very cold death in space.
Two things are now evident. First, Ahsoka and Plo Koon have a history.
The other is Dooku is not happy, not happy at all, that the Republic
now knows the Separatists have an Ion Cannon. As for Grievous, he looks
like he’s about to rip some heads off.
“There's a Star Wars tradition,” says series story man Henry Gilroy, “beginning with the Death Star in A New Hope,
of a super weapon that can dominate the enemy. A new weapon with
advanced technology can go a long way to creating a lot of fear and
terror, especially if it is mysterious. This is kind of the way the
Sith work. In this case, the basics of the story were inspired by the
true WWII battles of the German battleship, Bismarck. Here was this
very powerful battleship that created a lot of fear in the allies
because of how many cannons it had and how thick the armor was. Hitler
called it unsinkable. We thought there could be some interesting
parallels with Grievous having his own seemingly invulnerable super
ship he used to terrorize the galaxy.”
“The Malevolence is a separatist weapon and four or five times as big
as the largest Republic vessel. It needs to be this big to house its
main weapon, a mammoth ion cannon. The Ion cannon fires a huge EMP-like
blast that disables all the electrical systems of any ship, or entire
groups of ships, that it strikes, essentially knocking them dead in the
water. Then the Malevolence can pull up alongside and just blast the
ships to pieces, because they have no shields or weapons to defend
themselves with. It's a terrifying ship!”
So how can the Republic match this kind of firepower? Well, let’s say
something very, very old is now very new. Anakin and Ahsoka will have
something new to jet around in. The Y-Wing.
“We originally first saw the Y-Wing back in A New Hope on
the Death Star attack,” says Gilroy. “We always got the feeling that
the rebels were using old ships left over from the Clone Wars, because
they kind of looked beat up, so we wanted to show the Y-Wings when they
were new and cutting edge. Basically, they're specialized long range
bombers, complete with tail gunner bubbles. One of our designers,
Russell Chong, was inspired by an original Ralph McQuarrie painting to
make them feel like Y-wings we'll see in the future.”
“We like to find ways to draw connections between The Clone Wars and
the original trilogy,” episode scriptwriter Steve Melching adds. “In
the original Star Wars, the X-wings and the Y-wings have truly been
through the wars, and they’ve had the crap beaten out of them. We
thought it would be fun to imagine that they were originally
manufactured during the Clone Wars. So for us, they came off the
assembly line and into battle.”
“Guys like Russell Chong and Killian Plunkett, along with Dave (Filoni)
come from a classic Star Wars background, so they understand that Ralph
McQuarrie feel of the 1970s, and they do it right,” episode director
Brian Kalin O’Connell says. “We don’t want to change the lore, we want
to add to it. By introducing the Y-wings, we get to add a new
dimension, a little history. We know it’s a huge deal for the fans. We
don’t let it distract from the story, but we still get to add the geek
shot. When we do, we try to do it justice.”
Fans can say for themselves when the episode airs tonight at 9:00 p.m.
SWTCW DEBUT BREAKS NETWORK RECORDS
If you hear the chorus of Return of the Jedi’s Ewok celebration song coming simultaneously out of Atlanta and Marin County, it’s because the ratings for the Star Wars: The Clone Wars debut are in, and they shattered all previous records held by Cartoon Network.
“Star Wars: The Clone Wars' persons 2+ figure is 3,958,000,” says one CN insider. “[It] now replaces the April 18, 2008 series premiere of Ben 10: Alien Force as Cartoon Network's most-watched series premiere. Ben 10: Alien Force logged a total of 2,889,000 persons 2+, so this is a substantial gain.”
“This is a great start for our new night of fantasy-action-adventure
programming,” said Stuart Snyder, president and chief operating officer
of Turner Broadcasting’s Animation, Young Adults and Kids Media group.
“Kids and their parents made it a point to tune in to the amazing
storytelling and brilliant animation of Lucasfilm’s Star Wars: The Clone Wars.
We are looking forward to building on this foundation and are thrilled
with this turnout and record numbers for Cartoon Network.”
All ratings based on Nielsen’s Total U.S. Television Universe of 114,500,000 homes.
Related:
Blog@: Clone Wars Webcomics Debut
