Online Series: Star Wars: Ahsoka (August 23rd)

[Hivemind]

There will not be an Ezra/Sabine romance because it would be the first in the history of Disney's Star Wars

What?

 

[#37]

Following up on my previous post... lets just reboot the A-Team and drop it into the Palpitinian Star Wars era and ...

If you have a problem, If no one else can help and if you can find them. Maybe you can hire, The A-Team.

Enough with saving the galaxy, how about actually helping individuals one time.

 

[Hivemind]

Following up on my previous post... lets just reboot the A-Team and drop it into the Palpitinian Star Wars era and ...


Enough with saving the galaxy, how about actually helping individuals one time.

So.... the Bad Batch?

 

[#37]

So.... the Bad Batch?

Hey, I'm riffing here...

But, yeah, the Bad Batch sans Filoni. No Clones. Ok, maybe one clone to portray Murdoch. Smith is a Jedi. Live action. Old school, every episode is its own thing. They solve your problem and move on. No soap opera.

 

[StreetHawk]

Thrawns entrance was one of the best in SW for me. Top notch stuff.

I wonder if the Thrawns army is like Merrok and that theyre undead from nightsister magick?

Also it makes me wonder that the cargo they are transferring from the catacombs is dead nightsisters and thats the army Thrawn wants to command is an undead army full of nightsisters and zabrak?

I really hope we get more nightsisters and nightsister magick going forward not just in Ahsoka but in SW in general. Really cool stuff.

I agree with most that Thrawn's blue makeup looks weak, but kind of in line with GOG and Hondo's blue makeup which doesn't look as natural compared to how X-men did the make up for the 2 actors Lawrence and Rojmain as Mystic. Or even how they did the blue makeup for Karen Gillam in GOG.

 

[Hivemind]

I would argue that Andor is no less tropey than Ahsoka is. What makes it stand out is that it uses different tropes and contrivances than typical Star Wars media and it wraps it in a grim package. That grim package itself is somewhat tiresome this far past BSG/GoT where everything has been influenced by them and in terms of wider media, Andor isn’t doing anything new.

And don’t get me wrong. I enjoyed Andor immensely, but I feel like a lot of people don’t see it for what it is because it’s new for SW.

I think this is underselling Andor, a lot.

Andor isn't just "grim" coming to Star Wars. Andor is a phenomenally well-written and executed show. It's not just good for Star Wars, it's good in general that just happens to be Star Wars. It's a social and political commentary that doesn't just push the boundaries for Star Wars, but does so well beyond what the vast majority of TV does (even prestige dramas).

Is it the very first show to ever have commentary about the mundanity of evil and the mechanisms of oppression? No, of course not. But you don't have to be the very first to still be original, and Andor is absolutely original. You can try and paint it with the brush of spy thriller, heist, and prison escape tropes - but each of those only really falls within smaller segments of the whole and each are used as a tool to enhance the entire body of the work (rather than the entirety of the work fitting within said tropes). Andor uses historical allusions and subtexts to enhance, rather than cribbing off of past ideas.

I would argue that Andor is easily the best sci-fi television since the first season of Westworld, and perhaps the best television period during that span (I'm not nearly as high on Succession as others - although Barry and The Bear also deserve to be in the conversation for sure).

 

[#37]

Last one..

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Jedi.

 

[Bounces R Way]

Looking for an abundance of originality in your SW narratives is never going to go well. They basically blow up a death star in 4/9 trilogy movies. 5 if you include the Droid control ship that looks like a death star with a ring on it in Phantom Menace. 6 if you include the Snoke SSD, although in that case it doesn't actually conclude the movie.

I know what I would like to watch...

A show based in the Old Republic. One off episodes, a bit like Visions.. but more controlled by canon. Break Star Wars out of the Palpatine era (which is becoming a bit of a rut) and go somewhere else.

Give me pure fan service involving Jedi, Sith, and Mandalorians .Everything gets solved in one episode, like Adam West's Batman. Or Barney Miller, for that matter. Have a stable of reoccurring characters that randomly show up. (Think Inspector Lugar, but as a Jedi Master.)

Why does everything have to be a long running soap opera now? I'd love media to go back to a fast pace where you get 45 minutes of bang for your buck.

That'd be alright. TBF the Star Wars Visions and Tales of the Jedi standalones I thought was a cool concept. They basically just contracted a bunch of animation studios to create one off half hour story each. Some are good, some not so good.

I've been re-listening to the Rogue Squadron book series by Michael Stackpole and that is a live action project I could get behind. Top Gun in x-wings sounds like a good time, and there's enough content there for a couple seasons at least.

 

[HanSolo]

Looking for an abundance of originality in your SW narratives is never going to go well. They basically blow up a death star in 4/9 trilogy movies. 5 if you include the Droid control ship that looks like a death star with a ring on it in Phantom Menace. 6 if you include the Snoke SSD, although in that case it doesn't actually conclude the movie.



That'd be alright. TBF the Star Wars Visions and Tales of the Jedi standalones I thought was a cool concept. They basically just contracted a bunch of animation studios to create one off half hour story each.

I've been re-listening to the Rogue Squadron book series by Michael Stackpole and that is a live action project I could get behind. Top Gun in x-wings sounds like a good time, and there's enough content there for a couple seasons at least.

It was a good concept but what was delivered mostly fell short. The Ronin Jedi one was pretty cool and the animation was outstanding.

I still think there's an abundance of stories you could tell in the Galaxy Far Far Away, but I agree that it's starting to be time to move way from this era of the timeline, or at least have stories that have nothing to do with any legacy characters. Then the challenge is telling a compelling story with likable characters from scratch. Not an easy task for Hollywood these days.

 

[Hivemind]

I agree with most that Thrawn's blue makeup looks weak, but kind of in line with GOG and Hondo's blue makeup which doesn't look as natural compared to how X-men did the make up for the 2 actors Lawrence and Rojmain as Mystic. Or even how they did the blue makeup for Karen Gillam in GOG.

With regards to make-up and prosthetics - it's been a pretty consistent issue for most of the Disney Star Wars tv shows. They're still doing great with bit parts and background characters, but whenever they end up as primary speaking characters (which happens predominantly when translating animated characters into live action) - it ends up looking rather clunky. The quality is more on par with excellent cosplay than it is with excellent TV.

This thread has already talked about Ahsoka and Hera's appearances a lot.

We had the Grand Inquisitor and Fifth Brother both looking dopey as heck in Obi Wan

Even Episode 3 handled that species' make-up better

There were even fans who re-worked Cad Bane in BoBF


Andor largely side-stepped the issue by relegating aliens to being background characters or very minor roles. There were only like 3 aliens with speaking roles in the entire series, and at least two of them were puppets with very little need for wide emotion

But ultimately, the bar for make-up, prosthetics, and costuming should be a lot higher for Disney Star Wars than is currently being displayed. Just look at any of the Star Wars movies to see that it can be done better. Look at Rings of Power, as well. RoP was a tremendously disappointing show overall, but the character design and make-up was leaps and bounds better than we're getting in streaming Star Wars content.

 

[HanSolo]

With regards to make-up and prosthetics - it's been a pretty consistent issue for most of the Disney Star Wars tv shows. They're still doing great with bit parts and background characters, but whenever they end up as primary speaking characters (which happens predominantly when translating animated characters into live action) - it ends up looking rather clunky. The quality is more on par with excellent cosplay than it is with excellent TV.

This thread has already talked about Ahsoka and Hera's appearances a lot.

We had the Grand Inquisitor and Fifth Brother both looking dopey as heck in Obi Wan

Even Episode 3 handled that species' make-up better

There were even fans who re-worked Cad Bane in BoBF


Andor largely side-stepped the issue by relegating aliens to being background characters or very minor roles. There were only like 3 aliens with speaking roles in the entire series, and at least two of them were puppets with very little need for wide emotion

But ultimately, the bar for make-up, prosthetics, and costuming should be a lot higher for Disney Star Wars than is currently being displayed. Just look at any of the Star Wars movies to see that it can be done better. Look at Rings of Power, as well. RoP was a tremendously disappointing show overall, but the character design and make-up was leaps and bounds better than we're getting in streaming Star Wars content.

I mean you're comparing a show with a 1 billion dollar budget to

Ashoka: around 100-150 million (total not confirmed)
Andor: 250 million
Obi Wan: 90 million
Book of Boba Fett: 105 million
3 seasons of Mando: 360 million

So at about 905 million dollars, your comparison had a higher budget than all of the released Disney+ Star Wars seasons combined. I think on some level you have to accept that there are going to be some budgetary limitations. Andor, coming in with the highest budget clearly had the best production design, costuming, and cinematography of the bunch. For (presumably) being a lot cheaper, Ashoka still looks pretty high production for the most part.

 

[Ben Grimm]

Yawn. Nothing happened.

Spoiler

This show is pretty bad. The plot makes no sense. Thrawn has no more power than I do. He's just an insignificant man and force and magic users would never take orders from him.

 

[#37]

I mean you're comparing a show with a 1 billion dollar budget to

Ashoka: around 100-150 million (total not confirmed)
Andor: 250 million
Obi Wan: 90 million
Book of Boba Fett: 105 million
3 seasons of Mando: 360 million

So at about 905 million dollars, your comparison had a higher budget than all of the released Disney+ Star Wars seasons combined. I think on some level you have to accept that there are going to be some budgetary limitations. Andor, coming in with the highest budget clearly had the best production design, costuming, and cinematography of the bunch. For (presumably) being a lot cheaper, Ashoka still looks pretty high production for the most part.

I am curious where you got the billion dollar number from?

https://www.cbc.ca/news/entertainment/rings-of-power-expensive-1.6571965

And with the first season of a five-season run costing an estimated $465 million US

 

[#37]

Coming soon to a galaxy near you...

‘Star Wars’ Cookbook Recipe for Green Milk Cheesecake

‘Star Wars: The Ultimate Cookbook’ includes more than 80 recipes inspired by various corners of the ‘Star Wars’ universe

www.usmagazine.com

 

[HanSolo]

I am curious where you got the billion dollar number from?

https://www.cbc.ca/news/entertainment/rings-of-power-expensive-1.6571965

That's what I remembered being reported and when I Googled it looked like that was backed up. But I'll admit I didn't dig that deeply. Could be that the billion dollar figure included marketing.

Still at almost 500 million, that's a much higher budget than these shows are working with.

 

[Hivemind]

That's what I remembered being reported and when I Googled it looked like that was backed up. But I'll admit I didn't dig that deeply. Could be that the billion dollar figure included marketing.

Still at almost 500 million, that's a much higher budget than these shows are working with.

The $1B figure for Rings of Power was the shows total budget (for all five seasons by some reports), not just operating/production costs for S1. It includes the $250M they paid to acquire the rights to the LOTR appendices. For contrast, Disney paid $4B to acquire Star Wars.

I’m not saying the technical staff on the show should be doing more work or a better job for what they are paid. But this is Disney, a company with very deep pockets. If they need to pay more to get good costume and makeup design, pay more. Rather than shotgunning out mediocrity and hoping that half of it works, focus on quality. We’ve seen similar backlash to other Disney owned properties, such as the MCU.

I’m on my phone atm, but when I get back later I’ll try and post more examples of why Disneys “just paint their face a flat color” approach looks so fake. Skin tones aren’t uniform. There’s variation and color interest (and I’m not just taking about decals and designs).

 

[HanSolo]

The $1B figure for Rings of Power was the shows total budget (for all five seasons by some reports), not just operating/production costs for S1. It includes the $250M they paid to acquire the rights to the LOTR appendices. For contrast, Disney paid $4B to acquire Star Wars.

I’m not saying the technical staff on the show should be doing more work or a better job for what they are paid. But this is Disney, a company with very deep pockets. If they need to pay more to get good costume and makeup design, pay more. Rather than shotgunning out mediocrity and hoping that half of it works, focus on quality. We’ve seen similar backlash to other Disney owned properties, such as the MCU.

I’m on my phone atm, but when I get back later I’ll try and post more examples of why Disneys “just paint their face a flat color” approach looks so fake. Skin tones aren’t uniform. There’s variation and color interest (and I’m not just taking about decals and designs).

I mean I don't think you have to bother. I'll admit that it doesn't look as good as it could. I think it's a deliberate choice to make them look more human to be honest. But that said, I didn't think Thrawn looked terribly off. I thought the Twilek played by Andrew from Veep (Selina's ex husband) in Book of Boba Fett looked distractingly like a human doing cosplay, and I've mentioned that Hera's head tails look cheap and fake before. I thought Thrawn looked fine.

 

[LarKing]

This should have been a cartoon, Rebels S05. Those appear to be the fans who are lapping this up. Correct? As live action goes, its not working because it is written on the level one would expect to find in an elementary school library. For fans of Rebels and Clone Wars it's great, for Disney It's an expensive mistake.

After watching the last episode, I thought about what the Ezra/Sabine reunion would have been like if this were a show on HBO. The back story here is that Ezra has had a crush on Sabine ever since day one. Sabine spent years moping around Ezra's tower drinking boxed wine, wearing his old sweat shirts as a night gown, etc... In the end, they might as well have just exchanged a hardy handshake when reunited on a distant world in a galaxy far, far away... But, hey, they had packing to do!

I have a few predictions moving forward:
1.) There will not be an Ezra/Sabine romance because it would be the first in the history of Disney's Star Wars (well, Hera/Kanan... but they killed him off after he showed signs of affection on screen). Color me shocked if I am wrong about this.

2.) This season will end with a cliff-hanger and not be renewed for season 2.

3.) Dave Filoni will never get to make a full length Star Wars film.

*I also have a feeling that the Ewoks, er, Noti will play a huge role in saving the galaxy.

So your problem with Ahsoka is that Ezra and Sabine don’t appear like they’ll have a romance and uh some things you predict will happen? To each their own I suppose.

 

[Dubi Doo]

This should have been a cartoon, Rebels S05. Those appear to be the fans who are lapping this up. Correct? As live action goes, its not working because it is written on the level one would expect to find in an elementary school library. For fans of Rebels and Clone Wars it's great, for Disney It's an expensive mistake.

After watching the last episode, I thought about what the Ezra/Sabine reunion would have been like if this were a show on HBO. The back story here is that Ezra has had a crush on Sabine ever since day one. Sabine spent years moping around Ezra's tower drinking boxed wine, wearing his old sweat shirts as a night gown, etc... In the end, they might as well have just exchanged a hardy handshake when reunited on a distant world in a galaxy far, far away... But, hey, they had packing to do!

I have a few predictions moving forward:
1.) There will not be an Ezra/Sabine romance because it would be the first in the history of Disney's Star Wars (well, Hera/Kanan... but they killed him off after he showed signs of affection on screen). Color me shocked if I am wrong about this.

2.) This season will end with a cliff-hanger and not be renewed for season 2.

3.) Dave Filoni will never get to make a full length Star Wars film.

*I also have a feeling that the Ewoks, er, Noti will play a huge role in saving the galaxy.

I don't fall into this category, and I love the show thus far.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

If 45 years in, you didn't get that SW was a children's tale, told through kiddie flicks, toy figurines and cartoons, might as well stick with other hobbies, I suggest water dowsing.

As for Ahsoka, I can't say I care much for any of it, but it does have some really nice SW imagery. The tone is uneven, but the better parts are above most of the other series for me (apart from Andor, of course).

 

[Mario_is_BACK!!]

I didn’t follow Clone Wars, Rebels or Bad Batch. I just watched a video that showed me what I needed to be aware of. And I’m enjoying quite a bit. Really people will just complain to complain, man.

 

[beowulf]

The actor playing Ezra nailed it.

For a low event episode, I was enthralled the whole time proving that low event =/= bad.

Only thing missing was more Ahsoka for me. I mean for the amount she has been in the show so far they could have called this Return of the Rebels or something lol

 

[#37]

 

[RandV]

As to the last paragraph, mileage varies there. Personally I think the casting is a mixed bag. Thrawn (so far) and Baylan being terrific. Elsbeth, Ashoka, Huyang, Mon Mothma, Anakin (voice acting counts) good to fine depending on the episode. Sabine, Ezra, Hera, Jacen, and Baylan's apprentice are fine for my taste. The only character that I see that has notably poor acting is that x-wing pilot that's shown up in multiple Disney+ shows. I don't know whose buddy that is but he's not a good actor. The script is nothing special, but not it's worse than Book of Boba Fett, Mando S3, and Obi Wan. The pacing is not perfect but I haven't seen anything truly egregious.

Hey are you dissing Mr. Kim?

He was the lead on a stage production turned hit Canadian/CBC show, Kim's Convenience. I believe Filoni was a big fan of the show, and Paul Sun-Hying Lee a big Star Wars nerd (already had his own X-Wing helmet and all). That's also where Simu Liu came from, as prior to becoming Shang-Chi he was another lead on Kim's Convenience playing Lee's son.

But anyways, that's why he's there. I don't know about bad acting but he must between stage and the show he must of played the Mr. Kim character (which has a thick Korean accent) for a good 10 years.

 

[HanSolo]

Hey are you dissing Mr. Kim?

He was the lead on a stage production turned hit Canadian/CBC show, Kim's Convenience. I believe Filoni was a big fan of the show, and Paul Sun-Hying Lee a big Star Wars nerd (already had his own X-Wing helmet and all). That's also where Simu Liu came from, as prior to becoming Shang-Chi he was another lead on Kim's Convenience playing Lee's son.

But anyways, that's why he's there. I don't know about bad acting but he must between stage and the show he must of played the Mr. Kim character (which has a thick Korean accent) for a good 10 years.

I'll take your word for it. He hasn't been a fit in Star Wars.