Star Wars: Ahsoka

[Raymond F.]

I’m sure I’m going to ruffle some feathers here but I’m really frustrated with this new Star Wars nonsense.

I’m not sold on Dave Filoni. At all.

Let me rephrase that. He’s fine for what he is, continuing the fan fiction like cartoons aimed at younger audiences with rebels and clone wars or whatever. And fine to have him as a consultant or co writer of the live action stuff. But the minute Faverou took a back seat as seen with mando season 3 they let this fool go way too deep into his own lore and that's where it lost me.

I’m a huge fan of mando season 1 and 2 because it was made for me. A fan of the OT.

I tried to give the cartoon series an honest go but because I was not a kid when they came out they are just too much for kids. The overly noisy, fast paced, goofy lore (a planet of the force embodied by a father son daughter?? What??? Ok…) I know there is a lot of fans who like it so I promise I’m not hating on something you may love it’s just not for me, and that’s fine.

What I struggle with and I think Disney will struggle with is that it’s only going to reach this narrow audience that is a very certain age who watched the cartoon in adolescence and is coming into adulthood. It’s going to miss the broader and older demographic (old being 39) like myself. The cartoon storylines are just to silly and fan fiction feeling for my taste,

I understand the history of the character and why you need to go into it in a live action series. But like a straight continuation from the cartoon is a bad move in my opinion. If you don’t know or care to know what happened there you are totally lost.

Ashoka is an ok character, I like the premise, she looks cool. Love Dawson and I thought she was badass in the Mandalorian.

I know someone is going to counter here and say it’s good writing and it doesn’t matter if it’s geared towards kids it’s still good and was well done and this and that and I’m not saying it’s not. I’m also saying I watched a bunch of it, a lot more than I thought I would to get into it and it’s just not for me.

Instead of picking up where rebels left off why can’t they make it an all new adventure with some tie ins to the past cartoon that don’t rely as heavily on having watched the cartoon. Aside from those who watched the cartoon as children or teens and a select few hardcore fans, live action series is just not for the same audience. It’s not.

Because Dave Filoni thinks he runs Star Wars and he gets lost into his own lore… way too lost. And Disney, Faverou or whoever else is not reining him in, I suspect the series will do ok with those hardcore cartoon fans but won’t make Disney the money back they put into this. Because I can tell it has a high production value it looks and feels better than all of Andor and Obi wan did that's for sure.

 

[Raymond F.]

I don't know what this Sy-Fy Channel/Farscape level horse**** is, but it sure as hell isn't Star Wars anymore.

Clearly people enjoy watching this stuff, and I hope they like it, but I've always found "Oh just turn your brain off!" to be a poor justification for piss-poor writing.

Star Wars is finished as far as I'm concerned. If I want the nostalgic ending, I can always stop here.

View attachment 658628

If I want the cute, happy ending, I can stop here.

View attachment 658629

But my personal favorite, and the one that I think has the most emotional weight, is the bittersweet ending, here.

View attachment 658630

The rest is just corporate-funded fan fiction to me. Sabine "Poochie" Wren never existed in my Star Wars universe.

This is what I’m cherry picking from the new stuff too.

Mando season 1 and 2… and Rogue one.

The rest is bad. Really really bad. Keep Dave Filoni writing his kids stuff with the cartoons. He can consult but don’t bleed that stuff into the live action.

I know he can’t be blamed for Andor and obi wan. Lots of other people to blame for that.

 

[chrisstbh]

Then don't watch it, you don't have to watch everything if you don't like it. I got fed up with MCU stuff, realised it's not for me anymore so I've decided to stop consuming it. There's not a single upcoming MCU project that I plan on watching.

 

[Khev]

Watch, don't watch, canon, not canon, what difference does it make. The original theatrical OT will always be separate and untouchable, the rest is harmless and at any given moment we could just as easily get another Lizzo/Mando company picnic episode as we can a Luke vs. Dark Troopers or Battle for Mandalore episode. The commentary here is just as entertaining or even more entertaining than the new stuff so I definitely don't plan to miss out on any of this anytime soon, lol.

 

[Raymond F.]

Then don't watch it, you don't have to watch everything if you don't like it. I got fed up with MCU stuff, realised it's not for me anymore so I've decided to stop consuming it. There's not a single upcoming MCU project that I plan on watching.

Yup that’s where I’m at now. But it seems a lot of others I know are at this place too. Those who I know will geek out over a high quality fantasy based series like a game of thrones, last of us or watchmen who really loved Mando also got totally lost in the overly cartoon driven plot of Mando 3 and stopped watching.

So what I’m also saying is that Disney needs to probably re evaluate their strategy or the people they have behind some of these big budget properties soon as they are bleeding cash. And with the strikes they are bleeding more cash.

Even that scumbag Bob Iger publicly admitted their strategy was a big mistake, quantity over quality with Disney plus series being very lackluster.

I want to be able to consume quality Star Wars. But the same problem Is happening with marvel too for every third or fourth excellent installment you need to have watched all the crappy things in between to piece the story together which was not a problem any of it had before because it was all much better quality.

 

[ZE_501]

I’m not sold on Dave Filoni. At all.

I'm with you all the way on that. I think he's a jive-ass turkey.

Because I can tell it has a high production value it looks and feels better than all of Andor and Obi wan did that's for sure.

I don't agree with that. It looks different and I do think it has a higher budget, but they did a good job with Andor, I don't recall ever being taken out of it due to the sets, unlike say BoBF or what precious little I saw of Obi Wan.

 

[ajp4mgs]

Watch, don't watch, canon, not canon, what difference does it make. The original theatrical OT will always be separate and untouchable, the rest is harmless...

Yep! So true on each point. The OT and my experiences growing up with it can never be tainted. For a long time, I wanted to regard the whole tapestry of movies, shows, and books as one big interconnected story because of how much I loved the universe created by the OT. But when I realized doing so was tainting that original trilogy and love of the franchise for me, I just started either not watching what I knew wouldn't be enjoyable, or watched it merely for laughs.

At the same time, Andor alone has already given me more hours of SW that I can enjoy and respect at the highest level than I got from all of SW *combined* for 30+ years following the OT. So, in a way, I can easily consider this my personal "Silver Age" of SW despite hating the animated stuff and having little to no respect for any of the other live-action shows. For other people, though, Andor is awful SW and some of the other stuff is great. Cool! Everyone gets something.

SW has become generational and way too many different things to way too many different people for it to be an easy task to please everyone across the board. Enjoy what works for you and ignore (or laugh at) the stuff that doesn't work for you. Pretty easy to do, as it turns out. What's top-notch SW to one person will be bottom-of-the-barrel trash to another person, and vice versa. Who cares? No one can ever undo what made each of us a fan. So it's all, as you say, harmless.

 

[choombaz]

Wow … am i the only person who doesn’t want to consume a tv show? Like literally, get the show and shove it down my mouth? I just want to watch it with my eyeballs thanks.

 

[chrisstbh]

Wow … am i the only person who doesn’t want to consume a tv show? Like literally, get the show and shove it down my mouth? I just want to watch it with my eyeballs thanks.

You must absorb it completely into your being.

 

[achillesmf]

you dont have much time, let the content flow.

 

[ebor]

My Disney+ stream is not working properly to allow me to see Ahsoka episode 2… is this a sign?

 

[Johnny Utah]

Ahsoka's dull bleached stage sets and unrealistic outdoor lighting look terrible.

Andor was all done for real. Real locations. Real lighting. Please don't say Ahsoka is better looking than Andor for God's sake.

 

[Raymond F.]

Ahsoka's dull bleached stage sets and unrealistic outdoor lighting look terrible.

Andor was all done for real. Real locations. Real lighting. Please don't say Ahsoka is better looking than Andor for God's sake.

I don’t entirely disagree. After watching the second episode I’ll take it back partly as the first episode was mostly done on the ships and I thought all that part looked great .

But I will say this is a lot more ambitious than Andor. Which was practical and I love practical sets but easy to do when it’s a dull boring script with lack of any real interesting characters (sorry that's how I feel). I do appreciate this feels a bit more like Star Wars to me.

While the daylight sets do look a bit overly CGI I will say I appreciate the fact that I can see anything at all. With obi wan I felt I needed to watch the whole thing with night vision goggles.

 

[ScoutingForToys]

I haven't watched Ahsoka but I did watch this. It does not make me want to watch Ahsoka.

 

[ScoutingForToys]

I’m sure I’m going to ruffle some feathers here but I’m really frustrated with this new Star Wars nonsense.

I’m not sold on Dave Filoni. At all.

Let me rephrase that. He’s fine for what he is, continuing the fan fiction like cartoons aimed at younger audiences with rebels and clone wars or whatever. And fine to have him as a consultant or co writer of the live action stuff. But the minute Faverou took a back seat as seen with mando season 3 they let this fool go way too deep into his own lore and that's where it lost me.

I’m a huge fan of mando season 1 and 2 because it was made for me. A fan of the OT.

I tried to give the cartoon series an honest go but because I was not a kid when they came out they are just too much for kids. The overly noisy, fast paced, goofy lore (a planet of the force embodied by a father son daughter?? What??? Ok…) I know there is a lot of fans who like it so I promise I’m not hating on something you may love it’s just not for me, and that’s fine.

What I struggle with and I think Disney will struggle with is that it’s only going to reach this narrow audience that is a very certain age who watched the cartoon in adolescence and is coming into adulthood. It’s going to miss the broader and older demographic (old being 39) like myself. The cartoon storylines are just to silly and fan fiction feeling for my taste,

I understand the history of the character and why you need to go into it in a live action series. But like a straight continuation from the cartoon is a bad move in my opinion. If you don’t know or care to know what happened there you are totally lost.

Ashoka is an ok character, I like the premise, she looks cool. Love Dawson and I thought she was badass in the Mandalorian.

I know someone is going to counter here and say it’s good writing and it doesn’t matter if it’s geared towards kids it’s still good and was well done and this and that and I’m not saying it’s not. I’m also saying I watched a bunch of it, a lot more than I thought I would to get into it and it’s just not for me.

Instead of picking up where rebels left off why can’t they make it an all new adventure with some tie ins to the past cartoon that don’t rely as heavily on having watched the cartoon. Aside from those who watched the cartoon as children or teens and a select few hardcore fans, live action series is just not for the same audience. It’s not.

Because Dave Filoni thinks he runs Star Wars and he gets lost into his own lore… way too lost. And Disney, Faverou or whoever else is not reining him in, I suspect the series will do ok with those hardcore cartoon fans but won’t make Disney the money back they put into this. Because I can tell it has a high production value it looks and feels better than all of Andor and Obi wan did that's for sure.

That's pretty much my thoughts on Filoni.

I think with the current state of Star Wars you can either walk away from it altogether or just pick and choose the bits you like and reject the rest.
For me, Star Wars is the OT, some select EU, Rogue One and season 1 of Andor. Hopefully Andor season 2 won't disappoint.
I used to have Mando season 1 & 2 on the list above but season 3 was so bad it retroactively ruined season 1 & 2.

I'm not watching Ahsoka. It's a continuation of a cartoon series I didn't like, with characters I didn't like and it's from Filoni.

That's the best approach to take. Watch what you want and ignore the rest.

 

[choombaz]

Ahsoka's dull bleached stage sets and unrealistic outdoor lighting look terrible.

Andor was all done for real. Real locations. Real lighting. Please don't say Ahsoka is better looking than Andor for God's sake.

There was a ton of vfx in Andor. It was just a lot more invisible and well done. They even used the volume.

 

[Mandible]

Yup that’s where I’m at now. But it seems a lot of others I know are at this place too. Those who I know will geek out over a high quality fantasy based series like a game of thrones, last of us or watchmen who really loved Mando also got totally lost in the overly cartoon driven plot of Mando 3 and stopped watching.

So what I’m also saying is that Disney needs to probably re evaluate their strategy or the people they have behind some of these big budget properties soon as they are bleeding cash. And with the strikes they are bleeding more cash.

Even that scumbag Bob Iger publicly admitted their strategy was a big mistake, quantity over quality with Disney plus series being very lackluster.

I want to be able to consume quality Star Wars. But the same problem Is happening with marvel too for every third or fourth excellent installment you need to have watched all the crappy things in between to piece the story together which was not a problem any of it had before because it was all much better quality.

This is the big problem. Sooooo many people I have known over my life loved or liked SW at some level. Guys, girls, different ages, everything. Now (even my kids and their friends), there's barely anyone I know anymore that gives a ****. And worse, most (like the MCU) would rather gouge out their eyes and ears rather than see/hear/watch anything related to SW.

Other than folk in this forum, I only have one friend that continues (and enjoys) all things SW. Everyone else, from all walks have dropped it completely. Hell, even I've started selling off large parts of my collection.

Disney have truly destroyed what was once widely appreciated (whether it was your thing or not).

 

[jedibear]

Well, here I am to give my long-winded two cents.

It's finally happening. I have hit the wall of apathy with Disney Star Wars. Happened quite a while back with Marvel and I had really hoped it wouldn't happen with Star Wars but....here we are.

I could only (barely) make it through the first episode. It's......so.....slow. And dull. Nothing new here. At all. It's the cartoon come to life (a word I use VERY loosely here). A cartoon I never personally watched or engaged with when it first ran. It's fan ****, written, produced and presented in such a self-reverential fashion that the casual viewer may stumble on it and feel like they're interrupting something private. It's a huge, glaring example of the shortcomings of the director. Weather he wants to admit or realize it or not, animation and live action storytelling and presentation are two different styles. What works for one may not necessarily work for the other. No offense to Filoni here, but he needs more "apprenticing" by real filmmakers and storytellers on how to make that leap. If he is handed a theatrical release right now, it's toast except with a very small, vocal and passionate fan base of his work. I'd guess the studio is going to be looking for a bigger return.

Now am I surprised? Hell no! After the parade of missteps we've endured on D+, not one bit. The first two seasons of Mando are rewatchable, BOBF was almost saved by the design team (sure loving the figures from it) but ultimately sunk in the sands of it's own silliness. Kenobi was the last, great disappointment for me. That one stung. Always loved the character, enjoyed the actor's (movie) take on it, but the show was the most poorly written, cheaply produced character assassination fueled by agenda that D+ had presented up to that point. Side projects like "Tales of the Jed" & "Visions" were niche and harmless enough and presumably found an appreciative audience. Then there was Andor. The only production that didn't seem like anything else so far, mainly because it was produced by "outsiders" of the standard line of was coming out of DLFL. Real filmmakers and artists who knew how to craft a genuine story and a classy production. Granted, it wasn't everyone's cup of tea, but even those who found it's style of storytelling and presentation a little too far out from what they might consider to be SW could admit it was well done.

Then there was the strange twist of season three of The Mandalorian. It had a lack of focus, and threw the namesake of the show into a supporting role. It took another main element of the show (the child) and gutted it's story arc along with destroying any emotional impact earlier episodes had built for the sake of "humor" and "adorable" scenes. The production looked super cheap and it just bumbled along on a succession of WTF moments and nonsensical story choices, basically killing the golden goose. Just mind-numbing.

Now, to "Ahsoka". I wanted to give this the benefit of the doubt. Even though I've found most of the elements and characters from Filoni's cartoons that have been brought into "live action" have had mixed success, I found that Ahsoka's appearances had worked well, mainly due to their brevity and to Dawson's good performance.
But so far, no. One wonders if the approach of placing Ahsoka in an original story as opposed to forcing her into a continuation of a cartoon might have been more interesting. The elements were all there in her earlier appearances to build on. But instead, she's doomed to be stuck in this studio-budget cosplay production that reeks of repetition and cribbing of better ideas others had. Creatively inert.

Yes, I'm only one episode in, but I already loathe the young woman character who is unsympathetic, irrigating, better at everything (including, apparently, taking a lightsaber hit to the gut) and will likely maneuver the lead character into a supporting role on her namesake show (see previous examples Mando, Boba, Kenobi, Indy). It's the boilerplate template all these DLFL productions seemed destined to follow and it gets a big "no thanks" from me.

I'll let the season run out and maybe scan through it later. Or not. It's like I said. Apathy.

Think of the money I'll be saving on figures.....

 

[Asta]

Unfortunately, Star Wars is an apparently unstoppable juggernaut. Which means that enough people still want to watch new content. Or maybe, like me, they just watch it because it's there to watch? I wouldn't miss it if it was no longer being produced.

At least juggernaut crashes can be unintentionally funny, as with TBOBF and OWK.

However, after hitting the roadside barrier the machine always ploughs on and another series comes out.

In the mid 1980s Lucas had the good grace to pull back and stop making Star Wars films and series, because there wasn't the audience to sustain it. Toy sales told him that much.

In 1999 he doubled down and began releasing the Prequel Trilogy. A hit for some, but for me a painfully awkward and wholly unfunny juggernaut crash. Near the end of ROTS the machine managed to untangle itself from the barrier and pulled back onto the road.

By now the driver had suffered so many crashes they took to drinking to steady their nerves. While sober Rogue One, Solo, Andor and The Mandalorian released. While drunk the Sequel Trilogy, TBOBF and OWK released.


Star Wars output has reached such a volume that it's reduced something which was originally ground breaking to something that resembles a throwaway Saturday morning cartoon, inasmuch as very little of it matters, or even genuinely asks you to care about it. I watch it, but as Frank Lloyd Wright famously quipped about television, it's "nothing more than chewing gum for the eyeballs."


Even at its worst, I find Star Wars can be sufferable just so long as:

1) Jar Jar doesn't appear.

2) Kylo Ren doesn't appear.

3) Baby Anakin doesn't appear.

4) Rogering Battle Droids don't appear.

 

[Ramatuelle]

I haven't watched Ahsoka but I did watch this. It does not make me want to watch Ahsoka.

Im gonna go ahead and say, before I watch any of this s***, that whether in SW or not Im super duper uber-tired of seeing characters recieve killing blows only to brush them off later.

In the unflipped version of this still, we have Sabine here having a hole burned through her liver. The liver manages well over 200 metabolic functions and you cannot survive barely a day without it. Everything in your body goes through the clearing-house that is your liver.

Bacta, magic, whatever: healing a wound of that magnitude is going to take weeks at least. This character will shrug this off like nothing.

If no one ever dies, where is the tension? The audience ends up going, "meh."