A More Civilized Age: A Star Wars Podcast - 39: The Youngling Arc (Clone Wars 94-97)

Episode Date: August 3, 2022

For nearly two years now, we've had a number of questions about what it means to be a so-called Youngling in the Jedi Order. What's it like to be separated from your family and culture? How are they taught to live a life without attachment, yet one still devoted to service? How are classes structured? How's the food in the cafeteria?  Well, finally we get an arc all about Younglings. Only we don't get many answers, because no matter how much the crew behind Clone Wars says that lightsabers aren't all that important, they nevertheless can't seem to stop making episodes about them. Well, them and Hondo Ohnaka...  NEXT TIME: Episodes 98 - 101 ("Secret Weapons," "A Sunny Day in the Void," "Missing in Action," and "Point of No Return") You can support the show and gain access to a monthly Q&A cast by going to patreon.com/civilized Show Notes Hosted by Rob Zacny (@RobZacny) Featuring Alicia Acampora (@ali_west), Austin Walker (@austin_walker), and Natalie Watson (@nataliewatson) Produced by Austin Walker Music by Jack de Quidt (@notquitereal) Cover art by Xeecee (@xeeceevevo)

Let us return once more to a more civilized age, a Clone Wars podcast. I'm Rob Zackney, joined by Ali Akampora, Austin Walker, and Natalie Watson. You know, gang, Hondo is a land of contrast. One minute, he seems like he's ready to kill a boatload of kids for a few bucks, and then trafficked their teenage camp counselor. But then the next, he is helping those kids be the best child soldiers they can be. We're going to have to spend a lot of today's episode

thinking about this little arc as well as Jedi pedagogy as we discussed this latest quartet of episodes. We are discussing season five, episodes six through nine in which a group of Jedi younglings go on a field trip to build their lightsabers. Hondo attempts to pirate said field trip, ends up taking Asoka hostage only to lose her to a Youngling rescue mission, and finally ends up having to team up with them and Asoka to deal

with an incredibly petty stash house holdup by General Grievous on Count Duku's orders. Despite this being an arc, each episode is so self-contained and kind of tears up the stakes of the previous episode that I think it ends up being easier to take them one by one. So let's just start off with the gathering. In the gathering, a half dozen Jedi younglings, one could say a gathering of them, are on their way to the planet Illam to, it's Illos in Mass Effect, right? Not Illam? Yeah, I do the same thing.

But it's icy. A few weeks ago, it's icy. Well, yeah, Elos is, I think, no, isn't Elos the rich planet in Mass Effect 2? Elos isn't the one where the latter, like, lets the Racknai get loose? No, Racknoy is. No, okay, Elos is Mass Effect 1. I think it's the last planet on Mass Effect 1. Vermeier is the icy planet.

Yeah. And then there's like the mind control, Zoo's Hope, is the mind control place. naturally the Thor with the Thorian the lorian whatever that thing is called and what's the rich planet that was almost a bar right there the thorium lorium you know Dr. Seuss's Mass Effect

Fuck what's the name of that planet where everyone where you recruit Morinth or Samara and all that fuck what is that planet call. Moriums, Moriums.

Anyway, all lost like tears in the rain. Uh-huh. Yeah. So the younglings have to go get the crystals

for their lightsabers at the planet Illam. It's an ice world. Ilium is a different Mass Effect. You're not allowed to do this.

Mass Effect has an elos that's important and an ilium. Oh, I hate that. Those are two different words. There are two different words but they're very close. So close, though.

You got to put Ilium in Mass Effect 3 at the very least. Those have to at least be like moons of, you know, like there, it should be in a system together, like give it some through line. The World Fields Lived in. Not all names are good, you know. I do know. I do. Anyway, this one's different.

This one's Illum, which explains, right? It's Illum? No, that's wrong. No, we are on Illum. We're in the Crystal Claves of Il. Here is Elim. Yeah, it's Illum. Okay.

Not Ilium. Not Illum. Illum. Yeah. It's an ice world, and it has, and here's, it's crucial feature, it has a legend of Zelda cave, where, according to Asoka, the younglings will have only a few hours to find their faded crystal. Now, if they don't find it in time and leave the cave on schedule, because this is the

Jedi, something really fucked up has to happen. The entrance will be sealed with ice, and the kids will be stuck there for 20 standard days. Presumably surviving that would be very hard. What would be ice caves?

You have water. You have water. You just don't have food. Or heat. Or heat. Yeah, I think the hypothermia would get you

first. And you're 12. But you're a Jedi. But you're a Jedi. Right. Yeah. Also, we learned that this is bullshit.

Right. Yeah. At the end, that was the worst thing. I'm, we'll get there. Yeah. Just, Fuck you, Yoda.

Fuck me so many times, a million, billion times. Shut the fuck up. Layers of, like, weird mind games being played on kids. Oh, yeah. We'll start them early. You've got to teach them. We're breaking them in on the certain point of view of relationship for the truth. So.

Also, sorry, go ahead, Natalie. I was just going to say, Illam is significant for another reason in the future. Yes. It is a planet in, it is relevant in the sequel trilogy. Yeah, we can just say, we, I don't know, Keith and I just talked about this in that bonus episode that came out a couple of weeks ago. Oh, right. It becomes star killer base.

It also shows up in Jedi Fallen Order as the Empire starts to just like dig all these Khyber crystals out. I should also say lots of people have really. written in to say that Keith is wrong, by the way, about the history of Khyber crystals. For people who, who, people who are on this call who didn't listen to that episode, the very short version of it is that before this episode, it was not clear, it was, Jedi got their lightsaber crystals came from lots of places. The key lightsaber crystal came from a bunch of different places, not just this one cave. Like it was naturally occurring across the galaxy.

And it wasn't one type of crystal. You could use different types of crystals. Oh, okay. In the video, like Cotor and in the tabletop game, I want to say, different crystals at different effects, right? Like, oh, this one's good for, this is an attacky crystal. This is a defensive crystal. This one's, like, good for blocking. This one's good for cutting through armor or whatever, right?

There had only ever been, and in some of the behind-the-scenes phloney zone stuff that I won't be playing today. I'll play another one. But in some of the pholony zone stuff, he talks about how there was a scene kind of. Cut from Return of the Jedi, where it shows Luke making or, like, tinkering with his saber. And it's very mechanical. It is not floating the pieces in front of you and doing, like, a connection to the force. It's a fucking tool that you make with a screwdriver. And that's kind of one of the ways it was depicted.

It's been depicted a bunch of ways before this. This episode comes out after the Disney acquisition, what was created before, was obviously in production well before that. and it represents George Lucas's idea, and this is me, you know, kind of paraphrasing from Faloni, Lucas's idea about how the first, a Jedi's first lightsaber is made. You go here, you get the crystal, you use the crystal, these are where the crystals come from, it's very mystical. This is George's vision. Afterwards, you might just get a new crystal.

If you lose your lightsaber, for instance, like Anakin and Assoca often do, you don't have to come back here and get another crystal. They got crystals back to the Jedi temple from all the dead Jedi over the years. So they just have a bunch of depth. This is very much the field trip first time. Yes, exactly. And there's some other stuff that we'll get to that is new for this, how the crystals resonate with you, what they reflect, where the color comes from, all that shit is all new. And to Keith's bigger point, I think, the bigger point of that conversation, there is a weird

slippage happening in what is canon in Star Wars. Because this is a canon show, but it retroactively changes how the Legends canon, which is supposed to be separate, also works. It retroactively makes all of the, including the Crayet Dragon Pearl, a thing that comes out of a big dragon, that's now a Khyber Crystal. That's called a Khyber Crystal in the Legends Canon even. I think that slippage is very interesting. We don't have time to get deep into that right now. You know, if you write a really good question, maybe it'll come back. up. So, I don't know. Anyway.

Wow, wow, wow. Oh, but that's not the thing that I actually wanted to say. What do you want to say? That was just responding to Natalie. Here's what I want to say. What I want to say is, though as the war progresses, the number of Jedi have declined and new younglings are harder to find.

When a youngling is located, they are brought to the Jedi Temple. this is the intro, and learn quickly that their true family is now the Jedi Order. Yeah, yep. Dyer. So bleak. So fucking bleak. Also, wild that they say that, and then later in this episode, when the wookie kid is being talked to, fucking, I forget his name, Gungi, is that him?

Yeah, Gungi. Yeah, that the fucking droid man is like, your people must be very proud of you. A wookie Jedi is like hard to come by. It's like the fact that there's like this weird, like inherited legacy of your past. You represent your people. But you cannot fuck with them at all. But you represent them.

Yep. It's like you're on the Olympic team, but you can never. never go home. Like, you're just always on the Olympics forever and can never go back to your place. It's just so bizarre. Well, and if you're, if you're, uh, Gungi, you got a lot to prove. If you're a little shit heel like Petro, uh, no, you get to do whatever you want. Like, of course you're going to be, you should be in charge, Petro.

Uh, you're going to be a great Jedi, you arrogant little shit at. Uh, Petro's, Petro sucks. He's the, he's the little human. Uh, the, the little human, uh, boy among this, in this group. We have Cotuny. Uh, we, we have, uh, Biff, uh, who is one of the athorians with the big, uh, like, stalk eyes and the huge long neck. And he's wearing an awesome scarf when they land on the ice planet. Um, big fan of Biff here.

Uh, Gannoti, cool, oh, by the way, this is a big day for clone models. Oh, yeah. Huge. Other child models. uh being introduced in the show we had just talked about this yep like after years of the only children in this show being that little repurposed model of a uh twilight twilock kid now we got you know we have a full house roadian kids yeah the lotthian kids wookie kid goodota kid we're popping off nautilin kid and they look great too

They look really good, except the wookie, which is just personally, I hate... You don't like the snagletooth? The snagletooth is really cute, but for me, it's the fur. Just the way the fur is, like, one entity, and it's not actually fur. You've been over this. This is your feelings on the wikis in this show, period. Yeah, yeah. It's giving logo.

Right. I don't like it. That's fair. But I, yeah, outside of Petro, I really liked all these. Yeah, Petro fucking sucks. Petro's, like, at that level of, like, I don't like kids. And the truth is, I just don't like Petro, but I don't like kids. Because you'll get a Petro in a set of kids.

Yeah. He's such a little shit. He's a bad Jedi. Allie, are you going to defend Petro? I'm just saying, you'll get a Petro in adults as well. Yeah, I don't like adults either. But kids, I'm not, like, I can't. If there's a kid, I'm responsible for the kids.

Sure. If I, like, show up and there's a bunch of. If I, like, went downstairs and they were, like, seven-year-olds, and that was it, I'm in charge of those seven-year-olds now. It's all me to make sure they don't die. If it's seven regular people, there's a petro in there, I'm like, all right, fuck you, buddy, I'm gone. But if there's a petro down there, and he's, like, throwing eggs at me. Okay. He would.

Hey, guys, check out this trick. Hits me with an egg. That's a petro maneuver. Are you, Obi-Wod? Is he going to dole you? Just do you. Cutty and lock out the stage. And then, what, Obi-Won can't duel this kid back?

His kid drew down on Obi-Wan Obi-Wan will be the dick if he killed him Well, look at Duku Sometimes you duel your masters, I guess So I think Petra establishes himself early So they go to this planet Asoka is in class field trip

Chaperone mode In teacher mode Which is interesting It is very interesting I still think of her as a kid I still think of her as Like a It makes you wonder

Is this like a teaching assistant Is this like the equivalent of like your teaching assistants Like grading your tests for you Or it's like just take the kids out Or it's like senior year at least It's like you are Your 500 level class Part of that is

Like training up and leading group of 100 level You know kids on a thing Yeah I was also thinking about I think we we spoke at this about this in a Q&A about like how to keep the Jedi from quitting which is like after they get a really tough job

you give them a softball and I feel like after Assoca invented the CIA they're like yeah go on this field trip sorry that your companion died and you lost your man that's true that's that's true

yeah I by the way I found a new reservoir of Filoni zones I found a higher quality one shoutouts to Mr. Anderson's zero zero zero zero one i should have gone back to you to begin with you have all the season five featureettes and there was one of them from uh what's her name is ashley eccleston actually uh the voice actor ex-dine ex-dine who is asoka's voice actors talking about the relationship between asoka and luxe oh my god and about like her feelings and her sense of of the the you know

the feelings that she's developed there uh and not knowing what to do with them, and, like, how much she gets out of being able to go to Anakin and be like, hey, I have this sort of, and he notices and she, and he guides her, and it's like an important moment for the two of them. That's really it. I mean, she says more about, like, Asoka's grown a lot. It's been fun to play this character who's had a real character arc and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. But, you know, they're thinking about this luck shit still. I don't know. I don't know.

I don't know. This is, like, such a big deal for them. And it's like, like, they are, I don't know. They've... Yep. Mm-hmm. Anyway, we're out of Loxone. Not much on the screen to go off.

We've escaped the Lekstone, but I think you're right, Allie. Anakin and Yoda and Obi-Wan have all seen that she went through some shit, and they were like, just go babysit these kids, give them some low-key guidance. This is intro-level shit, like you said, Rob. And, like, that's... I think that setup works for me, basically. Yeah. But then it ends up just not being that at all. Well, it's very funny.

first of all, like, the thing I do like here, too, is that this is clearly such a beloved rite of passage for the Jedi. Like, Assoca is really relishing being the person who tells the scare story to the kids. Like, now remember. Like, it starts out with, like, we all have

to use all our force strength to open up this temple. Yeah, yeah. And, like, she and Yonar both, like, probably just like, let's, okay, move the rock wall now. But, like, you need to gather all your energy kids to open up the secret entrance to the temple. And then, you know, she's telling them, now this is real dangerous.

If we don't get our crystals, you're just going to be sealed in there. And left to die. Better get those crystals. And, like, she knows what's up. But now it's fun to be sort of the person who sort of is kind of being the game master for this little experience they're going to have. And, like, they are getting a, the thrill and terror of a life or death situation. but Asoka, you can sort of tell by her demeanor, it's very fun to be on this side of it.

Yeah. Which is a vibe I dig. On the other hand, those kids are pretty sure it's a life or death situation in a way that walks up to that ethical line. And we see some really revealing things about how they react to it, which is Petro is just like, every man for himself, goodbye. Peace out, y'all. Everyone knows I'm the best Jedi.

I'm not going to stick with the group. I'm just going to get my khyber crystal and win. And right from the first, it's like, what are you teaching these kids? What's the process of washing Jedi? Like, do you only wash Jedi out for, like, having a relationship with family and people they fall in love with? Like, what's the washout process for like,

oh, you're one of the most selfish, like, atrocious little of the children? Like, this is Dark Jedi shit. What do you think there's happened? I thought if you didn't make it this far, you had to become a gardener or, like, or whatever a cook instead of being like a Jedi Jedi, you're like Jedi support. Why is he that?

I guess they know that in the end of the day he has a good heart, da, da, da, da, da, but they don't know that. They don't know that. Well, he could still become a gardener if he doesn't get a master. And if he keeps this act up, I guess so. You're right. None of them are going to be like, yeah, let me take on Petro.

Yeah. He's going to have to alert humility at some point. Yeah. Okay, also, really quick, I did forget another thing, even though I'm going to go back to the thing I interrupted for before, which was the thing about the true family thing. Did you all see what was on the screen while they were saying that? Asoka being recruited by Plow.

Asoka being recruited by Plow, Baby Asoka. Little Baby Asoka. And it's like, that's the one way you could sell me this as like not make me hate it, is that Baby Asoka and Plow were very cute. They also did, there is these sort of, like, like, design hero image of baby Asoka, which is extremely funny to me. I put this in our chat just now with her little green dress on and her, like, big, bright blue eyes.

And she's so, it's just, it's adorable and also kind of like, everything about it is sort of sad to me. She, there's a, there's a shot in the sequence where she has her hand on her chest as a little girl, as if she's taking a little oath and she's treating it so seriously. Anyway, this is what I'm saying is, if all kids were like baby Asoka, I'd be fine with it. But sometimes you get a Petro who's only in it for himself. Yeah, 100%. So I was thinking, you always kind of also kind of wonder, what are those other Chagruta thinking of all this?

I know. I'm so curious. Is this a happy gathering? Or is this just like sometimes the Jedi show up and like, you got to give him a kid? Yeah. It's like a witcher thing. Yeah. You know?

Is that why the Jedi talk about it so often of being like, wow, your people are really proud of you because like that is a lie that you have to tell that it's like totally severance at that point your people your smile when they think about you your achievements as a Jedi bring your culture credit yes 100% your mother you may never talk to them again feel safer knowing you're a Jedi yeah uh-huh god anyway Petra runs in everybody else comes in behind him. Also, do we say that Yoda was there? Did we mention that Yoda was there? Yeah, yeah. The Yoda's already there. He's like waiting inside, like a little... Does not matter how the Clone Wars are going. Yoda takes time for this.

He needs more Jedi. Yeah, this is for him, I think. I think he's like, this is one of my favorite things to do all year. Yeah. Do we think that this is like the six who graduate this year from Youngling to Paddle? I mean, they're not Paduan yet. They're still younglings. They just get their lightsabers. Like, how How often does this trip happen? At the beginning of the episode, Asoka says they're the top of their class. So it feels like a yearly sort of thing. You think everybody else's could say, hand me down, temporary saber? No, you get left behind. You're still there doing meditation classes and reading Jedi history.

Another round. Yeah, we know that with the, yeah, it's the thing. With the war going on, do you think that they're grading on a curve? with the curve is the war I mean if you look at this look at these

look at these guys this is the top this is your best these kids are great these kids do all right Seth is texting in front of the teacher it's so funny

it's so out of pocket 100% he walks in texting I can't believe it Zat is on Twitter right now he is making a blog of the fucking yeah he's tweeting through it

Zat has all the best filters all the best Snapchat filters. 100%. His TikTok go crazy. I was sort of thinking about this, though, of all these cute, like, slow little rituals for cultivating Jedi and such.

And I'm like, yeah, but there's a war on. Like, I was sort of thinking about, in peacetime, it's cool to have a four-year military academy. That's great. Like, World War II, they were turning out second lieutenants at the rate of 90 days. Like, and that's kind of. kind of what it takes where it's like, okay, if you really boil it, is it good to have like

a thorough grounding and all the stuff like a person in this role could ever conceivably encounter? Sure. But let's be real. What do these kids really need to know how to do? Lead a squad of clone troopers to their death. And like, that doesn't take 10 years. No. I think it's interesting to think about Asoka where she was at when this show first started. And like, she's always seemed very capable. She blew it quite a few times in the beginning. But she

was, those were like poor decisions. It wasn't like being that's like poor decision making poor like war sense or like being able to, you know. But you can do backflips basically immediately. Exactly. She was like killing it at that where I was surprised that like

fucking I don't remember if it was Gnodi or I think it was Catoony had to climb the cliff. I was like, why aren't you jumping? You just jump up there and get the dang crystal I was like oh this is a piece of cake for a dead eye And she's like inching up the cave But but it does Biff is seeing things

Biff is straight up in Bro Biff is having the worst fucking time in there Like I was feeling for Bip I was like Everyone else is going on this like neat little obstacle course and Biff is in fucking hell right now Like Biff is so cute too

When they'll do the close your eyes and pick a direction to go and he realizes that he's going alone. He's the sad little distress noises. It's fucked up. The way he approaches the little, he has the full like dark side cave thing of like approaching the cave

whose like faces a mouth and it's like a bit of snapshot on his chiber crystal and like it appears to be closing as he gets closer to it. Like it opens like there's it's the size of his whole body. He can just walk into it. And as he

he's like reaching the Khyber Crystal. It looks like the jaws are about to like just tear his arm off. I just love his cute little yellow eyes, his little beady. I mean, they're big eyes, but the pupils are yellow, and they're beady and cute. He's great design. He's my favorite. Yeah, I think he's my favorite. Yeah, I think he's my favorite.

I do like Gungi, though. Like, him having away from the ice to freeze over and like just getting so upset at how long it's taking and like how scary is that water. come on that's great there's a thing Gungi does later that I like he's just like he's like the base he's like the foundation on which everybody else can stand literally and that part's

great so anyway they all go through the shit right it's like Gungggy has to wait for it to be icy and Biff is scared of the dark and the who's the one who has to climb up I think it was Catooney and Cotuni is the one with like the little head tendrils

Is that Cotuny? I forget what the species Jesus called? Talothian. The Lothian, yeah. Right, okay, sure. Yeah, and Gnodi had to like look at she had like too many crystals

and had to like use her force prowess to focus on the right one that was for her. And Zad had to put the phone down. Zad had to use the pieces of the phone for something. Is that what it was? He had to detonate his phone explode? He had to make his phone explode.

Yeah, he had to destroy the phone. He had to pass being a lot. You had to log off And Petro had to To learn how to be a good person Yeah It is weird to me that specifically Petro's crystal is like

You're in the ice of the person that you refuse to save Are you going to save them? That's fucked up I feel like It's such an obvious test It's an obvious test It's an obvious test You're a fucking jet.

Like, this is Gen fucking 101 Jedi shit. Yes. You see someone in need of help. Even if you're going to be selfish, don't be selfish out in public like that. You know what I mean? Like, she's going to report back on you and be like, yo, he could have saved me and chose not to. He's a shit Jedi.

Yeah. That's like during the fucking test, bro. He's not skimming off the top here. Do you know what I mean? Like running it ahead of time is one thing. And it's shitty also like that. But. Yeah.

Is it not the Jedi way to, like, choose when you can be effective of what you're going to help people? Because the Jedi don't help everybody. But it's a test. It's a test. Yeah, Mace being like, kids got, has what it takes. He would be. Mace is like, that's one to look out. And he identifies shatterpoints a minute later.

He's like, I don't want to get you out of this ice. Yeah. They chatterpoint. ice they both put their hands up and vibrate until it explodes or whatever sure all the other all the other masters are horrified that uh yeah pietro did that and maces like sacrifices must be made sometimes don't even be attached to each other i will say my one beef with this episode is how there are things about when you go in to the cave of horrors right and the cave of horrors, reflect you back at it.

I mostly think that you don't need to say a fucking word about what's happening. It can just do the thing. And so, like, there's so much exposition around certain tasks here, like Gnodi needing to, Gnody, who's the Rhodian, has to explain Gungi's situation with the ice freezing over and the shadow and all of that. I just, like, couldn't help but think about how the Tartikovsky Clone Wars animated series is, like, it's bigger and more cartoonish, which, gives it some leeway here, but it very rarely would need to, like, explain a situation.

It's just so iconic in design that it would just communicate that. And that's, like, also, you know, Yoda isn't like, when you go into the fucking cave of horrors, Luke, you're going to see your dad, but you're going to see Darth Vader, but it's going to be yourself. It just happens, and that's very clear, you know. And I think that, like, I actually think that most of the stuff would have been even more effective. This whole middle section could have been silent, because it had no dialogue, and

would have been sick. Oh, yeah. It's hard to do that. I understand that it's hard to do that. And it's a kid's show. And in that way, it just felt like a kid's show where they were like, let's explain what the trick of this new section is instead of just letting the design speak for itself. But anyway.

This was definitely one of those I am watching a kid's show episodes. Yeah, totally. Just in terms of how much. Still well made. Yeah. I mean, it looked great. But even the challenges themselves were like so. not big Jedi challenges and my I mean other than the fact that like oh you might get locked in here for

you know 19 days and freeze to death but like the actual I don't know the first like just climbing the rock or whatever I was like I guess I don't know I feel like it could have been a little bit more magicy I don't know a little bit more no like good like children's lit these types of things tend to be some of those memorable sequences and books and stories like this and this just doesn't rise that level in part because they're juggling so many characters so there's not really

much of a journey of any of these characters go on like the cave feels like it's about eight feet deep and there's just a bunch of tunnels that are also like eight feet deep that all of them go down different ones but like it feels small also it's cooling lots of

maybe not children's lit but like sometimes the kids fuck up in these sorts of stories. And there are real repercussions. I think a lot about I don't know if you all have read Wizard of Earthsea, but Ged like fucks up in the middle of that early on in his training to be a wizard and releases this like, I mean, that's what that book ends up being about, right? He fucks up in a big way that haunts him for the rest of his life, releasing this kind of darkness into the world. And he does it in the middle of when he should be being restrained and should be and like that sort of children's lit story you know a magic

thing is so much more evocative to me than like five kids go in the cave and five kids come out having figured it out and like petro almost does it but i wish he hadn't i wish he died but i mean no i mean if petro just would have come come out and they would have been like listen, Petro, like, you saved her in the end but, like, he never found his crystal and it's like, you did the right thing, but you need

more time at the Jedi brainwash tank. Like, we need to like, that would have been much more interesting of like, you you did. The Jedi brainwash tank was delayed, but it got me. Like, you ended

up finding the right way, but as a Jedi, you need to like, the first time it's got a if we're in wartime I don't know losing is the thing you needed here you do you do need another year sitting but not like another minute another year

I'm sorry you're sitting on this reminds me that like one like a thing that stuck with me that you said a while ago when you're talking about the dragon prince Austin yeah is there's a moment where I don't remember any of those characters names now but the little the main character wizard kid

wannabe wizard the shit like who's yeah Jake Whatever is Yeah Ty Allen Callum Callum yes Wow

Yeah I looked it up I didn't remember that There was an entire deal About like Callum's gonna let go of the thing that gives him power But then immediately gets more power than ever And you made the point that like No If there's no cost

If you're immediately rewarded by like the rules of the universe That like wow you made a sacrifice But also you didn't sacrifice anything you immediately get more than what you sacrificed in return, then the story has no bite, and the lesson is hopelessly muddled. Like, just the lesson the story is supposed to teach, and the lesson taught to the character,

and just the tension of it, all of it just gets kind of washed away because you're like, you can't bring yourself to actually inflict a loss on the character. And, yeah, I think, like, like, I think Natalie, your idea for how that could have gone, way more compelling portrait of, like, how the Jedi teach you,

which is, like, you'd, did the right thing. And you don't get to advance with the rest of them. Like, you stay back. And then he's there for the rest of the arc. And he still, at the end, still doesn't get to advance. But he's made peace with the fact that he doesn't get to advance. And he needs that extra year.

That's great TV right there. Swish. Yeah. They offer him the lightsaber at the end. And he's like, no, I'm going to come back to I'lliam next year and doing it myself. That would be wild. That's some real self-control. That's what I'm saying.

So, anyway. I do like, they all make their little, like, harrowing escape. And it's very funny because, like, Petro is so, like, the gate's closed. He just comes running and, like, smashes through it. Gunji does this, too, right? Gunji, like, you get a hint where Gunji makes it out, and he just, like, he's too tall for the gap and just bust through it. And you're like, well, that was pretty easy. I know he's a wookie, but, like, that was pretty easy.

And later, like, Petro does it too. and Yoda and Assook are both like, what, you think we're actually kind of, like, stuck kids in a meat locker for 20 days? No. Yeah, and then Yoda's like, wow. Yota was like, the ice is just frozen water, you're fucking idiots. The real prison was in your minds. I hate this little fucking goblin so much. I do have a couple of this small.

there's literally one more small thing or two more one is the youngling symbol shows up here on their like cold weather gear and it's like the it's like the sick wing with a star on it uh sort of i think that's very cool the second thing is also a symbol's thing when they first walk in to uh maybe when they first walk in somewhere in here according to star wars dot com in the temple there are symbols denoting the balance of the light side and dark side that's were first seen in the Mortis Ark, and they're on the temple entrance here. The markings that led to the, or the markings that lined the halls of the Father's Monastery on Mortars are also found within the Temple. So, again, they are making very direct draws back to the Mortis Ark. The Mortis Ark real. Those symbols are not, I mean, I guess, I guess Anakin and I guess everyone involved in the Mortis Arc would have gone through Elis before, Ilom before.

for and would have maybe projected those into the mortis arc because they think of those as sacred and holy symbols. I guess you could make that case. But you know the writer's room is like, oh, we can show that early Jedi who came to this place were, you know, tied to the fucking father and all that shit. We can make our awesome plot more canonical and foundational Star Wars. Now, the next episode does do that in a cooler way to me, though. So.

So any final. points on this one? I mean, there is a long quote from Filoni from an interview I read. I'll just read the beginning of it. The gathering really, I think, was George's effort to clarify the way he felt Jedi got their lightsabers, and he felt that it was something that happened when they were very young. He definitely threw us all a curve when he told us the crystals don't have a color until the Jedi actually have them. And then I thought that that was really interesting. That's one of those things. It only comes from George. When you're going to the mind the Star Wars Encyclopedia, it makes sense because if an average person goes in that cave,

there are tons of ice and tons of crystals, and you can't tell the difference between them. It's almost like a defense mechanism. When a Jedi is in tune with one, that one calls to them. They can find it. And when they have it, it basically will make a blade when it's bent a certain color. I thought that was one of the nice revelations there. I also liked that it was a very spiritual thing. Threat in the cave is basically only what you take with you.

you, which is exactly what Yoda tells Luke. It makes sense for these very young children. It's come up since then. So what do the do, what do the Jedi do if they lose their lightsaber later? Well, A, they're not supposed to lose their lightsabers. But B, there are enough lightsabers that have gone from Fallen Jedi over the many, many, many, many years, that they actually have light saber crystals at the temple, so they don't actually have to go all the way back out to Illum to get one. And because of the fallen Jedi, they can actually use that crystal, and it will work for them. The whole attunement thing is, uh, and everything, is just a special moment for them as a child to get in tune with the force. It's not so much being in tune with

your lightsaber. That's a big thing we all make a mistake on as we get very attached to our lightsabers. Oh my gosh, I have to have one. But remember, they're a Jedi. A lightsaber is just a thing. Now, the next episode's going to contradict this wholly. It's just a thing. It's not Excalibur. It's not an ultimately super special thing. It is to us because we make it a symbol when we watch the movies and Luke is given his father's lightsaber. That lightsaber is a little more meaningful because it was his father's. But you notice when Luke loses it, he doesn't go on some journey down in Cloud City

to get his lightsaber, and he doesn't even super lament the fact that he lost his lightsaber. I mean, we're probably more upset as kids that he lost his lightsaber. All those kind of things come up on our telling of the tale of lightsabers, and George had lots of thoughts about that. It all comes back

to selfish versus selflessness. That's always a key thing when dealing with the Jedi and the Sith, and I think that's expressed in the gathering. No one is. this this reeks of I need to hit like my 500 word limit or like a short essay it's a long answer you know on a test and the way he like wraps it up at the end that's expressed in the gathering is the most 19 year old English comp class shit so he's he's okay so he's trying to say George put this art together to say that getting your lightsaber crystal is very important but lightsabers are important No And I know The next episode

Someone is going to say A Lightsaber is a Jedi's only true ally I was literally about to bring that up I was like I couldn't remember if that was at the beginning of this episode or the next episode It's the beginning of the next episode

I could What the fuck are you talking about At this point You are just saying words A Lightaber is a Jedi's life Yeah Four seasons later You know I mean

look it's a fun thing for kids but like it's just it's a laser sword if you lose one there's tons of dead Jedi we just like pick their lightsabers up and but also it's very spiritual it's very faith-based it's very like tied to who you are as a person

being bestowed an ancient hero's lightsaber could also be very spiritual and faithful to who you are as a person and you're not wasting the gas to go to Illam like or the time yeah you're right

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you get a lightsaber and it was somebody's lightsaber. Right, it's not just like, oh, we're pulling it's for the drawer, which is apparently what they're doing with Anakin. I think they're pulling from the drawer, popping the crystal out and then letting him, like, redesign the shell. Sure. Yeah. Well, we're about to learn about that in this next episode anyway. Yeah, with the younglings having learned lessons that are going to be with them for the rest of their lives, which is, going to be about 18 more months

given Order 66. All these kids are off to the Star Wars version of Olavander's wand shop in a test of strength. And they meet droid olivander

Hu Yang. Hu Yang. Emmy award winning Hu Yang. The first daytime Emmy this show has won was won by the voice actor of Hu Yang. Does anyone know from Listening is a Obi-Wan's voice actor It is not

It's a famous person No This performance won an Emmy This performance won a daytime Emmy Wait literally this fucking robot This robot Yeah Huya won an Emmy Tennant

No Having just been the doctor and Doctor Who For a bunch of seasons Yeah why not Filoni was a big Doctor Who fan Of course Of course and so he reached out

and it turned out that David Tennant was a big Star Wars fan it was very happy to do this role there's a Filoni zone on this but it's kind of boring the most important and interesting thing is that Hu Yong's design was based on some early Ralph McQuary a robot design

some of which influenced the early C3PO designs and so because Hu Yong's an ancient android and ancient droid he's supposed to be kind of like what if a C3 And also because he kind of has lots of banter with R2 across these episodes. He and R2 worked together a few times.

They wanted to be like, well, what if this was like a different version of a C3PO that was like more about like building stuff and intellect or like technology and history than about like, you know, dip diplomacy? But like similarly is a protocol droid in that way. And he's like, you know, he's a kind of a bronze color droid like C3Pio, just not shiny. It's got a little minor helmet. He does have a little minor helmet on. like the little monocle I don't understand

why this one's an Emmy other than it's a famous actor yeah I'm so lost by that it's really thrown me for a little I will say in the research for this I learned this whole season wins an Emmy wins the daytime Emmy for special

it's like special outstanding special class animated program beating one of the Legends of Chorus seasons and another thing I had never heard of but was like another big thing not like a I mean not as big as Star Wars star was bigger than this other thing obviously but like not like a independent thing it was like another cartoon network show or something right and when we finish this season we should watch the the award acceptance is what I will say okay look forward to that so I don't find a David Tennant award acceptance for this accepted it remotely. But Falloni and Lucas do accept the Emmy for their show.

I really want to watch that. That sounds really interesting. I will say, so the scene where the introduce, Jung, is really instructive for me, maybe about what's going on in this episode in the previous one, which is this is such a Harry Potter era. This is a peak potter. Oh, for sure.

It is such a... And I think it kind of explains, like, to a degree, why is the last episode so inert? because that's what like at this point kids are really into which is like in general the Potter books like setting aside the many issues that emerged with rolling as years go along

but a lot of times in those stories like the least interesting parts about them were like the quests and shit that the kids went on just not like they tend to struggle with like how do you create a compelling little adventure that's also a test for the kids

and you know the first one kind of felt that way where it's like the almost the gobble to fire type shit where they compete in the least interesting tournament in history and here we get the whole like it's time to match the Jedi with the

lightsaber of their dreams they all look like light sabers you have the cool little droid being like which what What do you want your lightsaber? He's like the lightsaber instructor, right? Yeah, exactly. I thought it was funny that, like, exactly that Rob, as they're doing this with Gungy,

Gungi's like, you know, imagining his little lightsaber, and he's like, oh, wood. And I was like, oh, that's interesting. That'll be, like, an interesting material to make a lightsaber out of, like, wood. I mean, first of all, kind of weird, because obviously, too, we, or Mini Chui comes from, like, jungle land, so it's a little kind of vibes are off. But then he pulls out the lightsaber. It looks like a normal ass fucking lightsaber. It doesn't look.

I thought it was going to be like this cool. Yeah, that's the interior. Okay, there's two steps here. The same thing happens. Huyang is like, I will see if we have what we need. And he pulls out a bunch of shit. And he basically makes a regular ass lightsaber. But then later on in the episode, when they're like doing their final touches,

is there is the, like, proper wooden shell that goes around it. Oh, I missed that. It has like a, it looks sick. It is like, you know, there are, it, it actually looks a lot like something from the older, it reminds me of Sattel Shah's, uh, uh, lightsaber from Star Wars, the Old Republic. It has this, like, kind of swoopy curve to it, and it's made of wood. Um, I try to figure out where it was in the episode. I think it's before all the Honda shit happens, but maybe it's after, I don't remember.

In any case, it does show up in there somewhere, but it is not immediate the way that it seems like it's setting it up. So I had the same immediate reaction as you. Yeah. Oh, I totally miss that second part. Yeah. I do like the kids, like, you know, force putting their little lights together, giving arts and crafts. It's very cute. I will say this, too, about the, the wookie thing got me thinking.

So we got the whole, like, oh, a rare wookie in the jutta, and it's kind of weird. But the other thing is, you think a wookie really thinks the, you think a wookie finds a sort particularly useful? They got claws, and they're like, I'm just sitting there wondering, like, in terms of what would be the, like, purest expression of, like, shit wookies, like, Chui's got a bowcaster, and that's not to say, like, She was a great chips mechanic, but I am kind of like, you know, it would be sick. It would be like lightsaber Wolverine claws. And I'll bet, honestly, for like how wookie is just fight. I bet those exist. I bet that's like more of their speed anyway.

I bet those are in the comics somewhere for sure, right? Also, Natalie, it's when Gunji is like repairing his, he has all the pieces floating in front of him. It's all five and a half minutes into that episode, you can see. Oh, I see. I do want to go back to a thing I just kind of teased, which is Hu Yang's design. And the, I mentioned that Gungi's saber design reminded me of Sotel Shah's from Shah, Sean. Bastilla is, what's Bistilla's last name, Allie? Sean, right?

Is it Sean? Is it an end at the end? Okay, so then Sotil Sean, yeah, that's right. Who is her like granddaughter or whatever is from Star Wars the Old Republic. Also from Star Wars the Old Republic, this ship. Oh Hu Yang notes that he is a thousand years old That he's been on this ship for a thousand years

The ship is taken This design is taken from the old republic And you can see the old republic design Like the old republic symbol With the like the neck of the crane Or whatever the fuck it is And the big single wing all over the ship

It's an old republic ship Which is a weird thing more weird to me this is this guy's older than Yoda Yoda's only 900 in return of the Jedi I mean this comes up later

he mentions that he was there when Yoda got his lightsaber how the fuck is this the first time we're learning about this ancient ass droid why isn't this droid on the Jedi Council he should be on the fucking Jedi he should be the fucking leader of the Jedi Council this full he's the oldest member

he's the oldest and wisest I thought that was the rule of Yoda Wait, is he a Jedi? No, he's got a droid. Well, he's got to be. Look at the moves that he's getting off. I was like, the question of whether there is a Jedi, a droid Jedi is answered because this guy exists.

Do you think it feels like shit, though, when Hu Yong has to be like, well, you have to put your life force into the lights, into the crystal to activate it? And he doesn't have life force because he's a droid and that's how Star Wars works. Not to mention Petro's walking in. immediately being droid racist. Oh, yeah. Unbelievable. We forgot to mention that part where he's just like he immediately starts being fucking anti-droid.

I thought that was Giondi or maybe it was Gnody. Gnody. Gnody. Was it Gnody? I just immediately anything negative that happened associated it with Petro. But the whole thing is just like kind of wild where it's like, all right, everyone meet. professor young and like yep it's an ancient it's an ancient droid who has more institutional knowledge about the Jedi than literally anyone else yep by the way um he's an

artisan that like has literally there's not a single lightsaber that's been built in a thousand years that like in some way hasn't been like designed and doesn't bear his mark and And yet it's like, it's the droid that, you know, but every youngling, every youngling gets taught by this guy, not a Jedi, fuck off, sorry, Natalie, go ahead. No, it's, I just rewatch that little bit. It's like, from behind the group of younglings, it just hears, but he's a droid. He, what is, he's supposed to know about this or whatever? And then the camera like pans around trying to identify, like, who the fuck says us? that as like who young is like what the hell is going on and it settles on Ghanodi like pushing her way through the other kids and she sits she like stands in front and folds her arms and is like yeah I said that like fuck you

droid like what the fuck is good with is there like some Rhodian droid versus droid maybe that I don't know about why why is this kid being the war of late probably has not done wonders for that that's fair yeah but it's so it calls him sir. Yeah, oh yeah. No, all the Jedi know what's up. Yeah. It's just a little much.

Yeah, it's like one of those things where, like, it's a cool character, but again, the minute you introduce this character, it's like, so again, this poses all those questions of the Star Wars is like kind of allergic to, which is this guy is clearly a person, and a teacher and a mentor

for all these characters for all these Jedi and also because like droids are effectively immortal if they don't get their like memory wiped in time

they are the only connection to history in Star Wars Land and all the stuff kind of just gets nodded at but not much happens with it because the main point here is droid artisan 3PO who's going to teach

these kids a thing or two and what he teaches them is how to sort of IKEA their lightsabers together and Petro he's what we just went through this we just went through this

like teaching you to not be a little shit had and he's like I'm going to build a lightsaber I'm going to duel Obi-Wan then I'm a kill grievous I'm the best yeah Hipson kill Grievous. I was like, hold the phone. Well, you know what?

Why wait? Go on. Get out there, kid. Show us what you've got. Set about. Yeah. Go on, young fella. Show us what? Show us your moves. You're going to see Grievous real soon. Yeah. Yeah.

Oh, weird. He didn't even try. What do you actually saw Grievous? I'll talk. I do really want to see all these kids like huddled around a news program hearing about how many Jedi in that degree of this is killed, though. Like, we should get that scene if this is going to be Clone Wars. Yeah, yeah, agreed.

Another weird thing happening here, I think, is the, and this comes back to the droid stuff. There are kind of two, and this comes back to the stuff we were just saying about the lightsaber. There's a lot of contradictions, hmm, stop me if you've heard this one before. There's lots of contradictions in how the Jedi talk about things. On one hand, the lightsaber is just a tool, just a weapon, it's not important. And on the other hand, it is your only true ally, the sword, not the force, not other Jedi or the Jedi order, not the people you try to protect, not your own spirit, it's a sword.

The sword is your only ally. And on the other hand, of course, it is just a thing. And what's most important is your connection to the force or to other people. And likewise, you get Asoka saying something like, you know, just use the, your design will become clear to you through the force. And you also have Hu Yang saying, like, this time, use the diagram. And it's like, okay, the Jedi really want to talk a big game all the time about how the force is all you need, turn off the targeting computer, et cetera. But also, sometimes you just have to check the diagram. Sometimes what you need is a weapon. And they just

never will, they will just never, ever synthesize these positions or even recognize that they're in opposition. And instead, we'll continue talking big game on the faith stuff. And, And then at the end of the day, using a laser sword to kill people, you know? Mm-hmm. We're not even at the part of this episode. That's the episode yet. We should probably get there. Well, yeah, so while they're all making their lightsabers,

uh, Hondo is nearby about, he's got a, he's got a mega idea for a big score. Khyber crystals. He wants them, and he's going to pawn him. And you know where the best place to get Khyber crystals is? Nope, not illum. You might think Elam would be the answer. No, you got to wait. They're like truffle pigs.

The little younglings got to go into their little khyber crystal for us and go and like find the khyber crystals you got so you can bring them to the pawn shop and be like, what do you give me for this? You got any, you got any like cobbled together blasters? You got any, hey, you're any good circus acts nearby? You know any shitty old ships? That's what I'm in the market for. Yeah, he's still rocking the fries electronics Flying Saucer, R-I-P. The

But also, I'm saying there, it's like, so they do the thing, they attack the ship, they board it, and he's like, I don't care what it takes. Find me those Khyber crystals. And even one of the pirates is like, boss, the ship's full of kids. And he's like, yeah.

Yeah, and we're here for the money. Everyone needs it. That's why it's called money. He does call it like wet, hot, delicious profit at one point, doesn't he? He's so horned up for the bag right now. I mean, between this and some of the shit at the end of this episode with Asoka, yes, he is the worst version of this, like, sci-fi archetype. It's fucked. Um, he does also say, to his credit, the thing, one line that I like here, there are some,

there are some good Honda lines set out these episodes, he goes, khyber crystals, they're used for making laser swords, which is, that's good. That part I like. The part about killing kids less so. It's just so funny how we are like complete opposites here, because the only time that I liked Tando this episode was like when he was being fucking evil. Like if you're going to be evil, be fucking evil. Like, kill those kids, knock out Osoka, be fucking interesting. But when he's like

I'm secretly your friend, I'm, that sucks now. I'm back on, I'm back on fuckondo. This episode, Art, turn me against him again. Because they don't know what the fuck they want to do with him. It started off great where he's just like, I have no fucking loyalty. Like, yeah, I fucking like delivered, you know,

emergency supplies to all these, like to Asoka yesterday. but like, fuck it. I want a bag right now. I'm going to go get a bag. He says nice, juicy, fat, warm process. Oh, my God. Like, it's good.

And then just to end it the way it ends it, where it's like you are the guy at Disneyland in the Disney ride. That is who you are. That's where it is. And again, we're going to, I'm jumping ahead just a second here. And we're just, we should have a Honda talk a little bit. Yeah.

You know, Asoka had a crush last week, which means now it's okay to put her in sexual peril. That's what it means. He runs his thumb over her lips and talks about how she's more valuable as a hostage because she's a female Jedi. She does say that. There's only one way to read that shit. And it's like two episodes from now, he's supposed to be a goofball, a lovable goofball. Pick a lane. Pick a lane.

Pick one way. Yeah, agree. Or walk the edge of the lane. But then you have to actually walk the line And they're not walking the line They're jumping between the two Do you know what I mean? Oh yeah no I mean

It's like in one episode And they lampshade it Because at one point he's like Sometimes I'm really changeable Sometimes I'm this way Yeah today I woke up And I like kids I'm not gonna kill them and traffic them

Bro That's absolutely not If they had committed And made it like an actual turn Like the Honda thing of being like Well if the Jedi are gonna keep musing me I'm going to use these fucking Jedi. Like, do that.

Don't have the thing of, like, by the end of the arc, I want to teach this kid a lesson about, like, morality or whatever. I know. And, like, to believe in herself. Are you fucking kidding me? Yeah, hell no. I was thinking, before the show, I was thinking about, like,

the best version of Honda, I think, is he some version of an Elmore Leonard character. And I talked about this before on the show. But, like, Elmore Leonard, you're sort of beating. tier crooks, they can kind of go two directions. But like, even, like, being comic relief does not preclude being terrifying or really scary. This is the thing. And in many ways, that's kind of the point, is that in, like, Elmore Leonard stories, the kind of scary thing about criminals is because they're kind of unmoored from, like, morality or, like, law. They can

literally do anything. And some of them just turn out, like, they're, they're charismatic outlaws or they're just funny goofballs who end up in a life of crime. And some of them are funny goofballs who will, without any compunction, like, kill a bunch of people, like, you know, like in the blink of an eye. If we think about, like, one of my favorite Elmore Leonard adaptations out of sight, you know, the, um, the character like Snoopy is sort of a harmless goofball who is known for being a shitty boxer who, you know, we'll throw any fight for, for the right money. And then he becomes a terrifying villain, not because he gets, like, super competent or, like, has a heel turn.

He just kind of realizes that, like, if he is just willing to kill people, he can be really successful. Right. All this shit we agree to is made up. Yep. Right. And, like, when you agree with that, or when you hit that, then you can get that character who, to me, that's the character who walks the line. It feels like they're walking the line a little bit more here. Those characters, you know, there's a line, but the opposite version of that character, Rob, is like Omar from the Wire, who absolutely kills lots of people, but is always in the I'm a man with a code lane.

And Hondo tries to pull that man with a code shit here later, or maybe he doesn't. Maybe it's in one of the, it might be in a Filoni zone. I'm about to link or an interview I read. Oh, Hondo has a code. No, he fucking doesn't. Hondo has 17 different writers, is what he has. And sometimes those writers agree on how he should be depicted, and other times they don't. And what's confusing is that in a single arc to have him swing so hard is very strange to me.

Do you all want to go to the Filoni zone for Hondo and Naka? One last point, just on Hondo, which is the other direction he can go is, he is kind of an outlaw with the heart of gold and such. And he is just not built for this world and something badass to happen to him. Like, he could be, like, he could be a softie. and because he keeps trying to He should pay for Yeah he's wading into these waters Where he has no business going

That's the other destiny of characters like this Again in Elmore Leonard's story Some of those goofballs They just stay around too long They don't get the message You shouldn't be doing crime anymore With these people You were not built for this

And that could be Honda too But instead they just keep whipsawing As to what he's going to do This arc ends with Honda getting got And it's like I fuck with Duku too many times I fucked with him too many times You know Just like Duku walking in on Honda

trying to, like, piece things back together after all this, after he fucked him over one more time. Yeah. And, and just killing him, blah. Love it. Great. But... They want the lovable rogue. My counter to that is, I like the version of Honda that's, like, a slippery little eel.

And he just, like, always gets away with it. But in a really goofy, just outlandish way, that is, like, there's no, like, very cartoon. Like, there's no reason why... I like that... I like that character type. It's hard for me to... like, it's hard for me when that's the same guy who like got drunk a lot and let his dudes overthrow him, failed to steal all the penicillin, and also for that arc just randomly had

like parrot monkeys with him and was just like a bad soldier guy. And then later, remember, that episode we saw this season already with the first time that we saw him, not the, not the CIA gunrunner one, the time that he was, which I like gun runner Honda, except for when he called Stilo, his new favorite spice. But, like, I like him as, like, a smuggler. I like, that's fun, working for the Republic, working for the highest bidder. But in the first episode, when we see him with the mall stuff, the mall and savage stuff, that comes after this arc.

And this is the arc why his shit is all fucked up, why all of his base is all fucked up. It's because of this stuff. And why he's like, first you general grievous to me, da-da-da-da, that's about this arc. And that's why he's like, he doesn't have, like, a... place the way he normally does because it all got destroyed that version of him and this version of him should be lined up

very tightly and they just don't feel like this again this episode just goes so hard in the other direction that it's hard for me to square the circle on him in a way that like I just I don't know how I'm supposed to lovable rogues don't also traffic

children like I I think writers generally draw that line they have like a few things they don't do. I'm happy for him to run drugs. I'm happy for him to run weapons. And, and, you know, realistically, part of the fantasy of this character type is that you could have someone who's giving the finger to authority without actually hurting, without actually hurting people in ways that are dramatic or traumatizing. But like, it's, it passes that line. I recognize that I'm being kind of, you know, conventional in saying that I'd prefer that that line stay in that place,

but it's just a hard one to come back from. Yeah. I will, it, it, I don't say Hondo and Naka is problematic. Like, I'm not saying, like, and that's why Clone Wars is back. Like, I'm not going down that road. I just, yeah, exactly. But check my card. But I think the end of that episode is, like, as a throwaway, the writers do a, how are we going to raise the stakes for this thing?

Because here's the other problem. The stakes are low, right? Okay, So, okay, get captured by Hondo, what's the worst that's going to happen? And they do a head fake with, like, he's like, and I'm going to turn you out. And it's like, this fucking Deadwood? all of a sudden. And the next episode, it turns out it's not. He's like, well, I actually don't know what to do with you.

Yeah, I've nowhere to sell you to. There's a businessman who's interested in Jedi. Like, wants a female Jedi. That, like, yeah, I'll sell it. And there's scary implications there, but also, like, at no point is. But no one's ever identified. And he's not really, like, moving on this plan. He's like, he actually doesn't know what to do.

Yeah, he's stalling. Yes. I mean, he definitely feels, like, this arc feels like a Jack Sparrow effect in the sense of, like, they want him to be, like, a lovable slime ball, essentially. Like Pirates, too. Yeah, damn, just like cursed franchises the show's under the influence. Yeah, yeah, 100%. And I think in the past, Honda has been a lovable slime ball because he's slime ball first

and we love him for it because it's fun to watch. But him being, like him imparting moral lessons to children is like, hell no. What lessons? You're not the same person from day to day. How are you supposed to be the source of a lesson? Anyway, I did just look at my notes and I was clearly team Honda for at least part of this because I said, I wrote down here, I hope Hondo shoots this Petro kid in the head.

I'm sick of his shit. So, anyway, we're going to the Filoni zone. It's been too long. I do want to just say really quickly, this conversation is really revealing that, like, if they wanted this arc and they wanted to have, like, an actual danger here,

they should have had Cadbane. Yeah. Like, they didn't use Hondo at any other time, but have Cadbane fucking kill kids. This is the thing. How much was supposed to? like Hondo Anaku and Cad Bain is right there. You know?

Cadd commits. Anyway. Bring back Cadbane. And Cat has the thing where does he want to kill kids? No, he's not going to go out of his way to do it. Will he kill kids? Yes. Yes.

All those kids are dead. The fucking smoke bombs he throws in the shaft, nerve agent in the Cad Bain episode. A hundred percent. You know who, man, it's really coming together. The characters I like in Clone Wars, characters are willing to kill kids. Cadbane, Saw Guerrera. It's all lining up. Anakin Skywalker.

Uh-huh. Anyway, are we going to get more Caddain? I actually don't know. I mean, eventually, obviously, I know that we do. I'm afraid to look and the answer be no. It would suck if the answer was low. I need to, like, hold out for more Cadwain in my life. Is he on the Who Will Win?

He wasn't. He wasn't. Is he, he was not? He was not. He was not. He's already fallen. He's not, and I learned something else, and I don't know this for sure. But there's a character on that whose arc, I think, got cut. Oh.

Stop. It got cut. No. Embo. That's Embo. No. It did get cut. I hate this show.

We might still get more Embo at some point. It just might not be this season. Okay. This is my understanding. I believe. We had to have half of an episode dedicated to a carnival, so we had to write out Embo. Also, Ember could still be here, but I just, I did, yeah, I mean, God, we'll get to the card. Again, I did just, all I know is I saw a part of an interview where Filoni was like, yeah, we had to move this one thing out of that season because, da-da-da-da-da, so, anyway.

All right. Filoni's own time. If I copied you the link, are you ready to watch a test of strength feature at? Okay. Three, two, one, go. Fire the grappling upoons. That's Honda, for everyone just listening to the show. Wheel them in, and let's get what we came for.

Hey, I'm Dave Flunny, Supervisor and Director of Star Wars, the Clone Wars, and I'm here today to talk about the youngling... wearing a plug, a close bro's shirt. In particular, the episode, a test of strength. Guy, crystals, used for making laser swords. The price for just one would make a man. Rich. Right from the gecko, George really loved the character,

Honda. I mean, George created him for the show in the episode Counting was captured. Wait, he's blaming on George. He was kind of a very dynamic personality. Someone that we were able to really kind of base him in the world the Han Solo using. Remember what the show used to look like?

The Land of Carrizians of the world and say the Honda would fit great with those guys. You know, Honda is a character that is one of those kind of magic musical trickster characters. He's not the real villain. He's motivated by greed, but he's not doing it to be mean or cruel. He just, you know, wants to make a profit for himself. He's selfish.

I smell profit. Here it is. Nice, juicy, fat, warm profits. There was something about Jim coming to performance when I heard it. Don't write when you're home. That I thought, there's a lot of charisma here. And he's kind of pirate enough, but he mainly sounds exotic. Oh, no, Dave.

He's a con man, and he's a con artist, and he's a pirate. But he's not a bad, bad guy. He does have a code. You know, he knows why he's there. And even though he was ready to steal these little younglings blind, he didn't want him to get hurt in the process. He wanted him to go home. They're going to have a nice story.

They met the famous eye. That is a lie. He said he would kill them. And live to tell about it. Yeah, Rob, he has an Abe Lincoln pin and also, I think, a police badge. But playtime is over. Yeah, that's what my Honda is so great. is he gets you a lot of different levels of the voice actor for hondo though and kind of good he has a heart

you know he actually cares to a degree i never think of it as doing voices i think of it as doing characters i'm not doing hondo's voice i'm doing hondo well quite frankly i am probably the most interesting man in the galaxy he's a character that you want to listen to the dosaki's commercial no that's what he's going to say if i were not Me, I would envy you getting to meet me. For the Jedi, Hondo is kind of a bizarre character. I like to think that were the war not going on, Hondo, I don't think he'd be a big concern for the Jedi,

but they would probably be involved in his business more, mainly to stop his business. And he's a bit of a thorn in the side to our buddies, to Obi-Wan, and the actual good guys. And, you know, it's just that's who he is. He's got some of that savoy affair of the old international jewel thief from some of those movies from the 60s. It's like, oh, I mean, he's the bad guy. Why am I rooting for him?

Why am I rooting for this guy to get in and steal all the money from this safe? I don't know, but I am. I love movies. Are we talking? The ones from the 60s? I think the Jedi just, look at Hanum, probably shake their head. And they think, man, a few degrees more this way. And he could be a really great help and a great guy.

If he could just get over this greed, he could be. be a big help to them. Can he do it? I don't know. He's an ever evolving character on our show and one important thing about Honda though. And kids, you got to remember this about Honda. Always ask yourself, can you trust him? That's pretty key. Why do you trust him? No. That's pretty key. No. Wow. Is Honda a good guy or a bad guy? He's only nice to you when you give him drugs. They pay him drugs. They pay him a drugs. What is that? This is true. Well, in the time it took to watch that, and me go, hmm, I wonder why he has an Abe Lincoln and police badge pin on his, on his hat.

You know, there's some things about Jim Cummings that aren't positive, let's say. No, yeah, lots of. Like? So in March 2020, there's a lot of, actually, this goes back, in 2016, he was out here. retweeting stuff about Hillary Clinton having a brain injury and here's song one show voice actor saying

Jim Cummings has always had troubling political views unfortunately Jenny Nicholson saying Jim Cummings has the same politics as James Woods has been really open about this for years but people stay blissfully unaware of it because they like Winnie the Pooh. Also, oh, he had some he had some

he had some takes about COVID obviously and China And also, there's a big section called abuse at allegations on the old Wikipedia page for Honda-O-Nocca's voice actor, Jim Cummings. Also, again, Winnie the Pooh, Tigger, the Tasmanian Devil, etc. Darkwing Duck. Not in the original ones. Oh, my friend, yes. Jim Cummings is 60.

Wait, he's that old? He was born in 52. So, he's been Winnie the Pooh since forever, since, uh... Okay, since, okay, since... He's in Kingdom, War. 90s. There's an actual before you. He's in Kingdom Hearts.

He's in Kingdom Hearts. He's almost certainly in Kingdom Hearts. Oh, yeah. He's in Kingdom Hearts 3. He's in all of those. Yeah. I do not like, okay, so we're going to, the abuse obligation section is very troubling. It's very troubling.

It's very troubling. I, you know, you can go read that section and it's bad. Anyway. In that video, they do not know what to do with that character. And Faloni's kind of being like, he's just. so, you know, dynamic. And it is, your writer's room is addicted to using this character to, like, unjam ploppy. Yeah.

I was going to say, he's a very useful tool for, like, okay, how can they get out of this one? How do we let the, you know, I think, let's go back to an opposite thing, right? Or at a time when I think that they did something really cool by refusing to do that. And they still kind of found their thread in the Satin arc, when Satin was like coming to, of Corrassant to talk about neutrality. There's that guy who betrays them on the ship, and Annikin ends up killing him. And the situation where he's like, ha, ha, ha, you're all good guys, you can't kill me. So that means I win, and Anakin chose up behind him and stabs him in the back and Vader's a little bit.

That sequence rules. That sequence would suck if Hondo happened to be nearby, and they called Hondo in to save the day, right? which is what they've been doing with Honda this whole season so far is instead of it being a place where like, Anakin can be a little dirty and get his hands dirty himself or somebody else could do something kind of unsavory, we have this perfect slime ball who can be the instant patch to what the situation is and there's no stakes with it because we don't care if Honda slips to being more evil or if he slips to being more, I mean, we care because I feel like it's bad storytelling, But we don't have that investment.

We're like, oh, my God, Anakin can't come back. You remember when, like, Anakin choked that guy in the cell, or Asoka threatened that one guy's life? Those moments hit because it's slippage, right? Because it's like a character has decided to do a thing that we think is a little dirty, and that has some stakes behind it. Or refuses to do that and then gets consequences for it. The fact that Honda can be every Jedi's ally, this is the third time this season, that Honda is the ally of the Jedi needs. that Honda is the ally of the Jedi need in the worst possible moment, separated from the rest of the Jedi, there he is. I would rather be Cadbane.

I would rather be, you know, and have Cabin try to shoot you in the back on the way out. I would rather be someone who does not, who is not defined by their slipperiness at this point, or they're like, I don't know. I'm just, I'm, we've gotten a lot of Honda in a row, and I think that however high I was coming off to that first episode of the season, we've like, I'm ODing on Honda. I need less Honda I need to like bring it back down and they need to find out who the fuck he is

and pick that lane Stop throwing those weird beats in with him Right Like just like Like that's the other thing is Already inconsistency Would be less jarring If on top of that

You didn't have these like Valences where it's like And he's a total creep Right right And it's like okay So like already like Is he a good guy or bad guy This week fine

And then like The sorts of threats he make Are just too loaded Or the way he just like rolls up on Steela in last episode and is like yeah exactly uh it's like nobody like get out of here Honda so this episode uh in terms of like you know they huddle up you go to the cockpit

the rest of you kids go hold out and hold Asoka I do okay there's a beat I love Asoka is explaining what her part of the plan is and she starts talking real slowly as she elides the distinct probability that she's going to kill a boatload of pirates in the next 15 minutes. I'm going to go get them off this ship.

And just the way, like, you see her, like, she knows what the plan is. The Asoka and Anakin-style plan is like, and everyone's about to die. And she's like, can't tell the kids that. They're not ready to learn that they don't, they are not ready to learn what those lightsabers

are really for and how good they're going to need to be at it. Pietro is eagerly awaiting that. He gives out how to turn his into a booby trap, which is kind of cool. He learns how to do it because he sucks at making a lightsaber. He almost blows himself up in training.

And then he just does it on purpose and gives it over to them. I don't know how he didn't kill like three people here. Yeah. I mean, the way that it was described at the time when he fucked up the lightsaber, who Yang was like, if you like, if you

like this, all that will be left is the lightsaber and nothing else. Like, do not ignite this lightsaber. And then he hands it over, and it, like, they're standing right there. They could take damage. It's shrapnel.

I don't know. Well, and Jung does. He's like, that explosion, like, fucked me up. Sorry, I'm not going to be useful for the rest of this mission. Yeah. We do get, so the show sort of alludes to, like, What is Hondo doing here?

He and Soka fight. And she basically does that, man, I am trying really hard not to kill you. I thought we were cool. And his responses, and I appreciate that. I see that you are trying not to kill me. But it's like, yes, literally last week, two weeks ago, he was delivering Stinger missiles that she badly needed. And now, yeah, he's kind of doing this shit. I do like the way the ships are animated the whole like action sequence the tether's breaking and the air like all that stuff's good like these episodes generally look pretty terrific I think in terms of like the like set pieces we see the fight choreography I don't think most of this episode is that interesting beyond sort of what we laid out like it's interesting premise but this is a this is teeing up the rest of this arc's story I really struggled with this whole

arc, even though there are beats that I liked a lot, I was very, like, forcing myself to pay attention. And it's like, it's a kid's story. Like, and that's, it's a kid's show. And this is one of those episodes that really leans, I guess, like more middle grade than young adults to use the lit, the publication terminology. And like, I think that's fair. And that's fine. Their audience is not me, you know. But I do think, yeah, this episode just kind of happens. I will, I do want to shout out the pirate, the big pirate. I don't have this guy's name. Is he got a lobster bib? Maybe. He's ready to eat, you know? I love his design. He's like a bigger weakway pirate. He's like wider. He has good armor on. I don't know why he didn't show up. And maybe he did,

and I just didn't notice him in that mall arc. But he's like, he's the first one of these dudes who looks like he could win a fight against somebody because they're all like little pencil. Like they're tiny. They're so thin. This is a dude who looks. like he could hold his own against a big tough guy. So shout-outs. But yeah, the plan happens, right? That's, we can kind of align a little bit here. The kids, some of the kids get to the cockpit.

The other kids take a little while to get to the hold. Asoka has to kind of distract them for a while. She fights the pirates. And then they open the airlocks to, or they pull away from the grappling cables. And when they do that, they break the, the connection between the airlocks, enough to jettison everyone back into Hondo's ship. Unfortunately, that ends up including Asoka. Asoka also gets caught in the vacuum effect or whatever and winds up in Hondo's ship.

And the kids are like, uh-oh. Yeah. Hondo's UFO ship, the end. I got a shout out Asoka for just being very capable through this whole, I mean, outside of getting knocked into sports. base. But, like, that's, that's, she was, like, up against six people. That's, you know. It was absolutely fluke.

Otherwise, she 100% had it in the bag. She was, she killed it. This was, like, the, like, one of those, Asoka has grown a lot. That was, like, one of the things I was thinking about earlier was just the skill gap between Osoka and these, like, younglings was really blatantly, really set Asoka in this, like, oh, she's been in. war for Madlong now. Like, she's been doing the shit.

She's actually streaming. This is us playing Valorant with Haley, Natalie. It's being carried by a pro. And we're like, what are my abilities to do again? How do you jump in this game? We're both okay at Valorat.

I will say the... That's true. It's an arc that's like... It's graduation day. What are we still doing here? Why is a Padawan It's a tono. Like, she does not need, yeah. Yeah. She does not need help at this point.

It's like, and in previously, like, when you compare Asoka in the past, it was like 50-50, whether or not there, like, she would have a bad idea or a good idea, but like missed something important. Right. And it was like good. There were Jedi masters around there to bail her out. At this point, it's like. She's a knight. Yeah. Yeah, we're done.

Let her get her own paddle on if she wants one. Yeah. And, yeah, I mean, we just see it here. Like, the plan works basically flawlessly, if not for bad luck. She manages to save almost all the pirates from Honda's shitty plan, and she saves all them kids. It's true. Like, it is a flawless victory. But instead, she gets knocked by the last man being sucked through the airlock.

And then Hondo's like, ooh, could fetch a pretty price for you, my pretty. and then what that means is next time, you know, he's going to force her to hang out in his rec room. Yeah, basically. I have one more thing for this episode, very important. Yeah. Beginning of the episode, does anybody remember what Petro does during the lightsaber training? Well, he's spinning that stick around. Oh, he says that he calls his move the whirl of the galaxy or something like that.

It is the whirlwind of destiny. Sure. It was created by Brendan Lake, a young fan as part of the Joy in the Jedi Contest, sponsored by Hasbro. The winning entry was animated into the show and received, and he got, he's in the credits for this episode. Uh-huh. Good. I didn't realize that they actually licensed the Lightsaber Kid video. That's basically it, dude.

That is a content. That is basically it. It has its own wookie piece. media page. Okay, he was a nine-year-old at the time. So, like, that's cute. Sure. That's cute.

Shoutouts. So despite the really creepy ending of the previous episode, Bound for Rescue does renew the series commitment to making Hondo canonically harmless. He's just there hanging out with Soka. The most sinister thing he does is like, hey, you want some beer kid? Uh-oh, too slow. None for you. Meanwhile

So foul In a B plot that just exists to show why the kids have to do this themselves Obi-Wan loses an entire fleet Just randomly Like he's like Hey you kids better not get out to Whatever you do Do not try to mount a rescue mission

I'll be right there And then Grievous just blows up his entire fleet We get like weird side cuts into a really well-animate space battle because this show's gotten really good at it, and I think the animation teams that work on this shit, maybe we're just a little bored, and it's been a while since the Umbara arc, and they're like,

we need to show some Y-Wings eating shit. And they do, and you're sort of watching it, like, this is a weird little interlude in the middle of this episode. Is there probably losing this entire battle? Is this going as badly as it looks? It's bad. And it does.

And it does. Everyone's dead. Yep. So, no Obi-Wan rescue. Instead, the young ones have to be clear This fight happens the entire episode I know you already said there are weird sidecuts It is

It is if it's from a different episode of television Like they just drop in these sequences It's dizzying They need to keep reminding us why Obi-Wan can't be there Because he's getting his ass beat by Greaveson right now He's getting his ass beat The cuts are so

It feels so intercut from other episodes The effect is almost like comedic And another show would be comedy Because it would be like Oh, while the kids are off having this adventure Some really epic wild shit Is happening off in the corner with Obi-Wan here But they don't actually tell the joke

Instead, it's just like standard The Jedi lead a fleet To their doom against Grievous Grievous brutally executes Like clones as usual Just like just more brutal clone death And then at the end of all that At the end of this whole like little side plot

But Obi-Wan turns the coatings, like, oh, man, guess the kids are on their own. Yep. That part's great. That was sexy of him. Sorry. Yep. It's just funny because there's no way. Nobody calls the kids.

No one calls the kids. There's no way to reach them. But the kids are like, well, guess what? They're also running out of gas or something's wrong with their ship where they have to touch down. And they're like, well, the closest planet is Florham. So I guess. We're back, baby.

We got to just go rescue a social. and touch down the ship for a little bit. And to rescue Asoka, you know, what can a bunch of kids do? Well, they can execute the most powerful strategy in the history of stage, film, and television. They put on a show. They put on a show. They fought, this point happens because of Carnival. This is what our classes are, Allie.

Yeah, did Yoda do the choreography for their little show? Like, this is part of their. training? No, this is Jar Jar. This is Jar Jar got to teach an elective. It is Jar Jar. They took the Jarjar- including their little

act. Like, when they sort of look at the audience? Like, it's a great act. What do you call it? Gunn, yeah, the aristocrats.

They definitely took Gungan comedic acting or whatever for sure, theatrics. So to explain what's happening, they're like, man, we're far away from

wherever Honda is. Let me just like peek around and, uh, Bliff. What's the authority? Biff. Biff. Biff. It's B-Y-P-H though. P-H. It is Biff. Okay. It's like, yo, yo, yo, yo, yo, look over there. There is a carnival barge. There is a, like, a circus. Pre-Ego's traveling world of wonder. And it's like one of these like floating barges, except that has a bunch of like, you know, like fairy lights and like Christmas. lights on it and it has like some like curtains and and fabrics and inside is a carnival master and they like roll up to him and they stop the barge or whatever and he's like carnival master

from that episode where they unleash the kaiju is the same dude not the same dude but the same species like the carnival master version of those like ponies that walk around on their hands basically oil barons and and driving the barge those creatures that R2 and 3PO had dealings with on the little nomad voice they are

that you're right so it is the most whimsical carnival barge you could imagine yes he's a dug which obviously Sebulba is probably the most famous of all the dugs the great pod racing legend

and he's like y'all want to Y'all want to join the show? What do you do? Your children? And they're like, if they're on the subway, they put down the boom box,

they hit play, the music starts, they put on a show. They got their friend walking around with the Yankee cap collecting donations while they do it. I love that they have

they can dance too, he's just not as good. Their starting stance, like ready to go. Yeah, uh-huh. And then they start doing, they start doing shit they start doing cheer squad shit

they build a human pyramid they do lots of jumping around you know okay so I don't know this is where Gungi is the base of their most their like biggest human pyramid he's holding them all up on his chest

I like that they don't show how they end up in this fucking configuration though because Can't animate that no they don't need to it's fine we don't have a choreo animator but we can put them in the pyramid little flip.

So look, I don't know if this is like... And again, cut right from that to spaceships being destroyed. Grievous walks past a corpse. Like, literally that is the cut. The cut is the guy going like, well, I guess you could be,

you could be in the circus, hard cut. Of an entire battleship explodes as droid fighters do a stray, Pass. Cut. Grievous walks in over a clone corpse. His foot would have landed

on the corpse's head based on the direction that he's walking. Wait, wait. Are you sure this isn't the part where the clone is still alive and he puts his foot on his chest? No, no, no.

I just watched it. That's earlier or later. Yes, this is when it's like a clone officer that he walks over. Yeah, he's face down on the floor. And Obi-Wan is like, well, you beat us.

He sends a hollow message where he's like, I'm leaving to the escape pod. Bye-bye. ship will now self-destruct in 30 seconds. Uh-huh. Anyway. What a goofy, goofy thing.

I mean, why do we need, I'm just, like, we just keep having, is this filler at this point? This is so expensive. It's so expensive. It's cool. I like this stuff because a thing that I will say I like about this is we get to see a lot of ships we don't get to see a lot of in previous Clone Wars episodes. There's like the early Y wings are here, the Z-95 headhunters are out here, like all these ships that I used to love as a kid have started showing up in Clone Wars. I don't know if that's just because they got the budget or because it's later in the war.

I mean, it's probably both. But I like seeing all this dog. I like all these dogfights. I just, it's a very weird pivot from circus act. You know, it's funny. I'm not, I don't hate it, but. I mean, I crave this stuff because I'm like someday, please God, someone's going to make a video game out of this shit. And this is all useful, like, game design and balance notions.

Like, I fucking love the hanger on the clone cruisers with the, like, trench through the middle of the ship and all the separate bays. I love it. I also, honestly, I like the carnival barge. I love the carnival barge. It's fun. Yeah. And I actually love this next bit, which is, like, this is the shit that does, like, get me

back inside with Honda a little bit where, like, they're doing their whole little acrobatic act. By the way, Gungi is dressed as an Ewok. And who is it dressed as the, is a Pietro who's dressed as the wookie? Is that true? They're all wearing like little disguises and stuff. They wear disguises so

Honda won't recognize them. One of them is dressed like the guy from Temple of Doom again, by the way. You know, they love referencing the big act at the beginning of Temple of Doom of Indiana Jones on the Temple of Doom. did this before, I want to say, with the Sly Snoodles, or Slice Snoodles production,

there's a guy who's wearing the same, I don't remember who it is, but one of them is wearing that, according to Star Wars.com, is wearing the same, like, striped pseudo suit that that guy is wearing. So they are always going back to Indiana Jones in this show. But where they do the crowdwork stuff and they get Hondo to come away, and he does the, I'm not as young as I used to be, but I'm older and I'm like yeah Honda live your best life

absolutely stand on that bid I think we're I think we're a podcast divided on Honda now just hanging out on the base inviting the carnival through this is too

I mean you got Ali has never been team Honda I think you came across you let us have our Honda moment you're a good friend you were the friend

she's like fine Honda can come I know y'all like Honda. Wait, you said, Al, you're just sitting here judging me

for enjoying this moment of Wingsy and Merriman? The whole time, I was thinking the Honda train came up to the station. Y'all got on. I did not.

It brought you to a fucking carnival is what I was thinking. And I was like, this carnival's tight. Go Honda? Stand on the big seesaw. I loved that. I loved it.

I loved it. Bad things happened when he stood on the big seesaw. I love that he's got like two batty's on, like, each arm. Like, he's just watching some performances. Like, this is Thursday night on Florum. Like, that's- Any wonder he got fucking rocked by Grievous. He's not prepared.

No, he's not. You can just fuck with any. Any of these kids get one over on it. Again, this arc is so good if he gets killed at the end of it. It's just like, buddy, you are a character. from another kind of world, the Star Wars galaxy is not going to be the world has moved on.

Yeah. Yeah. The, kind of reminds me a bit of, there's a late, late era community. There's an episode where the whole conceit is it's a character hallucinating his favorite children's cartoons

and opens on a GI Joe where like Cobra, Commander Cobra or whatever the fuck's name is. Cobra Commander. It's Cobra Commander. It gets killed. And every cartoon, cartoon character asked to reckon with like death has entered this universe and I feel like that's a that's the

direction I would love it yeah it's like what the fuck did grievous just blow out like hondo's torso with his with his like foot and that'd be cool that'd be great anyway I also do enjoy I do love there's a quick detail I love in the circus before we move on they have drums but they play the drums by juggling like juggling balls into them that's great great detail I like all the costuming here. I think that they do a good job with this. I just, Honda has lost points. Anyway. And Assoca knows immediately

like, she's like, oh, fuck. He's fucking kids. The annoyance, but also like, the plan is working. This is a horrible idea, but it is working. That's all that matters. She gets her lightsabers back. Everyone's getting ready to go.

They seesaw Honda into he's having the time of his fucking life flying through the air. I don't know how it's back didn't get broken. He gets flipped on to like a cross beam. Yeah. It's just like, whoo. Yeah. I'm loving it. It's funny how they play it.

Like, the kids are like, oh my God, he's going to be so mad. But then he gets up and he doesn't give a shit. That was the only condo beat that I liked. And he was like, that was fun. It's not until like one of his one of his lackeys is like, ah, it's those darned Jedi kids. And he's like, oh,

time to be in villain mode. Uh-huh. And then they chase them out. They are trying to get out to their ship, you know, and everyone's happy. Everyone's, they're going to escape. They're going to. But they're just not. They're just not.

We don't actually see them not. If you just watch this episode, you would think, and then they got away, right? No. They crash. They're, like, brought in the custody at the end of this episode. So the whole thing, the end of this episode. I don't think that's true, Rob. They ride off into the sunset at the end of this episode.

They do. Are you sure? I just watched it a second ago, 100%. They don't tease any of the grievous stuff at all. Oh, does he end up, it does end with him hugging the little wildebeest that was left behind? Yeah, he hugs. He goes, I know how you feel, and you lost your master. I lost my younglings or whatever.

I lost my dead. And they're done. Which, again, speaks to the fact that this episode or this arc really does feel like four stand-alones in a weird way, even though there isn't, there is an arc. So a necessary bond opens on the failed escape. Yes, correct. where it all falls apart because the kid who was left behind on the spaceship

really are too has to pile it and do like a hot pickup basically by opening the ramp there's a whole like there's a speeder chase the two little like speeder skiffs are chasing each other and all kids need to jump from like their stage coach effectively onto the ramp of the Jedi Spaceship

and it doesn't work out in part because the full-proof plan of balancing one of the masks from their little carnival ask from their carnival act on the controls does not function in an autopilot. That's one of those things where I was like,

okay, so we were talking last episode like two episodes ago. Asoka, brilliant, like she's nailing it. I don't know what the, I don't know what to put the mask on the flight yoke was supposed to do. Well, it's just going to keep them going forward. You know? Yeah.

Yeah. It works about as well as you'd expect. Yeah, it doesn't work right. All the Jedi kids are basically now dangling from the, you know, from the ramp and it seems like there's going to be a grisly accident. And they're being chased by a tank. So like, yeah. And it is. There is a problem.

The tank is the tank. The tank is the problem. One shot destroys this ship. I know it's a thousand-year-old ship or whatever, but y'all got to invest in some shields. This is a fucking artifact. Why don't they have some... Yeah, I know. Shields on this shit.

This is also where the fucking OG lightsaber man is. Like, he's valuable. Yeah. Give it shields. He's got components in there. There's just me a nightmare to replace. Oh, yeah, they're all... Huge relic lost.

The gorges of florim or whatever. Which you know, Honda's going to send out like a scavenger crew to just build the shit out of that. Yeah. That's money. That's big, juicy profit, wet. Yeah. Yep. You're right.

So, and then in the middle of all this, so the, the Jedi, like, in the, in the craft, Everyone is rescued, this time from the ship and the skip that are both about to be destroyed. Everyone just sort of flies off. Everyone's fine, but the pirates win and take them into custody. But in the meantime, Grievous, apparently having just crossed off destroy Obi-Wan's fleet, just the do list, shows up. By the way, this is the, like, things going okay on the separatist side here. Because the thing is, he shows up.

they overpower hondo's forces Duku sends a hollow message where he's like, I've been so mad ever since that terrible season one arc where I was your hostage and nothing made sense I've been just stewing over it forever

and so I'm going to punish you we're invading and we're taking all your shit and you know you were now you're a subject of the separatist and we're seizing your goods. Melting down all your weapons and shit, specifically. Love it.

Great. But I also feel like, is it a good sign? The separatists are like, man, we need to get, we need this junkyard. This is a strategic, like, yes, it is to punish Hondo. But also, this is a lot of forces being dedicated to being like. Also, they should have made it more direct. Hondo did run those guns to Anderon last episode. Yeah.

That did just happen. He has, and, and I feel like Grievous just has a list of Obi-Wan's shit. He's like, all right, fleet, check. Uh, illegal smuggling buddy, check. Knock that motherfucker off. Like, he has the whole list. He's going after everybody. Just that, that Honda's high on that list.

And so, yeah, this is, this is Duku, just like, yeah, ah, just have been deferring this, this, this vengeance. So we're going to do it all now, now and today. And, uh, Asoka uses this to sort of convince the other pirates. You can't deal with the separatists. They're going to kill, like, they're not going to buy the Jedi from you. By the way, this whole universe, there's a recurring problem of people just being unwilling to bargain in good faith or pay ransoms. There's a whole bunch of problems that are just like, the whole thing where, like,

Asoka being like, you know the Republic will never pay ransom for me. And I'm like, why not? It'd be cheap. It'd be just, of course they're going to pay ransom. Anakin will pay ransom for you, much less the Republic. We know those guys have black cards. Like, we've seen them not, they have money. I see this isn't a lot of Republic credits.

They have drugs. They paid him for the, they paid him for smuggling weapons. They're not going to pay them for you. You're a weapon. Like, yeah, it's absurd that we don't deal with the hostage chair. Of course you do. Of course you do that all the time. All the time.

All the time. The series opened with them hopping into bed with the huts. Right. This is the sort of thing that the Jedi must have done all the time before the war. All right. Here is a brief. case filled with credits, go get the hostage back. Yeah. You're not here to fight anybody. You're here to fight people

if they try to, like, you're there with a sword so that when you give the money, they give the hostage, not to like kill them. Yeah. That's, I'm sure the Jedi did this all the time. Yep. No, how, and that's the thing. The most lucrative thing, like, that Honda could do.

This is, this is the piracy business model. This is it. Is you just, you just take people's shit and sell it back to them. They are still the best market for it. it is not like I'm stealing the goods I'm going to go find a fence to go sell it no you just hijack someone's shipment

or you take their crew and then you're like you want these back I don't want to hurt them but like and of course they do of course they do anyway the same thing's going for the separatists where life would be easy if Dukun Grievous ever paid somebody

and actually paid them and not you'll get what's coming to you like that's the problem they're always in that mode right we're like you'll get your reward no just give them the reward I know it's always like this like promised thing like just do the transaction bro

like don't just gesture towards the fact that you y'all have trade federation do some trades like just do it just do it my favorite little beat during all this is that R2 is just out here and the droids don't understand that he's not one of their droids and they're just like uh where are you going with that

what's your number Art 2 fuck some people up in this in this art he like he defends the kids he's like he's doing good good shit

love that for him yeah he the only thing missing here is that he does not somehow find a group of droids to send to their death he does not perform the R2 signature move

yeah it's true he's saving his special it felt like with that with that little droid who was the sentry who was messing around with Artu and bullying

him, it felt like Artu maybe could have conned him into being like, go off here and get killed. But either way, like, the plan to infiltrate the base goes off without a hitch and here we get yet another yet another little

facet of Honda. They find him in the punishment torture thing where you sit in like a weird little like particle effect thing and you're being, it's bad. They don't have rope,

but it's better than rope in this world. Better than rope, better than chains. It's like a hologram. Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's great. And they sort of fill

Honda in on the plan and before he will help, he just needs to make sure that these kids know the magic has been in them all along. I'm like, what is happening? show Hondo you're ready to fight

He says the one's not confident Sabre's not built yet He's like She's like I've done everything I can I've put it together the right way but it doesn't work And Emmy award winning Hu Young is there And is like

If you have it all that's You put them all together The force will bind them like you just do it right And Honda's like That's what I was going to say just do it yeah why is the Honda like imparting like Jedi fucking

values well like the thing that's wild about the scene so she does it and like in the lead up he's like it'll be priceless for me to see a Jedi do this and then he sees it and he's like bowled over he's like wow

like you float the pieces together the force you know builds it you know this is it's like he's seeing a beautiful thing and we're supposed to like get this deep connection the soul of Honda even Honda is an immune

to such workings of the force. She's building a sword. From a kit. From a really simple kit. I think he's doing it for her. I think he's doing it for her. He's like, but why?

I don't know. Because they decided that he's like for some reason going to be this like father figure in this circumstance. But in my canon, Honda is like, I don't really give a fuck about all that.

But I need y'all to get your lightsaber's in your hands right now. you need to get off this fucking ship and you need to show me you can use that motherfucking thing so we can, I can go and scavenge the fuck out of your crash landing. Right. The exact thing that he ends up saying here,

Assoca calls him on this. It's like, why the big show, you didn't have to do that whole thing. Like, you know, we have to work together. This isn't a thing. I know this isn't a thing you fucking believe. And he goes like, because Jedi, you know what we are about to attempt is very dangerous. And I

might be a pirate, but I do not like taking children into battle. Bullshit. And the Soca says bullshit. Assook says like, you didn't, you just did this. You just attacked us. You were fine with that. And he's like, well, today is a new day.

And lucky for you, today I like children. It's like, what are you talking about? This is an admission of guilt. This is your honor. Fucking here's evidence. The writer's room has lost the plot. Lost the plot. Well, and here's the,

thing, it doesn't even, the thing. He's so random, you guys. Honda's just so random. This truly feels like maybe they did the first three episodes. Or like maybe they had another version of it. And then they were like, we can't let Honda be that mean. It has to have a positive resolution. It has to have like, Hondo and them have to work together somehow, whatever. And then they had to like ham fist it into this positive Hondo, like, Papa figure ending for some. It feels. so disjointed. It's like

whiplash going between the beginning and end of this arc. The thing, so here's the thing. Here's the other way they're blowing this. So where Honda goes to that is I don't like taking children in a battle. No, no, no. That's not actually what the scene accomplished.

What he did was convince the group of children they could be effective soldiers. And the subversion of the scene that works is him being like what we're doing is incredibly dangerous and the odds of these kids surviving are very low but they have to believe they're up for this. Yep. Like this is, he's like, this is what we're doing. I don't want them

to cut and run. We need them to swing those lightsabers around. Back on board. And it could have been a moment where it's like, hey, Jedi, I am reflecting what you do back. You do this. Yes, exactly. Yeah. Like like, you know, where, you know, so we could respond sort of shock that he'd be so cynical. It's like, what do you think your masters have been teaching you for this entire time? Like, the entire thing is about, like, convincing kids that, like, they can do this and should, that they should be eager to run into the cannon's mouth.

Yeah. Is this so different than what, you know, you were already doing as their teacher? Right. I mean, not at all. This feels in line with how the Jedi order is preparing, like, especially with the context of the Jedi are declining, their younglings are harder to find. Like, yes, you are going to be imparting false. and you are in war?

Like when Hu Yang says the whole line about lightsaber's being Jedi's the only true ally of a Jedi, he's saying it in the context of the Clone Wars. He like says when we were in the wars of something, something, and then the peacekeeping of this thing, and now our Clone Wars, like the lightsaber is the true ally of the Jedi.

100% like these kids are being fucking manipulated to believe that they're capable soldiers from you know quite a young age and Hondo playing into that is

that's great bullshit Hondo characterization I think it's like it's actually makes him very seem very apt and like aware of what the the dynamics at hand um especially because I feel

looming over this is I couldn't stop thinking about Nadar Vib from like season one in all this, which is a kid they rushed forward. Kit Fistow's pattern on turn Jedi night. The little Moncal kid who like is already freaked out and exhausted by war and is so desperate

to fight grievous just to get out of this. That's Petro. Yeah that is like all these, this is what a waste these kids is like yeah, no, you're ready. You're totally ready to fight a massive... Sorry, what awaits these kids is Anakin Skywalker's Red Lightsever.

So don't worry about it so much. He doesn't have the Red Lightsever yet at that point, but still, they're not going to make it to war. They're going to make it to murder. It's worth saying, this is a, this, I just have to double check. This whole arc is written by one person, so any of the, like, inconsistencies around Honda don't, they might, you know, maybe that's the edit,

maybe that's supervising director Dave Filoni coming in and making tweet. Who knows what the production is, but the bass scripts were all written by Christian Taylor, who also wrote the Mortis arc, who also wrote the Lux and Death Watch episode. He has one more arc coming, it looks like, and then some bad batch stuff. And, you know, I, as a writer, I had this image in my mind of this dude listening to our podcast and being, like, cringing as we, like, say his name out loud and, like, diss him. This is the thing, right? Sometimes you just don't, your, your taste does not align with the writers, with what a writer's, you know, impulses are. And mine just do not. These are all misses.

To be fair, it aligned with most people's. Right. Totally. Hondo's on fucking lunchboxes were still a thing. Yeah. I have, we, shout us to the people who love Honda. I love many of them. They are my friends.

We're back on the fuck Hondo train, though. You really got on. of the edge there. You gotta get this guy out of here. Maybe next time he'll be great again. I don't know. Maybe. Right.

It's totally possible for them to make an arc where I like Hondo. See, this is the friend group now debriefing. It is. After giving him a second chance. Maybe we need, okay, we can't go to the bar with Hondo,

but we go to the movies. Where you don't have to talk to him. You'll just sit in silent. We can go to Applebee's. It has a bar, but it's not a bar. Do you know what I mean? He's not going to start any shit at the Applebee. Yeah, you're not going to get fucked up by Applebee.

He's going to get a fucking $3. Long Island iced tea. Five of those in. You're going to be like, why do we invite Honda? No, no, we wanted to play Smash Brothers after this. Now we invited him. We can't un-invite him when we got to go back to the house. I'm not letting this man into my house.

I'm not splitting another check with Honda. I'm not doing it. He won't tip. He doesn't tip. He says it. You have to, you have. You have to do it for him. You give extra for him.

Yeah, yeah. We can only do prefix meals from now on, and we just have to lie about how much it is. We have to build the tip in. Yeah. It's too much work to invite him. It's like, no, we can't do Applebee's. They got waitresses, don't they? So that's not going to work.

It's got to be a self-serve situation. Oh. Only Sizzler. Only Sizzler. We go to Sizzler with Honda. I go to, you know. Okay, well, Hanno, I think Sizzler might work out. Sizzler?

Sizzler, I think, both. Yeah. That's the vibe. Yeah. That's the vibe with Hondo. Anyway, they fight the robots. They fight the droids. Asoka has a cool fight with Grievous. She holds her own.

Yeah, she holds her own. Honda reveals that he has a secret stash of ships. At one point, the young is like, there's definitely, or maybe Osceau's like, Hondo's a pirate? Where are his ships? He doesn't have the one flying saucer ship And everyone is like Yeah, he has a secret collection somewhere

And that somewhere ends up being I don't know if it's actually Anakin's ship But it's that it's the twilight It's that model of ship that Anakin always flies in this show Crashed into a fucking mountain And then underneath it is a fake wall And it's behind the fake wall Is a hanger where the slave one is

Where Boba Fetch future ship is From when Asoka Cut it out of the fucking sky In season two or three during the Bobafet or a sing arc this is like in fact in fact also there's that whole chase scene through the like

Sonic 2 looking tube thing and that was in the ors sing chases Asoka through that same place I think that there's like a fun continuity of location there it's cool to be on floor and be like oh yeah this place

rhyme yeah huh this is Ryan's rhyming and so he takes slave one he tries to shoot grievous with slave one but first he almost leaves he does almost sleep But then, what's your name with the big eyes and like

the trembling lip, Catoony. Catoony. He's like, no, like, you can't, you wouldn't, you wouldn't believe him. And he's like, you couldn't become a pirate like us. You could come on board. You'd be like a Jedi pirate. Cotunie, go. This is the best like, here's their thing, though. If all those kids are like, fuck it, we want to go

be pirates, guess what, Honda just saved the Hondo is going to be like the foundation of the future Jedi order. That's the next Jedi order. Yeah. Or there's a cool schism, where he's like their anti-Pope. Right. And like, yeah, he's a true pirate gray Jedi. Oh, shit.

That? Okay, I'm back on. Oh, my God. I'm back on the imaginary train. I'll meet you on the Forbes with this Honda-O-A-U because it's not happening in the show. Anyway, he shows up with Slave 1. The young wings all jump on board. Soka holds off Grievous

and a 1v1 holds her own Doesn't get the dub But the dub is actually the kid's getting away So I think it's kind of like she gets the dub But it's not over it's not a victory Do you know what I mean? Grievous gets so angsty Then

Jokrified Laughing into the sky As we pull off the planet Honda doesn't get an easy kill It's an easy kill He has a specialies a fucking spaceship Pointed at Grievous Can't line up a shot

he's like he's like he does a little damage and then they're just like oh let's go yeah the tanks show up I get burned through all his good roles during the part where they charge out of the pirate base yeah seen of them all like tag teaming like the droid army and Jedi and the pie and the little pirates are all working together and it's cute but also like kind of cool but then yeah he flies off and he takes he takes all the younglings to obiwan's new ship RIP to that crew. Good luck. The track record's getting pretty bad.

I used to think that the worst thing that could happen is you end up working like Darth Vader on like the spaceship because he just burns through people. No, sorry, he only kills a few, like a handful of flag officers in that entire series. Meanwhile, Obi-Wan is out here just like burning through like decades worth of ship construction. It's basically like five minutes. And like blowing, like his first move, he's like, this battle's over. Time to activate self-destructed. He's like, what?

He's like, sorry, we're already on a five-minute countdown. Better get to the escape pods. But I left a sassy message. Speaking of sassiness, Hondo wants to file a expense report. Yeah, Honda. And everyone just agrees. They're like,

Pondo, it's classic. Yeah, like, Obi-Wad is like, weren't you just, you know, didn't you just trying to kidnap how you're spinning this basically is what he says

and Honda's just like yep that's right I'll send the invoice this guy's done I don't understand how the Jedi come across

looking like punks here at this point or I mean I guess at the end of the day they're like better to have him on our side

sort of kind of than not yeah I mean he has been he is a useful tool for them when he's like utilized in

the last time we saw him to like deliver you know to be this like quote unquote neutral uh uh entity that can deliver mass weapons but he was going to kill these kids he was going to kill them well he was at least going to sell them no because like okay here's the thing imagine what happens here is he get let's say he doesn't even kidnap them but if he disables the ship gets the crystals leaves ships disabled communications are down Obi-Wan knows where they are

but can't get to them because of how he gets his ass beat they starve to death in space or no they've landed on Florham and then join the circus for real and that's the rest of their lives that's the rest of their lives oh so my AUs are bad but yours

I have a final philoni quote I don't have a zone this is from an interview with I want to say I don't remember this is Star Wars.com or IGN or what is Star Wars.com. This is just about the whole thing. I think that one of the things

when we set out to make the Youngling's arc was that I was very concerned in the beginning that it could get cheesy so quickly. Oh, don't. Don't. Don't worry, but I tried to focus on movies I really liked as a kid. One of them would be the goonies, one of them would have been explorers, even stuff like the Lost Boys, where you see young people doing heroic things.

There's a certain easy believability about it, and part of it, you definitely credit to the actors in it. I thought we had a chance in our story to do a sort of Pinocchio thing, which is an escalation of how bad things get for these kids. Hondo comes out, and he's dangerous, but he's also very funny. That's one type of villain. He's kind of like the tricky fox. He might eat you, but there's something in it for him. But if there's something in it for him, he'll string you along. I think something that really works about.

the story arc is you begin with a very magical moment for these kids by themselves, where the threat is only within themselves, and then you move on to the next stage is a type of external threat, but it's really a selfish threat motivated by trying to make money, and Honda and the pirates are funny, but threatening, and I think the kids are able to deal with them to some degree. It's only when they're really on their own, and when they go to confront that by themselves and trick Honda in a very carnival kind of way, and it reminds you a little bit of Dumbo, that then real evil comes knocking on the door, and the the form of General Grievous. It's kind of interesting to see them grow up over four episodes so quickly, and even to the effect that they make one of the would-be villains, Hondo, not act like a villain later. When Grievous shows up, it reminds us all that this guy is just an evil-murtering thing. There's no negotiating with this guy. I think that's why it really works. The kids and the actors that portrayed them really sold us on their, at times, naiveness and cleverness, without being too far over the top. I tried to do some rewrites and direct a lot of it through action. The opening of Part 4, where they have the tank chase, none of that

was in the script that way at all. In the original script, the kids are being chased on a tank by a tank, and a stray shot flew over their tank and hit the crucible, and it blew up. The characters on that ship all died, and while the younglings were out there, they then got captured themselves because they had no ship to escape on. They saw Grievous's fleet fly overhead, and the planet just abandoned them out there. Or the pirates just abandoned them out there. They meet up with the pirates later. Those were all the original beats of the outline and the original script followed it, but I thought that we hadn't had a big action set piece in a while when I looked out of this one 88-minute movement, and I knew that the middle

part of the episode was going to be a lot of talking and deliberating about how they were going to get past grievous. So I took a page out of something George and I had been talking about, which was expressing a lot of character through action. He and I'd been talking a lot about Indiana Jones at the time. Two things keep coming to my mind, the truck escape in Raiders, and then the fight on top of that tank and last crusade. So I took it all, and I quickly rewrote it, beat as, you know, they're in this tank and they call for help and they get the ship up in the air. It just seemed to create a better cascading problem, which is something George was definitely going over with me. You have your heroes, uh, you have your heroes in a

problem and it continues to get worse. So I really wanted to express that. It gives you such a speed off the bat and then when something goes wrong, it all goes wrong at once. The fact that in the original draft, their ship blew up and all of the characters on the ship died is wild. Who was on that B1 chip? It's Hu Yong, right? And it's, uh, R2 wouldn't have died there. Obviously. Right.

So they must have imagined different characters, maybe? Kootuni is on there? One of the Younglegs dies? I don't know. They kill, they would have killed the kid? Hmm. Maybe all the kids get, that's how Filoni says it. I don't know.

Interesting. How does Yoda get out? Oh, he took his own ride. Yeah, remember Yoda was already there. Yoda was there before Asoka showed up with the kids. Yoda has his own little ship. Remember the little skate pod from... Oh, right, right?

His private jet. Yeah, yeah, yeah. His private rookie jet. Yeah. How did he, did he not see, like, Asoka get fucking jumped? Like, you imagine, like, Yoda, she's, like, chilling in the pod, like, floating away, seeing Asoka's fucking shit. And he's like, ah.

on you this is on you this is handle it you will vacation I have yeah sabbatical I am on yeah I don't know I don't hate these episodes

no I mean look they were they were like fun filler is kind of how it felt to me kind of sloppy oh one last thing let the droid tell his story about Yoda's lightsaber

agrees, agreed. Everyone shut the fuck up and let him Oh, Obi-Wan, we don't have time for that. Oh, what are you going to do? You need to go throw another fleet away? No, we need to hear this story. Literally, I wanted to kill Obi-Wan in that moment. I was like, you shut,

you shut the fuck up right now. Right fucking now. All I want to hear about is Yoda being like one billion years ago getting a lightsaber. Please. Droid, how the fuck did this guy take all this over? You know, you know this is what happened here.

But also, by the way. That droid has so much teeth. Like, we need to, he needs to come on another mission. Like, I want, he's, in the next time we get a Q&A that's like, who do you want to bring on a flight? It's fucking who yang. I have questions for you. Yeah. There's also a point where the droid, as he's like getting in the high, like, in the high dudgeon,

I suppose, at one point it stops being a thousand years and at one point he says, I have taught a thousand generations of Jedi. And it's like, whoa! And I don't think that's true, but I do feel like it's the sort of thing where he's just like, oh, I'm so mad, I'm so mad.

You know what, fuck it, a thousand generations of Jedi. I'm now the Tom Bombadil of Star Wars. God. I love him. You know, in...

You only says he was on the ship for a thousand years. Maybe he has... There is another... There is one other Luke in Rise of Skywalker says to Ray, we've passed on all we know, a thousand generations live in you now. But this is your fight.

Who young's been there since the jump? Who young's been there since day one? A thousand generations. If he says a thousand generations exactly, that to me, That means that somewhere there is a book, there is a data cube, there is a holocron that says there have been 1,000 generations since the Jedi Order was started. For both of those things to say exactly 1,000 generations? Yeah, that is interesting.

He's been on the ship for a thousand years. Yeah, that's true. He's mentioned in some High Republic books. I'm looking him up now. He's mentioned in some High Republic books. and... It's in the canon Wikipedia. It says a thousand generations.

Yeah. A thousand generations? I'm like, oh my God, I won't hang out with him. That Disney Plus series is going to be incredible. What's David Tennant doing these days? Doesn't matter. He's going to be... He, people...

Get a primetime Emmy. So, there was a leaked image from the Asoka show at the Star Wars celebration I've pasted it in chat Let's go There he is Let's fucking go

That's him Let's fucking go That's him That's him He's in an Asoka novel Apparently He's in the book Assoca They become bros?

They're hanging out. If he becomes like the C3PO of the Asoka show, like he's just around, like that. I'm into it. I'm into it. I want that. Yes. Is that it? Is that our episode on these arcs?

What's up next, Rob? Oh, got it. We're in for a doozy, I think. We are in for a doozy. We are in for a doozy. We are in a source of cooler. Because we are, I'm so excited for the episode after this episode. I'm so excited for everything left in this arc or in this season, but the episodes are secret weapons, a sunny day in the void, missing in action, point of no return.

Allie, what are you going to say? Oh, well, this is like a droid arc, right? It is. Some droids out and about. It is some droids out and about a bunch of different types of droids. I'm keeping my expectations extremely low. I know that there is one of these episodes is about, I believe, has a clone with an interesting name. in it um one of them a sunny day in a void i saw like 12 seconds of animation for and was like

where the fuck are they and i mean where they are is a sunny day in the void and it just looks and i heard philoni say basically like this is a ridiculous episode i didn't think we could do this this looks this has like such a strange it's a strange idea for an episode for him um because it's about droids and philosophy apparently it's having full soft of discussions so So I'm excited. It's all I know. And then, yeah, I do know that there is a... I'm very curious about a clone who shows up in one of these, I guess, is the third one of these.

That's all I don't know anything really about him, other than I know his mask is based on a hockey player's mask. It's based on a goalie mask after Jerry Cheever's Boston Bruins' gold tender. So you'll see. Well, you'll see. So that's in two weeks Yeah, four episodes And then we are And then

We are in it after that Oh man, who will fall Who will fall? This is This is Not Embo He fell out of the story He fell out of the story

Yeah I mean Embo will still show out The season I just don't know to what degree Also This is the Emmy Award winning season The first Emmy Award winning season Not just for David Tennant

As He Yang Who Yang deserves an award I don't know that David Tennant Does Yeah, I agree. I like who Yang is a character a lot. I guess I don't know who else was up that year. So maybe he was better than, but I don't think he's better than some key clone wars.

Yeah. It's just surprising after like a three episodes or two or three, I guess. Two episodes. Yeah. It's surprising. Come on. It's strange to me. It seems like for them to put up this episode as their,

as their Emmy one just seems really weird to me like I know how I feel about my expectations for the rest of the season I would have high expectations the rest of the season I remember they didn't know

the season won for best show but Tenant won for best voice acting in a cartoon or whatever so it's just how award shows go I wonder if that was part of the contract I wonder if part of the contract was like, and you'll submit me for awards. For sure.

Oh, sure. Do you know what I mean? Yeah. Maybe it's like a normal clause in his contract. His agents worked it out that like, if I do something, you have to submit me. I can see that. I can see that. And maybe it's like, maybe he didn't take a big paycheck, but he was like, yeah, say I should win an award for it.

We'll see if we win the award. I get the nomination. Maybe they'll nominate me. What are we up against Cora? So, I don't know that this is a better show than Cora. I'm surprised this season beat a Cora season. I'm not. Fucking show.

Interpret that how you will, listeners. All I'm saying is Zahir did nothing wrong. The Red Lotus are right. There should be no kings. I'm with you. These are my Cora feelings. I'm with you. All right, so in two weeks

We've got that arc to look forward to And of course, at the end of this month We'll be discussing that And this arc on our Patreon backer Q&A And if you just want to hear that Or you want to support the show, you can do so at patreon.com slash civilized Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait,

Before we finish the podcast episode This is awesome from the future of when we recorded the podcast episode You know Yeah, that's the sound of my time machine That was it I have Oh, we're here

We're here back in front of our own microphones Talking to ourselves I brought back with me The trailer for Andor Which dropped Whoa I love the commitment to the bit Natalie

I'm not committing crimes with Natalie Why not? I'm sorry, officer, we cannot go to separate interrogation rooms. I would be so good. I would be totally fine. I would say all the good, correct things, and we would go free immediately. That's how it works. You just do the project words.

Your prince were all over the murder weapon, little lady. No way! What? What? All right. It's not epic. It's not epic. Speaking of doing crime,

we should watch this trailer for Andor Who has seen it? Who has not? Not me, I was good No one else has seen it. I have not stayed pure But I only but I only like had it on I didn't like close look So that's fair, that's fair All right

Ready? Yes Three, two, one, go Oh Uh huh? Mountains Rogue one was great Yeah, dog

We need to go back. Bro, let's go. Star Destroyer over the fucking mountains. Yeah. That's a menacing little ditty. Yeah. You just walk in like you belong. Oh, no, Frodo.

Steal from the Empire. You just walk in like you belong. So fat and satisfied. They can't imagine. Not someone like me. Who would ever get inside their house? Let's go. Let's...

Let's fucking go. The Empire is choking us so slow. Is that a scar's card? I think it is. We're starting not to notice. What I'm asking is this. Wouldn't you rather give it all to something real? True.

True. I would. I need all the heroes I can get. For the greater good. Oh, fuck yeah. Oh, fuck yeah. Let's fucking go. Let's call it.

Let's fucking go. Let's fucking go. Hell yes. It's fermenting out there, so. Pockets are fermenting. You're in my net. Oh. Are you a fish?

Or are you a thief? You're slipping. Oh, I love to be on Khorasant where politics happen. Yes. I love to be in the Imperial Senate. There's a good chance they'll miss what I'm really doing. What are you really doing? Yo.

Yo. This is what revolution looks like. I'm tired of Lucy. Bro, same. Dude. It's a good trailer. Yeah. It's a good fucking trailer.

Three episode premiere, September 21st. Uh, hello? What the fuck? That looks so sick. I'm so tight. You know that show I often wish the Clone Wars was? Well, it's all grown up now, and it looks like this. And it's probably going to disappoint us in surprising ways, but I'm excited for it right now.

The vibes are like on, though. The vibes are fucking on. First of all, that music was wild. Yes. The like creepy, like children vibe. Like it's so, it feels like how Rogue One felt so different from everything else. Like it felt so against. Everybody feels touchable.

Like everybody feels like they. could get got in this in a way that's like excited. I mean, we know and or will not because of he has to go do Rogue 1 later, but everybody else this looks so much better from like a first watch. I mean, for any of the

other, like when we watch the Obi-Wan trailer, but for LobaFet, like it's like, okay, like we'll see how this goes, we'll see you know, it looks interesting. But this was just like bangor after banger after banger, like Cut, cut, cut,

holy shit. What is going on? Can I tell you a couple of, one big thing is they built sets for this. They shot this at real places. This is none of it was shot at the wall. None of it was shot with the shit from

Mandalorian, unlike all their other shows. So. Bob of that was airless because of that one version. Yep. I think it worked really well in the first season, or sorry, I think it worked really well in Mandalorian season one.

I think it still basically worked in two. I think by the time I got to Boba Fett it felt like I could you could feel the sound stage you know but it wasn't even a real sound stage right like it's so I'm here for

I like all this shit with with the high part of the Mon Mothma at parties secretly building a resistance like this is the shit I'm talking about this is what we want to see when they announced the show I was like why are we doing this

and now I've watched this trail and now I'm like I really want to watch it though it looks fucking good like well it's so funny go ahead Rob well I was just gonna say like the the elements of this that are like so we've been watching a lot

of La Carre adaptations and so if you like corrupt posh British people and I do like scheming and revealing the bankruptcy

of their political and moral system then I'm all the way in like this sounds that's the show was like that's not the only dish on the menu you, but

it's in the mix. He showed me some things I like. That's the thing is someone I know today was like, why is this an Andor show? Because only like a third of this is

casting an Andor. It's mostly Luton building this group. It's Mon Mothema on Corrassant in the fucking Senate, which like the Imperial era Senate, I'm so excited to see.

Because remember, it exists. Go ahead. Yeah. It looks so good. It looks so, fucking scary and good and like huge and all the ship designs are good being in the caves or saw is good seeing riots in the streets is good well and is he like it looks like he might

join up to infiltrate like he might yeah he joins the imperial service so that he can undermine it that's what it seems like um but is he being sent in for that is that just the thing he's naturally done we don't know. Also, it's maybe just a random association, but the whole, like, the scene where he's in what looks like a breakers yard. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It reminds me my favorite sequence in Jedi Order where we get a look at the galaxy between the wars,

where it's like this is an empire that is, to a large degree, also built on scrapping the remnants of the last regime and the war that was fought. And so that, like, beyond these, like, glittering set, like imperial cores, have a galaxy that is a wasteland in a lot of ways, which is a thing

I dig. That village, the large village set is literally built on the grounds of a former quarry in Little Marlowe, Buckingham Shire, Buckinghamshire, Buckinghamshire, Buckinghamshire, probably that. Not far from Pinewood Studios. So it was like filmed...

Well, I hope this show gets a mature rating, so it's the... It's fuckingham Shire. Oh, okay. Yeah, that's good. Uh-huh. But yes, literally in an old quarry, literally near real big dams and stuff. Like, I think that we're going to get some of that good industrial,

imperial era, you know, exploitation of nature that we love to see. Yes, 100%. A hundred percent. Anyway, I'm in. It also just like the shots feel very, like not very Star Warsy in a way. Like some of it does, but I think some of these perspectives, like, I don't know, this like close up on, uh, is this monothma crying?

Yeah, I think that's her. Like, that's, it's just so, I don't know, it feels very. Oh, that's not my mouth on that lady's a little too old. I don't know who that is, though. Oh, okay. Okay, yeah, I miss that. I'm like, I'm like scrubbing. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

I get you. But, um, but it just feels like. like, in the way that I think when I first watched the Obi-Wan trailer, I was like, oh, this feels gritty, but I knew I was reaching. But I was like, it feels gritty in comparison to

maybe like other stuff. But this actually feels, it's like very polished, but it feels like, it seems like it's going to be a grittier story. I don't know. This is kind of cool. Genevieve O'Reilly, the actress

of the plays Mimava, is who they had voice the character in Oh, sick. Oh, huh. Which they almost never do. They never do that. Usually, oh, we're going to shoot this on screen? Punt!

Yeah. And who was the voice after? That's fun. God, I'm excited to get to Rebels. I like, I know that Rebels is going to look uglier than wherever Clone Wars ends up, and I know it's going to have issues that I'm frustrated by. But I'm excited.

I'm excited to get out of the Clone Wars and into that period of Star Wars history, you know, so soon, soon. Yeah. And this first. This is, yeah, I'm running this on a repeat right now And it's just like all of the costume design is great All of the mechanical design rules

This goofy set where Andor is talking to Luthin It just like there's chains hanging everywhere And like a, I'd love it great Wherever that is great I'm just like please make Star Wars stuff That isn't just fucking shot at that one studio And it literally isn't shot there at all So

I'm starting about this like Light does things Real light does things. Sorry. It reminds me of, like, so we got a brief glimpse of a woman being chased through the streets by patrols and being brought to a halt. But, like, a thing that I think, like, in the Boba show, like, one reason that people didn't like the moped gang is partly that it was just kind of chinty. It was like, we're the downtrodden little waifs. But there's no, nothing has weight, nothing has any sort of kind of rhyme or, like, physical being.

And here, like, in every shot, that stuff is everywhere, right? Like, the buildings are tumbled down. The outfits are, like, cool, but also, like, reasonable, like... I just realized they're really good outfit detail, too. At 123, when these fucking Imperials are coming in at the quarry workers, uh, pause at 123 and look at how the quarry workers are dressed. in the oranges and the whites this is this is proto

rebel garb right like that motherfucker is going to be yes a hundred percent like it's rebel alliance is the work it's the fucking workers maybe you know you went from you went from salvaging whatever this big fucking I don't know ship part is

to needing to like pilot the next wing that's that's rebel colors love it great let's see it I love this moment with the two Imperials like taking a sip from their their mugs

at the exact same time like it's like slightly comedic but it's also like I don't know it feels like out of out of character for it's like so on the nose but in a way that's like

really really fun to watch God I'm excited and it's also going to be fun so like we spent now a year and a half in they're like okay let's analyze the

fall of this character and the fall of this republic. I'm excited for a show that's like the moment before the empire gets sort of plunged off its own cliff. Right. Again, like the Senate exists here, right? Yeah. Like, it's an important thing about this. So my, so it's, I'm looking at casting and stuff. The first season has over 200 named cast members and 6,000 extras. That's very fun. There are multiple seasons It's going to be a two-season show Okay, here we go

First season begins five Okay, I guess like Spoilers from the Wikipedia page Just about the structure of the show Yeah The first season begins five years before Rogue One And tells one year of Andor's story When he first becomes a revolutionary

The next four years are then covered By the second season Which leads directly into the events of the film So Interesting That's interesting God This is interesting

Gilroy Gilroy states This guy gave his life for the galaxy, right? I mean, he consciously, soberly, without vanity or recognition, sacrificed himself. Who does that? So that's, I'm excited.

This all sounds good. Describes him as kind of a mess in season one. Love it. Great. Can't wait. Also, Diego Luna is just extraordinarily hot. So, oh, yeah.

Come on. Not to even get into Alicia Vikander. and Diego Luna in a show together looking fucking good that is a scars guard that's Stellan Scarsguard

so good call in the Scarsguard catch Rob all right that was good I'm glad we came back for this I'm really excited by this so curious and so they said that

so they've delayed the the release day correct and they're now releasing it with three episodes. Three episodes on September 21st. Yeah. And how long is the season? It's 12 episodes.

It goes through the end of November. Yum, yum, yum, yum, yum. Yeah, that's juicy. That's juicy. That's a show. Very Merry Christmas around here. Oh, I'm excited.

I hope it's good. I think so. My only stuff, there's stuff that could be here about clones, I guess. But I don't think, We watched Rogue One. We know what happens.

Like, we know, I can't imagine this being, you know, we know what happens with Saul. We know what happens with these characters. So, it was my mom off my. I do think that is a thing that, not that the ultimate destination of stories, of characters, means that a origin story is necessarily inert. But, like, I am curious how they're going to increasingly deal with the fact that, like, there are certain there are certain

just set endings for some of this they're like and I think it's less of an issue here because the original sequel original trilogy is so terrific like it all goes in cool places you know Rogue 1 is cool but you know like I think the thing that

Mandalorian and Bobafat are kind up against is as cool as they make this intermediate stage between the sequel trilogy and where they're at now like we also know that at certain points some of the just absolute

silliest shit is going to happen and so I am curious to see how they start building out more of a sense of stakes and more of a sense of like there being a galaxy that's bigger than this handful of planets right

the other thing is it can if you just say well the ultimate fate of all this is covered in the original trilogy that could create there's only so much you can do with like dramatic irony but if you sort of build out the sense of

well even regardless of what happens in the imperial core and tattooing the two the two flavors of Star Wars place that there's a galaxy beyond that I think you can do good work opening up the setting and creating like greater possibility for stakes and narrative within it

yeah I'm I think that there's space here, and I think that it's largely around the fact that obviously Andorra and Montmotham are known quantities, but there's lots of space for other characters to get invested in. In the same way that in the main show, we're talking in Clone Wars,

we're very invested in Asoka now. After seasons and seasons of her being kind of disappointing, she's really found her, her groove in a way that, like, we're invested in whatever her future is, what her relationship is to the Jedi Order, et cetera. I think there's lots of room for that to be the focal point here, given that we know where Rogue One goes. We know where that story goes, right?

So we know where Star Wars goes from there. So I don't know. And also, like, there is a treat here. It is just nice to have a treat. It is nice to have, like, my Star Wars investment isn't just about plot stuff. It's often about mechanical design, cool new alien planets, seeing familiar things, you know, with a new coat of paint.

And, like, it's one of the, the only things in the world that I'm like that for. Like, I'm not that person for many things, but, like, seeing a cool ship battle in this show is going to rip, you know? Yeah. Seeing the colors of the rebels in these salvage workers made me go, like, yo.

And, like, that's, I'm happy to have an, I think, if it does that stuff well, like, that's enough for me. This imperial lady who seems to be evil, I mean, Imperial lady that seems to be evil, but seems to be, like, really, like, chewing the scenery evil, leaning forward and,

interrogating people. Yeah, let's go. I'm here for it. This is an opera I know well. I want to see it performed well. I think that it doesn't need to develop. I don't need to be surprised by world-shattering. I don't need a galactic twist.

I don't need like, well, secretly, so-and-so was in charge or whatever. You know what I mean? I just want to see Star Wars executed well. That's it. Like, just do it like good quality. Like, just give us good stuff. I don't need, if anyone, well, actually, of course they're going to say the word Palpatine. This is the thing.

He's here, right? He's going to show up, right? This is what I was about to ask. Do we think we get the Mon Mothma steps into a room and Ian McDermott is there and Sheave is there? And he's like, oh, I didn't see you. Come in. Take a seat. You know, and like.

That would be the twist, I think. It's just like he's involved. Yeah. Like, that's not going to come out. I think in any, maybe like the like, you know, launch trailer or something like that. They'll have like a sheave moment. but I think that will that's my bet

is that that will be like the twist of the season like the wild cameo of like what? I mean, of course he's there. He's leading the empire right now. The thing that's

notable that he's not. Mamma realizes they're all being gasped because she finds a picture of and the proofs he didn't always look like a little fucked up frog. God. Yeah, I guess he's a fucked up little frog by now, right?

But like she knew him before that anyway. A frog. She's in... She's in... Yeah, this is post-revention the Sith, right? It's post... Tertalitarian isn't those crazy things to... It does.

People like... Yeah. What do you mean? Yeah. God. Like, man... ...my very self-conscious. Well, that's part of his rise, right?

Isn't he like, the Jedi attacked me and I'm fucked up now... Oh, I should be the leader of the nation. And they're like, oh, it feels so bad for you. Please create an empire. fire. He needs it. He needs to throw up powers. Fuck.

Oh, no. I have to say, okay, as the person on this podcast who's watched Obi-Wan, I think the thing that seems most exciting for me here, like what we've talked about in terms of just like this looking well-produced, I think this story also feels like it's detached enough from like major plays. players that it's not going to be a thing where it's like we got to get the quote in, you know

what I mean? Like, Saucarera doesn't have like a... Right. He's not going to say you use the force or whatever the thing is. No one has said I have a bad feeling about this in a while. Yeah. Yeah. In Clone Wars.

You're right. And I hope obviously nobody... Andorra's going to say it in the first episode. He's going to say it right away. Sheave will say it. Oh, that would be great. Oh, yeah. But that's good because he should have a bad feeling. Rebels coming. Let's go. Oh, true.

You know, he's all. I don't care how many little ewes got in tank. We're going to get all of them. All right. I think that that should do it probably. He should probably end this podcast with this little bonus and we'll be back soon. Thank you for the treat. Yum.

Delicious. Until next time, please rate and review us on your podcast platform of choice. And, you know, just remember, whenever Honda does something gross, or even evil, probably doesn't mean it. Just goose. Just goose. Just goose and gags.

I'm going to be able to be.