Clone Wars Season 4

[Vader]

Well i have just watched the latest ep and boy it was superb, so much great action and storytelling.

Really cant wait for the next episode now, speaking of which heres a link to the preview:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2mRH2h51hPw&feature=channel_video_title

[mutley777]

As Vader said another excellent episode! This will probably be my favourite series todate the way things are going.

I did think this was going to be the end for Ventress and almost wish it was. Her character seems to be at end now with so many failed missions.

[Vader]

I did think this was going to be the end for Ventress and almost wish it was. Her character seems to be at end now with so many failed missions.

I agree, she has started to become rather boring now for me. But i can still see her surviving whilst other characters like Savage Opress being killed off first, we know that these last four eps are linked and i cannot see Maul, Opress and Ventress all making it out alive.

I have a nasty feeling that both Maul and Opress will die before Ventress.

[DoubleT]

Some interesting news is out today: Simon Pegg Will Be Dengar in the final of this season.
Pegg is know from Star Trek (Scotty), various cult movies and was last seen in the latest Mission Impoosible movie.

Click here to see a new clip with Pegg as Dengar:

http://insidetv.ew.com/2012/02/29/star-wars-clone-wars-simon-pegg-dengar/

[Vader]

Some interesting news is out today: Simon Pegg Will Be Dengar in the final of this season.

Mate this ep is not the last in this season, we still have another 2 eps after this one with the return of Savage Opress and Darth Maul

[DoubleT]

Well im sorry... but its still cool news

[casewiggles]

Well im sorry... but its still cool news

I'll drink to that, I'd love to see the real Pegg's likeness for Dengar, be hilarious.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z5W8EBHNsLc

[Vader]

Here is another preview for next fridays 'brothers' ep:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UpYfMvsuGTo&feature=channel_video_title

[Vader]

Well season 4 is now over, it's been quite the ride with some excellent episodes and the last two dealing with Darth Mauls return are two of the best IMO.

After watching part one of Mauls return i was very worried that part two would be rushed, after all part two would feature Maul, Savage, Obi Wan and Ventress in a major duel. Due to the fact that only one of those characters seemed to survive till ROTS, my money was on someone not making it out alive.

Anyway i don't want to spoil things for anyone waiting to see the ep, so ill just say that the ep wasn't rushed and was really good and it leaves things open for season 5. I just hope we see this story continued at the start of season 5 and that we don't have to wait for another year for the outcome.

[mutley777]

This really has been a great season! Well on par with the fantastic second season! As Vader said the final 2 Maul episodes were great and left things nicely open for the next season.

Next season will see the series go over the valuable 100 episodes mark, so I wonder how many more we can expect? As long things stay at this kind of standard I will be pretty happy! Roll on season 5!

[casewiggles]

I was worried about Maul's return but they've handled it pretty damn well, really enjoyed the last episode. They didn't pull any punches with him killing off that whole village and I'm glad, as Vader said, that it'll continue into series 5.

I thought the animation in this episode was top notch, the flames behind Maul in the village being particularly impressive.

Always good to see Obi-Wan get screen time too, he's by far more interesting than Anakin and he was never given much to do in the prequal trilogy. Although I'd have thought him being a Master now he could easily batter Maul but I suppose that would have been too boring.

Have to watch the other odd episodes I missed but it has be a terrific series!

[Vader]

New info about season 5 and Maul from an interview with Dave Filoni:

Everyone knows the name George Lucas. He's the guy who created the "Star Wars" universe. A name that is quickly becoming as recognizable is that of Dave Filoni, supervising director of "Star Wars: The Clone Wars." He's the man responsible for making sure the animated version of "a Galaxy Far, Far Away" runs like a well-oiled probe droid week after week. I had the opportunity to talk to Filoni about the return of Darth Maul and what we can expect from him in this week's episode and the future.

Tell us a little bit about what fans can expect from the episode tonight?

You're going to get to see the full rehabilitation of Darth Maul from his rather chaotic state as this machine man turns into a more formidable opponent that in some ways the fans might have expected originally. We're going to see how he can recover from the state we found him in last week and ultimately how his revenge fuels himself into a confrontation with Obi-Wan Kenobi.

There was a comic book back when "Star Wars: Episode III-Revenge of the Sith" came out that had Darth Maul alive and on Tatooine. Did that have any influence on the direction you moved in when bringing the character back?

"Visionaries" is the one where he first showed up with robotic legs. It was a short story that was proposing an idea that Maul maybe had survived. George brought up the idea of having Darth Maul be alive. Then I said, "You know, there's this comic book where he is alive and has these robotic legs. We brought that image up in the story meeting with George. It was up to him whether he wanted to go with that vision of it or not. That's an example of how things kind of run into each other. We're not telling the same story that you saw in that comic book, but it did influence some of the choices we made for the screen depiction of Maul.

Who came up with the spider leg idea instead of just starting off with the mechanical legs?

The spider legs were 100 percent George. When hashing these stories out, we do it all together in a writers' room. It includes six writers, George Lucas, and myself. George will say something like, "I want to do this story where we bring Darth Maul back." Then we all politely argue the different points of why we should or shouldn't. After that we outline everything together. George has a very heavy hand in all that of course. It's great because he gets to be the final say in the room. I do a lot of sketching in those meetings. I am drawing pretty much constantly the whole time so we have a visual to go with in our very early thinking. "Star Wars" is very visual. We work better when we're looking at visuals of everything. When you're looking at a lot of things, you need something to grab onto so you know what you're talking about. When we were envisioning how we would find Maul and what kind of state he would be in, I was sketching these different manifestations of legs. We all agreed that Maul would be holding himself together through his rage and his hatred. It would be an unconscious reaction. It wasn't an engineered thing. George said, "Why don't we give him a big spiderlike body." He loved the image of Maul hanging upside down from the ceiling in this decrepit state. I started doing some sketches in that direction, and it really went from there on out.

Talk to us about working with Sam Witwer and his portrayal as Darth Maul?

Sam is great to work with. He also played the son in the "Mortis" trilogy last season. When you come in to work on "Star Wars," you want it to be fun. It's very hard work. We try to work at a very high level and be creative. You want to feed off of everybody's creativity. Sam is so into whatever role you give him. He really throws himself completely into it. That's very inspiring. You go, "This guy is giving me everything. I have to make sure he's equipped. The more detail I tell him, the better he's going to be able to portray the character. He's like an encyclopedia for "Star Wars." It's unbelievable. I think he's almost up there with Pablo Hidalgo and Leland Chee, the keeper of the Holocron here at Lucasfilm. That's quite a statement to say if you know who those guys are. He's an uber-nerd, which has gone from being something that was laughable when I was a kid to being a term of respect now. It means you've amassed a large deal of knowledge. Sam has that and I think it shows when he plays Maul. I needed somebody that understood the responsibility of playing Maul. He needed to understand the people that would say, "No way! That's impossible! How could he do that?" If you understand that side of it, I think you'll be more successful when actually portraying the character. I think that's why Sam was really successful; especially with the first part where he brought the schizophrenic lunacy to the character. He then really leveled that off for the ending. He showed the level of cunning and intelligence I don't think people realize the character has.
Has original Darth Maul actor Ray Park seen the new episodes where the character returns?

I don't think he has as of yet. He's a busy guy lately with "G.I. Joe: Retaliation." I can't wait for Ray to see it. That'll be exciting for me.

What are we going to see of Darth Maul in coming episode and next season?

What's interesting about Darth Maul is he's one of the only characters from the films we've ever brought on to the show that we don't really know what happens to him. We brought on Chewbacca, Bossk, Admiral Ackbar, Tarkin, and other characters, but we all kind of know where they end up in the future. We all know their stories. It's just great to see them in this timeline. The audience doesn't know if Maul is going to be around for one episode, two episodes, or 20 episodes. One thing I will say is he's far more cunning and intelligent than what people gave him credit for. He's not just the blunt instrument you saw in "Star Wars: Episode I-The Phantom Menace." He has a strategy and some things to work out with Savage Opress about who's really in control. He's involved in a spectacular storyline in the next season. It's a real chance for us to explore this character in a way that we didn't have the time to in "The Phantom Menace."

[Vader]

Here is some good news for us UK SW Clone Wars fans:

Star Wars: The Clone Wars - Season 4 UK Launch

Season 4 will launch at 10am on Monday April 2nd on Cartoon Network. It will be repeated again the same day at 6pm.