Non-Alcoholic Star Wars

Last night I finally finished working my way through Dave Filoni's remarkably anaemic Tales of the Jedi. I guess I should be used to it by now. I realised that Dave Filoni's work without George Lucas' supervision feels sort of like watching a sleepy child playing with action figures. This extends to the animation and pacing.

So many shots begin with characters kind of drifting into frame, everyone from Count Dooku to Ahsoka Tano having exactly the same wooden, stiff-legged stride.

Mind you, most of these episodes were directed by Saul Ruiz, but I've been noticing this in every cgi production Filoni's been involved with since Disney bought Star Wars. Dave Filoni's role on Tales of the Jedi was mainly as a writer, a role he rarely performed when he worked on Clone Wars under George Lucas. With good reason.

Tales of the Jedi features various stories centred on Count Dooku and Ahsoka Tano. Dooku's stories are by far the stronger, one episode featuring both Liam Neeson and Ian McDiarmid in brief guest roles. It's a shame Christopher Lee isn't still alive to share some master and padawan scenes with Neeson. But at least they've dropped the Easter Island statue head design used for Dooku on The Clone Wars.

Unfortunately, Filoni seems reluctant to shake the boat very much. We learn little of Dooku's activities prior to Attack of the Clones that couldn't be inferred. The episodes take a slow, contemplative, Blade Runner-ish tone similar to Anakin's contemplation scene in Revenge of the Sith, but here it seems mainly to cover for the fact that Filoni doesn't have much to say. So even a twelve minute episode feels like it has a lot of padding.

The biggest revelation is the death of Yaddle, voiced here by Bryce Dallas Howard. She somehow tracks Dooku to his secret meeting with Darth Sideous, necessitating a sabre duel between the two. It ends with Dooku crushing her beneath a massive metal door. But then she manages to crawl out from under it without being bloody or mangled or visibly injured in any way. And then she collapses and dies. Like being crushed by a big metal door is a sort of poison. I can understand if maybe they can't show blood and gore. But then why have her crawl out from under the door?

Hey, that rhymes. If you can't have the gore, don't use the door.

As for the Ahsoka episodes, Filoni continues to remake Ahsoka into an aloof spectator in her own life who makes few decisions. Even the episode that takes us back to when she was a new padawan for Anakin is entirely about Anakin's decision on how to train her. Those hoping for the Return of the Tube Top will be disappointed because Filoni seems to be retconning young Ahsoka into old Ahsoka.

She kind of reminds me of some old paintings of children in which the artist didn't know how to draw children so he or she just made them look like serene miniature adults.

I suppose there may be many people who took issue with the fact that Star Wars was often exciting. If that's you, you may enjoy this show.

Tales of the Jedi is available on Disney+.