I don't see a problem
I went and saw Clone Wars today, with Elora and Sparky, as part of SuperHappyFun Week (the week after camp ends, but before school starts, so he's stuck with his parents for entertainment), and to be honest, I liked it. All I knew about this movie in advance was that it was kind of a pilot for the upcoming TV show, and that the general opinion was that it was awful. As I said a while back, I'm a huge fan of Genndy Tartakovsky's "micro-series" of Clone Wars that evidently served as inspiration for the new series, and I was prepared to be more than a little ticked that both Tartakovsky and the 2-D animation were jettisoned for this new version.
I'm still trying to work out exactly why I liked it. It didn't have the rampant Jedi awesomeness that Tartakovsky's version had; in fact, the Jedi seemed just about as human and limited as they do in the movies, if not more so. The plot was perfectly serviceable; I didn't find any obvious holes in it. The action seemed pretty good, if not up to the potential of an entirely animated medium. I still don't see the purpose of using the exaggerated Tartakovsky designs in 3-D; it doesn't make sense, but it also didn't bother me after the first ten minutes. (Except for Obi-Wan's hair...obviously the guy doesn't need a helmet, because he has his hair to protect him.)
It was the characterization I really enjoyed, which was what I liked about the older series as well. You get to see Anakin and Obi-Wan as friends and colleagues, which you're just supposed to assume if you only watch the movies, and that's a major weakness, to my mind. Count Dooku comes across as genuinely menacing and calculating, which again you don't have time to see in the movies, because you're still snickering at his stupid name. Asajj Ventress is suitably awesome, but not quite as much as she was in the older series.
I found that I especially liked the characterization of Obi-Wan. He still clearly has a blind spot where Anakin is concerned, but he's a good father-figure, realizing (along with Yoda) that maybe a padawan is what Anakin needs to fulfill his potential. Obi-Wan also plays mind games remarkably well -- his stalling of the Separatist general isn't too impressive, but the facility with which he gets under Ventress' skin indicates that he knows which buttons to push.
And then there's Anakin, and his spunky little apprentice. I simply like Anakin from this period, and I refuse to apologize for it. We're supposed to accept him as a hero before he becomes a villain (well, more "retroactively" than "before," but you get my point), except the movies do a phenomenally bad job of showing that. There, he's basically good-hearted, but whiny, petulant, and self-centered; he's tough to like. Whether that's the fault of Jake Lloyd, Hayden Christiansen, or Lucas, I couldn't tell you. In this series, he's a kid becoming an adult in the middle of a very long war, so he's got sharp edges, but he's also capable, confident, and authentically heroic. He's not just a font of misery; he has a sense of humor and enjoys bantering with Obi-Wan, the clone commanders, and even Ahsoka.
Ahsoka might be a little hard to take seriously, but I'm willing to give her time. She's awfully brash and outspoken for someone who's just come from Youngling training. I can't imagine that Yoda would have tolerated that much back-talk. I think the relationship between her and Anakin is realistic, though. She's obviously trying too hard at first, and she makes mistakes, but Anakin seems to genuinely like her, and the whole experience seems good for him.
Which brings us smack into the continuity problem -- how can we root for Anakin when we know what he'll become? How can we allow ourselves to like Ahsoka, if she's obviously not around by the time of Episode III? I can only speak for myself, but I have no trouble just liking it for what it is, at this point in history...stories about Anakin the hero and his padawan. If something bad is going to happen to them later, well, that's for later. It doesn't affect the stories from right now. And right now, Anakin is the hero that Luke always wanted to be, the hero he imagined his father was; and that's interesting enough to watch for a while.
One last observation...some of the music really struck me, which is odd, because I normally don't notice incidental music in a movie. Of course, the theme was "wrong," but I should have expected that. The incidental music, though, was definitely not John Williams-y, except when they were using his compositions directly. I heard some choral stuff in there, and some distinctively Indian flavor. In fact, I was more reminded of Battlestar Galactica's music than of Star Wars. Anybody else get that impression?
I'm still trying to work out exactly why I liked it. It didn't have the rampant Jedi awesomeness that Tartakovsky's version had; in fact, the Jedi seemed just about as human and limited as they do in the movies, if not more so. The plot was perfectly serviceable; I didn't find any obvious holes in it. The action seemed pretty good, if not up to the potential of an entirely animated medium. I still don't see the purpose of using the exaggerated Tartakovsky designs in 3-D; it doesn't make sense, but it also didn't bother me after the first ten minutes. (Except for Obi-Wan's hair...obviously the guy doesn't need a helmet, because he has his hair to protect him.)
It was the characterization I really enjoyed, which was what I liked about the older series as well. You get to see Anakin and Obi-Wan as friends and colleagues, which you're just supposed to assume if you only watch the movies, and that's a major weakness, to my mind. Count Dooku comes across as genuinely menacing and calculating, which again you don't have time to see in the movies, because you're still snickering at his stupid name. Asajj Ventress is suitably awesome, but not quite as much as she was in the older series.
I found that I especially liked the characterization of Obi-Wan. He still clearly has a blind spot where Anakin is concerned, but he's a good father-figure, realizing (along with Yoda) that maybe a padawan is what Anakin needs to fulfill his potential. Obi-Wan also plays mind games remarkably well -- his stalling of the Separatist general isn't too impressive, but the facility with which he gets under Ventress' skin indicates that he knows which buttons to push.
And then there's Anakin, and his spunky little apprentice. I simply like Anakin from this period, and I refuse to apologize for it. We're supposed to accept him as a hero before he becomes a villain (well, more "retroactively" than "before," but you get my point), except the movies do a phenomenally bad job of showing that. There, he's basically good-hearted, but whiny, petulant, and self-centered; he's tough to like. Whether that's the fault of Jake Lloyd, Hayden Christiansen, or Lucas, I couldn't tell you. In this series, he's a kid becoming an adult in the middle of a very long war, so he's got sharp edges, but he's also capable, confident, and authentically heroic. He's not just a font of misery; he has a sense of humor and enjoys bantering with Obi-Wan, the clone commanders, and even Ahsoka.
Ahsoka might be a little hard to take seriously, but I'm willing to give her time. She's awfully brash and outspoken for someone who's just come from Youngling training. I can't imagine that Yoda would have tolerated that much back-talk. I think the relationship between her and Anakin is realistic, though. She's obviously trying too hard at first, and she makes mistakes, but Anakin seems to genuinely like her, and the whole experience seems good for him.
Which brings us smack into the continuity problem -- how can we root for Anakin when we know what he'll become? How can we allow ourselves to like Ahsoka, if she's obviously not around by the time of Episode III? I can only speak for myself, but I have no trouble just liking it for what it is, at this point in history...stories about Anakin the hero and his padawan. If something bad is going to happen to them later, well, that's for later. It doesn't affect the stories from right now. And right now, Anakin is the hero that Luke always wanted to be, the hero he imagined his father was; and that's interesting enough to watch for a while.
One last observation...some of the music really struck me, which is odd, because I normally don't notice incidental music in a movie. Of course, the theme was "wrong," but I should have expected that. The incidental music, though, was definitely not John Williams-y, except when they were using his compositions directly. I heard some choral stuff in there, and some distinctively Indian flavor. In fact, I was more reminded of Battlestar Galactica's music than of Star Wars. Anybody else get that impression?