I have history with Star Wars. Not that I'm one of those guys that wear the costumes to the conventions or have all the collectibles. I'm just a fan. For the original trilogy I was a big fan. Since I'm a big gamer I've played nearly every Star Wars video game made. I even had a phone interview to work at LucasArts in video games before they went downhill.

And I've always been torn between Star Wars and Star Trek. Both have elements that I really like but I would have to say that I lean more to Star Wars. I like the idea of huge capital ships fighting each other in Star Trek but you get that plus the single man fighters zipping in and out of the capitals in Star Wars. For example, Tie Fighter is one of the greatest games ever made. You don't understand bravery (or stupidity depending on your point of view) until you are in a major battle flying a space craft that is so fragile you can be killed by someone just bumping into you.

The other major contender is the idea of the Jedi. An all powerful group that simply always does the right thing even though sometimes a handful can be corrupted, so they are not perfect. Lucas was superb in creating this world for us in the original trilogy.

Then we were presented with Episode 1 that began the destruction of everything that people like me really liked about Star Wars.

Star Trek was good until Gene Roddenberry died and the men who followed in his footsteps have screwed up that franchise to point the fans wonder if it can come back.

Lucas has no such excuse.

One day Lucas figured out that if he made the Star Wars films for his kids instead of his fans then there was a whole lot of money to be made peddling toys.

Some people dream of immortalizing their vision in a film that people will talk about for decades and suggest their grandchildren watch as a "classic".

Some people corrupt their vision with dreams of merchandising cash.

Anyway, about this movie. The Clone Wars.

This movie takes place between Episode 2 and Episode 3. In fact, this time period should have been Episode 2. Episode 2 has the subtitle "Attack of the Clones" but there's very little of that. Episode 2 ends with the beginning of the Clone Wars and Episode 3 is the end of that war. Only with silly made for TV content do we learn what happens during the Clone Wars. This is an event we've heard about and imagined since 1977 with the first film when Luke learns his father was a great warrior in the Clone Wars.

We now learn that one of his father's most important missions was to rescue a tadpole.

That's right. A tadpole, the son of Jabba the Hutt of all things.

This movie came about because of a series of cartoons on the Cartoon Network that covered the Clone Wars. These cartoons proved very popular and the decision was made to expand on them. They decided to get fancy and go with full 3D dropping the 2D style animation. During initial development it was then decided to do a full theatrical release before the TV show started.

Despite the odd look of the characters this movie looks really good. They could just take the audio from the movies to redo them in this style and it would work. It would be Star Wars.

Not really seeing any of the cartoons covering this conflict I've never really seen the storm troopers as more than shock troops wearing roughly the same armor. But you begin to see that each is in fact an individual despite being a clone of the same man. This is something that would have been great to have a proper subplot in a movie to explore. Even a movie in of itself. I was actually feeling bad for the storm troopers as they are killed even though they later take part in the Jedi massacre in Episode 3.

One thing that had been missing in the original trilogy was a proper lightsaber duel between two Jedi of significant power and strength. We got to see Luke, who knew next to nothing, fight the most powerful Jedi ever born in The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi. The first time, Luke gets his bony butt handed to him while the second time he manages to win by slipping towards the Dark Side. Episode 1 gave us the excellent fight between Darth Maul and Qui-Jon. Then later we get Maul and Obi-Wan. Obi-Wan survives while the other two are killed in the fight.

After that we only get flashy moves with no substance in the followup films.

And the flashy moves are not that impressive to begin with.

But this movie gives us what we want, proper lightsaber duels between Jedi who know what they're doing. No one dies but the fights are exciting to watch. I don't understand why this couldn't be done properly in the other films but probably because Lucas directed them.

After getting past the things I liked, I have to say the movie isn't really that good. This movie was made for kids. The story makes little sense, there's a wisecracking kid for no apparent reason other than to have a wisecracking kid and there's never any sense of urgency or danger to any of the characters. Only the faceless storm troopers get hurt or die and lots of droids get destroyed.

You know what I'd like to see? A Star Wars movie written and directed by someone other than Lucas that was made for adults that receives an R rating. A movie where when Jedi fight they don't follow the silly rule of the "first one hurt gives up."

Anakin gets a padawan for some reason that is never shared with us. They go to rescue the mentioned tadpole to get a treaty with Jabba the Hutt so they have easier access to the Outer Rim. How Jabba controls the "hyperspace" lanes is never explained and in fact, in terms of space travel makes no sense. To even understand what the hyperspace lanes are and how they work you have to be a serious fan and have played a video game or two. They are never explained in the movies as far as I can recall.

So, Jabba's son was kidnapped and yet, somehow, he has no clue nor a guess as to who did it. The Jedi agree to find the tadpole and bring him back. Anakin tracks the tadpole to a planet but the Sith wanted it that way to lay a trap. This is not surprising since everything the Sith do is a cleverly planned trap that hardly ever works. During the rescue attempt Count Dooku goes to Jabba and tells him that the Jedi have his son and plan to kill him. The Sith will attempt to rescue him for Jabba.

Why Jabba would believe this is strange since everyone knows the stories of the Jedi and the Sith. The Jedi are good and do nothing but good things. The Sith are bad and do nothing but bad things. Anyone suddenly believing the opposite is so out of touch with reality that it simply cannot make sense in any way possible.

Jabba believes him. Remember, Star Wars does not reside in reality.

Anakin and his padawan manage to rescue the tadpole but have problems escaping the planet. Some sacrifices from some Storm Troopers and a timely arrival of Obi-Wan gives him the opportunity to escape. But the tadpole is sick and dying for some unknown reason. But some generic medicine made for possibly hundreds of species that has a shelf life of around two hundred years saves him from his cold.

They manage to get back to Tattoine (every freaking movie!) and uncover the evil Sith plot that everyone thought was a good Sith plot. Good Sith plot, even though Sith are evil and everyone knows this. But I'm repeating myself.

So, all is well in the galaxy.

That is at war.

With one side (the good side?) using cloned slaves that do most of the dying.