I guess this is just an addendum really, but I've been watching some of the Clone Wars series. I've just got as far as Season 2, Episode 5, where the Republic forces invade Genosha (sp?).

In this, I learned that this was a planet they had previously already invaded, that the people there had managed to kick them off and so they were re-invading a second time to re-establish their control. Things that stood out to me - a Jedi Master had the troopers use flame-throwers on the native defenders (you get to see them burning as they roll around on the ground), Anakin and Asoka have a good-natured competition in how many of their enemy they kill (note, there are some droids in this one but most of the enemy seem to be living beings and the ones that the third Jedi master who wins the competition was fighting all were). Large parts of the defender's city are visibly destroyed including a massive tower at the centre of their city. Also the Jedi are "surprised" at the Genoshans (sp?) loyalty to Count Dooku.

Anyway, the episode ended with the Jedi comparing kill-tallies and Republic occupation of the planet re-established. I keep looking for subtext or self-awareness. I thought the third Jedi Master's comment about "so what do I win?" was going to be some sort of spiritual commentary on treating the deaths of others as sport, but it seemed not to be after all. Much more of this and you can sign me up for the Dark Side.

EDIT: Also, is it me or were the Genoshans in the caves unarmed? As far as I can see they were fighting bare-handed unlike the ones on the battlefield who mostly had guns bar the odd one swooping down. Does that means that the ones hiding in the caves away from the battle were just the civillans / evacuees? I mean they appeared to have no defences and the Jedi were only there because they got lost and had to take an unexpected path through the mountains. So there was no military purpose to the Genoshans being there - they seemed to be just hiding out until the Republic Forces blundered in.

Whether good guys or bad guys both sides do a lot of killing in a war. War is ugly and it is all too easy to lose one's "humanity" when doing so much killing.

Whether good guys or bad guys both sides do a lot of killing in a war. War is ugly and it is all too easy to lose one's "humanity" when doing so much killing.

Yeah, I get that. My issue is not with it not being plausible, but with the mismatch between this reality and how it is presented. I keep thinking that I'm supposed to view this as ironic propaganda (the News Reel war-era voice at the start of every episode doesn't help) and then it pulls back and leads me to think it's not being ironic and the audience really are supposed to view one side as Good Guys and the other as Bad Guys. That's the point of the thread, really. I get the above that you wrote. What causes me issues is that the director and audience view-point characters do not. So I was asking what I was missing that made the Republic "Good Guys" when the cause of the separatists seemed more supportable.

Whether good guys or bad guys both sides do a lot of killing in a war. War is ugly and it is all too easy to lose one's "humanity" when doing so much killing.

Yeah, I get that. My issue is not with it not being plausible, but with the mismatch between this reality and how it is presented. I keep thinking that I'm supposed to view this as ironic propaganda (the News Reel war-era voice at the start of every episode doesn't help) and then it pulls back and leads me to think it's not being ironic and the audience really are supposed to view one side as Good Guys and the other as Bad Guys. That's the point of the thread, really. I get the above that you wrote. What causes me issues is that the director and audience view-point characters do not. So I was asking what I was missing that made the Republic "Good Guys" when the cause of the separatists seemed more supportable.

It's a sad result of TCW being a kids show. There must be clear good guys to cheer for and bad guys to boo for.

Whether good guys or bad guys both sides do a lot of killing in a war. War is ugly and it is all too easy to lose one's "humanity" when doing so much killing.

Yeah, I get that. My issue is not with it not being plausible, but with the mismatch between this reality and how it is presented. I keep thinking that I'm supposed to view this as ironic propaganda (the News Reel war-era voice at the start of every episode doesn't help) and then it pulls back and leads me to think it's not being ironic and the audience really are supposed to view one side as Good Guys and the other as Bad Guys. That's the point of the thread, really. I get the above that you wrote. What causes me issues is that the director and audience view-point characters do not. So I was asking what I was missing that made the Republic "Good Guys" when the cause of the separatists seemed more supportable.

It's a sad result of TCW being a kids show. There must be clear good guys to cheer for and bad guys to boo for.

I guess that's so. Still, I feel there should be more to being a good guy than simply having the brass section of the orchestra start up when you appear. I just watched Jedi burning unarmed creatures to death with flame-throwers and joke about how many they killed. Some kids show. Mind you, I suppose Legolas and Gimli did the same and I laughed at "still only counts as one" along with everyone else.

I am a horrible human being.

Has anyone ever written any good fiction from the separatist or imperial point of view? If not, I'd be tempted to write some when I become more familiar with the setting.

Much as I am loathe to admit this, Lucas knew what he was doing when he created the Republic and the Separatists to be the way they did.

You're supposed to feel uneasy about how the Republic acts. Sure, they're the good guys... kind of. But the Separatists actually have legitimate complaints against the Republic Senate, and though there's certainly a Good vs. Evil thing going on (which doesn't match up with my personal love of moral ambiguity, but hey) there's a lot of people who are just fighting for their homes.

The hypocrisy of the Jedi is another one. By that point, it's easy to argue that the Jedi are every bit as corrupt as anyone claims, since while some of them hesitate or argue against war -- and all of those guys are subsequently driven out and declared Separatsists, by the way -- many of them leap into their role as generals with glee. Anakin is one of them, and rightly so, since it matches up with his militant personality.

I love The Clone Wars for what it did for that conflict. Sure, kids will see the Republic winning and the funny battle droids get beaten up, but an older audience will start to see some hypocrisy -- such as the aforementioned burning sentient creatures alive. The Jedi also get shown being hypocritical, as Anakin's fall to darkness is more subtle, more of a road to hell paved with good intentions.

You were meant to notice this, to ask, "Why are the Separatists the bad guys again?" After all, many former Separatists probably went on to join the Rebellion, and their ideals are similar.

Well..the fact is, the movies do not portray the 'Republic as the the good guys, and the Seperatists as the bad guys'.

There's PLENTY of screen time given to the fact that Palpatine is well, the Emperor and he's corrupting the Senate and the Republic and they're totally bad guys and there's not much Obi-Wan and Padme can do about it. At the end of AOTC this is crystal clear as Bail Organa watches the transports load up- he's not really certain if the Separatists really are the bad guys.

Then in ROTS, well, we know the Republic is bad news and the Seps are just patsies. The jig is up.

The only clear 'good guys' of the movies are Obi-Wan, Padme, Bail, Mace and Yoda. The rest are poor dupes that get sliced up by Palpatine or shot in the back.

Now, let's bring up the TCW cartoon.

Yep, the cartoons portray Republic Good, Separatists bad. Early on that is. Episodes in Season 5 and 6 clearly demonstrate that Palpatine = Sidious and the whole war is a sham and a shell game. We already know that from the movies, but for me to say HOW they demonstrate that...well, spoilers, watch it yourself.

Just know that the writers of TCW knew what they were doing, and in the end, there's plenty of room for us to see the Separatists as the same poor bastards suffering under Palpatine/Sidious, and frankly no one was happy. The shades of grey come out.

In the end, the Seperatists and the Republic are bad. There aren't any good choices there- they're both run by Sidious. The only good choice is to abandon the corrupt system altogether and start anew.

What causes me issues is that the director and audience view-point characters do not. So I was asking what I was missing that made the Republic "Good Guys" when the cause of the separatists seemed more supportable.

Actually I think that's one point of that episode, but they don't dwell on it very long, only a kind of passing regret that "this is where the Jedi are at now". And after all, you wouldn't want to season after season of "what will that nasty dead-sentient-counting Anakin do this time?" There's probably a little further subtext in this case, and that is that the Geonosians are "just bugs", kind of like droids. Think "Starship Troopers".

I would also like to note, that the citizens of the galaxy are really confused regarding the Clone Wars, and totally don't know which side to trust- the Seperatists or the Republic? It's not like the Seperatists are going to exterminate and enslave everyone like the old Sith did during the Sith Wars. No- the Seperatists kind of just want to run a Republican trickle down pro-corporation economy..which frankly doesn't sound too bad to a lot of folks. Definitely not worth having a blood bath over.

Remember that none of the member states are willing to lend ships or men to the conflict- it's all completely orchestrated battles between toy soldiers : battle droids and clones. The only 'regular troops' are resistance fighters on invaded planets.

This is very different from other Galactic conflicts, such as the one in TOR or the the original trilogy. I think the fact is most planets don't want anything to do with the conflict, and only join in when they're forced to by the Republic or Seperatists- EG Palpatine. It makes sense, if you want to rule the Galaxy, you don't mobilize people, you lull them into complacency and say "hey, someone else is handling this, sit back and watch TV."

This 'being forced to fight a white man's war', or rather Jedi's war, is probably what builds a lot antipathy towards the Jedi, leading to their downfall, and general revilement. The people of the Galaxy didn't fight in the Clone Wars, they didn't make any decisions. That's why they were ready to fight when the Rebellion happened.

I have reached about the same point in TCW and am enjoying it more than I expected to. It makes Anakin's fall more understandable. He was definitely manipulated and I think scarred by his experiences in the war.

Yes, there is an overly simplified good guys-bad guys division painted over the top of Star Wars, but underneath there is actually a surprising depth.

I guess this is just an addendum really, but I've been watching some of the Clone Wars series. I've just got as far as Season 2, Episode 5, where the Republic forces invade Genosha (sp?).

In this, I learned that this was a planet they had previously already invaded, that the people there had managed to kick them off and so they were re-invading a second time to re-establish their control. Things that stood out to me - a Jedi Master had the troopers use flame-throwers on the native defenders (you get to see them burning as they roll around on the ground), Anakin and Asoka have a good-natured competition in how many of their enemy they kill (note, there are some droids in this one but most of the enemy seem to be living beings and the ones that the third Jedi master who wins the competition was fighting all were). Large parts of the defender's city are visibly destroyed including a massive tower at the centre of their city. Also the Jedi are "surprised" at the Genoshans (sp?) loyalty to Count Dooku.

Anyway, the episode ended with the Jedi comparing kill-tallies and Republic occupation of the planet re-established. I keep looking for subtext or self-awareness. I thought the third Jedi Master's comment about "so what do I win?" was going to be some sort of spiritual commentary on treating the deaths of others as sport, but it seemed not to be after all. Much more of this and you can sign me up for the Dark Side.

EDIT: Also, is it me or were the Genoshans in the caves unarmed? As far as I can see they were fighting bare-handed unlike the ones on the battlefield who mostly had guns bar the odd one swooping down. Does that means that the ones hiding in the caves away from the battle were just the civillans / evacuees? I mean they appeared to have no defences and the Jedi were only there because they got lost and had to take an unexpected path through the mountains. So there was no military purpose to the Genoshans being there - they seemed to be just hiding out until the Republic Forces blundered in.

There is more story to it than that. Geonosis is the planet that was invaded in EP II. The Geonosians were manufacturing battle droids for the Sepratists, which in the eyes of the Republic is a crime - thus invasion. After winning the battle in EP II, the Republic left, que TCW episode and the Jedi find themselves back at Geonosis having to put a stop to their manufacturing yet again. Geonosis is also divided into castes; the warrior caste and the worker caste. The workers are the ones you see without weapons, yet are probably the ones building the droids and weapons.

I would also like to note, that the citizens of the galaxy are really confused regarding the Clone Wars, and totally don't know which side to trust- the Seperatists or the Republic? It's not like the Seperatists are going to exterminate and enslave everyone like the old Sith did during the Sith Wars. No- the Seperatists kind of just want to run a Republican trickle down pro-corporation economy..which frankly doesn't sound too bad to a lot of folks. Definitely not worth having a blood bath over.

Remember that none of the member states are willing to lend ships or men to the conflict- it's all completely orchestrated battles between toy soldiers : battle droids and clones. The only 'regular troops' are resistance fighters on invaded planets.

This is very different from other Galactic conflicts, such as the one in TOR or the the original trilogy. I think the fact is most planets don't want anything to do with the conflict, and only join in when they're forced to by the Republic or Seperatists- EG Palpatine. It makes sense, if you want to rule the Galaxy, you don't mobilize people, you lull them into complacency and say "hey, someone else is handling this, sit back and watch TV."

This 'being forced to fight a white man's war', or rather Jedi's war, is probably what builds a lot antipathy towards the Jedi, leading to their downfall, and general revilement. The people of the Galaxy didn't fight in the Clone Wars, they didn't make any decisions. That's why they were ready to fight when the Rebellion happened.

Numerically, both sides' militaries are actually made up primarily of local forces pledged to the cause. Jedi, clones, and droids were the primary instruments of overall strategy on each side, however, so they were present at most of the decisive confrontations. This creates a public perception of the Jedi, clones, and droids that leads to essentially the same effect you originally described.

Amidala herself wonders the same thing. And when the republic becomes the empire suddenly the separatists are rebel good guys. This upending of things is what makes Star wars so intriguing to me. Is vader the bad guy? he destroys palpatine and brings balance to the force after all. And GL became the Hollywood he rebelled against.

Whether good guys or bad guys both sides do a lot of killing in a war. War is ugly and it is all too easy to lose one's "humanity" when doing so much killing.

Yeah, I get that. My issue is not with it not being plausible, but with the mismatch between this reality and how it is presented. I keep thinking that I'm supposed to view this as ironic propaganda (the News Reel war-era voice at the start of every episode doesn't help) and then it pulls back and leads me to think it's not being ironic and the audience really are supposed to view one side as Good Guys and the other as Bad Guys. That's the point of the thread, really. I get the above that you wrote. What causes me issues is that the director and audience view-point characters do not. So I was asking what I was missing that made the Republic "Good Guys" when the cause of the separatists seemed more supportable.

Just like how apparently the Death Star was full of Geonosian workers or something, and GL's response to people asking "how many noncombatants were killed not he Death Star" was shrugging and saying "they're just bugs."

Honestly the non-combatants on the Death Star would the equivalent of loading civilians on an SSBN which than nukes one city and is on its way to nuke a military base when it gets destroyed. Its sad that they died but they were on a military target carrying a weapon of mass destruction on an offensive mission.

I don't disagree but there's a big difference between "they're noncombatant members of this military, and possibly enslaved to work, so their loss is unfortunate but inevitable to stop the super weapon" and "who cares, they're just bugs." GL's position is explicitly the latter in the EP 2 commentary.

*sarcasm* Yes, lets not destroy a Giant planet destroying battle station because of a few thousand innocent slaves on board. Obviously you want to save the oppressed at the expense of Billions that might be destroyed on a planet. Or might lay waste to some Teddy bears forest moon. Instead lets board the station and send thousands of troopers to their deaths as they try to save those oppressed people before another planet gets destroyed

my eyes hurt from the rolling

*sarcasm* Yes, lets not destroy a Giant planet destroying battle station because of a few thousand innocent slaves on board. Obviously you want to save the oppressed at the expense of Billions that might be destroyed on a planet. Or might lay waste to some Teddy bears forest moon. Instead lets board the station and send thousands of troopers to their deaths as they try to save those oppressed people before another planet gets destroyed

my eyes hurt from the rolling

That's not what Kshatriya wrote though. It's not whether on balance it's better that they die than a planet, it's the dismissal of their deaths as unimportant.

my eyes hurt from the rolling

hey yeah completely lacking empathy is Fun and Cool. who gives a f*** about thinkin through ethical consequences. ****in slaves deserved it, am i rite? nuance sucks.

*sarcasm* Yes, lets not destroy a Giant planet destroying battle station because of a few thousand innocent slaves on board. Obviously you want to save the oppressed at the expense of Billions that might be destroyed on a planet. Or might lay waste to some Teddy bears forest moon. Instead lets board the station and send thousands of troopers to their deaths as they try to save those oppressed people before another planet gets destroyed

my eyes hurt from the rolling

Careful not to cut yourself on all that edge.

GL's position is explicitly the latter in the EP 2 commentary.

Yeah, that is one of the things that still feels off to me about the Prequels and some (but certainly not all) of their follow-ups.

The Gungans, arguably a bunch of comic-relief allies, are never-the-less treated in-universe as a respectable group that is worth cooperating with, and Jar-Jar becomes a senator despite the general audience dislike for the character. On the other hand, clones (of Humans, no less) are treated as disposable cannon fodder, and many of the non-Human species on the Separatist side are treated as being acceptable targets, on about the same level as their droid soldiers.

So, like the OP, I too hope that The Clone Wars is intentionally making us question this, even if the show itself seems to play it all straight.

To preface, I'm basing these thoughts on the movies rather than the clone wars series. One of the big things to consider for these movies is historical context. What happened in Lucas's country around the time of the first films? The Vietnam conflict was wrapping up. People had lost trust in the government. Authority was being questioned. Star Wars, a film about a group of ill-equipped people going up against a massive military force possessing the most destructive weapon in existence comes out. Hmmm. In the prequels, they come out first at the tail end of a relatively prosperous decade that nonetheless is closing in on a bubble crash and has been filled with decadence and casual military and trade interference of small countries, followed by the Iraq war and the lies about WMDs and what have you. We get a trilogy about a decadent republic in decline that is too up its own ass to actually help anyone, followed by a false pretenses war that makes things worse for everyone. One interesting note, the most gruesome scene in the movies, Anakins injury by Obi-Wan and transformation into Darth Vader, comes out around the time that soldiers begun returning from Iraq with missing limbs. Again, hmmmm.

So why is it so much easier to see the good guys and the bad guys in the original movies than the prequels? To begin with, we had 20+ years of expanded universe muck that made the republic and Jedi into superheroes. Second, the historical parallels of the movies are different. By the time star wars came out, most people were regretting the Vietnam war and wanted it over. The prequels came out in the midst of a culture war in America over how just the wars were. The movie makes things more clouded because it wasn't tenable to wear the politics on its sleeve so clearly. It's interesting now that people pick up on these parallels, as we see the war in Iraq winding down and people having mostly admitted that it was a waste.

Also, I disagree with the statement that any of the Jedi are meant to be the good guys either. Protagonists, yes, but not good guys. The Jedi order itself lives in a palace in the capital city far above anyone else training child soldiers and (as we see in the movies) acting as spies/soldiers/assassins for the republic.

Qui-Gon introduces us to midichlorians, showing how out of touch he is with the actual force. Keep in mind that he has Anakins mother left behind even though he's completely willing to cheat and could have gotten her out if he'd wanted. Qui-Gon is not acting as a good guy, he's just following his religion and beginning the manipulation of Anakin.

Yoda is basically incompetent. He rushes into war, rushes into fighting, and ends up deposed on a swamp after attempting to assassinate the head of state over a religious argument. Yes, the emperor had all the Jedi killed, but this was after Mace and the gang tried to assassinate him. Oh look, an argument over whether it is evil to try exterminating everyone of a certain religion after a group of them attack you! How did that get here? Yoda continues to be a jerk in the Star Wars movies by trying to train Luke to assassinate both his dad and the emperor. Luke, actual good guy, notably doesn't listen to him.

Obi-Wan is a good person who has completely fallen for the Jedi cause. He's a war criminal who has engaged in espionage, assassination, and killed dozens on screen (we can have a conversation about droids being an underclass and how it's somehow okay to kill them). Obi-Wan later becomes a hermit living in a desert, haunted by his crimes but still believing the cause was right. Obi-Wan is also incompetent, largely because of how much he buys into Jedi ideals (only with use absolutes, if the planet isn't on our map it doesn't exist). Even when he kills Grievous, te last person on screen he ever kills, he focuses his disgust on the weapon rather than the act. Obi-Wan only knows how to be a soldier and follow orders, similar to another famous film veteran from Vietnam.

So yeah, the reason why most people dislike these prequel movies (in addition to them having quality issues in terms of acting and production) is that the actual story and theme are largely an indictment on the myth of superheroes, modern American society, and formerly beloved characters. This makes people uncomfortable.

P.S. And no, palpatine and company aren't the good guys either just because they oppose the republic. The only good people in the prequels are Anakin, Obi-Wan, Dooku, and Jar Jar.

The only good people in the prequels are Anakin, Obi-Wan, Dooku, and Jar Jar.

Was this before or after Anakin murdered all of those children? What about the village of Sand People?

Not trying to snipe. I think you make an interesting case, though I don't think direct analogies to Star Wars and real world events pan out perfectly.

They're not meant to be direct analogies. They just provide a context to viewing the film that allows the fiction on screen to impact the real world experiences of the viewer and vice-versa. Star Wars is not THE Vietnam War in space, but it is thematically similar. Darth Vader is not an injured Iraq war veteran, but he looks visually similar. Droids and aliens are different minorities, but they sound and are treated similarly. Also, calling out Obi Wan as being like John Rambo from the first movie is more about clarifying through example than saying he was based on Rambo (I think Rambo came out later anyway).

As for Anakin being a good person, I give him points for being indoctrinated and manipulated by the Jedi order at every turn and still being able to do what needed to be done. Anakin is sympathetic for how badly he gets ruined by participating in this war. Anakin kills all of those child soldiers and is devastated. How sad is Yoda about it? How sad would Yoda be about sending them into battle to die. Anakin does what he thinks is morally best, and at the time that includes stopping the Jedi from making soldiers. Anakin murders the sand people and it is so complex because he is again devastated over it but told by his wife that it's fine. They were just sand people. They were just child soldiers. Anakin does what he's told is right, but sees that it only brings pain. By the end, he just wants to destroy it all and get back with his son. Anakin is a good person who does bad things because that's what people in power told him was okay to do.

On the other hand, clones (of Humans, no less) are treated as disposable cannon fodder, and many of the non-Human species on the Separatist side are treated as being acceptable targets, on about the same level as their droid soldiers.

Maybe at first, but that quickly passes. Plenty of issues of TCW explore this, not least of which is the first episode with Yoda and his clone team, and the four episode Umbaran arc, where Rex is shocked to learn of General Krell's attitudes. "How could you, sir! You're a Jedi!" Meaning that the Jedi were known to *not* look at them as disposable cannon fodder.