The clones customized quite a bit though

Yet remain recognisable as units: it's minor things like a marking or two on the helmet or the extra equipment they use. It's a stark constrast to the old EU Mandalorians which share the armour shape and that's about it.

As for the pacifists, maybe it's just me, but I can't believe an entire society would be stupid enough to kill off their enemies, then become pacifist, and then expect that because they've rejected war, they can be neutral, and pander to both sides.

This happened before the Clone Wars. Mandalore became politically pacifist although it still had security forces: it could deal with small threats and if anything too big happened the Jedi (who assisted the winning side in the Civil War) or the Republic would help out. Mandalore refuses to participate in war, it doesn't refuse to defend itself else the Death Watch wouldn't have had to win over the populace before taking power.

It was the Clone Wars that made Mandalore's stance difficult and even then it was protected from the main powers by its position as leader of a large league of neutral systems: neither side wanted to attack it unprovoked for fear of driving that league into the arms of the other side.

Going back to the last Rebels episode:

I liked the episode, but I think they missed an opportunity. One of the most heartbreaking moment for me in season 2 was when Ezra came back and had to look at Rex (whoom I had forgotten after how emotional the end of the season was). The looks that they exchanged, facial expressions and the lack of words is actually what got to me.

Considering how close Rex and Ahsoka were (he saw her grow up after all), I would actually appretiate Rex losing some of his cool and show some more grief / anger.

I have to agree with this.

That said, I'm only about two seasons into Clone Wars (watching them in the canon order of appearance), but I'm doubting I'll get much more invested. The ending credits music is definitely not to my liking, as it sounds inferior to the original score, with unnecessary, awful percussion and a stuttering melody.

The later seasons are much better. First 2 seasons have some good episodes, but as a whole, are pretty mediocre. Season 3 and beyond is when it starts to get really good.

Going back to the last Rebels episode:

I liked the episode, but I think they missed an opportunity. One of the most heartbreaking moment for me in season 2 was when Ezra came back and had to look at Rex (whoom I had forgotten after how emotional the end of the season was). The looks that they exchanged, facial expressions and the lack of words is actually what got to me.

Considering how close Rex and Ahsoka were (he saw her grow up after all), I would actually appretiate Rex losing some of his cool and show some more grief / anger.

I have to agree with this.

That said, I'm only about two seasons into Clone Wars (watching them in the canon order of appearance), but I'm doubting I'll get much more invested. The ending credits music is definitely not to my liking, as it sounds inferior to the original score, with unnecessary, awful percussion and a stuttering melody.

What platform are you watching it on? can you not skip the end credits? Or do you mean the way almost every episode ends?

I'm sure Rex has some grief over her but it has been 6+ month's sense that happened and he may have thought her dead up until recently. He also lost allot of brothers during the clone wars, death is something he is used to dealing with. grief over Order 66 to. Of course as pointed out by last episode, it does some unspeakable things to you after a time.

The later seasons are much better. First 2 seasons have some good episodes, but as a whole, are pretty mediocre. Season 3 and beyond is when it starts to get really good.

This^

Going back to the last Rebels episode:

I liked the episode, but I think they missed an opportunity. One of the most heartbreaking moment for me in season 2 was when Ezra came back and had to look at Rex (whoom I had forgotten after how emotional the end of the season was). The looks that they exchanged, facial expressions and the lack of words is actually what got to me.

Considering how close Rex and Ahsoka were (he saw her grow up after all), I would actually appretiate Rex losing some of his cool and show some more grief / anger.

I have to agree with this.

That said, I'm only about two seasons into Clone Wars (watching them in the canon order of appearance), but I'm doubting I'll get much more invested. The ending credits music is definitely not to my liking, as it sounds inferior to the original score, with unnecessary, awful percussion and a stuttering melody.

What platform are you watching it on? can you not skip the end credits? Or do you mean the way almost every episode ends?

I'm sure Rex has some grief over her but it has been 6+ month's sense that happened and he may have thought her dead up until recently. He also lost allot of brothers during the clone wars, death is something he is used to dealing with. grief over Order 66 to. Of course as pointed out by last episode, it does some unspeakable things to you after a time.

I mean the ending music; John Williams original score is so much better!

Regarding the cast of Rebels, I wish they wouldn't gloss over the futility of the situation they're in. The droid stated their chance of success at less than a percent. Their Jedi crew is blinded, Asohka is AWOL, they're losing most members of the rebellion than they can recruit, and none of it is portrayed in their happy go lucky attitudes.

That was always my complaint with Star Trek: Voyager, too. They're stranded on the other side of the galaxy with no allies and many foes, but there's only a handful of episodes where their situation truly seems dire or they are barely holding together. I want to see the Ghost crew be desperate, not hear them spout cliche platitudes and moral parables.

Also, with the frequency they show off those lightsabers, I sincerely hope the Emperor or Vader terminate those two just out of spite of their inability to remain anonymous.

Think about where we are in the timeline. Rebels S3 should lead into Rogue One. The Death Star is near completion. Darth Sideous (as emphasized in the Tarkin novel) is getting ready to dissolve the Senate. He thinks he's about to hand over the day-to-day to a suitable military leader so he can focus on experimenting with the Dark Side, which he needs Vader for. Sideous is in his end game mindset at this point; he probably trusts Thrawn to handle a blind half-trained Jedi and his wannabe Padawan. Of course, Vader can still make an appearance, but he might also be hunting Maul - who was also a target of the Inquisitors. From a Sith Lord's position, who is the greater threat to send your apprentice after: a couple partially trained light-side malcontents? Or your fully-trained former apprentice who knows some of your dirty secrets?

First off, did anyone notice the shirt Andi was wearing in the Rebels Recon? Ahsoka walking away at the end of Season 2. Frankly that annoys me a little bit. I do wish she were dead, if only to give closure to that storyline. Or maybe Andi was just trolling.

This episode feels kinda like Fighter Flight to me: something that seems like filler, but will come back later.

The Tarkin novel also talked about droid fighter carriers being used by the proto-Rebels, so it's clear that old Clone Wars technology is still around.

His point is that it's the difference between the 620k in the US civil war and 6 billion people in his scenario and is using a reductive term to demonstrate the difference.

Oh, stop choosing to be offended. His point is that it's the difference between the 620k in the US civil war and 6 billion people in his scenario and is using a reductive term to demonstrate the difference.

Yes. The difference being that one was real and the other is fictional.

"A single death is a tragedy. A million deaths is a statistic." - Josef Stalin, after starving 12 million of his own people in the name of Communism.

None of those numbers (6 billion, 620k, 1.5 million, 12 million) are real to us, regardless of their actual truth. We can't comprehend that large of a number as individuals, lives fragile as our own, cut short. Adding description (heaps of bodies taller than the bulldozers pushing them into the holes, a child's gore-stained teddy bear frozen into the soil, broken limbs and heads dotting the dozer's trail as its engine gave the strained cries of agony its driver no longer can) simply sounds morbid. Even people who are there shut the reality out as best they can.

That cold truth is why we can hear about thousands of people dying as they try to escape Syria and shrug, but the photograph of one drowned toddler can bring us to tears.

So both sides here need to stop playing the wounded gazelle. If any of our member's eyes have actually gazed upon even a tiny fraction of the death we are discussing, then I wish them pleasant sleep and a hopeful future, but I'm seriously doubtful that any of us HAVE. It's all imaginary for us, and doubly so for a war that was over 150 years ago.

It's a fact in the current Star Wars canon that Mandalore ruined their own world and reduced their own population from six billion to four million through war, with most of the survivors so sick of the carnage that they declared themselves pacifists and exiled whoever wouldn't follow their ways. Imagine that you're one survivor out of fifteen hundred people and you might change your mind about fighting too.

Going "Wah, that shouldn't be so" is kind of childish, because it is so. No attachment to half-researched, half-rate novels that amounted to paid fanfiction will change that. Traviss' novels weren't the worst of the Star Wars EU, but that only says just how wretched some of them were.

So, about the episode? Pretty good, I think. I said, "The Empire" at the same time as Zeb, though really it was Pappa Palpatine who won.

Skimmed the last couple of pages as I have no interest in Civil Wars or Mandalorians.

Has there been a preview of this week's episode?

Loved The Last Battle. That scene with Kanan and Ezra either side of Rex was really cool.

if you're looking for a way to reocncile old Legends Mandalorians with things that started in The Clone Wars, this book does its best to retcon the two into one thing which I found very impressive.

The Essential Atlas also managed to do some reconciling - the desert is much of Mandalore but not all - there are still forested patches.

The Bounty Hunters Code also put some effort into reconciling Open Seasons with TCW, right before the Legends announcement.

Skimmed the last couple of pages as I have no interest in Civil Wars or Mandalorians.

Has there been a preview of this week's episode?

Loved The Last Battle. That scene with Kanan and Ezra either side of Rex was really cool.

Yeah, that's why everyone is tallking about Mandalorians

Skimmed the last couple of pages as I have no interest in Civil Wars or Mandalorians.

Has there been a preview of this week's episode?

Loved The Last Battle. That scene with Kanan and Ezra either side of Rex was really cool.

Yeah, that's why everyone is tallking about Mandalorians

Well that makes a lot more sense now

Hey! Dont you come for Karen Traviss! The first two Republic Commando books are some of the best EU books out there. I would put her up with Timothy Zahn and James Luceno.

His point is that it's the difference between the 620k in the US civil war and 6 billion people in his scenario and is using a reductive term to demonstrate the difference.

Yes. The difference being that one was real and the other is fictional.

http://www.dictionary.com/browse/scenario

Sorry if that was confusing for you

hence my very deliberate use of "in his scenario"

Even the greatest loss of life in history will sound insignificant when you compare it to one you made up.

"Oh, every war in human history caused 500 million deaths? Well that's nothing compared to Alderaan!"

We're not back on this are we lads?

We're not back on this are we lads?

hence my very deliberate use of "in his scenario"

Yes, but that's the part that can offend people. Comparing a fictional body count to a real one and then calling the real one "silly little".Even the greatest loss of life in history will sound insignificant when you compare it to one you made up."Oh, every war in human history caused 500 million deaths? Well that's nothing compared to Alderaan!"

way to miss the point.

I think his point is that many are sensitive to this and if you are trying to make a persuasive argument you may want to account for that. Otherwise you will get that reaction and will be forced to sidestep from your original point thus diluting your original argument.

Anyways within the SW universe the Empire's greatest atrocity noted as of yet is the least talked about, the cleansing of Geonosis. 800 billion Geonisians wiped out.

You're being incredibly insensitive to all the veterans, widows and orphans of the American Civil war. Go say that to their faces and see how they react.

I think his point is that many are sensitive to this and if you are trying to make a persuasive argument you may want to account for that. Otherwise you will get that reaction and will be forced to sidestep from your original point thus diluting your original argument.

Anyways within the SW universe the Empire's greatest atrocity noted as of yet is the least talked about, the cleansing of Geonosis. 800 billion Geonisians wiped out.

That's old the hyperlane to Genonosis. We don't go there anymore.

There are a lot of things in Star Wars that are just too big to comprehend. A planet-sized city. A Galaxy-spanning war. Multiple planets that matter per solar system.

Heck, there are things here too big to comprehend and we have just one planet. In one solar system. In about 20 years or so we might start on adding a second one, but even that is a long way off.

This is probably the best thing to help you put the number 1,000,000 into scale in terms of people: http://waitbutwhy.com/2014/11/from-1-to-1000000.html

(Edit.)

Oh, and a Star Destroyer in canon has "a total of 46,803 crew and passengers". Take a look at the Fenway Park dots, and think about the Star Destoyer they blew up in season one. If every rebel we've seen died, and every crew member on the corvettes and ships of Pheonix cell went with them, the Empire would still be paying them back for that one, single Star Destroyer.

Oh, and a Star Destroyer in canon has "a total of 46,803 crew and passengers". Take a look at the Fenway Park dots, and think about the Star Destoyer they blew up in season one. If every rebel we've seen died, and every crew member on the corvettes and ships of Pheonix cell went with them, the Empire would still be paying them back for that one, single Star Destroyer.

Come, come, now - we don't know they all died.

Indeed, we know they didn't - obviously at least Tarkin and his command crew escaped. Presumably most of the ship's company were able to escape, as well. It wasn't exactly an 'HMS-Hood-one-shot-instantly-explodes' sort of thing. Hell, the ship hadn't even finished breaking apart the last time we'd seen it (granted it was probably fractions of a second from that point as it went off-screen, but it DID still have sections intact...)

Ah I understand. I can kind of understand why Mandalorians are much more militarized in the new canon because they've basically been under constant assault from the Republic, Jedi, and other Mandalorians. That would create a much tighter military society when everyone's out to get you. I have no doubt that back when it was an option, they were probably more individual in their gear. Now it's basically mass-produced in a fight to stay alive. I was also under the impression that the planet was BD0ed by the Republic centuries ago. I think if it was the civil war, Satine would have been denounced as a hypocrite for fighting a war that destroyed the planet, and then insisting she was a pacifist.

Filoni specifically makes a point that Mandalorian armour isn't heavily customised in his commentary: it's a battle uniform rather than a medium for personal expression, like Clone Trooper or Stormtrooper armour. Sabine aside they don't tend to customise more than the Clones do.

As for Satine, the Mandalorian Civil War is what creates the pacifist faction: over 50% of the population die. The wholesale rejection of warfare by a populace that was increasily less committed to it isn't unrealistic. They remain a regimented society in the sense of organisation and discipline if the appearance of their civilians is any indication though.

They're still Mandalorians though: they don't take much convincing during the Clone Wars.

"Hey guys, we just won the civil war by deploying nukes and wiping our enemies off the face of the planet, by the way I'm now pacifist." That's very absurd. That said, I'm pretty sure the planet was destroyed well before the Civil War.

"We've won the war against the insurgents but at what cost? Most of our people are dead, our planet is in ruins. Here and now we commit: NEVER AGAIN. "

The clones customized quite a bit though, I'd say the stormtrooper comparison is more apt.

As for the pacifists, maybe it's just me, but I can't believe an entire society would be stupid enough to kill off their enemies, then become pacifist, and then expect that because they've rejected war, they can be neutral,

Worked for Germany, Japan and Austria for almost a half a century. And only the german unification really force the germans into a position with more responsibility, while the cold war force them to pick a side and keep a strong military presence, while staying out of any military intervention for a long, long time. So this is not not even without precedence and the crimes of ww2 are seem not be be on the same scale as the mando civil war. Though the political position of mandalore was more like the swiss, they took lead of the neutral systems and within their influence zone and they apparently had enough military and economical influence to keep CIS involvment out of their whole influence zone … 2000 systems under the control of an ancient warrior race, not the kind of society which you want to push into their old ways again.