Hello everyone and welcome to another double dose of Clone Wars catchup with episodes 5 and 6 of season 4, Mercy Mission and Nomad Droids.

Starting with Mercy Mission I felt that the episode had a few good concepts but rushed and muddled their way through things without the best explanations. The giant tree people were a good idea but appeared very randomly. Their leader Orphne was very under-developed and didn’t match the aesthetic of the sentient trees. Again, I liked the idea of her giving a mysterious riddle but it was solved almost as soon as it was first delivered. This all happening with C3PO and R2-D2 (as much as I love them both) didn’t really make things feel all that dramatic and important. This type of story didn’t really suit these two. The episode didn’t really play to their strengths.

The clones just came off as grumpy too. It wasn’t funny how they groaned about C3PO and the inhabitants of the planet they had come to save. They looked like the rabbits from Rayman too which was slightly distracting. A low point for the season really.

Episode 6 was much more enjoyable and handled the two droids so much more effectively. At heart they are a bickering comedy duo with a sweet bond and that was exactly what we got here. The episode itself was split into mini sections with very simple stories tying the whole thing together. We got the Star Wars version of Guliver’s Travels as the pair discovered a group of tiny people which was a fun idea; I’d have taken a whole episode of that! They ended up squashing their tyrannical leader, leading the locals to chant and cheer in a way reminiscent of the Munchkins in Wizard of Oz when Dorothy squashed the Wicked Witch of the East under a house.

That wasn’t the only similarity to the Wizard of Oz as the droids then found another mystical leader who turned out to just be a hologram (just like the man behind the curtain in the movie pretending to be the Wizard. Them all making it back before anyone really questioned either was great too…it gave me Rugrats vibes of all things! If you are going to do a C3PO and R2 episode do it like this…make it fun!

DD Ratings: (ep 5 3/10 ep 6 9/10)