Hello everyone and welcome to another double dose of Clone Wars catchup with episodes 3 and 4 of season 4. Starting with episode 3 we continued with the underwater invasion by the Separatists. The young prince ended up taking the throne and boy was he not showing any mercy come the end. He blew that shark dude’s head off! I was not expecting that but I guess it was a show of strength as he became the leader the newly united kingdom.

The Quarren siding against the Separatists and teaming up with the Mon Calamari who they were fighting was not really a surprising development as it was already clear that were not comfortable with Dooku’s actions under the guise of “help”. It was a fitting and heart warming end to the story though and it proved you can take the most obvious route and it still be satisfying. They held off on it for as long as they could though and the decision came just as I was beginning to think they weren’t going to do it.

Jar Jar was fine to in this. Of course he had to be of use by having super sticky spit but you just have to go along with this kind of stuff whenever he is around. Overall this was a strong 3 part arc to kick off the season as it gave us more of an insight into a species we know but is not explored all that much in the films: a perfect use of the Clone Wars anthology storytelling format.

Episode 4 actually gave us more of the Gungans, this time looking at their own planet of Naboo. The initial brainwashing bit demonstrated how easy it is to sway people’s opinion from a position of power. I was actually expecting a slow discovery of the brainwashing to make up the entire plot but we managed to cram much more in than I thought. This was probably the right call as things kept moving and it didn’t let you lose focus or get bored.

The end part was my favourite though as Tarpals went out in the best way possible. He shown no fear and the way that they damaged and captured Grevious genuinely surprised me. As Grevious appearers in the third film you don’t expect to see things like this happen to him so it really was an exhilarating moment.

DD Ratings: (3) 7/10 (4) 7.25/10