Star Wars: The Bad Batch

My original review is below, and I'm happy to report the show does indeed go in interesting directions. Basically, half the episodes are standard "mission of the week" type filler that can be skipped. However, hidden away in this show about defective clones is some of the most important SW backstory and setup for plotlines that carry all the way through to the new First Order era of content. And it's fantastic. Not just the stories, but the style, animation, soundtrack, etc, are fabulous. I grew up with the original trilogy, and this is some of the best content I've seen in the entire franchise. Do yourself a favor and find a list of the essential Clone Wars and Bad Batch episodes and watch them. You don't have to sit through all the boring filler - there's still hours of epic stories and character arcs to be enjoyed.

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Interesting start to this new series, but it's already slipping into tired, formulaic plots that we've seen many times before. The characters already feel stale and annoying. There is promise here, so hopefully they will take the show in interesting directions. However it's worrying that episodes are already starting to seem like filler.

It is really disappointing that a lot of this series is just filler and doesn't add anything at all to the story or to the characters. This could easily be half the length.

My favourite part of The Bad Batch is whenever the episodes aren't focused on them. I wholeheartedly believe that if the series focused more on the morality of the clones and the ethical dilemma that they present it would be far greater than it already is. By far the most interesting and mature theme of the show is seeing the clones get cast aside for the new Stormtroopers. As well as seeing the development of the Empire. Seeing how they are mistreated and abused is so heartbreaking and thought provoking it's the PERFECT theme for the show. I just wish the theme was consistent across the series. But the gems that do touch on this subject is what makes this and 8/10 for me.

The bad batch returns to the characters first seen in clone wars season 7. This first episode is an amazing buildup to what I believe an even better rest of the season. It is packed with some nice action, big suprises and gasping for air moments. I am very interested to see where it is going. Definitely worth the watch.

This show is really good. I understand why people don't like it, and they have some fair points that I agree with. I don't mind filler episodes if they are done well. Sometimes they're done well, other times, not so much. The plot centric episodes are really good though, and the characters are good, with crosshair being the show stealer in terms of writing, and the animation is incredible. Not all characters worked well. I feel like echo got sidelined, but he had his fair amount of development in the clone wars. This show's greatest strength is the world building. Seeing the Republic's transition to the empire from the clones point of view was great. Overall, it's the best first season out of any star wars animated show, but not one of the great ones YET. It's like a 7.8/10 for me.