Todays review is Star Wars Imperial Commando 5O1st written by Karen Traviss which was published by Del Ray in Oct 2007.

Okay, I’m going to get this out of the way right up front, I love Karen Traviss’ writing style and her take on the Star Wars universe when it comes to the clones and Mandalorians. Am I sad to see her go? Of course, plain and simple. Do I care if it was creative differences, money, contracts, aliens from another part of the galaxy that have no connection to the force (okay, I threw that in here just for the heck of it – I know it was done before)? The answer is, now, no.

For awhile it did bother me, that is up until our episode #27 of the We Talk Clones Podcast which I co-host with Stephen and William (see how I put a show plug in here – nice huh? ). I got on my soap box and went off on the whole thing. You will need to listen to the show to understand my possibly not really coherent rant. But, I did end the rant with a line (or two) that may have mentioned something along the lines of; it’s George Lucas’ universe and any writer should be happy (and honored) just to play in it. If at a certain point George wants to change his mind about a race, character, time line or whatever, it’s his right to do so. He created the universe that we all enjoy and love. That is the thing right now, there is so much to read, watch, collect and play (video games) that as a fan you have a massive amount of choice. This is great time to be a Star Wars fan!

Now that I have started this review with two paragraphs of another rant, you are probably wondering; why?

Well, this is a small part of that universe that as a fan and an avid reader, I enjoy. Re-written, ret-conned, torn apart by Lucas himself, I enjoy the clone commando universe that was created by Traviss. This book is part of that universe that was supposed to start another trilogy but as of now, until another writer is hired to finish it (possibly), it stands alone.

Let’s finally get started with my review now huh?

So, three weeks have passed since the clone wars have ended. Palpatine ushered in the new Galactic Empire, Darman and Niner never got off Corusant and Clan Skirata are now on Mandalore.

Whew! What a start for a review huh?

Now, I’m not going to get into the Palpatine thing mentioned above. We all know where that leads and how far he was thrown, errrr, fell, oh, you get the idea .

Darman and Niner are another story. Since Niner was injured at the end of Order 66, Darman did not want to leave a brother behind. Now, anyone who reads my reviews know that I am an avid “Read the Book” person so if you have not read Order 66, read Order 66 first then read this book.

So, here’s Darman and Niner still on Corusant and still commandos but in the Imperial Army. Their unit? Well, it just so happens to be the infamous, or famous, 501st Legion  Vader’s Fist. This unit is now tasked with hunting down and killing any Jedi Knights, Jedi Masters, clone deserters and anyone who helps these groups escape the system. Their secondary assignment is If they come across any Padawans, they are to bring them back alive so they could be turned into servants of the Dark Side.

Now, if you break down the paragraph above and isolate these words: “hunt down and kill clone deserters and anyone who helps these groups escape the system,” don’t you think that puts Darman and Niner in a bit of a predicament? I mean, Ordo, Corr, Atin, Kal and all the other brothers, and even their “sister in laws” are on this list. That puts our two “lost clones” in the middle of something that if they stay, they will be doing a lot dancing, deception and the like just to keep the family safe. Or, they could desert, which they were going to do anyway, and live life on the run. As you read the book, you will find out how this all plays out. I’m not going to give you hints how this plays out.

As for the Kal Skirata clan. The book opens with them sitting around their secret hide-out Kyrimorut on Mandalore. The mood is one of dread still because not all of the “family” is there. So Kal decides to mount a rescue attempt to pull out Darman and Niner. He sends Ordo, Mereel, Prudii and Jaing along with Nyreen Vollen (keep this name in mind because she plays a fairly good part in the book) to execute the extraction. The team was able to get into Corusant with no problem and even contacted Darman and Niner with the plan. Do these two off planet? Does Darman finally get to hold his son? Well, you will just have to read the book.

Look, I feel that I have given you enough to either go get this book or go “eh, not for me.”.

The book as a whole moves at a fairly good pace. There is enough going on to keep the pages turning but there are slow parts with not much happening. Try to keep in mind that this book is being used as to set up for what’s to come. I’ve listed below some of the “plot threads” that as of now are just hanging in the wind.

The search for a cure to slow/stop the aging process of the clones. There actually is something that happens (or someone that shows up) that puts Kal in a predicament because a piece of the puzzle appears to have just fallen into his lap but it causes a much bigger problem (wait, I just remembered that I believe it’s three problems that ultimately fell into his lap)

Jaller Obrim shows up as a part of Imperial Intelligence.

Dr. Uthan personally watches the fall of her home world. How this plays out is anyones guess

Skirata, at the end of the book, makes an uneasy alliance with ramifications that will last in the next few books.

There still are things left hanging ( I can’t give it all to you now can I? ) that Karen was setting up to resolve in the follow on books. As I type this review thee has been news coming out from the SW camp that there will be a Imperial Commando book 2. Who will write it, where will they pick-up the story, how many characters will make the transition and who might be left behind, all these questions will have to answered when the book is released.

Ms. Traviss had a knack with writing these characters, the clones especially. She was able to give each clone a unique voice that made them stand out of a rather large crowd. There is nothing we can do about the things that are out of hands. All we can do as fans of the Star Wars Universe is to understand that things change. We will always have Star Wars in one form or another. We should be happy that have a better / bigger universe (that didn’t need to be re-booted) to read and talk about then Star Trek does. All we have to do is keep this statement in mind: this is George Lucas’ universe. Any author, artist and even us fans should be honored to have this around to enjoy.

Well, that’s this one. I have one more coming soon and that will be my review of “Out Bound Flight.” Yeah, yeah I know, I’ve been promising this review for almost a year now but trust me when I type this; it has been sitting at 85% done. I just need to finish that last 15%. Major writers block, sorry.

This is your Uncle Kal, Thanks for reading my review.

Hummmmmm, okay, I’ll just get to it, I hated it! Plain and simple, nothing more to say about it.

This “sequel,” in my opinion, started out just like “Blue Harvest” for the first 5 to 10 minutes. Then the show took a turn that had me floored. The “snap,” the “beats” and “heart” that was present in Blue Harvest flew out the window so fast I liken it to the Falcon making the Kessel run in less then 12 parsecs.

Darkside took a turn right into crude, rude, infantile and any other word along those lines. Once the show went there, it never came back.

I could actually go on with this review more but honestly I turned the DVD off in the middle of it to get my kids out of the room. I was not expecting any of what I saw and I had to convince myself not to return it to get my money back. It was hard enough to pick-up where I left off so I can say that I finished it.

What really blew me away was a famous scene at the end of Empire that they tried to recreate here. I’m sorry I am not a Family Guy regular but I didn’t get the “F-You” comeback that was said in “this” scene.

Sorry folks. If you are a Family Guy fan and understand “why” they did this, then this DVD is for you. If you are not and just want to check it out, go a head and enjoy. If you are not a fan of Family Guy, this DVD is NOT for you.

I just hope that the sneak-peak they gave the Jedi parody that is being worked on is better then this. But I’m not holding out hope for it. I loved the Robot Chicken episodes BTW more then this, they where funny.

That’s my opinion, and I’m sticking to it.

Your Uncle Kal

P.S. Don’t forget to subscribe to the We Talk Clones podcast – the EUCantinas resident Close Wars podcast. You can find us at podbean.com, iTunes and the Zune Marketplace.

I bring this up now because on Dec 23 (?) they are releasing to DVD “Something, Something, Something Darkside,” and at work the other day we watched “Blue Harvest.”

My thoughts, and I will be honest here, I am not a Family Guy fan. Oh, I know about the the show and have tried to get into it but it just doesn’t click with me. But, this is the only episode I really enjoy.

Why you ask?

Well, they hit the beats within Star Wars perfectly! One great example, out of many mind you, was when Peter was practicing with his lightsaber and he and “Han” (don’t know the dad’s name sorry) had the discussion about the Force that turned into Kaballa.

Then there was some of those other beats where so wrong. Like when the Falcon was entering hanger bay 327 with the two Imperials watching it through the glass. The one moved closer to the other and tried to put his hand on the other guys back. That was soooo wrong but damn funny.

So post one thing from the episode here and please keep it short. Or, it doesn’t have to be from this episode. The way  I understand it, Seth McFarland drops a lot of SW references throughout the series.

Have fun and until next time -

This is your Uncle Kal – Good Night and Good Luck!!

As you probably know, I am a co-host on We Talk Clones – your resident Clones Wars podcast here on the EUCantina.net. Stephen, William and I enjoy doing the show and have had some great reviews posted.

I’m posting this one chain of posts here because I have been in contact with one of our listeners concerning our latest podcast concerning “Senate Spy.”

James posted a comment at wetalkclones.podbean.com where he brought up some very valid points about our review and I thought I would watch the show again. I posted my thoughts there and figured I might as well post them here too. You will find below that I posted James initial comment for you all to read;

James starts out below::

” James Says:
October 23rd, 2009 at 10:06 am e

No offense guys, but it was a little painful listening to this episode. It seems whenever an episode comes around that you don’t like, you spend the whole episode ripping into it and picking it apart. For me it doesn’t make for that great listening, especially when I enjoyed the episode. If you could find someone who does enjoy these episodes, I think it would make for more interesting listing (I’m always available, lol!)

And I am saying this not to simply criticize and hopefully you can understand that.

I enjoyed this episode simply because it had a lot of stuff going on in the background. For one, Notorious by Alfred Hitchcock.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ikko4UU0dg

Dave Filoni’s commentary was also interesting, interesting in a way that made me want to throw a brick at my screen, but still interesting.

wetalkclones Says:
October 24th, 2009 at 12:43 am e

Hi James;

This is Tom responding.

I appreciate you listening and passing along your thoughts. So, to be fair, I will watch the episode again with an open mind and post my thoughts here from the second viewing. And for full disclosure, I just finished Filoni’s commentary and have this to say about it, it was very interesting but now it appears that the only side “not” playing both sides are the Jedi themselves – if that is what we are meant to believe. Filoni and his writers hopefully have this all planned out on some master story line somewhere because if they don’t, this is going to very hard to follow.

But I do have one comment about what he said that I’d like make now. If you didn’t watch his commentary, you would never have known that Neimoidians / Loc Dodd (sp?) sell to both sides. So it appears that the only ones not playing to both sides are the Jedi.

Thanks Again – T

# wetalkclones Says:
October 28th, 2009 at 1:19 am e

Hi James;

This is Tom responding.

As I mentioned above I watched the episode again and watching it for second time I stand by my review.

I did find some more things I liked about the episode especially when it came to the opening sequence between Anakin and Padme. The interaction / dialog between the characters was fun to watch. I liked how Anakin basically “blew off” the lose of his ship when he need to hitch a ride on a freighter to get home. That, by the way, “home” line and Padme’s reaction was a nice touch, gives Anakin some “grounding.”

What bothered me in the beginning was the “exposition” or set-up for the story was too long. I stand by what said that somehow some way if the writers where able to show something in previous episodes to build to this point, it would have made it easier to believe Padme has some kind relationship with Clovis before this point.

I liked the argument in the senate chamber and how Padme was able to use Anakins own words to make her point (which BTW I hate something like happening to me in RL). What bothered me here was they where in the center of the chamber and no one else around heard the disagreement?

Okay, I need to scale back here because I don’t want to be labeled as nit-picking again. To me, this episode “moved to fast” on information that was not supplied to the audience. It made me feel that the writers “assumed” (and I know the double meaning of that word) the audience already knew (like the Jedi council) that Padme had “relations” with Clovis before Anakin.

I guess you can say that (for me) there was no real set-up or bread crumbs to make this whole “spying thing” believable.

With that said, I stand by my rating and also my review calling this episode – flat.

I know that I didn’t spend this time going over the show from beginning to end again. I did that on the podcast. I want be honest on my reviews because if I (or Stephen and William) give every episode the highest rating possible, I think we would lose credibility and the audience that we have.

We appreciate you downloading our podcast and trust me, we enjoy doing it.

Thanks you for your honest feedback – I hope you feel mine was the same.

Tom

I hope you all liked reading through this. I know Stephen, William and I appreciate hearing from you all and rating us on iTunes and the Zune Market place is a good thing too.

And James, if you read my blog here at EUCantina.net, I want to thank you again for posting and hope you enjoy our show going forward.

This is your Uncle Kal saying – Good Night All

Is it me or does it really suck trying to find new SW action figures these days?

I mean, look, I don’t have much money these days (like everyone else) but I like to cruse the isles just to see the new figures. Why am I ranting? Well, I’m going to tell ya’.

I was at Walmart earlier today just to see the new stuff. Pegs where full of Transformers (and I mean full), GI Joe’s (also full), Hot Wheels, Cars and such. I stopped at the SW pegs and see all the same leftover figures. Odi Wan, Anakin, Sensi Tiin, a Battle Droid and few clones, you know; the same picked over stuff week in week out.

Now, like I mentioned above, I’m really cutting back and I go down this isle knowing full well I wasn’t going to buy anything, well 97% of the time. But my complaint is – where are all the ‘new’ figures that have been released? I would love to see a Cad Bane, Ashoka in her new outfit, the Droid Commando and such. Why is it the hardcore toy collectors feel they have the right to grab the good stuff and sell it for twice to three times the face value on eBay or a swap meet?

I’ve seen Treasure Hunt Hot Wheels that at one time where selling for $30 (when they where hot) are now selling for $5 or, heaven-for-bid, face value.

Case in point, as of this writing I’m on toywiz.com. There 2009 Clone Wars action figure section shows a Cad Bane selling for $26.99 with New MEGA Hot! under the figure.

?WTF?

There are other figures on this page that go for $16.99, $19.00 and some at face value or lower (sorry 4-A7).

I’m wondering how much that Cad Bane figure will be worth in two to three years? My bet it will be back to face value. But it could be worth less if some kid where to get there hands on it and actually ‘play’ with it. Now that’s a concept huh??

BTW, for full disclosure yes I do have figures / Hot Wheels / LEGOS / older GI Joe’s that are still Mint in Box or on card. It’s looking at that part of my collection that made me stop and ask – - – Why am I doing this?

This is your Uncle Kal – Good Night and Good Luck

Well, I finished FOJ Abyss last night and my quick thought – - – - eh.

Here are some points I see:

The tension between Daala and Jedi I can believe. You definitely feel the weight of the split between the Government and Jedi. How and if it can ever be mended, only time will tell

The relationship between Luke and Ben has been a highlight of this series. All authors have been able hold this relationship together.

I believe I see, from this series of books, how the Jedi will split and end up as the Imperial Knights and Jedi like in the Legacy comics. Now, as we all know, this is the EU and Lucas can do whatever he wants so this could change at some point.

I don’t like the tabloid journalism aspect going on in these books. I know they need to develop the story and have a catalyst to move it forward but – we don’t need something like TMZ in the SW universe.

Is it me but does Daala’s assistant (please forgive me for not knowing his name off hand) bother you? And that pet of his bugs me too. As my old writing teacher taught me “if you call attention to something in the first act – you had better use it by the second.” To me there had better be payoff with this assistant and his “pet.”

That’s it for now. I will probably blog more later as I continue on my merry way in this Sw Universe

This is your Uncle Kal – Good Night, and Good Luck.

Anyhow, I do plan to blog more often since the Clone Wars has started again, I’m reading Abyss and hey, those Legacy comics, y’all still reading them? Hummmm. Okay. I can write about them too.

Until next time – nice to be back!!