TV Series Review: Ahsoka (2023) Disney+ *Minor Spoilers*

TV Series Review: Ahsoka (2023) Disney+ Minor Spoilers

After spending a considerable amount of time catching myself up on the 'Filoni-verse' by watching all of Dave Filoni's, Disney+ animated Star Wars series I was definitely ready for Season Five of Star Wars Rebels... A.K.A. Ahsoka.

First impressions, the animation looks so real... I think they might have actually shot this as a live action show?

I'm kidding of course. While I think you could probably jump into Ahsoka just based on the character's previous live action appearances in The Mandalorian and The Book of Boba Fett (where she, and a few other supporting characters, name drop Thrawn) you really will get a lot more from the series if you've at least seen all seasons of Star Wars Rebels.

I was going to say at least season four of Rebels but I think you will get the most from Ahsoka if you've followed the characters arcs of the main supporting cast from the beginning.

You'll get even more out of Ahsoka if you've watched the main character's story through all seven seasons of The Clone Wars. However if that's too much homework you can totally jump on from season six. Personally I believe season six and seven of The Clone Wars are some of the best episodes of Star Wars you'll see anywhere, including live action films.

It's not really a spoiler to tell you we get glimpses of Ahsoka's past in the show. If you like those scenes and want more, The Clone Wars is there waiting for you. Frankly, I'd watch a live action show of young Ahsoka with Ariana Greenblatt in the role all day after seeing her and Hayden Christensen's brief scenes on this.

Anakin Skywalker (Hayden Christensen) and young Ahsoka (Ariana Greenblatt) in Ahsoka (2023).
If you want to see more of this part of Ahsoka's story watch The Clone Wars.

Anyway, Ahsoka is an almost direct continuation of Star Wars Rebels with a few tweaks to some storylines. Set after the fall of the Galactic Empire, Ahsoka, has heard rumors of one of the Empire's most formidable Admirals, Admiral Thrawn, is set to return, and she makes it her mission to ensure that doesn't happen.

For the most part I enjoyed the show, particularly seeing the live action interpretations of the Rebels characters. Unlike some, I didn't feel anyone was miscast. It's just a case of getting used to the live action version.

Unfortunately (or fortunately, if you can wait for a season two, or for whatever comes next that continues this story) the series ends with quite a few unresolved storylines. The season finale, whilst entertaining and quite spectacular, is a little bit like going through the motions if you're a die hard fan who knows this show has at least one unchangeable outcome for the main plot.

Rosario Dawson as Ahsoka is generally well liked in the role, though she has taken some criticism for being too reserved, and not quick enough in her lightsaber duels. If you've only seen young Ahsoka in The Clone Wars (and in this series) the character is more dynamic, quicker, and expressive so you may notice it more.

Rosario's Ahsoka is the older version of the character closer to the Rebels version, and even older than that. You would expect her to be more reflective and self assured. That said, I do kind of wish she was just a little faster in a lightsaber fight.

Other than that it's a strong entry in the Star Wars universe that may see Dave Filoni finally transition his Star Wars to live action for the foreseeable future (I believe he's set to ultimately end this story arc with a feature film).

For me it's not quite as great as Andor but I'd watch it over The Book of Boba Fett (which had its moments but wasn't the story anybody wanted for that character), and even Kenobi (again, not the story anybody wanted for that character).

But, if Dave Filoni was to give me a live action series, with Anakin and Young Ahsoka, that told a self contained story from that time period, that we haven't seen before. He'd definitely have my attention.

Comments

I'm Confused About Why People Prefer to Say Discombobulated?

D iscombobulated. Is a word that I think someone rediscovered about three or four years ago (maybe more because the pandemic years have thrown out my sense of time) and now I hear it a lot. It's not a new word by any means, but when I started hearing multiple celebrities using it in everyday sentences, I actively had to look up what it meant. Define it with as many synonyms as you like but essentially it's just another word meaning 'confused'. Seinfeld Quotes: Quotes.net The words are pretty much interchangeable. He was discombobulated by too many choices. He was confused by too many choices. My confusion is the length of the word. It's unnecessarily long with too many syllables. There are many other words that mean confused, and therefore also mean discombobulated. Most of them are shorter and easier to say. So why not just say 'confused'? Perhaps discombobulated sounds more intelligent, maybe? Hawaii Five-0 Quotes: Quotes.net I've noticed it gets us...

Introducing the Second Sunday Skateboard Sessions - Doing Less to Skateboard More

This was my second heelflip attempt of the day. I was pleased I at least got the full rotation even if I didn't land it. I am determined to keep skating for as long as possible, though, since my last post in May 2024, about reigniting my kickflip battle at age 54 , I've probably been skateboarding less than I had hoped. Still haven't landed that elusive kickflip either. Strangely I've been wanting to film myself skateboarding again but have been reluctant to do so because it can be a bit of a hassle trying to create interesting content, not to mention a lot of editing, if you want to capture the full journey of learning a trick. I really hate editing. Looking at my camera equipment the other day I was thinking what is the most minimal setup that I can put together that would make it easy to film skate videos anywhere? I landed on using my Samsung A13, Android phone, mounted on a GoPro selfie stick that has a tripod base in the handle, and a wireless mic I bought some t...

TV Series Review: Skeleton Crew (2024) (Disney+) No Spoilers

I f you saw the trailer for Skeleton Crew and decided the show looked too much like Star Wars for little kids, and didn't watch, you missed out on a real treat. While I will say this show was definitely targeted at bringing in younger fans to the Star Wars universe, it is very much more like family viewing than kids only TV. Not to mention, characters are literally gunned down or murdered on this show, but without the really graphic violence you might see on a more adult orientated show. It's actually no more kid only orientated than the first series of Stranger Things (2016), or even the original Star Wars (1977) movie. In fact the whole show is a not so subtle homage to original Star Wars (1977), Treasure Island (1950), and eighties movies like The Goonies (1985), ET (1982), Explorers (1985) and others. The plot is very straight forward. A group of children, living in the Star Wars equivalent of the suburbs, find an aband...

The Princess' Butterflies - Using an AI Image to Video Generator to Animate Art That Started as a 23 Year Old Rough Pen Sketch

B ack in October of 2023 I used Prome AI's Sketch Rendering feature to color a 23 year old rough pen sketch I did of a princess watching butterflies, sitting next to a waterfall in the forest. You can read more about that in my previous article, The Princess' Butterflies - Using an AI Art Generator to Color and Enhance a 23 Year Old Rough Pen Sketch The three images I used to create my final image (bottom right). Notice how closely the AI has followed my line art sketch (top left) but in the first image (top right) has misinterpreted the waterfall as some kind of large tree stump. Prome's render of the artwork was pretty good but I did end up creating a composite image myself from two of the best renders, to get my final image. Since then AI Image to Video has come a long way, particularly when it comes to creating animation from artwork and maintaining the art style for the whole generation. AI still does much better with turning photographic images to video but I found ...

Two Former Right Wing Australian PM's Call Out President Trump and His America First Approach

Q uite often, leaders on all sides of politics, once they've retired from office, become the kind of person, with a political view that I would've supported, if they had been that person with that viewpoint, when they were leaders. Case in point, two former right wing, Australian Prime Ministers were individually interviewed about President Trump's negative impact on Australia and global politics in general. Both said things that even a left leaning 'woke' voter like myself could get behind and nod in agreement with. Keep in mind both these former PM's are right wing politicians that should be aligned with the US Republican party, and President Trump's views on many issues. Malcolm Turnbull Mr Turnbull, like President Trump is a businessman turned politician. He's a person I was all set to vote for until he aligned himself with the Australian Liberal Party. Which was a little unexpected for me because up to that point his politics sounded more left than ...

Meanwhile, In Australia... The World's Most Boring Government Is Fine... We're All Fine.

That's um... What's his name? T o be honest, I stopped following politics in Australia years ago. The only time I check in is usually around election time just to see which set of woke lefty independents, I'm going to vote for, ahead of my fallbacks of the Greens, and then Labor. Despite my sister trying to categorise me as more of a 'left brained' person I definitely lean 'right brained' more at home with my cry baby, woke, alphabet, lefty people. (For the record, if this is the first musing of mine you've ever read, I'm a straight white male who identifies as an artist... Male artist - just in case you were thinking artist is some new kind of gender you hadn't heard of). This year is an election year for our Federal Government, potentially the world's most boring government, for no other reason than during its entire term, if you asked me who was our Prime Minister I'd actually have to stop and think for a moment. Maybe our 31st PM shou...

TV Series Review: Creature Commandos (2024) No Spoilers

O fficially, Creature Commandos is the first show of James Gunn's kind of reboot of the DCU. Technically though, it starts with James Gunn's, The Suicide Squad , and includes his series, Peacemaker , as the events of both are either referenced or felt within the show. Potentially that means Margot Robbie is Harley Quinn in the DCU, but I'd be surprised if she would even want another crack at it, let alone that James didn't recast the role. However that's a whole other rabbit hole for a character that may not appear again for at least a few more years. Creature Commandos is Suicide Squad but with monsters, and no real threat of Suicide - well, having your head blown off if you stray from the mission at least. Though I don't recall that being a thing in Gunn's Suicide Squad movie since the team was renamed 'Task Force X'? Amanda Waller (Viola Davis) somehow still has a job, but is no longer allowed to use humans on her team, so she assembles a team of...

TET.Life (The Extraordinary Tourist Life)

Search This Blog