Who knew. Half the awesomeness of the exciting new 3rd season of Star Wars The Clone Wars (besides the adventure and the visual spectacle like this half-destroyed, yet habitable planet with a Jedi prison for instance in that galaxy far, far away) is the additional context and perspective that colours in everything that Star Wars fans never knew they needed to know.
As new episodes of Star Wars The Clone Wars are rolling out until 9 September on Thursdays at 17:55 on The Cartoon Network (DStv 301) a fascinating observational and character study is actually the unspoken revelations inside this finely-crafted animation series. The show continues to fill in hordes of little-known details only hinted at in the movies.
The 3rd season - through a myriad of side adventures by the characters which is taking them across Lucas' (in)famous galaxy - are giving fans more insight into the underlying motivations, places and the galaxy-wide socio-economic and socio-political machinations that is Star Wars. And its vast, and wonderful. Just take the Jedi - that mysterious warrior religious order - who wields the Force. Star Wars The Clone Wars offers tantalising new details, background and revelations about the Jedi that we never knew.
Did you know for instance that ''bad'' Jedi who've ''lost their way'' got locked up in an inescapable prison tower on a faraway world (the one above)? Didn't? Well, watch and learn my young Padawan. Here's 10 things the 3rd season of Star Wars The Clone Wars reveals about the Jedi - that we never knew.
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1. Skywalker (who became Darth Vader) has a surprising history with someone.
Look out for a very young Captain Tarkin towards the end of this season. Yes. The man who eventually runs the day to day operations of the Death Star and is friends with Darth Vader in the movies actually new Anakin Skywalker way back when they met years earlier. But when they're first introduced they don't like each other at all!
2. Obi-Wan Kenobi really actually stretches the truth (often).
I really just completely love this character as he's portrayed and coloured in fuller in terms of his personality in Star Wars The Clone Wars. It's not that he's dishonest. He's just omitting things. Sometimes important things. When we first saw him in the first Star Wars movie having a conversation with Luke telling him that he knew his father, Obi-Wan doesn't tell Luke that his dad is actually Anakin Skywalker and therefore Darth Vader. Star Wars The Clone Wars shows quite consistently in the character portrayel that this is actually a firm personality trait of Obi-Wan. He keeps not telling people everything they should (?) know upfront, which really sometimes makes things difficult.
3. Jedi younglings sometimes went without their Jedi masters.
Maybe it was the circumstances of the galaxy wide war and resources being spread thin. Who knows. Although Anakin Skywalker and his young Jedi apprentice Ahsoka mostly did everything together and went together on missions, it actually wasn't always the case. Fans will see at least two occurrences in this new season where Anakin's young padawan became embroiled in life-and-death battles. On her own.
4. Sy… you devious spy.
Sy Snootles, the flimsy little thing who appear briefly as a lounge singer for Jabba the Hut in the movies is actually … a very cunning female. In her backstory she turns out to be dastardly evil and conniving. Who knew she had a story all of her own? What does it have to do with the Jedi? Well, of course they got involved when she killed someone.
5. Asajj Ventress … the good Jedi?
The very evil Asajj Ventress, actually…wasn't always evil. Would you believe that she was chosen to become a Jedi? Was saved by a Jedi master and started her training as a Jedi padawan? All true. And then something terrible happened. For the first time in Star Wars The Clone Wars fans get insight to what happened to her as a young child and what led her to become revengeful and bad.
6. The Jedi: wise – but actually totally clueless.
The Jedi as an arcane order of galactic peacekeepers were actually completely overstretched. They basically had no clue about the intricate political games that were being masterminded all around them. The new season of Star Wars The Clone Wars shows in many ways how the Jedi were simply unable to put all the disparate events happening around them, together. Although wise, they lost focus of the overall intricate picture, and became involved in irrelevant smaller battles. It's incredibly fascinating.
7. Where bad Jedi used to go …
Did you know that ''Jedi who went bad'' were sent to the Citadel, an ''impenetrable fortress'' on the planet Lola Sayu? Three utterly great episodes are going to take place here in this new third season on an amazing planet – still habitable – that had a massive chunk seemingly cut off like you would slice off the side of an apple.
8. Love and war and a grown-up Ahsoka.
Jedi aren't supposed to fall in love but obviously Anakin did. And now, maybe, Ahsoka… Fans are in for the mystery of an outdated Jedi distress code that is picked up and is thousands of years old, Obi-Wan's Jedi master Qui-Gon Jinn shows up and fans get a look at what a very grown-up Ahsoka would look in the future.
9. There is not just one Jedi temple.
You thought the Jedi Temple on Coruscant was the only one? Guess again. Jedi temples apparently were placed across the galaxy. And some are in trouble and under siege…
10.War changes people. Even Jedi's.
Anakin, Obi-Wan and Ahsoka have a slightly (updated) different look in this third season to take into account that time is passing and that they're involved in a war. Ahsoka is a bit taller and older and carries two lightsabers. Obi-Wan and Anakin are both starting to look more like how they do in the Star Wars Episode III movie that follows after this series. Also look out for Jedi master Quinlan Vos who's a bit crazy and impulsive. He teamed up with the more reserved Obi-Wan for a mission.
Star Wars The Clone Wars III, The Cartoon Network (DStv channel 301) Thursdays at 17:55
