The Clone Wars (Star Wars)

Review by The Delite Rancher for The Clone Wars (Star Wars)
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“The Clone Wars” tells a story about a day in the life of Anakin. This is no rehash of the Cartoon Network’s “Animated Clone Wars.” Even compared to episodes II & III, many of the prominently featured characters play a much smaller role. This is okay because this story introduces an exciting new character to the Star Wars pantheon: Ahsoka. Ahsoka is Skywalker’s apprentice. Along these lines, one of the central themes to “Clone Wars” is the master-apprentice relationship. While this has been done before, the theme is fresh as Anakin and Ahsoka negotiate their relationship. Having nicknames like Skyguy and Snips, their partnership is a contrast to that of Anakin and Obi-Wan. In this story, we delve deeper into the clones. We find a surprising amount of individuality and contemplation. Whether it be their physiology, politics or reproductive habits, we also learn more about the Hutts. Naturally, Count Dooku, Asajj Ventress and Darth Sidious are participants. As the title suggests, there is a good deal of action in the story. Karen Traviss has a knack for combat writing. In addition to conveying the characters’ fatigue and injuries, the reader can also feel their motivation to survive and continue fighting. As with the Republic Commando books, some may find that too much page time is given to combat. Indeed, compared to the theatrical trilogies, this story is heavy on the action and light on character development. With the exception of Ahsoka, “The Clone Wars” does little to advance our understanding of Anakin or other characters. In fact, it does little to flush out significant events of the Clone Wars. Compared to the battles of Geonosis and Utapau, the fighting on Christophsis and Teth have little significance when it comes to the big scheme of things. In the end, we shouldn’t over intellectualize; this story is eye candy (or is it mind candy when read from a book?). Despite having over 250 pages, this is an enjoyable story that moves quickly. Whether as an end unto itself or an appetizer for the upcoming film, “Clone Wars” is action packed fun.

POST-FILM ADDENDUM

Now that the film has been released, I thought that I’d throw in a comparison between the “Clone Wars” book and the movie. As would be expected, the book contains more detail. Much of the book’s internal dialogue is sacrificed in the name of big screen action. The film excludes the little character development that could be found in to the book. In particular, the film lacks the interesting mental dialogues of Anakin, Ventress, Jabba and to a lesser extent, Count Dooku and the clones. Dave Filoni’s screen adaptation highlights the lighter side of the “Clone Wars” story. While the motion picture lacks substance when compared to the regular trilogies, it makes up for it with fun. At this point, I imagine that most people reading this review have seen the film and are wondering if they should bother with the book. Unless the viewer just hated the film, the answer to this question is ‘yes.’ Traviss’ poetic description of combat is much appreciated. The heretofore character development is also enjoyable. The book contains all of the movie’s action and additional content substance. So as a post-film supplement, Karen Traviss’ book can be most gratifying.

Review by Andrew Liptak for The Clone Wars (Star Wars)
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[This review contains spoilers for The Clone Wars]

Earlier this year, the Star Wars Lit community was abuzz with the news of a couple of things – that there was an untitled Karen Traviss novel coming, and that there was a Clone Wars movie coming out. A couple of months ago, fans learned that they were both connected, as Karen turned out to have been writing the novelization.

The release of The Clone Wars brings about the first book released in the time frame since Traviss’s last Republic Commando novel, True Colors, which was released last year, and once again shows that Traviss is one of the better writers for the Clone Wars.

This novelization isn’t the best work that Karen has released. The book is a very short one, and plotwise, has a bit to be desired. In a nutshell, the Seperatists have kidnapped the son of Jabba the Hutt, hoping to anger the Hutts enough to ensure that the Republic can’t utilize their space lanes.

The book is rife with action, which is Karen’s strong point, especially when it comes to Clones. the main characters are introduced with a battle, where Karen puts her expertise gained from the Republic Commando books. What I really enjoyed was seeing an author put a level of military realism to this – the Clones talk and act like soldiers.

Karen leaves a lot of nods to the 501st, helping to further explain the role of Vader’s fist, the battalion seen in Revenge of the Sith, named for the 501st Legion. One of the more interesting characters in the book is Captain Rex, whom a number of Legion members are building in anticipation of the film’s release. Karen pushed these guys to a particular prominence in the book, which is a great nod to the group, of which, she’s an honorary member. There weren’t any mentions of Republic Commandos, which surprised me a little.

The plot of the book leaves more to be desired beyond the military sections. There are some interesting political ideas here, but the idea that the Republic would send two of their most highly regarded Jedi after a Huttling is somewhat ridiculous. While this is addressed somewhat at points, I found it hard to believe.

More so, I found the notion that the Hutts, or more particularly, Jabba, would completely base foreign policy on a kidnapped child a ridiculous notion. Granted, this is a novelization based off of an animated movie, so expecting something on the level of Karen’s other books or other Clone Wars novels such as Shatterpoint is somewhat expected.

Unfortunately, the book is short, clocking in at around 250 pages, taking me a total of five or so hours to read. Fortunately, Del Rey seems to have realized this, and as a result, I only paid $12 for the book (yay for a 40% discount at Borders).

Overall, this is a decent enough read, despite the fact that it is short and not as good as her other books. However, with four more books to go in the series, there’s plenty of room for more improvement and Clone action.

Review by Robert A. Raymond for The Clone Wars (Star Wars)
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I loved listening to this star wars novel. I not only love the way the reader reads the book, but I love the star wars music and sound effects that are woven into the reading. If you are blind like me, there is no better way to enjoy star wars.

Review by Rem for The Clone Wars (Star Wars)
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I had seen the animated movie. I knew that it was directed mainly at the younger generation of prospective fans and dyed-in-the-wool Star Wars aficionados. Since I knew about Tracy West’s same-titled junior novelization of the movie, I assumed that Karen Traviss’s adaptation would be directed at adult Star Wars devotees. To put it simply: I was mistaken.

While the book does give more background and describes events in more detail, the plot simply isn’t deep enough for an adult novel. And while more material is included in the book as opposed to the movie, some events from the movie are simply missing. For instance, in the denouement, while we know exactly what was happening with Anakin, whatever happened to Ahsoka and the Huttlet between the time she and Anakin split up and then reunited is simply omitted.

I already had seen the movie and thus knew (mainly) what was going to happen. Couple that with the fact that the book ended up being below my expectations, and the rating is * * *. However, if I hadn’t seen the movie and hadn’t seen the book’s dust jacket (with the characters clearly animated), the fact that the book turned out to be a young-adult novella, etc. wouldn’t have mattered that much. Thus the rating would probably have been * * * *.

Review by David Pruette for The Clone Wars (Star Wars)
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The actual Clone Wars, not the book, have come a long ways in the Star Wars universe. We originally learned of them from a mostly off-hand reference early in the films. Some of us may have wondered then what kind of fighting went on during the Clone Wars. When was it? Where was it fought? Exactly who was on each side?

Well, here we are down the road. We have a movie. We have an animated TV series, and we have a book by none other than Karen Traviss. Ms Traviss is noted particularly for her excellent Republic Commando series, and she has maintained her high standards with The Clone Wars. She is now one of the authors whose name alone on the front of a book can increase sales.

At the time of this book, the Clone Wars are raging across the galaxy. On one side we have the Separatists, led by the venerable Count Dooku, a onetime Jedi and current Sith Lord in secret. He manages a huge droid army. On the other side we have the Republic, publically led by Supreme Chancellor Palpatine (Nudge! Nudge! Wink! Wink!) and his army of clone troopers led by Jedi generals.

The story is fairly straightforward and includes a number of impressive action sequences (as you might expect since the story is based on the TV series). Jabba the Hutt’s infant son has been kidnapped, and both sides are trying to rescue him. The successful side is hoping to gain enough favor with Jabba to gain access to key routes through Hutt-controlled space. Basically we end up with Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Won Kenobi with their clone troops fighting droid forces led by Asajj Ventress. We also are introduced to Anakin’s new Padawan Ahsoka, who turns out to be a breath of fresh air in all of the Clone Wars

As the tale unfolds we are privy to much of the thinking of the clone soldiers. Ms Traviss seems to be specializing in this. We are also allowed in the mind of Palpatine to see what he is actually thinking. This was a great idea because there are some classic moments when Palpatine may not be thinking exactly what you expect.

All in all, The Clone Wars is a fun story to read. See the movie! Watch the TV series! Read the book! It’s all good.