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andrewliptak's review
3.0
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.
(Originally printed: http://jeditrilobite.wordpress.com)
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.
(Originally printed: http://jeditrilobite.wordpress.com)
jaredkwheeler's review
4.0
Star Wars Legends Project #126
Background: The Clone Wars was written by [a:Karen Traviss|12672|Karen Traviss|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1199058946p2/12672.jpg] and published in July 2008. Her other Star Wars books include the Republic Commando series and 3 of the Legacy of the Force novels. She also wrote several Halo and Gears of War novels, as well as some original science fiction.
The Clone Wars takes place somewhere between 2 and 16 months after the Battle of Geonosis, 21-22 years before the Battle of Yavin. The timeline surrounding this period is crowded and muddled, mostly because it was filled by a coordinated media blitz of Expanded Universe novels and comics published between the releases of Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith, and then filled again with the release of the The Clone Wars movie and subsequent 6 seasons of the TV show and related novels and comics beginning in 2008. For the most part, the problem with these overlapping events isn't so much that they can't be imagined as fitting together, because while it's clear that not all of this could have happened during such a short period, and that Anakin's apprentice Ahsoka Tano would have merited mention elsewhere had previous EU authors known of her existence, the two timelines only explicitly contradict each other in one major detail:
In the original EU timeline, Anakin Skywalker is raised to the rank of Jedi Knight 36 months into the war, shortly before the events of Revenge of the Sith, and in The Clone Wars show, he is promoted only a month into the conflict. And even this isn't as much of a problem as it appears, because Anakin appears in relatively few of the stories from the previous timeline. He is entirely absent from the Republic Commando books for example, and even from books like The Cestus Deception, where I believe he is referred to one time as Obi-Wan's apprentice but never actually appears. These sorts of things are fairly easy to ignore, and ignoring them makes far more sense, to my mind, than the official method of reconciliation, which is to move all of the previous EU material from when it is actually set to all happen within the first month of the Clone Wars.
So, according to the official timeline, this novel takes place around 7 weeks after the Battle of Geonosis, but other hints dropped here and there throughout which reference events in other media, most notably the Battle of Jabiim, suggest that it may make more sense to place it around a year and a half into the conflict, or at least to read it after the material that I have placed before it in my own Legends project. That is, of course, assuming that it makes sense to include it in the "Legends" timeline at all, since the show and associated materials are still officially considered canon. The point is . . . it's a mess.
The main characters of the novel are Anakin and his new apprentice Ahsoka Tano, Obi-Wan, Asajj Ventress, Count Dooku, Jabba the Hutt, and the clone Captain Rex. The action takes place mostly on Christophsis, Tatooine, and Teth.
Summary: Jabba the Hutt's son has been kidnapped, and it seems the timing couldn't be more perfect for the Republic. The Hutt's crisis provides the Republic with a chance to gain some leverage in acquiring access to Hutt space as the only route to the Outer Rim that isn't under Separatist control. But all is not as it seems. The kidnapping is a Separatist plot to frame the Jedi and simultaneously turn the neutral Hutts against the Republic while closing off access to the Outer Rim territories. The Jedi most readily available for the mission are Obi-Wan and Anakin, just wrapping up a hard-won victory on the planet Christophsis. For Anakin, playing lackey to a Hutt raises difficult memories from his past, and his plate is already full with a headstrong new apprentice assigned to him against his will by the Council. For Anakin personally, and for the Republic as a whole, the stakes of this mission couldn't be higher.
Review: I saw The Clone Wars when it was first released in theaters in 2008, and I believe I've watched it 2 or 3 times since then. It is not a good movie. The plot is a mess. The dialogue is terrible. Ahsoka and Anakin spend the whole movie battling over who is going to be the most annoying character in a movie that includes a shrieking baby Huttlet. In terms of theatrical releases, this is scraping the bottom of the Star Wars barrel. So, I'd say my expectations for this novelization of the movie were pretty modest. And danged if Traviss didn't blow it out of the water.
It was obvious from the beginning that I was reading a version of the same story the movie told, but beyond that, this was barely recognizable . . . one of the more powerful illustrations I've seen of the difference good writing makes versus bad writing in approaching the same idea, and perhaps the greatest departure of a novelization from the source material I've ever encountered. Gone is the constant bickering between Anakin and Ahsoka, replaced by genuine character development and internal monologues that give new depth and meaning to what the characters are going through. Rex, the clone commander who barely registers as a presence in the movie, is foregrounded here as a fully-fleshed out and compelling personality in his own right. And, of course, her depiction of the clones dovetails perfectly with how she depicted them in her own Republic Commando series. Ventress and Dooku, flat cartoon villains in the film, are also fully-realized, even sympathetic, people with believable, reasonable motivations here.
This is something I noted that Traviss did particularly well in the first Republic Commando novel, Hard Contact (my review). She humanizes the antagonist as well as the protagonist, and turns them into compelling characters that you want to hear more about. One of my favorite scenes in the novel, the duel between Obi-Wan and Asajj, is told entirely from Asajj's perspective, and (using strictly the movie dialogue) Obi-Wan comes off looking like kind of an ass. You feel why he and his smarmy wisecracks embody everything Asajj hates about what she sees as the flippant arrogance of the Jedi, and also why her hatred is at least somewhat justified.
Even the plot, which makes so little sense in the movie, almost works here. Traviss puts in a lot of work talking us through things that were never explained in the film, seemingly because no one thought of them. In so doing she ends up highlighting how absurd the movie's plot as presented actually is, while at the same time almost redeeming it. This, like most of the book's other flaws, lies squarely at the foot of the source it was forced to work with. I got to the end of this book and wondered if perhaps I hadn't been way too hard on the movie . . . if it weren't, perhaps, far better than I remembered it being. And then I rewatched it. It was not better than I remembered. That was all Traviss. So, if you haven't seen The Clone Wars, don't watch it, but do read this. And if you have seen The Clone Wars . . . I'm sorry. Give this a shot anyway.
A-
Background: The Clone Wars was written by [a:Karen Traviss|12672|Karen Traviss|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1199058946p2/12672.jpg] and published in July 2008. Her other Star Wars books include the Republic Commando series and 3 of the Legacy of the Force novels. She also wrote several Halo and Gears of War novels, as well as some original science fiction.
The Clone Wars takes place somewhere between 2 and 16 months after the Battle of Geonosis, 21-22 years before the Battle of Yavin. The timeline surrounding this period is crowded and muddled, mostly because it was filled by a coordinated media blitz of Expanded Universe novels and comics published between the releases of Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith, and then filled again with the release of the The Clone Wars movie and subsequent 6 seasons of the TV show and related novels and comics beginning in 2008. For the most part, the problem with these overlapping events isn't so much that they can't be imagined as fitting together, because while it's clear that not all of this could have happened during such a short period, and that Anakin's apprentice Ahsoka Tano would have merited mention elsewhere had previous EU authors known of her existence, the two timelines only explicitly contradict each other in one major detail:
In the original EU timeline, Anakin Skywalker is raised to the rank of Jedi Knight 36 months into the war, shortly before the events of Revenge of the Sith, and in The Clone Wars show, he is promoted only a month into the conflict. And even this isn't as much of a problem as it appears, because Anakin appears in relatively few of the stories from the previous timeline. He is entirely absent from the Republic Commando books for example, and even from books like The Cestus Deception, where I believe he is referred to one time as Obi-Wan's apprentice but never actually appears. These sorts of things are fairly easy to ignore, and ignoring them makes far more sense, to my mind, than the official method of reconciliation, which is to move all of the previous EU material from when it is actually set to all happen within the first month of the Clone Wars.
So, according to the official timeline, this novel takes place around 7 weeks after the Battle of Geonosis, but other hints dropped here and there throughout which reference events in other media, most notably the Battle of Jabiim, suggest that it may make more sense to place it around a year and a half into the conflict, or at least to read it after the material that I have placed before it in my own Legends project. That is, of course, assuming that it makes sense to include it in the "Legends" timeline at all, since the show and associated materials are still officially considered canon. The point is . . . it's a mess.
The main characters of the novel are Anakin and his new apprentice Ahsoka Tano, Obi-Wan, Asajj Ventress, Count Dooku, Jabba the Hutt, and the clone Captain Rex. The action takes place mostly on Christophsis, Tatooine, and Teth.
Summary: Jabba the Hutt's son has been kidnapped, and it seems the timing couldn't be more perfect for the Republic. The Hutt's crisis provides the Republic with a chance to gain some leverage in acquiring access to Hutt space as the only route to the Outer Rim that isn't under Separatist control. But all is not as it seems. The kidnapping is a Separatist plot to frame the Jedi and simultaneously turn the neutral Hutts against the Republic while closing off access to the Outer Rim territories. The Jedi most readily available for the mission are Obi-Wan and Anakin, just wrapping up a hard-won victory on the planet Christophsis. For Anakin, playing lackey to a Hutt raises difficult memories from his past, and his plate is already full with a headstrong new apprentice assigned to him against his will by the Council. For Anakin personally, and for the Republic as a whole, the stakes of this mission couldn't be higher.
Review: I saw The Clone Wars when it was first released in theaters in 2008, and I believe I've watched it 2 or 3 times since then. It is not a good movie. The plot is a mess. The dialogue is terrible. Ahsoka and Anakin spend the whole movie battling over who is going to be the most annoying character in a movie that includes a shrieking baby Huttlet. In terms of theatrical releases, this is scraping the bottom of the Star Wars barrel. So, I'd say my expectations for this novelization of the movie were pretty modest. And danged if Traviss didn't blow it out of the water.
It was obvious from the beginning that I was reading a version of the same story the movie told, but beyond that, this was barely recognizable . . . one of the more powerful illustrations I've seen of the difference good writing makes versus bad writing in approaching the same idea, and perhaps the greatest departure of a novelization from the source material I've ever encountered. Gone is the constant bickering between Anakin and Ahsoka, replaced by genuine character development and internal monologues that give new depth and meaning to what the characters are going through. Rex, the clone commander who barely registers as a presence in the movie, is foregrounded here as a fully-fleshed out and compelling personality in his own right. And, of course, her depiction of the clones dovetails perfectly with how she depicted them in her own Republic Commando series. Ventress and Dooku, flat cartoon villains in the film, are also fully-realized, even sympathetic, people with believable, reasonable motivations here.
This is something I noted that Traviss did particularly well in the first Republic Commando novel, Hard Contact (my review). She humanizes the antagonist as well as the protagonist, and turns them into compelling characters that you want to hear more about. One of my favorite scenes in the novel, the duel between Obi-Wan and Asajj, is told entirely from Asajj's perspective, and (using strictly the movie dialogue) Obi-Wan comes off looking like kind of an ass. You feel why he and his smarmy wisecracks embody everything Asajj hates about what she sees as the flippant arrogance of the Jedi, and also why her hatred is at least somewhat justified.
Even the plot, which makes so little sense in the movie, almost works here. Traviss puts in a lot of work talking us through things that were never explained in the film, seemingly because no one thought of them. In so doing she ends up highlighting how absurd the movie's plot as presented actually is, while at the same time almost redeeming it. This, like most of the book's other flaws, lies squarely at the foot of the source it was forced to work with. I got to the end of this book and wondered if perhaps I hadn't been way too hard on the movie . . . if it weren't, perhaps, far better than I remembered it being. And then I rewatched it. It was not better than I remembered. That was all Traviss. So, if you haven't seen The Clone Wars, don't watch it, but do read this. And if you have seen The Clone Wars . . . I'm sorry. Give this a shot anyway.
A-
jimbob2001's review
adventurous
lighthearted
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
3.75
lebanon's review
4.0
The Clone Wars movie and TV show were some of my favorite things to watch when I was younger, so I was naturally pretty excited to read the book by Karen Traviss. This book adapts the story of the movie well, while also providing a little extra information about the events. To summarize for anyone who hasn't seen the movie, the plot revolves around Anakin Skywalker and his padawan Ashoka Tano trying to rescue the son of Jabba the Hutt after he was captured by Count Dooku. The plot is pretty basic and relies heavily on action, which would be a knock against the book, except that it is exactly the same as in the movie, so I can't fault the author for being accurate to the source. Even though the story is mostly action based, Traviss adds some extra characterization, especially to Anakin, who is still dealing with his mother's death and his slaughter of the Tusken raiders. Overall, The Clone Wars is a fun read with a lot of action, although it is light on plot.
viktoria_rosalynn's review
adventurous
funny
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
hidingzeus's review
3.0
I did not realize going into this book that it was a novelization, but it kept me going long enough to finish it, so it was decent enough.
jetteleia's review against another edition
adventurous
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
I am so grateful and happy for every Padmé mention I can get and this book didn‘t lack those. Love Anakins thoughts about her („Padmé. My wife. Hey, that‘s my wife.“). Also Traviss gave the theme of saving for Anakin so much thought, especially his complicated relationship with it („Save; he did so much saving now but it would never be enough to make him whole.“) and towards the end he thinks that he wasn‘t able to SAVE him but Ahsoka and then eventually after Padmé comes to resue he thins that she SAVES him evrytime. Just amazing.
Karen Traviss most certainly gave the Clone Wars movie adaptation her own touch which I appreciated so much. Like the thought she gave Ahsoka and her species as former predator and how she described Ahsokas demeanor due to it. And her signature can also be seen in the understandability of the „bad guys“ because Ventress and Dooku all have understandable motivations which empathises that the Seperatist never really were the bad guys but both sides were just outwitted by Sisious, so there was never the possibility of an understanding between the Republic and the CIS.
Sadly, it the messed up timeline (due to The Clone Wars) became clear when battles like the Battle of Jabiim (which originally took place some years later in the Clone War) even though the book takes places relatively soon after AotC (solution was that Jabiim and every other media from the Multimedia Clone Wars Project was squeezed into the time period between AotC and the Clone Was movie).
Karen Traviss most certainly gave the Clone Wars movie adaptation her own touch which I appreciated so much. Like the thought she gave Ahsoka and her species as former predator and how she described Ahsokas demeanor due to it. And her signature can also be seen in the understandability of the „bad guys“ because Ventress and Dooku all have understandable motivations which empathises that the Seperatist never really were the bad guys but both sides were just outwitted by Sisious, so there was never the possibility of an understanding between the Republic and the CIS.
Sadly, it the messed up timeline (due to The Clone Wars) became clear when battles like the Battle of Jabiim (which originally took place some years later in the Clone War) even though the book takes places relatively soon after AotC (solution was that Jabiim and every other media from the Multimedia Clone Wars Project was squeezed into the time period between AotC and the Clone Was movie).
hstapp's review
3.0
The book is actually a little more entertaining than the clone wars movie. I love the clone wars series as a whole, but the movie is definitely not the best part. An acceptable book. Reasonably entertaining.
hstapp's review against another edition
4.0
This is by far the best version of the Clone Wars movie that I've encountered. It makes me wonder why I don't like the movie, because this book is really good. Exciting, filled with action, and the only book that goes into Obi-Wan's Surrender negotiations.
katewans's review against another edition
DNF’d. Not particularly a fan of how biased this is against the Jedi so far, and I don’t feel as though this story will provide enough new information to push through.
Each scene from the Siths’ perspectives are heavily critical of the Jedi, and there aren’t any subsequent chapters in which the Jedi are able to contradict or offer alternate perspectives.
There are also some parts that seem odd in the greater context - for example Obi-Wan is always referenced as just ‘Kenobi’ in Anakin’s PoV chapters.
Each scene from the Siths’ perspectives are heavily critical of the Jedi, and there aren’t any subsequent chapters in which the Jedi are able to contradict or offer alternate perspectives.
There are also some parts that seem odd in the greater context - for example Obi-Wan is always referenced as just ‘Kenobi’ in Anakin’s PoV chapters.