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jaredkwheeler's review against another edition
2.0
Star Wars Legends Project #112
Background: Clone Wars Adventures, Volume 3 was released in March 2005. It consists of four stories in the style of Cartoon Network's animated Clone Wars series: Rogue's Gallery, The Package, and A Stranger in Town, and One Battle. All four were pencilled by the [author:Fillbach Brothers|5498466], and they also wrote the third one. The first was written by [author:Haden Blackman|16071920], the second was written by [author:Ryan Kaufman|95259], and the fourth was written by [author:Tim Mucci|667331]. Kaufman has a smattering of random Star Wars credits to his name, including a few other comics and video games like Republic Commando. This is Mucci's only Star Wars work.
Rogue's Gallery is set 6 months after the Battle of Geonosis (22 years before the Battle of Yavin), and features Durge, Asajj Ventress, General Grievous, and Count Dooku. The Package takes place on Ord Mantell around the same time, and the protagonists are clone commandos, with a brief appearance by Chancellor Palpatine. A Stranger in Town also takes place around the same time and stars Yoda. One Battle takes place 4 months after the Battle of Geonosis, on the planet Aridka, and features Plo Koon.
Summary: In Rogue's Gallery, Durge and Asajj Ventress enter Count Dooku's trophy room to deal with a mysterious intruder, and find that they may have finally met their match.
In The Package, two squads of clone commandos give their all to retrieve an item intended for Chancellor Palpatine before it call fall into Separatist hands.
In A Stranger in Town, Yoda walks into a small village bearing a strange burden that confuses and amuses the locals.
In One Battle, Plo Koon appears just in time to save the Republic from defeat as the battle's last surviving clone troopers are on the point of losing hope.
Review: Please refer to my review of [book:Star Wars: Clone Wars Adventures, Vol. 1|35438] for some general thoughts that apply to the series as a whole.
Once again, the stories in this collection aren't actively terrible if you're into this sort of thing, but they're fairly forgettable. I liked the middle two, and didn't much like the others. Rogue's Gallery suffers from the inevitable "Durge problem" . . . by which I mean that it has Durge in it. He's still not a great character as written thus far, and his power is so ill-defined that his presence annoys me. This is a perfect example of that: He has previously defeated multiple Jedi masters with very little trouble. Here, he is dispatched with similar ease by another antagonist, who will himself later be defeated by a Jedi who was easily defeated by Durge . . . Consistency isn't too much to ask for, is it? One Battle has the problem that I've complained about before, except it's even more obvious about it, because this issue is literally what the story is about rather than it just being an annoying detail within a story about something else. The Republic forces are almost all dead and about to be defeated . . . a Jedi drops in and destroys literally thousands of Separatist troops single-handed and with no trouble, leaving one to wonder why the Republic even bothers with an army at all, and how it is that the Separatists haven't already lost. Just nonsense.
The Package is a really nice break from a long string of stories about uber-powerful Force users, and it feels (in stark contrast to basically every other story so far) like there are real stakes and a real cost to the conflict. And it ends with a gut punch that I found very effective. A Stranger in Town is the sort of story I ought to complain about, but it's so obviously not taking itself seriously that there doesn't seem to be a point. It's an example of how to do this right where One Battle is an example of how to do it wrong. It is supremely conscious of the various Western and Kung Fu movie tropes that it is tapping into, and it just revels in them in a way that I really enjoyed. And so goes Volume 3.
C-
Background: Clone Wars Adventures, Volume 3 was released in March 2005. It consists of four stories in the style of Cartoon Network's animated Clone Wars series: Rogue's Gallery, The Package, and A Stranger in Town, and One Battle. All four were pencilled by the [author:Fillbach Brothers|5498466], and they also wrote the third one. The first was written by [author:Haden Blackman|16071920], the second was written by [author:Ryan Kaufman|95259], and the fourth was written by [author:Tim Mucci|667331]. Kaufman has a smattering of random Star Wars credits to his name, including a few other comics and video games like Republic Commando. This is Mucci's only Star Wars work.
Rogue's Gallery is set 6 months after the Battle of Geonosis (22 years before the Battle of Yavin), and features Durge, Asajj Ventress, General Grievous, and Count Dooku. The Package takes place on Ord Mantell around the same time, and the protagonists are clone commandos, with a brief appearance by Chancellor Palpatine. A Stranger in Town also takes place around the same time and stars Yoda. One Battle takes place 4 months after the Battle of Geonosis, on the planet Aridka, and features Plo Koon.
Summary: In Rogue's Gallery, Durge and Asajj Ventress enter Count Dooku's trophy room to deal with a mysterious intruder, and find that they may have finally met their match.
In The Package, two squads of clone commandos give their all to retrieve an item intended for Chancellor Palpatine before it call fall into Separatist hands.
In A Stranger in Town, Yoda walks into a small village bearing a strange burden that confuses and amuses the locals.
In One Battle, Plo Koon appears just in time to save the Republic from defeat as the battle's last surviving clone troopers are on the point of losing hope.
Review: Please refer to my review of [book:Star Wars: Clone Wars Adventures, Vol. 1|35438] for some general thoughts that apply to the series as a whole.
Once again, the stories in this collection aren't actively terrible if you're into this sort of thing, but they're fairly forgettable. I liked the middle two, and didn't much like the others. Rogue's Gallery suffers from the inevitable "Durge problem" . . . by which I mean that it has Durge in it. He's still not a great character as written thus far, and his power is so ill-defined that his presence annoys me. This is a perfect example of that: He has previously defeated multiple Jedi masters with very little trouble. Here, he is dispatched with similar ease by another antagonist, who will himself later be defeated by a Jedi who was easily defeated by Durge . . . Consistency isn't too much to ask for, is it? One Battle has the problem that I've complained about before, except it's even more obvious about it, because this issue is literally what the story is about rather than it just being an annoying detail within a story about something else. The Republic forces are almost all dead and about to be defeated . . . a Jedi drops in and destroys literally thousands of Separatist troops single-handed and with no trouble, leaving one to wonder why the Republic even bothers with an army at all, and how it is that the Separatists haven't already lost. Just nonsense.
The Package is a really nice break from a long string of stories about uber-powerful Force users, and it feels (in stark contrast to basically every other story so far) like there are real stakes and a real cost to the conflict. And it ends with a gut punch that I found very effective. A Stranger in Town is the sort of story I ought to complain about, but it's so obviously not taking itself seriously that there doesn't seem to be a point. It's an example of how to do this right where One Battle is an example of how to do it wrong. It is supremely conscious of the various Western and Kung Fu movie tropes that it is tapping into, and it just revels in them in a way that I really enjoyed. And so goes Volume 3.
C-
rivulet027's review against another edition
4.0
I really liked the Plo Koon saves the day story. It was interesting to see the one where Grievous joins Dooku and how Dooku tests him.
jmshirtz's review
4.0
My favorite story in this one was "A Stranger in Town" which stars a silent, yet well-prepared, Yoda.
velocitygirl14's review
3.0
This one was darker and showed the callousness of the Republic towards the troopers. It actually got to me, despite the childish art and feel.
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