STAR WARS: What if The Clone Wars Isn’t Coming Back?
Tuesday, January 29th, 2013 at 5:46 pm Category: Cartoons, Clone Wars, Star Wars, TopI don’t want to be alarmist here. I’m not Chicken Little. Or Ziro the Hutt.
I’m just asking an honest question. What happens if The Clone Wars is done after Cartoon Network airs the Season 5 finale? I know, it makes no sense whatsoever for them to sit on the two or three seasons of episodes that are already done or in production. I get that. But what if?
What if Disney just isn’t a fan? What if they want to keep Disney XD for their Marvel properties? What if there’s no place for it on ABC Family? What if they don’t want to run it on a broadcast network like ABC at any point? What if they decide to treat it like Tron Uprising, a show that was, by all accounts, fantastic? What if they decide that the reason they gave for postponing the 3D releases, “focusing on Episode VII,” applies to The Clone Wars, too?
What would we do?
Is there a sizable enough audience to force Disney’s hand? Should we be begging for confirmation that the show is coming to a Disney owned station the same way we all clamored for confirmation that JJ Abrams was really directing Episode VII?
If no confirmation is forthcoming, if Disney XD doesn’t release their lineup, what would we do? What could we do?
I’m not sure about you guys, but for the last 5 seasons, I’ve been enjoying The Clone Wars as the best show on television. Dave Filoni, Joel Aron, the cast, the crew, everyone, has done a fantastic job on this show and they’ve made it absolutely the best drama on television. But what if the higher ups at Disney don’t see it that way? To a dark place this takes us. And, to be honest, the thought of unaired episodes of The Clone Wars just hanging out there in the aether, wishing for us to see the final fate of Ahsoka and Rex.
What if Season 5 is all we’ve got?
Remember back at the beginning? This show was only originally planned to run 100 episodes. After this season we’ll have gotten almost a dozen more than that. Filoni and Lucas have always said that they’ll keep making them as long as they’re having fun and doing well. But they never mentioned anything about airing them. And it’s not exactly in their hands, is it?
I don’t know. After the news of the postponement of the 3D releases, work that was, by all accounts either done or close to it, I’m skeptical. Maybe that’s just the skeptic in me. Maybe I’m just expecting the worst and hoping for the best. But I’ve seen too many sites reporting this as a confirmation that Disney XD is taking the show, but this is never something anyone official has said. This has just been our own fan speculation.
I want to be wrong. I really do.
But you have to admit, it’s certainly a possibility. And the decision makes about as much sense as the 3D decision, which is to say none at all.
What if this (and the 3D postponement) are just a bargaining chip for Disney to acquire the distribution rights for all the content back cheaper? Maybe that’s just me being very cynical.
Let’s hope for a confirmation that Disney will do right by The Clone Wars. But in the meantime, let’s come up with a plan in case it doesn’t happen. Are we strong enough to force their hand? Are there enough of us who want to see the show continue that we can speak in a loud enough voice to override some short sighted, anti-fan decision? I would like to think so.
While we wait for that confirmation, let’s all hope that I’m just worrying needlessly.
Responses to “STAR WARS: What if The Clone Wars Isn’t Coming Back?”
One word — merchandising. Think about all of the Clone Wars toys in stores, and events like Disney Star Wars Weekends that are saturated with Clone Wars content. Disney has a fantastic relationship with James Arnold Taylor and Ashley Eckstein. The TV show itself will not make much money from ads, it’s the residual profits that count.
We pull a “Fanboys:” break into Lucasfilm, watch the remaining episodes, and read the outlines/scripts.
We will fight. We will have to fight. Spam Disney with Mail. Use the social networks to attack them in front of everybody. Sign a petition, why not! Anything would be worth the shot! But I don’t think we will have to. Developing the 3D films and making the clone wars are very different things. Keeping the clone wars would be logical: the merchandising makes a lot of money. Bringing it to XD would steal viewers from CN. They want to exploit Star Wars’ television potential, they said it. It would be counter-productive to cancel TCW, the only Star Wars show, a show that is successful and well established. Disney has put the Clone Wars in the spotlight during the last Star Wars weekends, and will do the same this year too, sign that they love the show. And the Hollywood Reporter saying that TCW will probably move to Disney is more than simple fan speculation. Of course, we can’t be sure of that. Nothing is sure. All we can do right now is wait. Hope for the best, get ready for the worse, and enjoy every episode like if it was the last one.
I too have a nagging sense of worry that Disney hasn’t made any announcements regarding the show. I’m not too distressed because not airing future episodes seems like throwing money down the drain. Lucasfilm has a Clone Wars production groove going, and has proved that the show is a ratings and merchandising winner for its target audience.
“Should we be begging for confirmation that the show is coming to a Disney owned station the same way we all clamored for confirmation that JJ Abrams was really directing Episode VII?”
Yes, we should.
It’s a long wait until the Disney Channel upfront (March 12).
At the USO screening, while JAT seemed to confirm season six (but not beyond) in his interview (certainly it has been in the pipe), the Q&A did not definitively say season six. the question of Cad Bane’s return showed Filoni’s caginess about the future (Cad’s not in the rest of this season, but IF he were to return, he might be in the company of Boba Fett). IF. not When.
that’s a scary thing to think about.
Can somebody find a single example of a TV show switching networks when the original network wanted to retain the show? I can’t. So all this speculation of The Clone Wars moving over to a Disney network is baseless speculation. Yes, Cartoon Network has only ordered the current season and nothing beyond, but that’s true of just about every show on TV. I’d have to think that CN has rights to renew the show and keep it on its network. It doesn’t really matter if it’s taking away viewers from Disney channels as long as it’s bringing in money for the company.
The only option I see would be for them to stop producing the show, but we’ve heard numerous times that they’re working on season six. I can’t see the show becoming too expensive like other shows
that were successful but cancelled anyway.
I suppose there is some legal way that they could make the sixth season direct to video, but I don’t think it will happen. I do think that season six will be the final season. Disney should have another Star Wars show to put on air by Fall 2014.
IMO If TCW was put on the ABC Network that would be BIG for them and Smart, Way more people would see the show and if they did this it should be on Saturday in the Morning and again at Prime-time like 7:30pm.
I think they may go for direct to DVD releases IF they decide not to air the show. However, the 3D movies was a Lucasfilms project, while the Clone Wars is a Lucas Animation project.
And right now the Lucas Animation project is what’s been keeping Star Wars a floating boat all this time. It would be stupid for them to cancel it when they have an opportunity to draw in a massive audience to their tv scheduling.
We must try to contact Disney now in every way possible to tell them we want them to keep the show going.
The Disney XD website has a ”contact us” section, and a ”Suggestions” section. I sent them an e-mail in both asking them to host the Clone Wars. For hese brands, every e-mail represents a large amount of silent viewers. If we all send e-mails, we can get the message through.
I don’t think I would be disappointed. It really has gone down hill in the past couple of seasons. It’s time to wrap it up.
Jenn B:
I’m not sure you’ve watched it the last couple of seasons if you think it’s gone “down hill”
Swank-mo-tron:
I’ve watched it faithfully and I’ve been very disappointed. It’s the Clone Wars, not the Senatorial Wars.
But I digress…..It should just wrap itself up, kill off everyone who needs killed off and call it a day.
Now I KNOW you haven’t seen it because they haven’t been in the Senate in LITERALLY 2 seasons.
I watch it every single week.
I don’t care for Darth Maul’s return, I don’t care for the story lines about the padawans. They have the changed Death Watch. It’s just one thing after another.
They should’ve really told a different story and not the same old story over and over again.
I’m not sad to see it go because hopefully they can move onto bigger and better things.
It was nice while it was good, but that is over.
This Maul stuff is awesome. Same with the Padawans. Death Watch is rad.
Is it because it’s rewriting some of the more boring parts of the EU that you have a problem with?
And you’d really rather let episodes that are finished rot in a vault?
They would come out on DVD at some point.
Don’t be so sure.
If they cancel The Clone Wars before they finish the story (lead up to ROTS, fate of the new characters, Maul, etc), then I am done with Star Wars.
I’ve found myself more excited for each week’s TCW episode than about Episode VII…