Downfall of a Droid was the name of tonight’s episode and it was another solid entry into the series. It starts with Anakin and Ahsoka guarding a planet from Separatist attack when, of course, Grievous arrives. Hopelessly outgunned, Anakin conceives a tactic that’s really quite cool that he leads Grievous into. (I won’t spoil the actual trap since it’s pretty cool.) And although the trap Anakin springs is successful, Grievous escapes in his ship after disabling Anakin’s fighter.

Anakin wakes up on his flagship to be told that Rex had to rescue him, he was knocked unconscious and Artoo was left in the wreckage. Obi-wan tells Anakin that it’s not a big deal until Anakin lets him know that his memory hasn’t been wiped and Artoo has a complete readout of the Republics tactics and a list of bases. Which leads Anakin and Ahsoka to a Trandoshan salvage ship that’s trawling the wreckage of the battle. They board his ship looking for Artoo, but find themselves in a pretty bad-ass showdown with a trio of IG-Assasin droids.

Needing to get back to the battle to try to hunt Grievous down, they leave, confident Artoo isn’t aboard the Trandoshan’s ship, but they were wrong and he’s plotting to sell Artoo to Grievous. Some more action ensues and Anakin’s new droid, a brand spankin’ new R3 unit dubbed Goldie repeatedly tries to inadvertently kill him.

I was taken a little bit off-guard with this episode since I figured that they would retrieve Artoo by the end of the episode, but he’s not even close to being rescued. The episode ended with a cliffhanger and the tease for the next episode where we see the Trandoshan disassembling Artoo and learning his secrets. That’s intercut with footage of Anakin being a badass and looking extremely pissed that he doesn’t have his droid.

All in all, this episode was another good one. There was a great action sequence for every section of the episode. Before the first commercial break, we had the great capital ship combat sequence where Anakin outwits Grievous, the middle segment featured that kick-ass fight between Anakin and Ahsoka and the IG-droids and the third had Anakin single-handedly holding his own against both his defective droid and three Separatist capitol ships.

So, I’m eagerly looking forward to next week’s episode.

Until then, May the Force be with You.

(And in case you missed it, here’s a preview clip that Lucasfilm was gracious enough to provide us with of this episode.)

So, those of you geeks who live in Utah, you’re fortunate.  You see, starting today, the Geek Show will be available weekly on Comcast’s ON DEMAND service.

It’s easy to do, too…

Go to: Channel one, Utah on Demand, Geek Show.

Then watch.  And be sure to tell your friends about it.  The more people who watch it, the better it will get.  And face it, you know you’re curious to see what it looks like when it’s being recorded.

For those of you who are fortunate enough to not live in Utah, the Geek Show podcast is available for download on iTunes.  Just search for “Geek Show Podcast” or check TheGeekShowPodcast.com.

Also, pass this info along to everyone you know.

Some great news from Variety regarding “Graysons”:

The trade says the decision to yank the project came from Warner Bros. Pictures Group president Jeff Robinov, who initially gave his blessing but changed his mind in recent days.

The CW had been counting on “The Graysons” to fill the void left by the likely series end of “Smallville.” Like “Smallville,” “The Graysons” is a superhero origins story. The show was developed to revolve around the world of Dick “DJ” Grayson before taking on the iconic Robin identity.

“The studio has opted not to go forward with the development of ‘The Graysons’ at this time as the concept doesn’t fit the current strategy for the Batman franchise,” the studio said in a statement. “Warner Bros. Television is currently working on several replacement options for the CW.”

A script had not yet been written for “The Graysons,” which was still in early stages of development.

The one-hour “Graysons” was to be set in modern times and focus on young DJ as he faced challenges involving first loves, young rivals and his family — a famous juggling act — as he grew up.

Whew! Dodged a bullet there!

Lucasfilm and Cartoon Network have been kind enough to give us this clip of a scene from this Friday’s episode of Clone Wars.

I don’t care how jaded most of you are, I’m really loving this series.

Here’s the Quicktime Version…

Superman: New Krypton Special

Writers- Geoff Johns, James Robinson and Sterling Gates

Artists- Gary Frank (Penciler) and Jon Sibal (Inks), Renato Guedes(P) and Wilson Magalháes(I), and Pete Woods (P/I)

Let me start by saying I hate specials and crossovers. I do not like to buy other books when crossovers happen for a myriad of reasons, but the big two being story and cost. Typically, when you read issue “A” of one series and the next part in book “B”, you loose something in translation as the two writers attempt to make the story cohesive and work. Not only that, but “Special” usually means a book that costs more and includes reprints or some kind of supplemental material (which is in reality padding any way you slice it), it’s usually a lose-lose situation.

“Superman: New Krypton Special” is both the end of the previous “Braniac” arc and the beginning of the New Krypton story. The book comes in at a stunning 40 pages of story (48 pages, do the math on the ads yourself) for an extra buck ($3.99). The story tells what is both the worst time and the best time in the life of Clark Kent, his father recently deceased (John Kent) and his “Kryptonian” family (Aunt and Uncle) arriving with 999,998 (that’s 1,000,000 all together) other Kryptonians. Unfortunately, these Kryptonians didn’t have the benefit of being raised by a kindly Kansas couple and see humanity as lesser beings.

Geoff Johns, James Robinson, and Sterling Gates all manage to mesh together in one cohesive story (their books being Action Comics, Superman, and Supergirl respectively). On the same note, not so much on the artists ends (through no fault of their own). The art of Gary Frank (of Action Comics) tells the story of the funeral of Clark’s father, and why Jonathan Kent was so important in whom Clark is. In an inner thoughts moment that is emotionally chilling, Johns and Frank tells us why it’s important that Superman not “act” the way we would want to given the circumstances, and what would happen should Superman drop what some perceive as a dated morality. Additionally, Frank manages to capture the essence of Christopher Reeves in appearance and mannerisms in both his renderings of Clark and Superman.

The art of Renato Guedes and Pete Woods seems to mesh pretty well in a drastic departure from Frank’s work. It doesn’t interrupt the flow of the story so much, but is a bit jarring to adjust to. The two artists manage to tie the story together with their respective writers. For the first time, I actually admit to myself that I want to read the three individual Super-books, and not for the crossover (New Krypton runs through Action Comics, Superman, and Supergirl).

Last night’s episode of Clone Wars was called Rookies and centered around a small group of “shiny” brand new clones on a remote listening post.  They have what is perhaps the most boring job in the Republic, or at least they believe.  But that all changes when a crack group of droid commandos (bad-ass droids we’ve never seen before) catches them unawares in the midst of a meteor shower.

Their seasoned seargent is killed and they’re all that’s left to protect Kamino from a full-blown assault by General Grievous.

This episode reminded me a lot of the most fun parts of the Republic Commando game, and when Commander Cody and Rex show up for an inspection all hell breaks loose.  This was a great action/adventure story and there weren’t any Jedi to get in the clones’ way.

I think this episode had a lot of the bad-ass kinds of moments people wanted in the movie that made them dislike it a little bit…  There was one great moment where Rex (maybe it was Cody) shot a droid disguised as a clone in the face at point blank range.   It was pretty bad-ass.

Where as episode 1.3 (Shadow of Malevolence, I think) was the World War II bomber-plane movie, this was more like the Dirty Dozen, minus all of the planning stages…  In fact, it ends with a cool explosion and sacrifice much the same way The Dirty Dozen did.

I would like to see more clones-only episodes like this in the series, as this one was great.

I want to say bad things about this show, just to prove that I’m not unbiased, but this show is really kicking ass and taking names and I can’t find anything bad to say about it.

Unfortunately, the next new episode isn’t for two weeks (predictably, they’re skipping Halloween), but here’s hoping it’s as good as the first five have been.  It looks great.  The preview explains that Anakin lost Artoo in a fire-fight and the enemy has captured him.  This is really bad news for the Republic since Artoo’s mind hasn’t been wiped.  I’m assuming they launch a rescue mission for Artoo.

As a reminder to catch up, the last two weeks of episodes are available for free at www.starwars.com and this episode will be available today on iTunes (though it’s also being re-run on Cartoon Network throughout the week.)

This weeks episode, Destroy Malevolence, was the end of this three part arc as well as the Clone Wars debut of Padme and Threepio.

I’ve been saying it everytime I’ve seen a new episode, and it’s a good thing if I can go on saying it, but this episode was the best so far.  I know last weeks was good, and the two before that were good, but this has been the best.  If they can keep making them better on a rising curve, then we are in for some total bad-assery.

Last episode ended with Anakin and his squadron of clone pilots disabling the ion cannon on Grievious’ ship, The Malevolence, which is left in shambles and racing from a trio of capital ships led by General Kenobi.  Destroy Malevolence opens (essentially) with Count Dooku admonishing Grievous for his failure and reminding him that the Separatists require The Malevolence to reach the rendezvous point in one piece, which is why he’s organized some insurance.

He faked a situation that would put Padme on a diplomatic mission that left her hyperdrive path directly in the way of the crippled ship and then explains to Grievous that once on board, the Jedi will cease their attack and they’ll have a valuable hostage.

Predictably, Anakin insists on racing to her aid, sneaking aboard The Malevolence with Obi-Wan.

Basically, a whole bunch of cool shit goes down, including a great showdown between Obi-Wan and Grievous and some cool business between Anakin and Padme.  Threepio also gets into some trouble that’s somewhere between Attack of the Clones and Empire. (I laughed more than I wanted to, but not harder than the kids.)

I’m still really impressed by how much better the pacing of the episodes in a 2-commercial break format works than the scotch tape approach they took with the movie.  As much as I loved seeing Clone Wars on the big screen (repeatedly) I sort of wish that I had seen it on TV instead.  And, quite frankly, I think the Destroy Malevolence arc would have made a better movie.

I just hope you guys are actually keeping up with this series, because it’s been getting better and better.  As a reminder to catch up, the last two weeks of episodes are available for free at www.starwars.com and this episode will be available tomorrow on iTunes.

So, I’ll see you next week (which might be a little late since I’m traveling). And next week’s episode looks rad.  The preview was very “clone-commando” centric, which pleases me greatly.

So until then, May the Force Be With You.

Tonight’s episode, Shadow of Malevolence, was the second episode of a three epsiode cycle and involved a daring attack against General Grievous’ flagship, The Malevolence.

The Malevolence is such an important target because they’ve rigged a full-sized Ion Cannon to one side of the ship and are able to disable and destroy entire ships.   Led by Anakin Skywalker and Plo Koon, a group of Y-Wing bombers have to race against the clock to destroy the weapon, since Grievous has plotted a course for one of the Republics main medical facilities.

I have to say, the more I see this show, the better suited for television it is.  The commercial breaks always hit at exactly the right beats and the endings always leave me wanting more.  You can also tell that the writers watch as much Star Wars as I do, since it’s actually noticeable that they lift even the most innocuous dialogue from random parts of the movies, in this case, quite a bit of dialogue from the pilots echoed dialogue spoken by Red squadron in the battle of the first Death Star.

This episode was very much a classic World War II film story with the squadron of malcontents (in this case Shadow Squadron under Skywalkers command) sign up for what is essentially a suicide mission behind enemy lines and carry it out and it works well.  It’s also great to see General Grievous in action (even though he spent this entire episode on the bridge of The Malevolence barking orders at obnoxious battle droids) since we saw very little of him in Revenge of the Sith.

The scene that’s pictured above is really cool, too.  I won’t detail what it’s about too much, but it was a great moment and Anakin needs to look before he leaps.

This episode ends with Skywalker and what’s left of his squadron disabling Grievous’ weapon, but he’s on the run.  The next episode involves what appears to be the final destruction of The Malevolence.

All in all, this is another solid entry into this series.

For those of you who missed last week’s episodes, you can watch them in their entirety on the official Star Wars website.  Here’s Ambush, and Rising Malevolence.  It’s free, so you really don’t have an excuse not to.

Arse-bot here, just wanted to share my favorite clip of all time from the Bruce Timm animated series Justice League Unlimited. I was/am a big fan of the DCAU and couldn’t even begin to count the hours I spent watching all of these series’ as a young bot.

Enjoy!