Star Wars: The Clone Wars episode 6

Episode 6: Downfall Of A Droid

The title of this episode is a bit misleading. There’s no Downfall Of A Droid going on here at all. Disappearance yes, downfall no. Still, what’s in a name?

In the latest instalment of The Clone Wars we find Anakin and Ahsoka (no, stick with it) leading a rather nifty attack in asteroid field (yay!) on General Grievous and his robotic chums. During this, however, R2-D2 (making his first appearance in the television series) goes missing after Skywalker’s ship crashes.

And so begins the search for everyone’s favourite astromech droid in another mini-story arc. The “downfall” in the title could easily refer to Anakin as he displays much of that teenage stubbornness/irritation that we witnessed in the prequels. He shows a little too much fondness for his little guy (I’m still talking about Artoo here) and his attachment is not a Jedi feature – as picked up on by Mr Grumpy himself, Obi-Wan Kenobi.

When the future Mr Vader receives the replacement for the droid – the rather bling-like R3-S6 (nicknamed Goldie by Ahsoka who seems incapable of calling anyone by their given monikers) – he mopes like a spurned lover. I don’t really get why he lurves the little guy so much, it’s not as if he built him like Threepio. And when the new droid fails to live up to his predecessor’s antics, the Jedi comments, “He’s a poor excuse for a light switch.” Charming!

Still, this all highlights his shortcomings as a Jedi. Interestingly, and I use the word quite wrongly, R3-S6 is an updated (and, therefore, better) version of Artoo. Yet he doesn’t live up to those expectations. Are we being taught that new is not always better? I think that’s very sticky ground for Lucas & Co. to tackle. Moving on…

During the search for Artoo we get introduced to a Trandoshan (and give yourself ten points if you’ve already said to yourself, “Hey, there was one of them in The Empire Strikes Back – he was a Bounty Hunter named Bossk”) named Gha Nachkt voiced by, fact fans, Ron Perlman. He uses his ship, scavenging for droids, much like the Jawas do with their Sandcrawlers on Tatooine. On this vessel, Anakin and Ahsoka bump into some IG assassin droids (and give yourself a gold star if you mumble something similar to the last remark involving IG-88) but make light work of them.

Visually, Downfall Of A Droid is a treat and the asteroid sequence has a number of eye-popping scenes and, notably, they all take place in an asteroid field (where all good Star Wars stuff takes place). Top marks to Rob Coleman (visual effects supremo on the prequels) for the image of the Separatists ships departing the field. Even better was the reveal of the squad of AT-TEs sitting on an asteroid as they prepare to blast the eff out of Grievous’s ships from behind. Great stuff.

I wasn’t expecting much from this episode as I knew it was an Anakin/Ahsoka adventure but this appealed to me greatly. No real script gaffs (there are a few Battle Droid moments however) and the story is allowed to breathe as it forms the basis of an ongoing story. Of course, we all know that Artoo will be found, but how and when is undoubtedly worth tuning in for.

Check out Cameron's review of the episode 5 here.

Complete list of the DoG Clone Wars reviews