[REVIEW] OVERWATCH 2 – Balance Issues Defeated by Boredom! (Multiplayer Beta Review)

Overwatch 2 is here! Almost. After spending $40 to buy the “Watchpoint Pack” (essentially just paying to get a beta key), I’ve spent the last week testing out the game’s multiplayer. How is it? Good? Bad? The answer is honestly somewhere in the middle, which if I had to describe in one word would probably be… “meh”.


Overwatch 1 is one of the most fun and also one of the most frustrating games that I’ve ever played. The rollercoaster of good and bad games that sometimes make you feel like a king and then five minutes later make you feel like the entire world is somehow out to get you is very addictive, but as the game has declined in the last couple of years, my friends and I have been playing it less and less, finding that the number of bad games we’ve been getting is starting to greatly outnumber the number of good ones, a stark contrast to how we felt when the IP was at its best with new content rolling out on a regular basis.


Overwatch 2 has somehow managed to iron out these up and downs into a very mediocre middle ground where I find that I never really like or dislike a single game, but always have this neutral “I’m kind of bored…” feeling at all times, usually resulting in me quitting after a few games and going back to play Overwatch 1 for a little while. Yes, you read that right, after paying $40 to get access to the three week beta, I have played much more Overwatch 1 the last week (and surprisingly enjoyed it!) than I have Overwatch 2. Why? Because Overwatch 1, even in its current sad state, is better than Overwatch 2.


Here’s the deal. Overwatch 2 feels very much like Overwatch 1. I agree with the popular review on Youtube from “dunkee” that the game, at this point, is much more like an “Overwatch 1.1” than it is any sort of proper sequel. There are things I like. The graphical improvements, while subtle, look amazing. The new characters, Sojourn and Junker Queen, are both really well designed, and playing them is the closest thing that I had to fun the entire time I’ve spent in the beta. Orisa’s redesign is also really fun. Some of the new maps, especially Parisio, are really nice. There are some improvements here. Not every change in Overwatch 2 is bad. I would kill to have Sojourn and Junker Queen in Overwatch 1 right now, because they are both some of my favorite characters to play now. I really miss not having them as options when I boot up Overwatch 1.


Unfortunately, I just don’t think the main gimmick of Overwatch 2, the 5v5 instead of 6v6 dynamic, really works AT ALL. First of all, drastically changing the team dynamic has significantly lowered the number of viable characters. Since very few characters were re-balanced for the new 5v5 gameplay, and some have had key aspects of their toolkit (McCree’s stun/Mei’s ability to freeze) taken away, there seem to be a lot fewer competitively viable characters than before. Being a Support is also a big problem now – they’re too squishy. Without a second tank around, it is very hard to play Support and stay alive, especially if the one tank you have is going off on their own a lot or is simply not very good. (Also, very aggressive tanks like Junker Queen offer little to no protection to you if your team is using her.) I’ve noticed that players trying to use any Supports other than Mercy and Moira are getting very low healing numbers, as it is very hard to stay alive long enough to be an effective support to your team with anyone else, plus having a Mercy constantly boosting/healing/rezzing your team’s one already overpowered supertank is becoming a staple strategy I’m seeing in most games.


DPS and tanks have a different problem – queue times. Both queues have a 10 minute wait to get into a game, as no one wants to play Support and constantly die, so everyone is either playing the already overselected DPS role, or queueing in to be their team’s new DPS-heavy supertank. As someone who usually plays Support or Tank, I find it extremely frustrating to have to choose between being a weak (almost useless) Support or having to queue 10+ minutes for a game. Playing games in Open Queue instead of Role Queue eliminates some of the waiting issues, but reveals a bigger one – most teams in Open Queue play with 2 Tanks, 2 DPS, and 1 healer, as healers are mostly useless in Overwatch 2 (they might as well just go back to 6v6 with 2 Tanks and 4 DPS – the Supports really aren’t needed anymore), but having 2 supertanks per team is amazing! So much for the game’s new balance in Open Queue. This will only get worse with time as more tanks specifically built for 5v5 are added to the game.


I’m not a big fan of the new “Push” game mode, either. It’s just a really annoying version of “Tug of War” where you go back and forth over the same little stretch of road over and over and over and over again for like 10 minutes, and it’s hard to feel like you’re really doing anything fun or productive. It’s not terrible. Again, like every other change in this game, it just feels very “meh”. So many of the changes in Overwatch 2 feel like this – they’ve “balanced” the game but also removed all the fun. I like the new scoreboard. I like that all your skins all carry over from Overwatch 1. There are things I like, but, honestly, all playing Overwatch 2 does is make me want to go and play Overwatch 1, which I’ve had some surprisingly good games in lately.


The best argument I can make in favor of Overwatch 2 is that its multiplayer changes are only supposed to be a SMALL part of the game, as the addition of PvE campaigns is supposed to be the big draw of the sequel. Except… we haven’t seen anything about this supposed content, which leads me to believe that the development of it is not going well, and the Overwatch Team is stalling by showing us as much as possible of the multiplayer changes ahead of time to buy time to iron out PvE’s problems. I saw one of the interviews about the PvE. Null Sector is back? Isn’t this game supposed to be about equal representation and rights for everyone? Why are the robots fighting against human oppression always the bad guys? Can’t they come up with something more engaging than “Good guys shoot robots – go boom”? Now they’re talking about releasing the PvE in stages. Great, we can spend more time in the mediocre multiplayer, then, I guess.


Before I go on any more of a rant, let me just summarize my thoughts on Overwatch 2 so far and let you go on about your busy day. The PvP is very similar to Overwatch 1, feeling more like an update to it rather than a sequel, yet, unfortunately, most of the changes they have made to Overwatch 1’s formula feel bad (to me, at least) rather than good, and take all the fun out of the game under the guise of “fixing” it, creating a very bland, safe version of Overwatch that I honestly do not enjoy playing almost at all. (I played one game today, and then quit. It was… ok. I played Moira and had over double the healing numbers of my team’s other Support. We lost.) The PvE could be its saving grace, but I am very suspicious that Blizzard is still showing us nothing of what is supposed to be the biggest part of the “sequel”, leading me to believe they are very behind on its development, or otherwise are having significant problems with it. The best part of Overwatch 2 is the new characters, Sojourn and Junker Queen, which are a blast, and I really don’t mind paying $40 just to try them out. I just wish they were in Overwatch 1, not the game’s bland “sequel”. (On an unrelated note, good luck playing a weird tank like Hammond in Overwatch 2 with only one tank slot.)


Review score time. When I first started playing Overwatch, I would have given that game a very impressive 9/10. As Overwatch has declined, however, I would probably give the current state of the game a much more waning 7/10 – still fun sometimes, but desperately needing new content injected into it. Overwatch 2? A very mediocre 6/10. That’s all I can give it right now. Rather than fixing Overwatch 1’s problems, it seems like all Overwatch 2 can do is worsen them, or otherwise replace them with absolute boredom. No wonder Jeff Kaplan left. He probably fell asleep beta-testing it. I know I wanted to.

Blizzard, my mind’s not completely made up yet. Fix this before October. Please?

[REVIEW] Kenobi – “A Surprisingly Satisfying Conclusion…” (Part VI)

“A surprisingly satisfying conclusion…”

Well, the final episode of Kenobi has come and pass. Before moving on to the next assembly line Disney “Star Wars” product, I suppose it’s time to give a few final quiet thoughts to Ewan McGregor’s return to that galaxy far, far away, and see from a bird’s eye view how it went, with some deeper discussion on the conclusion to Obi-Wan’s latest adventure across the stars.

While I know some Star Wars fans were unhappy with this show from start to finish, I honestly liked Part VI. It wasn’t perfect by any stretch of the imagination, but you can tell, at least, the writers tried on this one. Obi-Wan was finally allowed to stand up and shine after many episodes of mostly being a pushover, attempts were made to patch up some of the plot holes in the Star Wars continuity made by pretty much everything that happened in the show, and Leia’s appearance was minimal and… tolerable. Reva was given a believable conclusion to her story arc that didn’t revolve around her being a Mary Sue, but instead just focused on her awakening once again as a fully fleshed out human being, stepping away, at last, from her one note anger and ambition seen throughout the rest of the series.

Honestly, I liked Part VI a lot, about as much as Part I, or maybe I’ve just convinced myself of that because of how bad the rest of the show is. My expectations were certainly pretty low going into the series conclusion. I doubt I would be as optimistic after a second watch, but, for now, I’m willing to give Part VI an honorable 8/10, tying it with my review of Part I. A lot of the show was spent giving us a proper lightsaber battle between Obi-Wan and a formidable Jedi of the Dark Side, with Obi-Wan actually being allowed to fight on a level worthy of his name and reputation for once, even if it didn’t 100% make sense for him to have gotten that strong (again) quite so suddenly.

There are still a lot of plot holes in this show, and even more created in “A New Hope” by this series even remotely being considered canon. Obi-Wan is portrayed here as being basically a second (or third?) father to Leia, when she didn’t seem to know him at all in Episode IV except secondhand from Bail Organa. Darth Vader’s line of now being the master when he meets Obi-Wan in the Death Star is more than a little screwed up by them having had multiple battles in this Disney+ series. Leia being a super genius on the level of Grand Admiral Thrawn makes no sense in comparison to her smart, but not Einstein-level, persona in the entire rest of the Star Wars continuity. There are various attempts in Part VI to fix some of these issues, which is appreciated, but the overall plot of the series has been crashed so haphazardly into Star Wars canon, it just can’t be patched completely no matter how hard the writers of the final episode may try. This show really doesn’t fit well with the original Star Wars trilogy. It can’t, without having a drastically different plot. The maker of “Obi-Wan Kenobi” admitted knowing nothing about Star Wars before creating this for Disney+ and it shows.

Overall, this is just another subpar Disney “Star Wars” show. Am I glad I saw it? I guess I am, even if most of the episodes were pretty far on the stupid side. It’s certainly far better than all of the Boba Fett episodes of that living nightmare put together. (I don’t really count Episodes 5 and 6 of Boba Fett as episodes of that show – they’re Mandalorian episodes in all but name.) If I average out my reviews of each individual episode of Kenobi, it comes to a respectable 7/10, which is probably a fair review of it as a whole… maybe more fair than the show deserves. For the sake of mercy, I’ll be nice, leave it at that, and move on with my life. As sad as it is to say, Kenobi isn’t really worth any more of my time. It honestly wasn’t even worth the time I spent watching it. My final thoughts on this episode and the show itself are below:

“Kenobi ends with a surprisingly satisfying conclusion, finally letting its title character shine and trying its best to patch up the countless plot holes created by the bad writing of its creators, albeit with mixed success. A final battle leaves the show on a high note, helping flush away the subpar tripe that was most of the rest of its episodes. While not as terrible as Boba Fett, Obi-Wan Kenobi was definitely a disappointment, just not from start to finish – some ideas were executed well enough to create a few smiles. Too bad my most common reaction to most episodes was indifference.”

[REVIEW] Kenobi – “Better, but Subpar Star Wars…” (Parts IV and V)

“Better, but subpar Star Wars…”

Looks like two more episodes of “Obi-Wan Kenobi” have premiered since my last review.  If you read my take on Part III, I’m sure you aren’t surprised I chose to take a week off reviewing this series.  Honestly, I didn’t even want to talk about Obi-Wan Kenobi for a while after that episode.  Fortunately, Parts IV and V are both a little better than Part III, although they still have a variety of problems that need to be addressed here.  Unlike last week’s post, I’ll try to keep this review (relatively) brief and mostly spoiler free, at least for Parts IV and V. 

Part IV begins with Obi-Wan trying to infiltrate the headquarters of the Inquisitors, working together with the leaders of “The Path” to rescue a lost comrade who is now in Inquisitor Reva’s hands.  This episode was very… “blah” for me.  If it had frustrated me as much as Part III, I would have written a review on it immediately to vent (despite being burned out by the previous week’s show), and, similarly, I would have written something immediately to celebrate if Part IV had been great.  Instead, it was just a marginal improvement over the previous week’s outing – the good moments weren’t clever enough to impress me and the bad moments weren’t stupid enough to infuriate me, although there were unsurprisingly a lot more idiotic moments than genuinely good ones.  The only way I can describe the show at this point is that it’s ambitious, but also just dumb.  There are some actual good ideas here in the show’s plot, but every single one of them is executed in ways that just don’t make sense.  They violate the lore of the Star Wars universe, defy the laws of physics, clash with characters’ motives and abilities, and, on top of that, are all written in amateurish ways that only aggravate these “suspension of disbelief” problems instead of alleviating them.  Very little in the show really makes sense if you think about it for more than two seconds, and the writers seemed darned and determined to focus your attention on that fact instead of hiding it.  I would personally do the exact opposite if I was writing a show full of plot holes, but that’s just me.

Part V is a little better than Part IV, but still very mediocre.  By this point, I am so sick of Leia, I cringe every single time she is on screen.  I’m so sick of this ten-year-old super genius who can identify different types of starships, resist Force manipulation, stay resolute in the face of interrogation and torture, repair the wiring of massive military bunkers, psychologically dissect those around her, lie convincingly without forgetting any important details of her story, tell when people are hiding things from her, nearly escape on foot from a full team of mercenaries, etc., etc., etc.  Why does anyone else in the Star Wars universe even need to exist when Leia is a thing?  Star Wars fans online may complain about Reva, but I honestly don’t mind her character.  She’s clever and powerful, but not unrealistically so.  I do feel her personality is a bit of a one note (in Reva’s case, mostly ambition/anger), but that seems to be the case with every single character in this show, especially the female ones.  Reva’s actions are generally consistent, and some of the details of her goals and motivations revealed in Part V were somewhat interesting.  I still don’t understand why the writers won’t let her actually fight with Obi-Wan Kenobi, but, again, the show is not written very well so I’m not too shocked by those kinds of obvious oversights anymore.  In a show full of lightsaber combat involving Jedi, why have the show’s two main characters actually have a lightsaber battle?  Instead, let’s make Obi-Wan have a horribly one-sided battle with Darth Vader, and show Reva doing parkour, jumping and backflipping around on Tatooine buildings like a Dallas Cowboys cheerleader using the Force.

While I think it is an exaggeration, I definitely understand the feelings of those who feel Obi-Wan is getting “The Last Jedi” treatment here and being degraded as a character like Luke Skywalker was in the Sequel Trilogy.  It is frustrating watching him, four episodes into this six episode series, still struggling to fight a small number of Stormtroopers, his lightsaber apparently now taking up to three or four hits on their armor to kill them (instead of just cleaving straight through them like it should), whereas other characters like Tala can just hit the stormtroopers with a quick strike of their fists and it seems to hurt them significantly through the same level of armor.  Obi-Wan apparently cannot use the Force almost at all, but can still deflect blaster bolts with his lightsaber… how do the writers think that Jedi do this?  I’m pretty sure that’s why non-Jedi don’t use lightsabers.  They can’t sense incoming threats with the Force to block blaster fire and would just get mowed down by their enemies from a distance.  It’s very clear to me that no one with any real Star Wars knowledge is getting any final word on the scripts of these episodes, nor is anyone with any real writing talent, for that matter.

I’ll go ahead and wrap things up here before I end up in another rant.  I give Part IV of Obi-Wan Kenobi a meager 6.5/10 – “blah and uninteresting”, and Part V a vaguely respectable 7/10 – “entertaining, but just barely so”.  As a reminder to those keeping score at home, I gave Parts I-III an 8/10, 7/10, and 6/10, respectively, so we’re at least swinging upwards in quality a little now, which is very much a good thing.  Hopefully, Part VI will be halfway decent and leave the show with a tolerable ending.  My final thoughts on these two episodes are below:

“The Obi-Wan Kenobi show continues to have subpar writing and unrealistic characters that take away from what could otherwise be a very interesting outing into a relatively unexplored part of the Star Wars timeline.  Numerous logical inconsistencies and plot holes, sometimes laughably obvious ones, take away from genuinely endearing moments, and leave the show on the bargain bin of science fiction entertainment.  Overall, these episodes are better than Part III, but still subpar Star Wars.”

[REVIEW] Kenobi – “A Wasted Confrontation…” (Part III)

By: “The Watchman”

“A wasted confrontation…”

“Part III” of Kenobi is here.  What did I think of it?  How to even begin…

Let’s start like this: Imagine if you will, a sequel to one of the highest grossing movies of all time – let’s say, Titanic.  After surviving in the cold waters of the ocean clinging to a fragment of wood for survival at the cost of her newfound soulmate, Rose later learns that Jack, the man she thought had frozen to death for her to live, is still alive and has become someone she doesn’t even recognize – a violent, aggressive criminal and womanizer who is now the antithesis of everything she knew and loved about him back in the original movie.  She seeks him out, and, after finding him, confronts him about everything he’s become since they were together, challenging him with the very same ideas and words that she originally got from him during their brief fling on the ill-fated barge that brought them together years before.  Now, the sequence of events leading us here might have to be a little convoluted to make such a reunion happen, but you can imagine, at least, that such a confrontation between the two would still feel very overwhelming and intense, bringing you to the edge of your movie theater seat as you witness the reunion of characters once tied so closely together, but now cast apart by the radical, irreconcilable transformation for the worse by one of the parties.  There’s something interesting in that idea. 

Now, imagine instead, the same situation, but… written in the absolute worst way possible, and, this is a little close to Spoiler Territory, so if you’re really concerned about such things, maybe read this review again after finishing the episode… imagine instead, making Rose look cowardly, incompetent, and weak, a useless shell of herself unable to even find the words to confront Jack with as he taunts and even attacks her during the confrontation.  Even Jack himself is acting out-of-character versus what you have come to know of his new, corrupted self.  Rose can do nothing but be made a fool of by Jack, unable to even hold the emotional or moral high ground against him, as she literally stays silent against his accusations and assault.  What should have been an interesting, dramatic moment between the two once-fated life companions is cut down into something confusing and incoherent, a one-sided power struggle that results in nothing but the humiliation of the party you’re supposed to identify with, the one who is supposed to be the movie’s protagonist.  All you get to do is watch the degradation of Rose.

If you’ve watched “Part III” of Kenobi, you don’t have to imagine this.  You don’t have to imagine this at all.  You just watched it on screen while groaning inside at how painfully disappointing it was. 

Essentially, Part III of Kenobi continues the slow decline in quality that started at the very beginning of the show.  Despite having low expectations going into the series, I was surprised at how much I liked Part I, and, although Leia annoyed me in the show’s second outing, I liked Part II as well.  Part III is another small step down from Part II, moving from impressive or respectable territory into the realm of the just “so-so”.  Infuriatingly to Star Wars fans, however, Part III wastes one of the most interesting reunions in all of Star Wars to try to force a badly written encounter that turns out to be the most irritating part of the entire “Obi-Wan Kenobi” series to date, when it should have been the highlight moment of the entire Disney+ adventure, something to be talked about for weeks if not months or years afterwards.

The first part of the episode is honestly kind of dull.  Things are happening, but few things that are genuinely exciting, beyond a few fun interactions with Obi-Wan, Leia, and those around them that also drop in quality with some later revelations in the episode.  The second half contains a confrontation between Obi-Wan Kenobi and a great enemy, one which is written so badly, and which makes Obi-Wan look so sad and weak, it’s not really enjoyable at all to watch, setting my expectations for the entire series as a whole lower from the incompetence shown with such easy-to-write material.  It’s a little challenging to go into this week’s outing without venturing into spoilers, so, I’m actually going to go into some heavy spoiler content now, something I don’t usually do in my reviews, but the frustratingly bad writing here is gnawing at me so much I feel the need, as a writer myself, to publicly call it out.  If you want to keep some mystery about the episode for yourself, I’ll just go ahead and tell you I give this episode a 6/10, and we can leave the review at that for you until you’ve watched Part III (if you even want to).  For everyone else who either doesn’t care about spoilers, or who is up-to-date on the show, I’m going to continue now into a full spoiler breakdown of several key issues I have with the episode.  Again, these are full spoilers I’m going into now – don’t say you haven’t been warned.

The highlight of Part III is the confrontation between Obi-Wan Kenobi and his former apprentice turned Dark Lord of the Sith, Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader, which leads to Obi-Wan igniting his lightsaber again for the first time in the series before taking Vader on.  This should have been incredible, except the writers seem to have forgotten that the Obi-Wan Kenobi they’ve portrayed in the series is no match whatsoever for Darth Vader anymore, making it basically impossible to write any sort of interesting battle between the two of them.  So, instead, Obi-Wan Kenobi sees Darth Vader, lets him hurt a whole bunch of innocent people without really intervening or saying anything to him, runs away from him, is found by him anyway, runs away from him a few more times, and then stays basically silent as Darth Vader attacks him, overpowers him, and literally sets him on fire while promising to torture him.  Then, a random new character introduced in the episode, a Rebel-sympathizing Imperial named Tala, helps Obi-Wan run away again in a convoluted way, which he does, while Darth Vader seems to just let him escape instead of implementing any number of obvious solutions to keep this from happening.

Obi-Wan is completely incapable of putting up any sort of meaningful lightsaber fight against Darth Vader and has no defense whatsoever against Vader’s Force powers.  The only thing he says to Vader at all is “Look at what you’ve become.” to which Vader simply replies, “It is what YOU made me” before beating the crap out of him like an angsty, violent teenager.  Darth Vader then scatters some kind of conveniently-located… flammable something (it is not explained in the episode)… along the ground from a nearby container which he then easily ignites before raking Obi-Wan through the flames with Force Grip to burn him alive.  He doesn’t get very far with this, however, before Tala sneaks up and shoots some random machine near the fire which explodes in exactly the right way to make the fires between Vader and Obi-Wan slightly bigger, and this now is too much for Vader’s Force powers to work through for some reason, and Obi-Wan can now get away.  Keep in mind that Vader was extinguishing large swaths of flame a few minutes prior, simply by accident, while using the Force to throw Kenobi around like a rag doll, but now stands there solemnly like there is nothing at all he can do when the flames become very slightly bigger and Obi-Wan Kenobi runs away again.  Vader doesn’t try to throw dirt on the flames with the Force.  He doesn’t try to grab Obi-Wan’s body again with Force Grip.  He doesn’t try to do anything to stop Obi-Wan’s escape at all.  Frankly, I don’t understand how Tala was even able to fire a blaster bolt in Darth Vader’s general direction without being sensed by him and the blaster bolt blocked with Vader’s lightsaber, or simply stopped mid-air Kylo-Ren-style since the Sequel Trilogy is still considered canon.  The entire battle had to be written in a completely unbelievable way for Obi-Wan to survive it, and yet the writers felt the need to make it happen anyway.  It should have been saved for later on in the series when Obi-Wan was capable enough to actually hold his own in a fight with Darth Vader for more than two seconds.  What, then, should have happened in Part III?  I’m glad you asked.

Obi-Wan should have battled Reva in Part III.  Reva is obviously being built up to be the main antagonist of the show, but we know nothing about her ability level beyond her talent at leaping over the top of Tatooine buildings while doing flips.  She hasn’t had a full fight yet for us to see what she can really do, so it is difficult to actually perceive her as a threat.  This would have been an excellent opportunity to pit the old and out-of-practice Obi-Wan against the fiery, up-and-comer Reva to show the difference in their current abilities, allowing us to perceive Reva as a legitimate enemy for Obi-Wan after likely winning a much less one-sided fight against him, and the wall of flames being used again to help him escape, something that Reva would be less equipped than Vader to overcome, making for a much more believable exit for our show’s protagonist.  If he had a single brain cell working in his head at the time, Obi-Wan would have shot the probe droid that was trying to identify him at the checkpoint BEFORE it confirmed he was on the planet, so that only a random report of a Stormtrooper patrol being attacked would have reached the Empire, something that I’m sure still happens frequently only ten years after a major governmental upheaval throughout the galaxy.  Reva already suspected that Kenobi was hiding on one of several small planets on a list that included Mapuzo, so, on a hunch, she would have still gone with the Inquisitors to Mapuzo seeking our fugitive hero, but Darth Vader himself would not have dispatched to Mapuzo on a “maybe”.  Obi-Wan would have then been forced to confront Reva head-on, having to see firsthand how much his abilities as a Jedi Knight have waned, from someone who was once a match for the Force legend now known as Darth Vader, to someone who now can’t overpower a single Inquisitor subordinate of Darth Vader’s.  Reva would have been shown to be someone of legitimate combat skill and talent with the Force, well beyond what would be expected of a normal Inquisitor, while Obi-Wan would be forced to look deep inside himself after narrowly surviving this encounter in order to find a way to reawaken who he used to be, hoping it would let him win the next battle with Reva.  After all, he knows he has that power sleeping somewhere within him.  Or, at least, he used to.

The confrontation with Vader could then be saved for later on in the series, and the plot hole of Reva reaching Leia at the end of a one-way tunnel that Reva somehow teleported to the other side of ahead of Leia would be erased.  The show’s two main characters become more well-defined, and the connection between them as protagonist and antagonist is strengthened.  Instead of Obi-Wan looking like a coward and a weakling, he comes off as someone who is out of his prime, but who still has a few tricks up his sleeve, including the potential, perhaps, to become the Jedi Master he once was again.  Instead of Reva still being a blank slate character, whose abilities are unknown, we learn the extent of her talent and training with the Force, and build her identity as a threat to Obi-Wan Kenobi.  This is how the episode should have been written.  Instead, we got fan service with no substance, and one of the most interesting reunions in the entire Star Wars universe is realized in a way that has no heart and makes no sense.

If the show was really insistent on forcing in the confrontation with Vader, it at least should have been done in a way that was consistent with the established characters, and helped them each, in their own way, to shine. Imagine how powerful it would have been if Obi-Wan, watching Vader throw villagers around like toys to draw out potential Jedi, could bear watching what his former apprentice was doing no longer and, even knowing he didn’t stand a chance against the Dark Lord anymore, stepped out into the village to confront him, declaring in a loud voice, “That’s enough, Anakin!” while igniting his blue lightsaber for the first time. Anakin, having erased the instability and weakness of who he used to be as a Jedi under the cold moniker of Darth Vader, would be enraged at being scolded again by his old teacher as in the days of their apprenticeship and called again by his name as a young Jedi Knight instead of the title he now bears as the feared and tyrannical Dark Lord of the Sith. This would have led to a much more emotional and satisfying battle between the two, even if the outcome of Obi-Wan being overpowered and having to escape still played out as before. Simply having that moment of Obi-Wan stepping out into the void again to be the man he used to be, while forcing Darth Vader to look in a metaphorical mirror at himself, would have, in my book, excused a lot of bad writing and plot holes, making the whole episode easier to swallow.

Part III of Kenobi is not a terrible episode of Star Wars, but it adds nothing of any real value to the universe it takes place in.   It’s got a few fun and interesting moments scattered amidst a backdrop of boring background dialogue, empty character interactions, and rapidly-multiplying Star Wars universe plot holes.  I rated Part I of Kenobi a 8/10 and Part II of Kenobi a 7/10.  Part III, however, earns only a 6/10 from me, still better than most of “Book of Boba Fett”, but leaving me with a bit of a bad taste in my mouth that I can’t quite rinse out.

“Fan service without substance, Part III of Kenobi forces character interactions that break the pacing and plot of the series, leading to a wasted confrontation with no creativity or cleverness.  Some fun moments break the tedium of mediocrity, but this is mostly a by-the-numbers episode created by people without a real eye for the universe they are trying to be a part of.”

[SATIRE] BREAKING! – Amber Heard Accuses Jurors of Physical Abuse Against Her During Trial

By: “The Gatekeeper”

BREAKING NEWS! – While many short-sighted individuals on the Internet have sided with the cartoonishly supervillainous Johnny Depp during his defamation trial against his ex-wife Amber Heard, Miss Heard has revealed the truth about Depp’s co-conspiring jurors today with a new op-ed published today in The Washington Post, entitled “I spoke up against juror violence – and faced our culture’s wrath. That has to change.”

“It wasn’t just Johnny that abused me.” Amber Heard explained a few hours later to reporter Michael Hamden from a large interview room in CBC News’ Richmond, Virginia headquarters. “The jurors in Fairfax came up to me whenever the cameras were turned the other way and hit me repeatedly in the face. They and Johnny would drag me and my sister up the stairs of the courthouse and then push us down them while laughing at both of us. One of them even attacked me with a bottle while saying they would make sure I never got to star in Aquaman 3. Fortunately, I brought my Amica cream with me into the courthouse to cover up the bruises so no one watching the trial from home would be able to see my shame.”

“What are you even talking about?” Michael Hamden asked in confusion, having watched pretty much the entire trial from home, along with most of the rest of the country. “That’s not even… how could that even happen? There were people in the court room. Lots of them. The judges. Lawyers on both sides. Are you saying they just allowed this???”

“Johnny Depp is a VERY powerful man.” Amber frowned, trying to give her best impression of someone crying, but being unable to shed any tears, most likely from the great trauma of what she was describing. “People flock to defend him. Some of my own lawyers even joined in the abuse sometimes. That’s why they did such a bad job with my case. They were really supporters of Johnny!”

“That never happened.” the judge in Amber’s case stepped into the CBC News interview room, in a dramatic turn of events reminiscent of most of the last half of her Virginia trial. “None of that happened.”

“I don’t even KNOW who you are! You weren’t there, so how would YOU know?” Amber shouted accusingly at Judge Penney Azcarate. “Everyone is here for their fifteen minutes of fame, coming out of the woodwork to attack me!”

“I was literally the judge in your case.” Miss Azcarate answered, shaking her head and sighing. “I just don’t get paid enough for this.”

“Did you just threaten to microwave my baby???” Amber pointed accusingly at the judge. “SHE JUST THREATENED TO MICROWAVE MY BABY!!!”

“Objection: Hearsay!” Amber’s attorneys burst into the CBC News set, surrounding Judge Azcarate while continuously repeating their favorite objection over-and-over like a strange kind of magical or ritualsitic chant.

“I don’t… even know what’s going on anymore…” Michael Hamden frowned, getting up and leaving his own news set, wondering where in the world the security guards for the CBC News building were at.

Returning to the set the next day, Michael Hamden found the room he was interviewing Amber Heard in to be completely trashed, a fresh pile of human feces present on the chair where he was sitting the night before.

“Uh… my editor isn’t going to like this…” Hamden frowned, trying to figure out how to clean up the #MePoo mess before his boss strolled in and uncovered the damages occurred while he left Amber Turd unsupervised in the building overnight.

“It’s ok…” a strong, angelic voice rang out from the other side of the room as a bright and smiling Camille Vasquez, the light from a nearby window shining directly upon her to give her a saintly aura of radiance, approached Mr. Hamden from behind with a warm but fiery look of kind determination in her eyes. “I felt your despair in my soul and rushed over right away. I’ve been through this before. I can help you.”

As Mr. Hamden considered this, a small angel-like feather dropped from the back of Camille Vasquez as she noticed it and quickly kicked it out of the way before anyone around her could see it.

As of the posting of this article, Johnny Depp has filed yet another defamation lawsuit against Amber Heard for the contents of her new op-ed, while CBC News Corporation, Inc. under the legal representation of Ben Chew and Camille Vasquez, have issued a restraining order against Amber Heard and her legal team while preparing a small claims action against them for the damage to the CBC News building’s interview room.

In response, Amber Heard released a picture of several of her Fairfax, Virginia jurors asleep at their homes with melting containers of ice cream mysteriously placed at their sides, having apparently followed some of them home to take the pictures. Amber Heard is also counter-suing Johnny Depp again, this time for “11 billionty dollars”, all of which she has vowed to “donate to the American Fund for Sad and Lonely Kittens if [she] wins”, although in a later clarifying statement to the above, she changed “donate” to “pledge”, brushing off any suggestion by reporters that the two words have different meanings, which is completely fair as those two words are obvious synonyms.

Judge Penney Azcarate could not be reached for comment about these events by “The Eye of Zatara” as she was rushed mysteriously to the emergency department of the hospital closest to CBC News’ Richmond, Virginia building after somehow losing part of one of her fingers, presumably to abuse from Johnny Depp.

When will the evil reign of terror from Johnny Depp finally be stopped???

UPDATE: Some of you readers have accused “The Eye of Zatara” of editing the picture attached to this article which depicts Johnny Depp as Darkseid, one of the most powerful supervillains in the DC Comics universe. I assure you, these pictures are just as authentic as the pictures of abuse displayed by Amber Heard during her trial. If someone says the metadata in the photo suggests otherwise, that is just a lying witness influenced by Johnny Depp’s stardom trying to manipulate you into setting back the clock for domestic abuse victims in favor of powerful men like Johnny. Johnny Depp is, in fact, Darkseid.

~The Gatekeeper

[SATIRE] “Taste of Space” in Coca-Cola Starlight Revealed to Just Be Stale Sugar Cookies

By: “The Gatekeeper”

St. Laramie Parish, LA – Customers struggled to push their way into their favorite “Dollar General” in downtown Madville today as Coca-Cola slowed its production of “Coca-Cola Starlight”, a limited time product made to “Taste Like Space”, which apparently means to taste like the stale sugar cookies Coca-Cola was buying from various dollar stores throughout the country to make the drink.

“One day, Coca-Cola was buying every single cheap, flavorless, lightly frosted sugar cookie we had in stock, and, the next, boom… we have so many ‘Super Sugary Wafers’ the automatic doors can’t even push open through the things to let the regulars in.” Dollar General manager Dale Bakerston reported to CBC News reporter Michael Hamden, Jr. this morning. “I guess people didn’t like the flavor of the stars or whatever.”

Coca-Cola denies using years old discount brand sugar cookies to create the distinct kick of their new Coca-Cola brand product, however, and says the increase of ‘Rainbow Happy Cookies’ and ‘Kimbler Elf Delights’ on the shelves of local discount stores is just a coincidence.

“Coca-Cola harvested a unique blend of unusual, cosmological flavors to mix together into the masterpiece that is our limited edition ‘Coca-Cola Starlight’ product, and that’s why millions of customers with poor taste throughout the country have celebrated the beverage with open arms and even opener wallets.” Director of Marketing at Coca-Cola, Inc., Todd Fizz, told online news outlet NowNews last week. “You really think we’d crush up stale shortbread cookies and sugar into a Coca-Cola and call it something new? I mean, come on, this is Coca-Cola we’re talking about. We’d never do something cheap like that, and admit it. Never! Besides, the sales of Coca-Cola Starlight have been incredible! Stellar… even.”

“Isn’t that just because people are accidentally buying Starlight while reaching for what a few months ago would have been a Cherry Coke?” NowNews asked in reply, while shaking their head at Mr. Fizz’s obvious pun. “Everywhere I go, it seems like store vendors are just replacing the Cherry Coke spots in their fridges with Starlight, and the label color is almost identical. You don’t even realize you got cheated until you leave the store and take a sip. By, then, it’s too late to get a refund.”

“You sound like you’re speaking from experience…” Todd Fizz answered thoughtfully before noticing the still half-full bottle of “Starlight” in his interviewer’s trash can.

“I am.”

As Coca-Cola continues to deny the use of ‘Frosted Fun Cookies’ and ‘No Stuff Fun-REO’s’ in making their “Starlight” flavor, “Dollar General” and “Dollar Tree” stores throughout the country continue to face the problem of how to keep walkways through their businesses clear of the literal flood of years-old, stale, one dollar treats now pouring into their stores continuously with every single truck delivery from their suppliers.

At the time of reporting, President of “Family Dollar”, Buck Quarters, had devised a potential solution for his own company, at least. By relabeling all ‘Flashy Family Cooksters’ and other similar products as “baby formula”, he sold every single package in every store overnight for $10 a pop, making enough profit to singe off his taste buds with lasers so he could never even theoretically taste a Coca-Cola Starlight again.

“It was worth it.” was the only reply he gave to “The Eye of Zatara” when requested for comment.

“The Eye of Zatara” has yet to investigate rumors from the southern border of newborns being fed these ‘Flashy Family Cooksters’ after Family Dollar’s new ‘baby formula’ was purchased en masse by the Biden administration and given to them.

[REVIEW] Kenobi – “A Strong Start…” (Parts I and II)

By: “The Watchman”

“A strong start…”

I didn’t have high expectations as I sat down to watch the two-part premier of “Obi-Wan Kenobi” on Disney+.  Thoughts of Boba Fett and his Vespa Power Rangers gang of spinning gunmen filled my head as I saw the announcement for the new show scrolling at the top of my Disney+ home page.  While I was very pleased to see Ewan McGregor back in his iconic role as the wise Jedi Knight and mentor of the boy, Anakin Skywalker, who would become Darth Vader, I feared that the hand of Kathleen Kennedy and other destructive influences at LucasFilm would ruin the character as I remembered him, as they had done with the rest of the canon Star Wars universe, “The Mandalorian” alone seeming to represent Star Wars correctly among all live action adaptations.

I am surprised to say, however, that I enjoyed both “Part I” and “Part II” of the Obi-Wan Kenobi show and am looking forward to next week’s episode.  “Part I” introduces Obi-Wan as a broken man trying to forget the life he lost, hoping to live out the rest of his days as a quiet, anonymous kind of everyman, content to make just enough credits to scrape by with while keeping a low profile.  He is scarred by his failure to keep Anakin from the Dark Side, and haunted by the actions this failure became entwined with… the destruction of both the Jedi Order by the Sith and the transformation of the Old Republic into the sinister, Emperor Palpatine controlled, Galactic Empire.  His only real link to his old life is the boy Luke Skywalker, who he watches over from a distance, the one connection he still has to the good times he had with his student, Anakin, before the events of “Revenge of the Sith”.

In the meantime, however, the Galactic Empire is hunting down the last remnants of the Jedi Order wherever they can find them, led by so-called “Inquisitors” trained in the Dark Side of the Force.  Luke’s young sister, Leia, is kept safe on planet Alderaan, raised by foster parents in an environment secure enough not to need Obi-Wan’s direct oversight to ensure her safety, and the trail leading to Obi-Wan himself has gone so cold that even the Inquisitors now cannot find him.  He has succeeded in burying who he used to be and becoming a mere memory, an echo of his former self now known simply by the name of “Ben”.

This is an excellent backdrop for a deep and interesting character study into one of the more nuanced personas in all of Star Wars.  The show takes the time to build up the story of Obi-Wan and Anakin first with a recap of clips from the Prequel Trilogy, and then with ample time spent with Obi-Wan himself in the normalcy of his current humdrum routine on Tatooine.  It mixes old and new characters well, taking efforts to show who each of its various characters are, not only as a whole, but also where their current goals and ambitions lie, so you can understand their dynamics with one another on more than just a surface level.  (Compare this to the “Book of Boba Fett” where multiple characters join up with Boba Fett on a whim and then instantly have 100% loyalty to him without ever wavering in their motivations even one iota.) 

When Obi-Wan is forced out of his comfort zone going into Part II, he doesn’t immediately start kicking butt and taking names.  He is out of touch with his Jedi lifestyle, and it shows.  He can still fight decently and is ok with a blaster, but he uses craftiness, distraction, and guile to get through most obstacles, rather than relying on the Force, which he seems unsure how well he can even still tap into.  By the end of Part II, he has not even activated his lightsaber yet.  This slow pacing of Obi-Wan remembering how to be more than just “Old Ben” again feels much more authentic and natural than say, Rey “Skywalker” suddenly being able to fight halfway on par with Kylo Ren at the start of the Sequel Trilogy despite having no Jedi training, and will undoubtedly make it feel much more rewarding down the line when Obi-Wan truly awakens again into being who he is.  It also suits his character well, showing that effort is being taken here to match the Obi-Wan Kenobi of this series to the Obi-Wan from the canonical movies, a kind of charming diplomat of a Jedi who is very skilled in combat, but likes to smooth talk his way out of situations first whenever he can.  It is nice to see a classic character represented well in a new outing instead of being re-written completely like we usually see from LucasFilm these days.

The one thing about the show that bothers me thus far, though, is Leia.  Leia is a surprisingly major character in the series, and while I like her most of the time, she’s written a little over-the-top and it stretches the believability of the scenes she’s in.  Basically, she’s not only a total tomboy but also somehow a know-it-all genius, and while she’s written kind of charmingly, it still kicks hard on your suspension of disbelief when a ten-year-old suddenly dissects the psychological motivations of someone around her without warning and then tears them apart by explaining to them all of their deep-seated insecurities and misplaced personal values.  That is not something a ten-year-old, no matter how observant and smart, should be able to do, and it doesn’t match very well with the Leia I remember from the Original Trilogy, who now seems so much stupider by comparison to her literal genius of a ten-year-old self.  Leia was always smart and sassy, but I don’t remember her ever being a psychological genius who could instantly profile the people around her and use their core emotional weaknesses against them.  She is not Lelouch vi Britannia from the anime “Code Geass”.  She is also not Sherlock Holmes.  This version of Leia, however, kind of is these people sometimes.

The increase of Leia in Part II lowered my overall enjoyment of that episode compared to Part I which focused mostly on Obi-Wan and the Inquisitors.  I enjoyed both episodes, however, and am somewhat looking forward to next week’s outing, a stark contrast to “The Book of Boba Fett” which I almost (or actually) dreaded watching each week.  Overall, I think I would give Part I of Kenobi an 8/10 (a 7.75 without rounding up) and Part II a 7/10 (more like a 7.25 rounded down).  My final thoughts on these episodes are summarized in quotation marks below:

“A strong start to a series with a lot of potential, Kenobi encourages us to look ourselves in the mirror and face the demons of our past, while realistically portraying the harsh struggle that such a journey is to embark on.  While not perfect, this feels like Star Wars, and the characters generally feel believable and real, especially Obi-Wan Kenobi himself thanks to Ewan McGregor’s excellent performance.  I look forward to wherever the show’s story goes from here in that galaxy far, far away…”

[REVIEW] “The Book of Boba Fett” – Season 1, Episode 7

By: “The Watchman”

Surprise, surprise – we made it to the final episode! I wasn’t sure I could hold on after the bantha fodder that was the start of this series, but after the refreshment of what was essentially “The Mandalorian” Season 3 taking up Episodes 5 and 6, we made it to the ninth inning, ready to see if Boba knocks one out of the park to turn things around for the home team. How’d he do? Was the Force strong with this episode?

[MOSTLY SPOILER FREE REVIEW]

This is a “Mostly Spoiler Free Review”, so I will talk about different elements of the show without discussing almost any specific plot points. This is a review for Episode 7, however, so there WILL be spoilers for previous episodes as we set the stage for what happened this week. If you are not caught up through Episode 6 before reading this review, you might want to do that first.

If you’ve read my other reviews of this series, you know that I basically hated everything about Episodes 1 through 4 with few exceptions. I felt that the show was stupidly written, with characters doing things that made no sense and convenience being used to drive the plot more than anything realistic or believable. Boba Fett seemed very “Disneyfied”, not even allowed to fire a gun half the time, and scolding Fennec Shand for using the mere appearance of her pistol in its holster to strongarm her way through the Mayor’s obnoxious assistant.

Episode 1 was mostly Boba Fett standing around smiling with his helmet off while nothing interesting happened. Episode 2 was a little better, having a satisfying training arc between Boba Fett and some Tusken Raiders that ended in a fun and interesting battle against a train that made me much more optimistic for the future of the show, even if the whole premise of the Tusken vs. train battle was nonsensical if you stopped to think about it for more than two seconds.

Episode 3 was awful, with cartoonish characters doing cartoonish things. (The introduction of the Mods as major characters was definitely a low point for the series.) Episode 4 tried to, at last, explain some of Boba Fett’s motivations and thoughts behind his actions, which were mostly a mystery up to this point despite us now being halfway through the season, but it was a very boring episode, and Boba was shown up repeatedly by Fennec Shand in-between explaining his very generic character motivations, making him look basically useless (as usual) in his own show.

Episode 5 did not even have Boba Fett in it and, unsurprisingly, turned out to be amazing as a result. The Episode started with the Mandalorian cutting people apart with the Darksaber before reuniting and then splitting up again with his old Mandalorian crew after an awesome traditional duel for his new Kyber crystal weapon. He gets a new ship, a heavily souped up Naboo starfighter, before Fennec Shand shows up to recruit him at the end, Din Djarin actually refusing her money and agreeing to help his friend Boba Fett for free.

Episode 6 was even better than Episode 5, if you can believe that, featuring a very well written Luke Skywalker that felt exactly like Luke Skywalker should feel, training Grogu in the way of the Force. The Mandalorian comes to see Grogu only to be turned away, not by Luke directly, but by the reappearance of Ahsoka Tano. She questions Mando about his reasons for wanting to see Grogu, warning him that his very presence there could disrupt the Child’s training. This outing also reintroduced Marshall Cobb Vanth and an interesting side character I am told is from other good Star Wars shows (the blue bug-faced outlaw), featuring a wild west style shootout between them that was satisfying, while once again treating Boba Fett himself as nothing more than the most minor of side characters in his own show.

Episode 7 was a mix of all these things, the good and the bad, thoroughly shaken up and poured out together into a single not quite 100% cohesive Smoothie King smoothie. It had plot points that made me shake my head and say “Really?” out loud, as well as moments that made me genuinely cheer at the screen with excitement. It did a very good job of tying all the different concepts and characters introduced throughout the star-studded run of Boba Fett’s little Disney+ outing into a single narrative arrangement that, more or less, worked to create a decent end to the series. Unlike the Star Wars sequel trilogy, which started out so-so but ended horribly, “The Book of Boba Fett” has played out much more like George Lucas’ earlier Prequels, beginning very rough, but, in the end, eeking out a minor overall win after some rather well-crafted fight scenes.

I was really hoping Han Solo would show up at the end, as that was the rumor flying around since his name appeared on the IMDB cast list for the episode, but, alas, that was just a rumor. Either that, or he was removed following the last minute changes and reshoots also rumored to have been taking place on Episode 7 over the last few days to try and salvage the show’s reputation. (If that’s what happened, they worked. Of the five ‘Book of Boba Fett’ episodes that were actually about Boba Fett, this is, by far, my favorite.) I’m also a little disappointed that we see Grogu’s choice between a Beskar shirt Mando acquired for him (representing Grogu’s desire to return to the Mandalorian at the cost of abandoning his Jedi training) and Yoda’s old lightsaber that Luke was offering him (representing a chance for Grogu to set aside his past and remain as Luke’s student until he became a great Jedi Master), with Baby Yoda choosing the Beskar shirt, forcing Luke to send him back to his buddy Mando via an empty X-Wing flown to Tatooine by R2-D2.

Choosing the lightsaber would have erased the Disney trilogy by making Grogu into Luke’s first student instead of Ben Solo (“Kylo Ren”), which would be a big plus for all true Star Wars fans in my book, but Grogu choosing the Beskar shirt and returning to Mando is what I was expecting for a couple of big reasons. Mainly, it would be a little financially silly for Disney, even if they are planning to retcon the Sequel Trilogy someday (which is very possible), to remove the money-making mascot, Grogu, at the heart of The Mandalorian from his own show, and risk hurting the bottom dollar of their merchandise sales going into Season 3. Even worse, such a decision would risk damage to The Mandalorian show itself, which is the life support keeping Star Wars alive at this point. (Clearly, “The Book of Boba Fett” isn’t exactly going to be winning awards any time soon for its storyline.)

Reluctantly returning to “The Book of Boba Fett”, there’s really not a whole lot more I can say about the final episode without going into spoilers, so I’ll have to keep the rest of my review a little brief. I am currently planning to do a spoiler-filled “Season 1 Retrospective” in the next week, in which I will breakdown the whole series with a little more specificity, but, for tonight, I think the most telling thing I can say about ‘The Book of Boba Fett” is that, even after watching and mostly enjoying this week’s episode, the biggest thing on my mind immediately afterwards is “The Mandalorian” and the future of Star Wars as effected by “The Mandalorian”. What Grogu and Din Djarin do is a hundred times more interesting to me than anything Boba Fett does, even if Boba mustered up a literal army of rancors and ex-Wookie gladiators to rush to his side and help him kick criminal butt across half the galaxy.

Din feels much more like Star Wars than the literal character he’s based off from the original Star Wars trilogy. Let that sink in before you keep reading. Din feels much more like Star Wars than this version of Boba Fett does. Again, Episode 7 is definitely worth watching if you’ve kept up with the series up to this point. It is a decent episode in my opinion, with some fun moments, including several epic fight scenes that have to be seen to be believed. It also has some stupid moments, too, though, mostly featuring the Mods, or Boba Fett being shown up by Fennec and/or the Mods. Overall, I am glad to have seen it, and, with the addition of Episodes 5 and 6 to help me make it all the way to the end, this “satisfying enough” conclusion to the whole affair makes me glad that I watched “The Book of Boba Fett”, even if some episodes (Episodes 1 and 3 especially) were just painful to get through. Let’s just say I hope there’s not a second season of this, and wrap things up for the night on a mostly positive note, shall we?

Final Score for Episode 7, the Season Finale: 7/10

“A mixed bag conclusion to ‘The Book of Boba Fett’ that wraps up the show in a ‘satisfying enough’ way as to justify all of the plot threads woven together throughout the mostly long and boring episodes that came before it, excluding those focused entirely on The Mandalorian which were anomalies. Worth watching if you stayed committed to the series, but nothing you’ll be ranting and raving about with your friends a week from now. At best, this episode reveals ‘The Book of Boba Fett’ to be a well-crafted plug for Season 3 of ‘The Mandalorian’. At worst, it confirms it to be a pale imitation with far less imagination and energy than the latest adventures of Grogu and Din Djarin, which you are left immediately wanting to see more of.”

Overall Series Rating (The Average of My Scores for All Seven Episodes of Season 1): 6.5/10

“Mostly boring and stupid, ‘The Book of Boba Fett’ is not a fun Star Wars adventure until the Mandalorian arrives to interject some real character and personality into the ‘bland as sand’ universe that Disney is attempting to create around their new, neutered version of Boba Fett. While it has some interesting characters and moments, contrivance dictates many of the show’s major plot points, and the conclusion has just as many of the cringeworthy moments from the series’ early episodes as it does the ‘winner takes all’ action of the Mandalorian – Season 3 insert episodes. Overall, worth watching for Star Wars fans, even if just to see Episodes 5 and 6 and nothing else. It may be hard to get through Episodes 1-3, however.”

[REVIEW] “The Book of Boba Fett” – Season 1, Episode 6

By: “The Watchman”

What has happened to this show? Seriously, it was so irredeemably stupid on so many levels, and now it is absolutely amazing. Again, there was very little actual Boba Fett in this episode, and I don’t care, because every single thing I saw on the screen today was Star Wars. It was both heartwarming and incredible, which a genuine respect for the lore and characters of the established universe, and a focus on everything the next generation of Star Wars could and should be – and very well might still become.

[MOSTLY SPOILER FREE REVIEW]

This is a “Mostly Spoiler Free Review”, so I will talk about different elements of the show without discussing almost any specific plot points. This is a review for Episode 6, however, so there WILL be spoilers for previous episodes as we set the stage for what happened this week. If you are not caught up through Episode 5 before reading this review, you might want to do that first.

Last week’s episode, which was essentially Season 3 – Episode 1 of “The Mandalorian”, was a much-needed change of pace from the first four episodes of “The Book of Boba Fett” which were awful. Until this point in the show, violence has mostly been toned down or outright forbidden, and we’ve wasted much of our screentime watching street thugs and failed pig guards save an old and useless version of Boba Fett from repeatedly losing fights, often in humiliating ways. Only Fennec Shand has been allowed to shine at all, repeatedly telling Boba Fett what to do, and succeeding in everything from sharpshooting to information gathering – even operating Boba’s own ship better than him – as Boba Fett himself fails at these same tasks and needs her help, and everyone else’s help for that matter.

At the start of Episode 5, however, Din Djarin (the Mandalorian) changed the tone of the show in an instant – drawing the Darksaber out of nowhere and cutting a bunch of criminals in two. He delivers the head of a criminal in a bag to claim a bounty, wanders across an incredible-looking Halo-style ringworld, rejoins his old Mandalorian clan, gets into a duel for ownership of the Darksaber, and then proceeds to do about fifty other extremely exciting things that kept spitting out rapid fire on screen to my drooling amazement. I could sit here all night long writing about it, and still smile ear-to-ear.

Much to my surprise, this episode picks up where the last episode left off, ignoring Boba Fett while continuing to focus on The Mandalorian and other side characters in order to build up to what might very well be an extremely satisfying conclusion in Episode 7 (or not – Rodriguez is directing it again). It starts with the satisfying return of Cobb Vanth, the cowboy sheriff from Episode 1 of “The Mandalorian” Season 2, and continues by showing us Grogu, training with you-know-who on a mysterious forest-like planet with a very familiar looking Astromech droid, the show building up more and more of a fleshed out new Star Wars universe by adding cameo after cameo of old and new favorite characters until I could only sit back and watch in silent awe at what was happening on the screen, understanding, at last, why all my friends were calling and texting me all evening repeatedly asking me if I had seen it yet.

Like I said at the beginning of this review, Boba Fett barely gets any screen time here in Episode 6, or any lines, and the same goes for most of the rest of his little “Breakfast Club” of ragtag misfits, which is fine with me, as I care very little for them (except maybe for Krrsantan), based on how poorly they have been fleshed out in “The Book of Boba Fett” so far. (Especially by Robert Rodriguez – I looked through IMDB, and he directed both of my least favorite episodes so far, Episodes 1 and 3. I can’t believe he’s slated to direct the final episode of the show. Please be a typo, IMDB. Please! Dave Filoni himself directed this episode, by the way.) The focus again is on the new canon of Star Wars characters being birthed into the Favreau-Filoniverse and their building interconnectivity to create a Star Wars that feels, for the first time, like the Star Wars of the original trilogy days.

This episode helped me finally understand why it was Mando got a Naboo starfighter to form the basis for a new ship. I thought it strange, from a writing perspective, to change the main character of your flagship Star Wars franchise’s mode of transportation from the much more interesting Slave I rip-off he had before (the “Razor Crest”) into a souped-up starfighter from The Phantom Menace, one of the least liked of all Star Wars movies, sequel trilogy included. Then, today, it hit me – they are establishing the limits of their new canon. By including characters like Ahsoka and Bo-Katan in “The Mandalorian”, they’re showing what parts of the Star Wars universe outside of these new Disney Plus shows should be considered part of the revised mythos going forward. By including a Naboo starfighter in “The Book of Boba Fett” as Mando’s new wheels, it fixes the anchor of canon for the Favreau-Filoniverse as including the Star Wars prequel trilogy all the way back to, and including, Episode I – The Phantom Menace. There is a reason for all these callbacks and cameos, beyond simple fan service – this is world-building!

I can also basically confirm after seeing this episode that the rumors that Kathleen Kennedy might have had her contract renewed, but basically have a window seat at LucasFilm, must be true. I cannot see how, in any stretch of the imagination, this episode could have occurred if she had any say over the Star Wars brand anymore beyond her stupid new hotel that had been approved long before all of this. The return of a certain someone at the end of “The Mandalorian” Season 2 was, according to rumor, kept secret from her, but for him to appear again in this episode in the way that he did, represented correctly and respectfully, rebuilding the very character Kathleen Kennedy worked the hardest in her failed sequel trilogy to destroy, confirms to me that Kathleen Kennedy really is out of power at LucasFilm, and we have a genuine chance of more good Star Wars like Episodes 5 and 6 of “The Mandalorian” (excuse me, “The Book of Boba Fett”) being born in this new frontier of restored canon.

Overall, this was a very exciting and well written episode, that kept me on the edge of my seat from start to finish. I think it may have been even better than last week’s outing, as I didn’t like some aspects of the long Naboo starfighter segment last week, but never failed to enjoy a minute of “The Book of Boba Fett” this week… except when they briefly showed Boba Fett and his little team. Maybe I’m biased, but I’m going to go ahead and give this episode an incredible 9/10 because of how much I loved it, even if writing-wise, it might have been more of an 8.5. I want Episode 7 to be just like this!

Final Score: 9/10 – “A heartwarming nod to everything wonderful in Star Wars, and the opening of a gate to a better future for the franchise, where Favreau and Filoni restore some balance to the Force while Kathleen Kennedy can only sit back from her window seat and watch. Truly enjoyable.”

[REVIEW] “The Book of Boba Fett” – Season 1, Episode 5

By: “The Watchman”

Finally, an episode of “The Book of Boba Fett” worth watching! All it took was for them to write an entire episode of Boba Fett’s show without him in it! Imagine my (very great) relief when I tuned in to “The Book of Boba Fett” today only to essentially see Episode 1 of “The Mandalorian” Season 3! I’m not kidding. Boba Fett was not even in this episode, and it was amazing.

[MOSTLY SPOILER FREE REVIEW]

This is a “Mostly Spoiler Free Review”, so I will talk about different elements of the show without discussing almost any specific plot points. This is a review for Episode 5, however, so there WILL be spoilers for previous episodes as we set the stage for what happened this week. If you are not caught up through Episode 4 before reading this review, you might want to do that first.

So, Episode 4 of “The Book of Boba Fett” left off with some kind of ridiculous tea party that Boba Fett threw for the three major criminal houses in the Mos Espa area which ended in all three of the other underworld bosses refusing to help Boba Fett.  It’s ok, though, because he convinced them all to at least not help his enemies… probably.  Oh, and Krrsantan is part of his gang now, too!  Hooray, I guess.  

I liked some aspects of Episode 4, as it took the time to explain some of the goals and motivations of Boba Fett that had, up until this point, been left for us to guess. Did all of his explanations for his actions really make sense? No, but at least someone in the writer’s room was trying. Keep in mind, though, that nearly all of Episode 4 was extremely boring. Of course, the writers of this show trying to make anything make sense results in them having no idea how to hold anyone’s attention. As mentioned in last week’s review, we also saw Boba Fett continue to be essentially useless, with Fennec Shand having to help or save him from failure more times than I could count.

Fortunately, whoever was behind “The Book of Boba Fett” this week realized what it was the audience really needed after four slow, stupid, almost unbearable episodes of their terrible show – a brand-new, full-length episode from a different show! Queue this week’s episode, which doesn’t feature Boba Fett at all (not even for a single solitary second outside of the recap), and is, instead, a well-written teaser leading into Season 3 of “The Mandalorian”, a much better show than this one.

I don’t really know who all writes “The Mandalorian” versus “The Book of Boba Fett”, but I groaned the minute Mando walked onto the screen at the start of Episode 5 because I was sure the writers of this show would ruin him, except… they didn’t. He immediately starts being a badass, whipping out the Darksaber and slicing people in two, while acting in the same ice cold, all business manner that makes him such a cool and interesting protagonist on his own show. He doesn’t kill unnecessarily, but, if he’s in a fight to the death, he takes it seriously. If that means a few people die because they don’t want to be taken in “warm” instead of “cold”, then that’s part of the job. He doesn’t relish in it, but he also doesn’t whine about it like Boba Fett.

This may actually be part of Boba Fett’s problem. Din Djarin (“Mando”) is essentially based off the movie portrayals of Boba Fett. He’s the strong, silent type, unrelenting and deadly, never taking off his helmet, and focused coldly on doing his job even if that means doing some shady things for shady people from time to time. Other than his interactions with Grogu (“The Child”), Din essentially IS Boba Fett, which means that for the writers of the Favreauverse to flesh out the original Boba Fett, they had to take him in a different direction. This caused them to make Boba gentler, more introspective, and to take off his helmet every chance he gets. They moved him away from bounty hunting and into a more administrative role over shady bounty hunters like Din, except they screwed up and made him too weak and useless. This new interpretation of Boba Fett is meant to be less hired gun and more The Godfather, but he acts more like a Regional Manager for Walmart than he does any sort of actual intergalactic criminal mastermind. (No offense to anyone who works at Walmart. Retail’s a tough job. I respect you.)

It was so refreshing to get away from Boba Fett and actually watch an episode of the show this is supposed to be a spin-off of. It really highlighted how different the two shows are, one feeling like a loving and exciting expansion to the current Star Wars universe and the other feeling like a lazy bastardization of name brand characters for a quick Disney cashgrab. I got nervous halfway through the episode, fearing that Boba Fett might return at any minute, as I was genuinely enjoying myself and didn’t want it to end. Even without Grogu, the Mandalorian alone is an interesting and well-rounded character, and this episode went the extra mile by not simply bringing him in for a cameo, but actually showing where he is and what he’s doing now, his goals for the future, and some of the new tricks and toys he’s gotten his hands on. (Including, as mentioned above, the Darksaber!)

I really could just keep going on and on with this review, as it was genuinely excited to have a chance to write something positive about Star Wars for the first time in a while! (I’m listening to the Thrawn Trilogy on audiobook right now in my free time. Maybe I’ll write a review of that when I finish. They’re incredible, by the way. Go get them on Audible immediately if you’re a Star Wars fan!) To keep this review from getting too long, I’m going to stop here for now, and keep further any discussion of Episode 5 for next week’s review. To summarize this week, it was very enjoyable, and I would recommend any fan of “The Mandalorian” watch this episode, even if they have to understandably skip every other piece of relative bantha fodder that is the terrible show known as “The Book of Boba Fett” up to this point.

Final Score: 8/10

“‘The Book of Boba Fett’ finds a way, at last, to show us an exciting, well-rounded episode, by ignoring its own plot and writing an episode of ‘The Mandalorian’ instead. Boba Fett fails to appear in his own show, and I couldn’t be happier.”