the bad batch | the m0vie blog

New Escapist Column! On “The Bad Batch” as a Show About Veterans of a Forever War…

Posted on February 19, 2023 by Darren

I published a new piece at The Escapist last week. With the release of the second season of The Bad Batch, it seemed like a good opportunity to talk about one of the more interesting facets of the series.

The Star Wars franchise has always been intensely political. George Lucas tied the original films to the Vietnam War, and the prequels to the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars. The Bad Batch feels like a culmination of this trend, a follow-up to the prequel trilogy, released in the wake of the American withdrawal from Iraq and Afghanistan, that is very much engaged with the question of what happens to an army of soldiers at the end of an ostensible “forever war.” It’s a meaty theme for an animated series, and The Bad Batch is at its most interesting tapping into it.

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.

Filed under: Television | Tagged: afghanistan war, forever war, george lucas, iraq war, metaphor, politics, star wars, the bad batch, veterans, vietnam, Vietnam War | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On How the Bad Batch Adds Nuance to the “Star Wars” Hero Mythology…

Posted on January 12, 2023 by Darren

The Star Wars franchise has become synonymous with the idea of bloodlines, particularly the Skywalkers and the Palpatines. This can lead to a sense that the heroes of this massive saga have to be “insiders”, that they have to belong to a particular grouping, the membership of which is determined at birth. Part of what is interesting about The Bad Batch is that the show is an explicit rejection of that. It focuses on a group of people who are genetically identical to the armies of the First Galactic Empire, but who still find the strength of character to stand against it. Heroism is a choice, not a pre-determined genetic destiny.

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.

Filed under: Television | Tagged: bloodlines, choice, destiny, identity, politics, star wars, the bad batch, the escapist, the solitary clone | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On How the Bad Batch Are the Worst Part of “The Bad Batch”…

Posted on January 4, 2023 by Darren

I published a new piece at The Escapist last week. With the release of the second season of The Bad Batch, it seemed like a good opportunity to review the series.

The Bad Batch is an interesting series. It is essentially a spin-off from The Clone Wars, but one that rejects the anthology nature of that show for a fixed central cast and a linear series of episodic adventures. This is somewhat frustrating, as it strips the most compelling part of The Clone Wars in favour of a generic riff on The A-Team or Kung Fu. Still, when the show gets out of its own way, The Bad Batch is a surprisingly compelling and thoughtful addition to the Star Wars universe, a meditation on what happens to soldiers at the end of a Forever War.

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.

Filed under: Television | Tagged: clone wars, disney, escapist, star wars, streaming, Television, the bad batch, the escapist | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On “Order 66” as the Unlikely Lynchpin of the “Star Wars” Universe…

Posted on May 7, 2021 by Darren

I published a new column at The Escapist earlier in the week. Given that The Bad Batch launched this week on Disney+, it seemed like a good opportunity to take a look at the way in which it solidifies “Order 66” as an unlikely lynchpin of the larger Star Wars universe.

There are any number of big events in the Star Wars canon, many of which have been depicted on screen – the destruction of Alderaan, the Battle of Yavin, the Battle of Hoth, the Battle of Endor. However, it’s striking that the event that has played most frequently across a wide variety of Star Wars media is the implementation of “Order 66” from the end of the prequels. It speaks to both the power of the event itself, its versatility and scale, but also to how the prequels have been rehabilitated and integrated thoroughly into the canon.

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.

Filed under: Movies | Tagged: canon, continuity, reference, star wars, the bad batch | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On the Future of “Star Wars” on Streaming…

Posted on July 19, 2020 by Darren

I published a new piece at The Escapist yesterday. With the announcement that Star Wars is launching a Bad Batch television series off the back of The Clone Wars, it seemed like a good opportunity to take a look at why the franchise’s future might lie on streaming.

To a certain extent, Star Wars has suffered because it is no longer a pop cultural monolith. It arguably hasn’t been a monolith since the release of The Empire Strikes Back in 1980. Since then, Star Wars has built a fanbase populated by different audiences who want different things from the franchise. There are a lot of problems with The Rise of Skywalker, but at least part of the problem comes down to the fact that the film tried to avoid offending anybody and so satisfied nobody. Streaming offers a chance for Star Wars to be multiple things, to multiple people.

On streaming, freed from the burden of being a box-office-record-smashing success, Star Wars has the opportunity to be more experimental and more bold. It can also specifically target particular segments of its diverse fanbase, offering a little something for everybody while still potentially offering room to grow and expand. If managed wisely, Star Wars is in prime position to make the jump from big screen to small screen.

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.