Clone Wars -- "Hunt for Ziro" (Ep. 3.9)

-- Love comes in all shapes and sizes.

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I don't often wonder about the lifespans of the various races in Star Wars because, well, they're aliens. We know that Chewbacca is more than 200 years old and that Yoda is somewhere north of 900, but there's not a lot of revelation about the lifespans of any other of the races. However, we also know that Jabba the Hutt was already a power on Tatooine during The Phantom Menace and was, evidently, still in his prime when he was killed during Return of the Jedi. Along with Jabba, we have Sy Snootles; she was with Jabba in "Hunt for Ziro" and still with him during Jedi. How long does a Pa'lowick live? Because she still seemed pretty spry during her musical number in the movie.

So the action in "Hunt for Ziro" picks up right after the season one ending episode, "Hostage Crisis." We go back to find out why, exactly, Cad Bane rescued Ziro to begin with. We also find out that Ziro had a previous relationship with Snootles...
Um... No, I don't even want to think about that.
And it seems that Hutts really do have a thing for twi'leks. Or maybe it's just that everyone has a thing for twi'leks. They do seem to be every sentient beings favorite dancers.

But Cad Bane!

Oh, wait... We also get to meet Quinlan Vos, a Jedi that Obi-Wan, to put it nicely, doesn't seem to care for. This particular thing is interesting to me, because, really, we are almost always presented with Jedi who all get along with each other and have no real issues. Sure, they have disagreements, but they seem to all like each other just fine. However, Vos is a Jedi Obi-Wan seems to have a strong personal dislike for. He's too undisciplined. At least, that's how it seemed to me.

But, as any good Jedi should, Obi-Wan doesn't let his own feelings get in the way of what he needs to do, and Vos and Kenobi work with each other to track down Ziro.

And, of course, run afoul of Cad Bane. That's a good fight scene and shows just how capable Bane is. The episode is worth it for that scene alone.

Clone Wars -- "Hostage Crisis" (Ep. 1.22)

-- A secret shared is a trust formed.

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You can blame it on Boba Fett. Or, more specifically, whoever it was who decided that Boba Fett should be released as a secret character action figure ahead of the release of The Empire Strikes Back. Between that and the actual bounty hunters in the movie, bounty hunters became a mythos of the Star Wars universe without doing much more than standing in place and being told, "No disintegrations."

With that in mind, it's somewhat surprising that they waited until the last episode of season one to introduce bounty hunters to The Clone Wars. However, they did it by introducing a whole team of bounty hunters, including Aurra Sing (of The Phantom Menace fame). But it's Cad Bane who runs the show, and a very interesting character he is.

And I'm not really going to talk about that other than to say that he's an ongoing character and, possibly, one acting outside of Palpatine's machinations.

This episode has a hint of Ocean's Eleven flavoring. It's not a heist, per se, but each of the bounty hunters definitely has a specific role in the plan that Bane is hatching.

Still, with all of the bounty hunter action that's happening, the true story revolves around Anakin and Padme and the stupid things that people can do for love. Specifically, you guessed it, Anakin. It's another step on the path of Anakin's downfall for him, though it might not appear that way, but it's an obvious thing that Anakin does not hold his Jedi code in the place that he should.

All in all, this is a pretty good episode. I think it would have been more enjoyable as a two-parter, especially if they had done an end-of-season cliff hanger but, maybe, that's not a thing in shows primarily targeted to younger people do. I don't know. It's a fun episode as it is, but it could have been a bit more. Of course, season one Clone Wars doesn't have any actual multi-part episodes, so that's probably part of why it's contained as a single episode.