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On the one hand, in an era of DVR, iTunes, and Hulu, it seems a little silly to get too worked up about a DVD release. Then again, we get our DVR through AT&T's U-Verse service, which doesn't let you back up to an external device. All it takes is a summertime power outage, and you're explaining to your 6-yr-old that, while all of Mom and Dad's stuff is backed up to external hard drives, a Time Machine, and BackBlaze . . . his Clone Wars episodes are gone. So today's release of the Star Wars: The Clone Wars Season 1 DVD couldn't come fast enough.
The four-disc DVD set features all 22 episodes (7 with extended director's cuts), and featurettes for each episode. There's also a lovely booklet that includes concept sketches and production notes for the first season (see above). The Blu-Ray version includes the "Jedi Temple Archives," which are early animations, scene flythroughs, and such-like.
The featurettes are pretty interesting–for example, these two clips kicked off a conversation with the kid about what Star Wars "really" looks like. For example, after watching Kilian Plunkett, a designer for the show, talk about how Yoda's appearance has been "pushed," we tried to figure out how much you could change the Jedi master and still have him count as "Yoda" (this book helped a lot):
And in this clip, director Dave Filoni acknowledges drawing on Ralph McQuarrie's concept art for The Empire Strikes Back, rather than the movie, to develop the visuals for The Clone Wars:
Definitely a set worth picking up, although one is capable of wishing that its release had been timed for before the start of season 2!
Which reminds me: New episodes of season 2 return this week with a special Wednesday episode, "Landing at Point Rain," in which Anakin, Ahsoka, and Ki-Adi-Mundi lead an intense assault on a Geonosis droid factory. Here's a still and a clip:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PSlnmQHA3Uo
