This Week in Star Wars: The Clone Wars: Corruption Strikes Mandalore

This week's episode is the sort that sounds in advance like a bit of a mixed bag: On the one hand, the Mandalorians are back! On the other hand, instead of the Death Watch, we get the banal evil of political corruption. The episode also prominently features Padmé Amidala (see my interview with Catherine Taber) and Duchess Satine, teaming up to investigate an illness attacking Mandalore's children, and with implications of corruption deep in Mandalore's government.

According to Dave Filoni, what's interesting about this episode is the interplay between internal political conflict on Mandalore and the galaxy-wide Separatist/Republic split:

“Mandalore has a long history of violence, and they’re trying to move away from that. But this is all taking place in the middle of a galaxy-wide civil war, so it’s difficult for Satine to make a case for peace when there’s so much violence all around. And that’s exactly why peace is so important to her.

There are bigger threats to peace than the Death Watch[.] We’ve seen their approach in Season Two; they used violence as their message. But political corruption can be far more damaging in the long run. The scale’s so much broader here, and the stakes are system-wide. Ultimately, Mandalore’s allegiances are key to the Clone Wars, so every little transgression can have ripple effects throughout the war. Corruption can spread, and it’s threatening to poison Satine’s best efforts.

Whenever we visit Satine, we’re going to see a war of ideals[.] She’s very steadfast in her beliefs, and that’s what makes her a good leader. She’s got a tough job, though. She is often undermined by her own people, and her core beliefs are even at odds with the beliefs of the other Clone Wars heroes – including the Jedi and the Senate. Ultimately, they all want the same thing – peace – but they have different thresholds. With an endgame that is so important to the entire galaxy, compromises can be difficult – even when it comes to the means by which peace is achieved.”

Here's a clip from this week's episode:

"Corruption" premieres Friday, October 8, at 9pm ET/PT, on The Cartoon Network.