February 3 2012

view: (720p)



"The strong survive, the noble overcome."

Episode Guide: The Box


Synopsis: The disguised Obi-Wan accompanies Cad Bane and Moralo Eval to Serenno, where they enlist in a brutal competition with other bounty hunters from around the galaxy to determine who will participate in a plot to kidnap the Chancellor.

view: (SD-HDTV)

Pretty awesome episode. I loved the whole Box concept. Kind of made this a stand-alone episode within this arc.

The extensive intro to all the bounty hunters, as seen in the preview, was very cool.

Something that kinda gets my goat, though, is having Obi-Wan suddenly become some incredible shot with the sniper rifle. Didn't make much sense. Anyone care to explain that? Are Jedi trained to master sniper rifles?

It would be easy to say that he simply relied on the Force to guide his shot. However, Yoda and Mace probably already knew who they were going to set up as the bounty hunter to off Obi-Wan. By picking the guy known as "The Marksman of Concord Dawn" it would be natural that they'd have Kenobi take a crash-course on sniping. I'm also sure that serving as a general in a galactic army would require you to have some sort of weapons expertise on the battlefield, so it could come from some form of bootcamp early in the war. Again, the Force is the easiest thing to fall back on.

With it’s tight pacing and unrelenting cynical tone, this episode played like a horror film. Great stuff all around.

In killing an Ithorian for his hat, Bane may have finally evaluated himself to an upper echelon of Star Wars villains.

The preview video for next week also deals with Obi-wan’s snipping abilities:

...and in fact that's probably where one could end it. There's no reason to say that the same kind of muscle memory and ability that allows them to precisely predict the location and timing of blaster shots fired at them wouldn't allow them to precisely predict the location of blaster shots that they are also firing. Jedi (presumably) don't use blasters not because they can't, but because in skilled hands the lightsaber is more adaptable (tool, defense screen, weapon, etc.).

And I think this episode is fun because it seems to show that basically all of the fistfights Obi-Wan "lost" (the previous "Slavers" arc) were probably just fights that he threw to get something else done. That had always been something that sort've bothered me, because short of fighting something like a Wampa (or maybe a Wookiee), Jedi should come out on top in hand-to-hand fights simply by virtue of their supernatural ability.

Just noticed that Derrown - the tentacle/mushroom head dude - has a nice little shoulder cannon there. A tip of the hat to Predator maybe?

I have not viewed the episode yet, but the preview immediately reminded me clearly of a scifi horror movie called Cube (Wikipedia summary).

I am not saying this episode is similar : I doubt it greatly. But the concept of a cube with rooms does remind me of this...

* Cube (trailer)

* Opening Scene of the movie
"This is the smashing opening sequence from the 1997 Canadian movie "Cube". Directed by Vincenzo Natali."

* Cube 2 Hypercube (trailer)

And I just noticed on Youtube there is a Cube 3 called Cube Zero.

In my opinion, although I know it sounds like an easy response, he used the Force. As Maveritchell mentioned, Jedi fight at incredible speed and see things coming faster than others, otherwise they would die just training with lightsabers. And Obi-Wan most probably is trained in various weaponry.

What annoyed me is that Count Dooku can't sense that the new bounty hunter is a Force user.

Cool you mentioned the Cube series (I'm only familiar with the first one). I thought of that right away as well.

And thanks everyone for the various explanations about Obi-Wan's sniping prowess. Makes more sense now.

Or maybe he can...