Star Wars: Resistance - Disney's Animated Series Set In Between The Episodes VII and IX

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The new animated series follows Kazuda Xiono (also unveiled in the above art), a young pilot recruited by the Resistance and tasked with a top-secret mission to spy on the growing threat of the First Order. The series will feature BB-8 alongside ace pilots and colourful new characters. Poe Dameron and Captain Phasma will indeed be voiced by actors Oscar Isaac and Gwendoline Christie, respectively!

Dave Filoni, exec producer and director for both The Clone Wars and Rebels, is back to helm Resistance. In true Filoni fashion, the series has its own unique art style, being described as being "anime-inspired."

“The idea for Star Wars Resistance came out of my interest in World War II aircraft and fighter pilots,” said Filoni. “My grandfather was a pilot and my uncle flew and restored planes, so that’s been a big influence on me. There’s a long history of high-speed racing in Star Wars, and I think we’ve captured that sense of excitement in an anime-inspired style, which is something the entire team has been wanting to do for a long time.”

The voice cast also includes actors Christopher Sean (Days Of Our Lives), Suzie McGrath (Eastenders), Scott Lawrence (Legion), Myrna Velasco (Elena Of Avalor), Josh Brener (Silicon Valley), Donald Faison (Scrubs), Bobby Moynihan (DuckTales), Jim Rash (Community), and Rachel Butera (Tammy’s Tiny Tea Time).

Star Wars: Resistance - first character art unveiled

 

[Rodders]

This is good news. Still not seen any of Filoni's Star Wars creations, but they are on my "Watch Pile".

 

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This is good news. Still not seen any of Filoni's Star Wars creations, but they are on my "Watch Pile".

You really should start from the clone wars. A first two to three seasons might not make much of sense as there's so much filler stuff in there, but once it's over it gets much better. Rebels is better constructed and they took early on onboard advices from the audience as later on things get focused on and besides the point, if you want to understand some of the Last Jedi force related stuff, both series gives you information and explanations.

 

[Rodders]

Thanks ctg.

I have the Clone Wars box set at home.

 

[night_wrtr]

I have the Clone Wars box set at home.

Now all you need is some popcorn and nothing to do for several days.

 

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Cool and funny trailer. It's coming out at October 7.

The new animated series follows Kazuda Xiono, a young pilot recruited by the Resistance and tasked with a top-secret mission to spy on the growing threat of the First Order. The series will feature BB-8 alongside ace pilots and colourful new characters. Poe Dameron and Captain Phasma will indeed be voiced by actors Oscar Isaac and Gwendoline Christie, respectively!

Dave Filoni, exec producer and director for both The Clone Wars and Rebels, is back to helm Resistance. In true Filoni fashion, the series has its own unique art style, being described as being "anime-inspired."

“The idea for Star Wars Resistance came out of my interest in World War II aircraft and fighter pilots,” said Filoni. “My grandfather was a pilot and my uncle flew and restored planes, so that’s been a big influence on me. There’s a long history of high-speed racing in Star Wars, and I think we’ve captured that sense of excitement in an anime-inspired style, which is something the entire team has been wanting to do for a long time.”

The voice cast also includes actors Christopher Sean (Days Of Our Lives), Suzie McGrath (Eastenders), Scott Lawrence (Legion), Myrna Velasco (Elena Of Avalor), Josh Brener (Silicon Valley), Donald Faison (Scrubs), Bobby Moynihan (DuckTales), Jim Rash (Community), and Rachel Butera (Tammy’s Tiny Tea Time).

Star Wars: Resistance - first trailer for new series

 

[BAYLOR]

Cool and funny trailer. It's coming out at October 7.

Star Wars: Resistance - first trailer for new series

I hate that style of animation, I think im going to skip this one.

 

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I hate that style of animation, I think im going to skip this one.

I loved it. It's really cool and it goes all the way back to Akira and beyond. What I am concerned is the storylines. I still WANT TO see the Solo movie, but getting into the theatre with a disabled person under your care isn't the easiest thing to do. What concerns me most is that they are focusing on the piloting and forgetting the Force, even though since BB-8 is there that it is going to play some sort of thing in the series. There just isn't Star Wars without the Force. Can there?

I suspect that that they are aiming with the classical Anime style to gather larger audience than what they could have done if they'd continued the rebel style. With the anime style they can increase the details in the vessels and other mechanical/architecture to match the style seen in the movies, as it was missing in the previous two animated series.

I know they can do the stories and make some of them better than the movies as the Disney crew has more room to expand things than what they have in the movies. To be honest, the movies should be reserved for the highlight items and the series should take the main place for the audience, because at the moment, they're losing the game to the Star Trek.

ST does it right. They do long arcs in the small screen and the movies are the highlights, and not the main vessels of the storytelling as they were in the old days. I don't mind if they continue using animated series to do that, because at least with the animated they can put as much emphesis to things as they want without blowing the budget.

In some ways animated is so much better than live acting. I understand it was a movie first and then it became the thing we know. But, over the years, instead of evolving like other things, the movies has remained as the central platform for telling these stories. So, in a way, I have to say SW is really conservative old school institute instead of being a progressive space fantasy.

 

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[Rodders]

I still need to watch The Clone Wars cartoons and get the Rebels series on Blu-ray before I can even consider watching this.

I don’t like the ship designs that I have seen so far as they all seem a bit too random. Still, I hope it’s enjoyable.

 

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I don’t like the ship designs that I have seen so far as they all seem a bit too random. Still, I hope it’s enjoyable.

Well see. I just got my hands on the Solo Blueray, yay.

 

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The Recruit: Part 1

X-wing pilot Kazuda Xiono is recruited for the Resistance, but finds himself in over his head when Poe Dameron assigns him to a remote fueling station to spy on the First Order. Then, after Kaz boasts about being the best pilot around, he is forced to compete in a dangerous sky race.

Guest starring Oscar Isaac (Star Wars: The Last Jedi) as Poe Dameron, Jim Rash (Community), and Bobby Moynihan (DuckTales) as Flix and Orka, respectively.

The Recruit: Part 2

X-wing pilot Kazuda Xiono is recruited for the Resistance, but finds himself in over his head when Poe Dameron assigns him to a remote fueling station to spy on the First Order. Then, after Kaz boasts about being the best pilot around, he is forced to compete in a dangerous sky race.

Guest starring Oscar Isaac (Star Wars: The Last Jedi) as Poe Dameron, Jim Rash (Community), and Bobby Moynihan (DuckTales) as Flix and Orka, respectively.

The Triple Dark

Kaz and BB-8 uncover information on an imminent pirate attack and must find a way to stop it.

Guest starring Gwendoline Christie (Star Wars: The Last Jedi) as Captain Phasma.

Fuel For The Fire

Kaz befriends a sky racer named Rucklin who pressures him to take some rare and dangerous hyperfuel hidden in Yeager’s office.

Guest starring Elijah Wood (The Lord of the Rings trilogy) as Jace Rucklin.

The High Tower

The First Order arrives at the platform for mysterious reasons and Kaz and BB-8 are determined to sneak into the tower to find out what they want.

Guest starring Donald Faison (Scrubs) as Hype Fazon.

Star Wars: Resistance - first five episodes' synopses emerge

 

[Rodders]

Thanks ctg.

Looks interesting.

 

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[BAYLOR]

Interesting.

 

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Kazudo Xiodo and Poe Dameron

Spoiler: S01E01 - The Recruit

I watched it once and fell in sleep. Maybe because I'm so worn out on everything. So I'm watching it again as I'm writing this review.

There is a mystery at the beginning with a red tie fighter as not only it's almost completely red, the pilot is also wearing abnormal red coloured armour as well. Traditionally we have only seen the red armour worn by the Emperor's bodyguards, or with Snoke's Supreme Palace Guards. So it is strange to see an advanced, red tie-fighter deep in the space, hunting three advanced x-wings with New Republic markings.

Only a Force user would be crazy enough to stack odds like that and survive. Especially against Dameron Poe. The wiki calls him skilled, but taken he took down alone a Dreadnought class vessel, I'd say he's an elite pilot, who survived all the turmoils that Luke ascension to be the Last Jedi in the whole galaxy caused. So, the red pilot got lucky when he managed to punch the hyperdrive and blast out of the danger zone.

Although it was an exciting beginning, what came after that felt kind of childish, and not aimed at the general large audience. Especially comparing the pilot episode against the Rebels. But in their defense, the galaxy has been lulling in a peace for a very long time and the people have kind of forgotten what it feels to live in middle of the conflict.

Still, nothing has changed as there are no rules, where Kaz and Poe goes. There are no police. Not even a sheriff making sure that the life in the ocean planet, where Kaz ends up showing his skills, goes without a trouble. In other words the ocean platform feels a bit like Tatooine's trade hub or Hondo's Pirate base, instead of a place made for pilot racing.

I liked that they made the "best starfighter pilot in the galaxy" a thing instead of missing it out and letting the story to develop naturally in some other direction. Instead they could have made Poe as the main character and give the audience much more on the hunt for the First Order. It really feels that they are absent and somewhere in distant, gathering their troops, making war-machines and making plans. Also there is no explanation on how they came to be in the grand scheme of things. Instead it is like with the movies, and we simply aren't allowed to know more.

The Fireball. It was named so, because you cannot do nothing without risking on making it burst flames. Not even commit landing. In many ways it feels much like Anakin's Podracer, which also was held together with pieces of wire and duct tape. But in the grand scheme of thing I like all of these new vessels. The Fireball "looks like an explosion with wings" but at least it comes with a mechanic and a droid names Bucket.

Bucket at the moment is my favourite droid, going way over Chopper and R2D2. And I love it is carrying a helmet over it's BB8 head module.

What also saved the pilot was the race. It was well executed and thrilling to the end, even if Kaz didn't win.

I look forward for the next episode and I hope that at some point the childish feeling drops out altogether.

 

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Star Wars Resistance

, the animated series which debuted earlier this month, will actually overlap with The Force Awakens, revealing TV audiences to some of the first post in-universe stories told in the era of the sequel trilogy. The choice, according to head writer Brandon Auman, came down to making the storytelling clear and letting fans -- even younger or more casual ones -- understand from the get-go when the story takes place.

"It's a little hard for the younger fans to wrap their heads around it if it was, say 15 years before The Force Awakens," Auman told SYFY Wire. "Then it's a very nebulous timeline. You're kind of not sure. The fact that we've got Poe Dameron and BB-8 from the very beginning — kids and any fan of any age automatically just know... 'This is the new movies, this is where it's gonna take place,' so it's just easier. And it was just fun to kind of roll in and back up a little bit instead of just trying to follow exactly where the movies are at."

It also likely means that characters and stories from The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi which were not explored in any depth due to time and storytelling constraints will likely be able to resurface and be given more room to breathe.

"This is actually an interesting timeline," series producer Justin Ridge said, "because you have all this old tech that's still around, and some of the old droids and things that are still working, but you have all the new tech from the new movies. It's a cool hybrid of old and new. Even though it has more the lighthearted tone to it, there are still stakes. This is still Star Wars, there's still good guys and bad guys, it's just there's not a war going on at this point, so we don't start off heavy with conflict, we have to see how the First Order is building up. This is part of [series lead] Kaz Xiono's mission: to figure out what that is and report it to the Resistance."

'Star Wars Resistance' Will Overlap With 'The Force Awakens'

 

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Kaz, BB-8 and Neeku

Spoiler: S01E02 - The Triple Dark

It is kind of strange that Poe keeps leaving BB-8 behind, even though it is his robot. We know from the history that BB-8 serves same function as R2D2, but unlike the classic droid, BB-8 is all over the galaxy. Almost as if there are no other droids.

What is even more disturbing is that Kaz keeps showing no finesse for the spy business. If that is true to all New Republic spies then there is no wonder why the First Order was able to create the StarKiller Base and create all the other humongous pieces of hardware, like for example the Dreadnought.

You could argue that because of the immense distance the New Republic isn't able to recruit suitable people for the spy functions, but to be honest, it's BS as after the fall of the Imperium, the rebels knew better, and they would have logically cast a vast network to hunt down remaining Imperial troops and their spies.

The surprising thing is that Kaz keeps saying, "I'm a pilot, not a mechanic..." as he's unwilling to get into the role of being the Resistance spy. Maybe during all the purges that Emperor ordered the Rebels lost their spy masters, and afterwards, those who were left was too tired to organise things for making a spy school to teach recruits the trade craft.

If you look at the population living in the ocean platform, they are normal, almost standard civilised people for the Star Wars Universe. They don't talk about the past, instead live in the present, blissfully not caring about what might come around the corner.

If Kaz had gone in that school, he would have understood that as soon as 'Count Dooku's ship' landed on the platform, he could have downloaded the logs, and even installed trackers in the client ship. The surprise is that Kaz realises that the client was a 'Pirate Spy'

Dun-dun-doo.

Man, I love that they come equipping the old school uniforms, but I hate that the events become silly and childish, when they could have made a bit more serious to avoid the hate this series has received. In Kaz defence the Pirate Spy did a piss poor job on guiding the pirates to a platform full of ace pilots and other racers. But then again, it was a brilliant cover for the First Order, who were scouting out those platform defences.

At the moment it looks as if the First Order is the adult part, while the Resistance is mainly aimed for the younger audience. We see how this series develops in this season and given a bit more time.

 

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Neeku, Tam and Jarek

Spoiler: S01E03 - Fuel for the Fire

The troubles continues to rise as Kaz tries his best to impress people with his newly acquired, not thought mechanical skills. It's true that pilots should have some sense of the machines they operate, but Kaz's track record is abysmal.

Nobody helps him. Not even the droids. In a typical fashion it causes chaos as Kaz loses a client engine at the bottom of the sea and gets bollocking, as all his mates effed to watch the races. So, the only thing that Kaz remains good at is piloting. But, even though he has his golden luck item in his pocket, he doesn't invest it in the Fireball and show Jarek that he is real racer.

I'm glad that they keep showing items that weren't present in the movies or in the other animated series. But as a spy Kaz keeps failing to understand the types the Imperium and First Order keeps recruiting. Maybe if Poe would have briefed him properly on the past and in the present Kaz could have realised that Brooklin is another spy and the 'bike race' was a recruitment effort.

Jarek for being the boss of his garage and in kind of responsible for Kaz's success, it would be beneficial for him to teach things to Kaz. He should understand how valuable Kaz is for the effort, but there is no fathering skills, not talking about teaching the fact of life to the young one.

The silly moment. It is like the bombing run in The Last Jedi. In this one, the fabric of realism is torn with BB-8's rescue, when it launches line to attach itself to the falling ejection seat. Just think about it for a second. A ball attached to a falling item, and it somehow doesn't launch itself to a trajectory into the see.

To be honest, the amount of ships and all other hardware that is at the bottom of the sea, the rescue divers and mechanics should be making a mint from these stupid pilots. Maybe the laws of physics really doesn't apply for the Star Wars universe. Or they do, when and if they are needed. I strongly believe this is the reason why the Resistance is losing the audience and gets loads of 1 star ratings at the IMDB. The people living in the information age cannot take old foolish tropes that Disney keeps alive.

Jarek says honestly that Kaz isn't a really good mechanic or even a remotely good spy. Maybe that is the series characters fighting back to the production team silliness.

I continue to watch this series because it keeps showing the realm outside the Force and Jedi/Sith/Grey orders. It is something I wished Disney would make, but now I also wish they would add a bit more seriousness into the mix.

 

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BB-8, Kaz and Bucket

I'm a little surprised that IMDB rates this series as 4.9 and rottentomates gives it 91 percent (according to the mainstream critics), while the metacritic smacks the score all the way down to 3.7. This series is clearly aimed for the younger audience, and it ignores almost completely those who have grown up with the Star Wars since 1970's, when The New Hope came out. But because it focus on the new content after the first six films and two animated series, it feels essential to watch ... if you are hardcore fan like I am.

I don't honestly know if Disney is going to give this four or five seasons, like Lucas did for the Clone Wars to grow out from the childish stuff, but I feel this series is going to be a steadily progressing one that goes on for a couple seasons in Disney's own streaming service, before it's phased out and left to rot. At the moment I don't believe it has a core set of followers, and on the piracy side, which measures success fairly well amongst the great unwashed grey mass that never comments, the SW Resistance gets oddly low numbers for being a SW product.

Nevertheless, those who are interested in the episodic comments, click the spoiler button.

Spoiler: S01E04 - The High Tower

I'm not surprised that it has taken ages for Kaz's new friends to fix the Fireball, when all the drama appear childish and not very logical. To be honest, I wouldn't feel bad if The First Order would wipe out the station, when even the characters aren't working together for the greater good.

What I liked is that they forget the childish jokes and went fairly quickly to explore Captain Doza's connection to The First Order. I also liked that they continued to expand the background through the other Ace Pilots, not just keeping them as side-characters, but actually giving them a bit of flesh over the bones.

I don't understand why TFO's stormtroopers are called stormtroopers and not something else. In the Clone Wars, they were Clone Warriors before the Emperor took over and made the order to name them as the Storm Troopers, and then the Disney decides to continue the trend, even though they had really nothing to do with the Imperium.

Kaz, the spy continues mostly failing in the clandestine activities, so much so that if I would be the Resistance's spymaster, I would have never given the task to BB-8 instead of trusting that a human would get it right. Especially as untrained as Kaz really is. In fact, to my eyes, he seems to be more of trouble than a help to anyone.

The side-characters start to even bet on failing activities instead of giving him the help that he needs. It is as if they all want him to die.