Musings & Thoughts for Wednesday, May 26, 2021, or: The 500th Post!

Greetings and salutations, Dear Reader. It’s late morning – nearly noon, in fact – as I begin my 500^th post in A Certain Point of View, Too. It’s Wednesday, May 26, 2021, and it’s a muggy, greyish late spring day here in New Hometown, Florida. Presently, the temperature is 84˚F (29˚C) under mostly cloudy skies. With the wind blowing from the southeast at 10 MPH (16 KM/H) and humidity at 35%, the feels-like temperature is 86˚F (30˚C). Today’s forecast calls for partly sunny skies and a high of 93˚F (34˚C). Tonight, we can expect partly cloudy skies and a low of 68˚F (20˚C).  Today’s Air Quality Index (AQI) is 42 or Good.

My Star Wars: The Clone Wars Blu-ray – the one with the theatrically released pilot of the eponymous animated TV series – arrived via the U.S. Postal Service yesterday afternoon. This was the only Star Wars-content Blu-ray I didn’t have in my collection; when Star Wars: The Clone Wars hit theaters back in 2008, my former neighbors Ivan Kivitt and Daniel Mason invited me to see it with them at the nearby Dolphin Mall. We all enjoyed it, but I was not exactly impressed by director Dave Filoni’s computer-animated film’s story. (I didn’t hate Star Wars: The Clone Wars, but I had issues with Jabba’s Huttlet son Rotta, and since this was Ahsoka Tano’s first appearance, I didn’t know how well her character would fit into the established canon).

Also, I still only had a DVD player – I would not buy a Blu-ray player till spring of 2009 – so when Star Wars: The Clone Wars was released in home media, I figured I’d just get the DVD and not bother with the Blu-ray.

I’ve already told the story of how I changed my mind about not getting Star Wars: The Clone Wars movie on Blu-ray in other posts, so I won’t repeat myself here. Suffice it to say that last week I finally found this Blu-ray title on Amazon at a reasonable price and ordered it.

As the Clone Wars sweep through the galaxy, Jedi Knight Anakin Skywalker and his new Padawan learner Ahsoka Tano plunge into a dangerous mission to rescue the kidnapped son of notorious crime lord Jabba the Hutt. The renegade Count Dooku is determined to make sure that they fail, and with his deadly assassin Asajj Ventress in pursuit, this is a mission with grave consequences. – Excerpt from the packaging blurb, Star Wars: The Clone Wars

I’ve watched the movie on DVD many times when I revisit the series – most of which I also own on Blu-ray, except for last year’s Season Seven, which Disney finally allowed Lucasfilm to produce for its Disney+ streaming service – so when I played the Blu-ray version last night, I activated the only exclusive-to-Blu-ray extra on Star Wars: The Clone Wars. This was the video commentary track, which splits the image in two, with the feature on top and the video commentary by several participants, including editor Jason Tucker, director David Filoni, producer Catherine Winder, and writer Henry Gilroy.

The DVD has this commentary track, too, except that in the older, less capable A/V format this track is audio-only, with none of the neat images used in the Blu-ray’s version. I saw clips of Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope and behind-the-scenes clips at appropriate parts of the commentary, so this version is a bit more interesting than the voice-only one on the 2008 DVD.

I watched the whole thing – it’s only 98 minutes long – with the video commentary track before going to sleep. I slept okay, I guess, but I woke up at 5:30 AM and now I’m a bit drowsy. Maybe I’ll be more alert once I take a nice hot shower and change into clean clothes.

Well, I better get going. It’s already past noon as I write this, and I have other things to do. So, as always, Dear Reader, take care, stay safe, stay healthy, and I’ll catch you on the sunny side of things.