Star Wars: The Clone Wars returning for a seventh and final season is a great indicator of how healthy the animated Star Wars shows are. After all, Rebels just wrapped up with a very well-received final season, the highly anticipated Resistance is set to premiere on October 7th and, in perhaps the best indicator of their success, Solo: A Star Wars Story featuring Darth Maul was the final proof that these shows are very important to the continuity.
Even so, it was still a nice surprise to learn that The Clone Wars is getting a revival four years after it was unceremoniously cancelled by the Cartoon Network. Though some plot strands were picked up by Rebels, it was still commonly felt that this was a story in need of an ending.
Since the announcement, fans have been speculating on what form the revival’s going to take. We know that most (if not all) of the original cast will be returning, including Matthew Wood, which probably means we’re going to get more General Grievous. We also know that James Arnold Taylor will be reprising his role as Obi-Wan. And it’s from his mouth (or, his Twitter feed) that one more tidbit of information has now come to light: the length of each episode.
According to the actor, each episode will be exactly the same length as previous episodes, 22 minutes. Now, that’s hardly a bombshell in terms of news, but it does indicate that despite the four-year interval between seasons, this is very much a direct continuation of what came before. Perhaps future viewers of the show might not even be able to tell that there ever was such a gap.
Star Wars: The Clone Wars‘ revival also indicates that Disney and Lucasfilm are increasingly happy to engage with elements from the Prequel Trilogy. Up until the appearance of Darth Maul in Solo, it felt like the Sequel Trilogy and most of the supporting material in comics, books and so on skated over Episodes I-III. But with The Clone Wars taking place in between Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith, it’s smack dab in the middle of it. Perhaps this could even give some credence to the rumors that Episode IX will contain multiple callbacks to the prequels? Time will tell.
