Watching Star Wars tra-la-la.
So, I would say that I am a Star Wars nerd. I have watched every piece of cannon video, played every video game, and even read several of the books/comics. This year, there is a small amount of new Canon Content releasing from Disney and I decided that it was time to do a chronological reset of the Star Wars Universe. My focus is on Canon Video/Game Media. It has been a few years since I did a chronological watch, and there are new stories to add to the mix. So, like a good nerd, I built a spreadsheet to track my progress :-).
When you start wanting to do a true chronological watch of Star Wars video content, things get weird (mostly with Clone Wars). Four years ago, when I did this last, I just binged everything in the chronological order playlist in Disney+. It is pretty close, but is missing some content and the order of some series really is not well defined (Clone Wars, Tales of the Empire/Jedi, for example). So before I dive into the plan, a couple of opinions.
- If you don’t watch “cartoons shows” you are not a real fan (there is more animated content that is official Star Wars media than there is live action). I was not an animated fan, and honestly some of the animated story arcs are some of the best Star Wars that is out there.
- If you disagree with watching in chronological order, you are wrong. Star Wars builds on itself. Watching in release date order does not show any of that build up. There are some things that flat out do not make sense if you do not commit to watching it all, in order.
- If this is a second or third time through, there is a great chrome plugin that will let you watch at increased speed (I admit that I actually used it more on the movies than anything else).
217hrs 51min of Video and 147hrs of Gaming… in 12 months: The Plan
Okay, so my first step was to identify all cannon content in the line up. This included all of the movies: Episodes 1-9, Solo, Rogue One, and the Clone Wars Animated Movie. I included all of the live action shows: Acolyte, Kenobi, Andor, Mandaloria, Book of Bobba Fett, Ahsoka, and Skeleton Crew. Then I layered in all of the animated shows: Clone Wars, Tales of the Jedi, Tales of the Empire, The Bad Batch, Rebels, and Resistance. Lastly, I layered in all canon game media in the appropriate place: Fallen Order, Survivor, Vader Immortal, Outlaws, Squadrons, Battlefront 2 +DLC, and Tales from Galaxies Edge +DLC.
I built all of that into a spreadsheet that listed in order the Episode, Series, Show, minutes, and link to Disney+. Then I built out a place for notes and started breaking the total into 12 chunks. Because of the length of the gameplay in a number of these games, I assumed that I would start playing and watching simultaneously in January (which does cause some dissonance, but it is doable). So, that is 1100 minutes of video content per month and 735 minutes of gaming for a grand total of 1835 minutes per month (or 30.6hrs). That is just a staggering amount of content!
You can access my monthly plan as a blank template here.
I started on January 3rd, 2025 and I am hoping to come back here and post each month on how things are going. I also plan on posting some general reviews as I complete each series, film, and game. Stay tuned for a lot more nerdy content in the days to come!
January Report
Well, the month started strong. Not going to lie, I found myself drawn back into the stories from the Republic and the Clone Wars. I also cheated! While watching The Phantom Menace and The Clone Wars movies, I found myself bored. I have watched them so many times and I could tell you those stories by heart. I lucked into finding a Chrome app called Disney Plus Speeder which allowed me to stream them at 1.75x speed.
January is a dosage of the past, starting with The Acolyte and working through Episode 1: The Phantom Menace, Episode 2: The Clone Wars, The Clone Wars Animated Movie, and most of the first season of The Clone Wars (with a smattering of Tales of the Jedi). Taken in the whole, it shows that the Jedi are always serving at the pleasure of the Senate, they are not infallible, and ultimately that they cannot see the future.
In the High Republic Era, we see that Jedi’s can make big mistakes as Sol destroys a force convent. That progresses in the Fall of The Jedi Era when we start with the turning of Master Dooku (Tales of the Jedi episodes Justice and Choices). We see Dooku learn that his choices, with the best intentions, can lead to death and suffering – again, learning that the Jedi are not infallible.
We are introduced to a Togruta youngling named Ahsoka who is destined to be a Jedi and then we charge full seed into Episode I. Episode I begins with the blockade of Naboo and ends with the liberation of Naboo (with lots of intrigue and fighting in the middle). In the Sith Lord (Tales of the Jedi), we see Master Dooku enter the Jedi Archives with an old Masters access code and he deletes a planet, Kamino, from the archives. As he exits the archives, Dooku learns that his former Apprentice, Qui Gon, was killed on Naboo. He refuses to attend the funeral and instead flies out to the outskirts and meets with Darth Sidious. Dooku is followed by Jedi Master Yaddle, who tries to convince him to come back to the light. Dooku overpowers Yaddle and kills her while Sidious smiles.
Our journey then fast forwards a couple of years to the start of Episode II. The Separatist movement is gaining steam and Dooku is rallying many systems to depart the Republic. Padme is under threat of invasion and as Anakin and Obi-Wan try to solve the mystery of her assassin, they stumble onto the planet Kamino, where they learn of the Grand Army of the Republic that is being trained there. Anakin goes to Tatooine to avenge his mother (killing an entire village of sand people) and everyone goes to Geonosis, because they track some baddies there. Anakin, Obi-Wan, and Padme are captured by Viceroy Gunray and Dooku and sentenced to execution. The jedi arrive just in time and are almost defeated when Yoda arrives with the Clone Army – thus begins the clone wars.
Now, it is clone wars, all the time :-). In January, you start with some out of order episodes that highlight clone training (S3 E1) and the Battle of Cristophsis (S2 E16 and S1 E16) before you watch the Clone Wars Animated Feature. The Movie shows how Ahsoka becomes Anakin’s Padawan and walks through a plot from the Separatists to convince Jabba the Hutt to join them. The Jedi instead convince the Hutt’s to side with the Republic. Then we learn of the fall of Ryloth and aid supplied by Toydaria, then the King of Toydaria joining the Republic. Anakin, Obi-Wan, and Ahsoka attack Greivous, with the help of several other Jedi, and eventually Padme captures Viceroy Gunray on Rodia. He escapes with a turn coat in the Republic Guard. Anakin gets captured by Dooku but is freed by Anakin, they crash on a planet and meet Hondo Ohnaka the Pirate who detain Dooku and the Jedi and ransom them out. My January journey through the Clone Wars ends with the liberation of Ryloth at the hands of Mace Windu and Obi Wan.
Gaming wise, I started really out of order with