REVIEW: Star Wars Resistance Season One
Well, Star Wars Resistance has officially finished its first season, with anticipation now building for season two. On the whole, it's been a very...interesting journey to get to this point. As mentioned previously, Resistance was hated pretty heavily by the vast majority of the Star Wars fandom when the reveal trailer came out, even more so than the Clone Wars and Rebels when they were announced. There were a lot of reasons for that hate, the trailer itself was really bad, if I'm being honest, the art style and tone caught everybody off guard, plus...fans weren't exactly thrilled the direction the franchise was going, especially after the Last Jedi.
I, personally, went into the show with little optimism, but hoping it can provide a little entertainment for a kid's show. However, after watching all of season one, I can confidently say that I do like the show, and thought the first season was, at its best, really good, even if I do have serious complaints.
First, my overall take on Kazuda Xiono, aka Kaz. At first, I'll be honest, I wasn't a huge fan of his character. I mean, I didn't hate him, and I can understand his overall story of a spoiled young adult learning responsibility. That being said, even for a kid's show, he acted way too goofy and irresponsible as a spy to be taken seriously.
That being said, as the season went on, not only did Kaz get more skills as a spy, engineer, and pilot, he also grew more as a person, taking more responsibility and learning to live with the consequences for his actions. The final stretch of episodes of the season really nailed that point as he led the overall movement to rid the First Order from the Colossus and to rescue his friends.
I'm very interested to see not only where the character goes in season two, but what will be the overall endgame for Kaz, and where he will end up when the show is finished.
Next, let's take a look at the side characters, which I thought were a mixed bag. Yeager, I loved, as he is my favorite character. I thought he was handled well, and can't wait to learn more about his past.
I also enjoyed Captain Doza, and I love his daughter, Torra Doza, as I thought she was a very fun and enjoyable character, with some of my favorite interactions in the show dealing with her and Kaz.
I'm indifferent with Neeku. There are times where I find him charming, but then there are times where I find him grating. Bucket was kind of useless if I'm being honest.
As far as film characters, I thought BB-8 and Poe Dameron were used really well in their appearances, while Phasma, in her appearances, pretty much stood around and did nothing...so pretty much like her film counterpart.
I liked Synara as a character, the background and side characters of the Colossus were hit or miss for me, and, with the exception of Torra and a little bit of Hype, the show completely failed in its "development" of the rest of the Aces.
We barely saw them, they barely interacted with each other and other characters. Hell, some of them didn't even speak until halfway through the season. Hopefully, they are used A LOT more in season two.
Finally, we come to Tam. Make no mistake, I still stand by my criticisms of Tam throughout the season. However, after thinking about it, I think her interactions with the cast were all intentional. I believe the whole goal of her character this season was for her to slowly lose trust in Yeager and Kaz, and to make her sympathetic to the First Order, in order to make her choice of going to the First Order that much more believable. In that sense, I think that it worked really well. I'm invested to see what they will do with her in season two, and whether she will remain loyal to the First Order, or make her want to come back to the Colossus.
As far as villains go, they were...ok. With the exception of Synara, I really didn't care for Kragan and his pirate gang, as I thought they were pretty generic to a lot of pirate gangs we've seen in Star Wars before.
I thought the First Order was handled well though, as I thought they were more intimidating and threatening to the main cast than the Empire was in Rebels. I really enjoyed Commander Pyre and Agent Tierney as villains, and look forward to seeing them in the future. Major Vonreg, on the other hand, he was generic and really didn't have that many appearances to make an impact.
Now, how was the writing? Well, the first half of the season can be boiled down to this, when it focused on the main plot with the First Order, I thought it was handled pretty well. When it didn't deal with the First Order, most of the time, I felt very juvenile and "filler." There were moments that made me excited to watch the show, and there were moments that made be wonder why I'm even watching the show as an adult.
However, with the exception of the episode Bibo, the second half of the season was handled really well, with great writing and development, and even a few twists that made me want to keep watching the show to its conclusion. Hopefully, the show takes a page from its sister shows, and not so much, "mature," as I doubt the show will get as graphic or dark as later seasons of the Clone Wars, but to keep the story more focused, and have few distractions along the way.
Finally, what did I think of the technical side of the show? I quickly got used to the animation style in a matter of a couple episodes. The backgrounds and ships look beautiful, as the best action sequences and set pieces easily involved ships and dogfights. Some of the characters and action involving them were rough in the beginning, I'm not going to lie. However, by the end of the season, I can tell the animation ran a lot smoother, and the models moved in a smoother way. As far as action, it ranged from decent to pretty good, though there wasn't a major stand-out sequence like the Clone Wars or Rebels had in its first season until the very end. As far as music goes, it was decent, but again, nothing truly stood out to me either.
Overall, if I had to give the first season an overall score, I'd give it personally a 7.5 out of 10. I thought it was good with a lot of good elements, and was better than I was expecting it to be. However, the first half of the season struggled in some parts, and there were some flaws that I couldn't overlook. Still, I have a lot more confidence going forward with the second season than I did in the beginning, and I hope that the show continues the evolve and improve as it goes forward.
