The folks at Lucas Animation, a newly launched division from Lucas, were on hand at Celebration IV this weekend where they debuted a trailer for the upcoming Star Wars: Clone Wars animated series for the first time. On hand for the event from Lucas were Catherine Winder, producer of The Clone Wars, and Supervising Director Dave Filoni. Unfortunately no photography was allowed, but I will tell you that the animation and sound from the trailer looked incredible. The show is being done in CGI and will be shown in HD (would you expect anything less from Lucas?).
The series is set to tell the story of the events that take place between Episode II and III, similar to the series previously shown on Cartoon Network, only with a much more realistic look and feel. At today's panel, Lucas Animation assured fans that Jedi capabilities would mirror the movies, the animated series will not have a single Jedi wiping out an entire army single-handed.
All your favorites from the pre-quals are set to appear in this series like Anakin, Grevious, Obi-Wan, Yoda, R2-D2, C-3PO and many more. Even Expanded Universe characters like Asajj Ventress are set to appear.
The detail in the animation seen in the trailer is simply incredible. In one scene, we see some Republic Gunships flying in formation. You can see a lady has been painted on one of the ships, like you would see on War World II airplanes. As good as the first Clone Wars animated series was, this one just looks so much better.
Lucas is planning to get this series on the air around June 2008, however the network tapped to show it is still up in the air. The animated Trailer is to be online at
StarWars.com, so go check it out now.