October 2, 2008 - Star Wars: The Clone Wars debuts Friday night on Cartoon Network, and the man helping guide the show in the key position of supervising director is most certainly a true Star Wars fan. In fact, Avatar: The Last Airbender alum Dave Filoni is a big enough fan that he wore a Plo Koon costume to the opening night of Revenge of the Sith.

The new Clone Wars weekly half-hour animated series focuses on the adventures of characters like Anakin, Obi-Wan and Yoda during the Clone Wars, while also featuring Ahsoka Tano, Anakin's padawan, who was introduced in The Clone Wars animated film this summer and whose presence raises some interesting questions. I spoke to Filoni for an exclusive chat with IGN, to find out more about The Clone Wars and what fans can expect to see on the series.


IGN TV: Ahsoka's not mentioned or seen in Revenge of the Sith , so that raises a lot of questions and it's hard not to have some dark ideas about that. Do you know where you want to go with her?

Dave Filoni: I have thought very long about her character and her character arc, and I have discussions with George [Lucas] on it. And, that is going to be probably one of the most interesting things see in this series, is what happens to that girl, whether for good or for ill. I'll dance very delicately here, but I give a lot of thought to it, almost on a weekly basis, to what happens.

- Lucasfilm/Cartoon Network
Ahsoka vs. Grevious in Star Wars: The Clone Wars
IGN: There's a family audience for this show, so what are your limits, content-wise? Can you show people dying?

Filoni: Well, that goes into the whole thing where we have different types of episodes. And you'll find some that are more in the Empire Strikes Back feeling. They feel a little more intense, a little darker. Then, we have some that are more in the Return of the Jedi realm. Jabba's palace has that almost puppet feel to it, so we have that lighter side as well. But, you have to tell those different kinds of stories, so we're not always chopping people's heads off. But Jedi do die in the Clone Wars. That's just what's got to happen to them. So, there will be that.

IGN: Where does each episode's story come from? Do you sit around and pitch ideas with writers?

Filoni: Usually we go through an outline period with George Lucas and Henry Gilroy, who was the story editor of Season 1. George says "Let's do a story about this," or we pitch it to him like, "Hey can we do a story about Yoda?", for example. We then work it out and Henry would have a writer come in that would take that. But we would hash it out and argue about certain things and what we would like to do. Then that gets presented back to George. And again, because he's the creator of the universe, we really want to make sure it's what he wants to see happen with the characters, especially someone like Yoda. And George feels very strongly about Yoda.

We come up with these ideas and then we send it back to him, and then we get a script with notes back on it from George. And once we start shooting it, more like a feature film, a lot of developments happen then, where we'll change dialogue in the editorial quite constantly if we have to, and George will come in and do his pass. So it's a very alive process. We really try to improve the characters and grow them. And what I take away from it is that it really is the Star Wars storytelling process when you see it up on screen, so it's exciting. But as you can imagine, the arguments you can get into with people about what's Yoda going be like and what's he going to fight like, and talking to these clones. But in a way, it's one of the most fun things to do.