The Clone Wars' greatest success was making the Star Wars prequel movies more watchable

How the animated series became an essential piece of the Star Wars canon

Star Wars: The Clone Wars, which just wrapped with its series finale on Disney+, proved itself over seven seasons to be an essential piece of the Star Wars canon — and the film saga is ultimately better for it.

Set in the timeline between Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith, the George Lucas-created animated series debuted on Cartoon Network in 2008, following up a film of the same name, to delve into the war between the Republic and the Separatists mostly kept off screen in the Star Wars movies. It functioned essentially as an anthology show, with seasons broken up into standalone arcs, and like most anthologies, the results were inconsistent. But The Clone Wars' contribution to the franchise was still immense, and not just because it helped foster a love of Star Wars in a younger generation and provided the series with tons of new lore. Its most important function, instead, was to dramatically strengthen the prequel films and help right some of their wrongs.

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Brendan Morrow

Brendan worked as a culture writer at The Week from 2018 to 2023, covering the entertainment industry, including film reviews, television recaps, awards season, the box office, major movie franchises and Hollywood gossip. He has written about film and television for outlets including Bloody Disgusting, Showbiz Cheat Sheet, Heavy and The Celebrity Cafe.