Funny, because 200 jedi (Mace included) couldn’t even handle what must have been only a tenth of the droid forces on Geonosis.
The cartoon is actually much more consistent with what the Jedi were supposed to be than in the movies. Think about what a trained master could do: since they can move pretty much any object, essentially a form of super telekenisis, it would be child’s play to give themselves, super speed, accelerate into the air, rip apart driods, etc. Everything Windu does is consistent with the idea of what the supposed powers of a force master should be. It’s the movies which aren’t all that consistent, or at least feature Jedi who don’t seem to think very hard about what they could do.
As Lucas himself explained, in the first three movies, we saw only an untrained Jedi, an old man who wasn’t really even looking to live, much less fight hard, a torn apart shell of a man who’s mostly machine, an ancient master who will not fight again, and an emporer too arrogant to even bother trying more than torturing his victims with Force lighting. The original Jedi were supposedly godly, especially Windu, Yoda, and a few other masters. AoTC didn’t really show this off well at all: just a bunch of silly lightsaber deflections.
But yeah: the cartoon and the comics are both superior to the movies.
Though I have a complaint there: it doesn’t look like the cartoon and the comics can be consistent with each other. Both of them feature first meetings with Ventress and Durge, and both of those characters (apparently) die in their first meeting and confrontation with Jedi. In the comics, both characters have repeated interactions with the Jedi: several fights and escapes.
The other problem is that Anakin is supposed to be incredibly powerful: more powerful than any Jedi seen before. He’s had two movies, and in neither of them has he displayed much that would make him seem more powerful than all the other Padawans: nothing that shows he’s specially gifted. If he’s supposed to hunt down and destroy Jedi in movie III, he’s got a LONG way to go.
See, this goes back to that thing about the last two movies sucking. Speaking only for myself, here, but I stopped considering the movies to be canon the moment I heard the word “midichlorians.”
Addendum to my last: my hope for EpIII in terms of seeing Jedi unleashed, is that SOMEBODY is going to have to defeat Grevious, since he’s not around later on. And if he’s anything like he is in the cartoon, that somebody better be pretty darn awesome at what they do. Still, it could end up just another impressively choregraphed but ultimately pedestrian lightsaber duel.
There’s more on Grevious here: a sort of alien cyborg, obviously, but one thing I’m not sure about is whether he could weild the force or not.
He don’t need no lightsaba to fight no droid army! He’s a bad mutha shut yo mouth! Mace!
[extreme nitpick]Two or three shots, I thought.[/extreme nitpick]
Say who with the what now? I’m guessing the word “microseries” also has something to do with European coinage, but help me out here.
I have to say that the microseries was very well done. The animation, plot, everything was superb. Unfortunately, whoever thought up the 5 minute episode format needs to be shot in the face (I suspect that is was Lucas himself). The night the first episode aired, my kids settled into see it, thinking it would be a normal length show- maybe even an hour long for the premiere. We got pizza, popcorn, the works to enjoy it.
5 minutes later, the screams began. And the swearing.
sigh
Anyway, that’s my only gripe…though all things considered, it really dampened my enjoyment of the series- and my kids hated it, and I think that’s certainly the bigger issue.
Right on! Did you notice the echo of Return of the Jedi when Aanakin had Asajj down on the ground pounding on her lightsaber like Luke did to Vader? There were tons of little touches like that.
And I kind of agree that the 5-minute format was less than optimal, but I waited and watched the whole thing at once. I can’t wait for the DVD.
I don’t think Obi-Wan blocking blaster shots with his hand is so out of line. Yoda blocks Dooku’s Force lightning bare handed, and it seems Force lightning is much harder to deal with than mere blasters.
Given that, inexplicably, blaster shots don’t even travel as fast as bullets do in our galaxy, deflecting them should be child’s play for any Jedi who could just as easily lift an entire spaceship off the ground.
Sorry, here’s that link to info about Grevious. Spoilers for the microseries, but not episode three (other than that he will appear in it and be a major threat)
Wow wow wow…you’re giving credit away before George even has a shot to show you Episode 3. You say it’s a nice touch having Anakin and Asajjwhoeverthefuck’s fight mirror Vader and Luke’s!? I have news for you, ANY fan of Star Wars could have thought of that, and most of us see it coming.
If you’ll notice, Anakin and Luke mirror one another. In ANH, Luke destroys the Death Star, and in TPM Anakin destroys the command ship. In ESB, Luke is an arrogant whiny bitch who gets his ass kicked, and leaves his training to save his friends. In AotC, Anakin is an arrogant whiny bitch who gets his ass kicked, and leaves his duty to go save his mother. But make no mistake; in Ep. 3 Anakin will come out in full badass Jedi form ala Luke (although I guess it’s really the other way around, with Luke becoming a badass ala his father).
Anyway, judging from the way Lucas’ has been matching them up, its essentially a fact that Anakin will battle Dooku before Palpatine, just as Luke fought Vader, only where Luke held back and turned from the dark path at the last minute, Anakin will go full steam ahead and beat the shit out of Dooku, fulfilling his journey to the darkside in the process.
I really wonder who is going to have to kill who.
Some Spoilers below, though few actually for Ep3 plot outright per se, just a collection of information from other sources that we know about events that happen sometime around Ep3, some confirmation about what WONT happen, and so on. One or two spoilers about who will or will NOT fight who, a couple about who will have action scenes and/or lots of screentime, and some spoilers for the Extended Universe (i.e. the books about other things that have happened before after and during the movie periods) One Jar Jar spoiler, and one major major spoiler about Nute and Rune Haako, who are I think are the weird fish head people with psuedo-Chinese accents. Most of it is fairly common knowledge: stuff that’s been publically mentioned by Lucasfilm people, usually more about production than plot.
We know that these characters probably don’t survive much past Ep3, and most likely die in Ep3:
-Dooku (probably, but we don’t know for sure other than that he has no role in Star Wars history after the Ep3 era ends)
-General Grevious (obviously something this powerful wouldn’t be around by Ep4 but not be involved in the story)
-Mace Windu (we know he dies, because Sam Jackson won’t shut up about it)
-Sidious? (I know it seems obvious that he and Palpatine are one in the same, but something is still fishy about it, and we know from the extended universe that Palpatine’s powers burn out his bodies very quickly, forcing him to move from body to body: could be that someone at least seriously inures him)
We know that Obi Wan will at some point so seriously injure Anakin in a duel that Anakin will have to use the Vader suit for the rest of his life.
We know that in Mace Windu’s bio, it says that the only lightsaber duelists that have bested him are Dooku and Yoda, though the Dooku thing might refer to their very brief meeting in Ep2, or it might be a previous encounter. In any case, it doesn’t seem that he’ll die to a lightsaber battle unless it’s against Dooku. But then, maybe that bio is completely wrong, because someone has to fight Grevious. He does die fighting, and he does have lightsaber fights.
We know that Yoda will not fight Grevious. Yoda will not fight Dooku again. Yoda WILL fight somebody.
Sidious will have some lightsaber work, and Palpatine has some action sequences.
Dooku will have action scenes serious enough to require major stunt and CGI work, but he won’t have as big a role in Ep3 as he did in Ep2
Jar-Jar does not die!!!
“Nute and Rune Haako will have new hats.” -Official Source 
So who’s going to fight who? Who is going to kill who?
It has been rumored that Obi Wan is assigned to hunt down Grevious, so that could be very interesting. 
Just to add to the speculation, I’ll toss in this plot summary for Episode 3 (possible spoilers obviously). I have no idea who this guy is and I’m not even suggesting that his article is accurate. That said, the story does sound promising. The various showdowns could be very cool if done properly. Grievous is a major factor in this version of the story.
Psst!
I believe Obi-Wan is supposed to take out Grievous.
For info about Episode III, try: Just the Facts.
Supershadow is an idiot who doesn’t deserve the time of day. A compulsive liar, he tells people he is friends with all the Lucasfilm people, and that George personally tells him the whole story to each of the prequels years before they’re released. The fact that the plots he reveals early on turn out to be not even a little bit close to the final released film doesn’t seem to stop a whole bunch of people believing his every word.
You said you hated “EU” so I took the next logical step.
ahem…I said that, not him. 
Actually, the scene that really sold me on the series is one of the first episodes, when Anakin is leaving. He flies up and out the window is Amadala. The look they share was more convincing of any kind of love, than the hour spent trying to convince us in Ep 2.