Space Wars: Chapter IV – Revenge of the Smith

Space Wars: Chapter IV – Revenge of the Smith is a 2048 American animated epic science-fiction film written and directed by Brandon Greene. It stars Brad Pitt, Mae Whitman, Dante Basco, Mark Hamill, Dennis Haysbert, Christopher Lloyd, Sonny Strait, Harvey Fierstein, Gedde Watanabe, Jerry Tondo, John DiMaggio, David Tennant, Dee Bradley Baker, George Takei and Ethan Peck. The sequel to The Martian Menace (2039), Attack of the Troops (2042) and The Civil Wars (2045), It is the eighth film in the Space Wars film series, the final installment in the Space Wars prequel quadrilogy, and fourth chronological chapter of the "Starrider Saga".
The film's setting and characters is primarily a parody of .
Set two years after The Civil Wars, The Astro-Knights of the 0R-01 Enterprise are spread across the galaxy, leading a large-scale war against the Galactic Organization. Following the death of Organization leader Count Doofus, the Astro-Knight Council dispatches General Oberon Kanary on a mission to eliminate General Genghis, the head of the Organization army, to put an end to the war. Meanwhile, after having visions of his wife Stella Amadeus dying in childbirth, Captain Adrian Starrider is tasked by the Council to spy on the President Commander, the Supreme President of the Spacefleet Republic and, secretly, a Smith Lord. the Commander manipulates Adrian into turning to the dark side of the Source and becoming his apprentice, Dark Slader, with wide-ranging consequences for the entire galaxy.
Revenge of the Smith was released on Amazon Prime Video on May 19, 2048 and received positive reviews and has been deemed the best out of the prequel films by many, with praise for its animation, action sequences, mature themes, score, visual effects, darker tone, and the voice performances; criticism largely focused on the film's dialogue and humor.
== Plot ==
Above Cusueturn, General Oberon Kanary and Captain Adrian Starrider lead the 0R-01 Enterprise on a mission to rescue the kidnapped Supreme President Commander from the cyborg Organization commander General Genghis. After infiltrating Genghis' flagship, Oberon and Adrian battle the Smith Lord Count Doofus, whom Adrian overpowers and decapitates at the Commander's urging. Genghis escapes the battle-torn ship, which the Jedi crash-land on Planet Kansas. The Enterprise crew rest and celebrate their brief victory until one Organization warrior catches one of the crew members, Bardrick off-guard and decides to give him the "gift" of seeing the future as his way to avenge his people, before being killed by Adrian as Bardrick subsequently passes out. The crew return to Cusueturn so Bardrick can heal. There, Adrian reunites with his wife, Stella Amadeus, who reveals that she is pregnant. While initially excited, Adrian soon begins to have visions of Stella dying in childbirth.
When Genghis and two Organization alien soldiers Zadoc and Domick steal a Cusueturn artifact from a London museum, Adrian and Bora Tribe leader K'Rabi urges him to bring the two aliens back alive. Oberon, Adrian, Yoel, Lane, Cheepo, and Zuva travel to Busan, South Korea, where Zadoc and Domick plan to sell the artifact to Genghis. A firefight erupts, and Domick attempts to flee but is caught by Adrian, who reluctantly releases him to Senator Ross Organitza's custody. Zadoc tells Ross that Cusueturn's international image is a front for a technologically advanced civilization. Genghis attacks and extracts Domick and Zadoc as Ross is gravely injured. As Genghis, Zadoc, and Domick escape, Oberon and Adrian take Ross to Cusueturn, where their technology can save him.
While Celfhea heals Ross, Alpine appoints Adrian to the Astro-Knight Council as his personal representative. The Council, suspicious of the President Commander, approves the appointment but declines to grant Adrian the rank of Astro-Knight Master and instead instructs him to spy on the Commander, diminishing Adrian's faith in the Astro-Knight. Meanwhile, on Itapúa, Genghis relocates the Organization leaders to the volcanic planet Rugaro. Oberon and half of the crew (Bardrick's team) travel to Itapúa to confront Genghis and Oberon him, while Yoga travels to the Sehlat homeworld of Trilan to defend it from a Separatist invasion.
Bardrick starts to have visions of Dark Slader and the Infinity Empire, as well as Cusueturn and the 0R-01 Enterprise ship's destructions at the hands of the President Commander. Bardrick dismisses the visions and goes to join the Astro-Knights. the Commander tempts Adrian with his knowledge of the dark side of the Source, and offers to teach him the power to prevent death in order to save Stella's life. Adrian deduces that the Commander is the Smith Lord behind the war and reports his treachery to Mane Windup, who confronts and subdues him. Desperate to save Stella's life, Adrian severs Windup's hand before he can kill the Commander, who sends Windup falling to his death. Adrian pledges himself to the Smith, and the Commander knights him Dark Slader. Slader ingests the heart-shaped herb and orders the rest incinerated. Slader, supported by the Commander, K'Rabi and his army, prepares to distribute shipments of Cusueturn weapons to operatives around the galaxy.
The Commander issues Order 88, which commands the space troopers and space bots to kill their commanding Astro-Knight generals across the galaxy, while Slader and a battalion of space troopers kill the remaining Astro-Knight in the Astro-Knight Temple, thus inciting a riot on Earth. Slader then travels to Rugaro to assassinate the Organization leaders, while the Commander declares himself Emperor before the Galactic Senate, transforming the Republic into the Galactic Infinity Empire, and denounces the Astro-Knights as traitors.
Learning that Bardrick's team survived Order 88, the Emperor Commander sends Domick and Slader's new robot soldiers to go after them on Planet Beef. Having survived the chaos, Oberon and Yoga return to Cusueturn, where Oberon learns of Adrian's turn to the dark side. Oberon Bardrick, Yoel, Lane, and Cheepo go to join their team on Planet Beef, only to discover most of them dead, and Bardrick's best friend Toron mortally wounded. Before he succumbs to his injuries, Toron reveals that Bardrick's squad was betrayed and killed by Domick and Slader's elite robot soldiers, and that the Commander ordered the attack on the crew and that he turned Slader to the dark side due to him becoming paranoid about the prophecy possibly coming true. Horrified and enraged by his fallen friend's last words, the crew battle Slader's robot soldiers and defeats them all, only for Bardrick to be easily overwhelmed by an explosion from the space troopers. The remaining crew head to the ship and return to Cusueturn. Bardrick is left severely injured, but manages to return to Cusueturn.
Yoga instructs Oberon to confront Slader while he faces Alpine. Oberon seeks out Stella to find out Slader's whereabouts and reveals his treachery. Now realizing that the Emperor Commander intends to destroy the entire Astro-Knights, Bardrick attempts to convince the other crew of the 0R-01 Enterprise ship of Slader's betrayal and the danger that they are all in; but his claims are laughed off and ignored. Bardrick thus begins a final one-man assault against the Commander and his men. The Enterprise crew and Yoga head to Planet Rubogawa to fight the space troopers and the new Imperial robots, who were created by Slader. K'Rabi and his army fight Yoel, Lane, Cheepo, and the Zephilim, while Ross remotely pilots a jet and shoots down planes carrying the vibranium weapons. M'Baka and the Wolfara Tribe arrive to reinforce the Astro-Knights and Zephilim. Confronted by Zuva, K'Rabi and his army stand down. Meanwhile, Stella travels to Rugaro – with Oberon stowing away on her ship – and pleads with Slader to abandon the dark side and leave with her, but he refuses. Seeing Oberon aboard the ship, and thinking that they are conspiring to kill him, Slader uses the Source to strangle Stella to unconsciousness in a blind rage. Oberon then engages Slader in a lightsaber duel that ends with Oberon severing Slader's legs and left arm, leaving him at the bank of a lava flow where Slader is horribly burned. Oberon picks up Slader's lightsaber and leaves him for dead.
Back on Rubogawa, Yoga battles the Emperor Commander until their duel reaches a stalemate. the Commander then teleports him and Yoga to his ship and see Bardrick coming. After fighting his way through the space troopers, Bardrick sends a large flaming energy blast at the tyrant himself. However, the Commander counters this with his deadly Gigantic Death Ball, killing Bardrick, many of his own soldiers, and destroys both the 0R-01 Enterprise ship and Cusueturn . As he perishes, Bardrick has one final vision of the future: Slader's son facing off against Slader. Assured that there's still good in Slader and that he will be able to fufill the prophecy, Bardrick smiles as he along with the Enterprise ship and Cusueturn are engulfed by the energy bomb. Realizing he cannot defeat Hideous, Yoga flees with Ross and regroups with Oberon and Stella on the planetoid Polis Massa. There, Stella gives birth to twins, whom she names Gary and Gwen, and passes out soon after, still believing there is good in Slader. The Emperor Commander retrieves a barely-alive Slader and takes him to Coruscant, where his mutilated body is treated and covered in a black and red armored suit. When Slader asks if Stella is safe, the Commander says that he killed her out of anger, devastating Slader.
Stella wakes up and Oberon and Yoga plan to conceal the twins from the Smith and go into exile until the time is right to challenge the Empire and Oberon disbands the crew and they all go their seperate ways. On planet Xemoitera, with the Empire in control of the galaxy, X'ahmers sent the rest of the Ikvean away to find a new home planet to live as he seals the hall of technology forever. Later, the sky turns grey, the sun fades away, and the Eternal Flame dies out. Elsewhere, on the grey alien homeworld of Zeta Reticuli, Spark, a young grey alien informed his people of his Cusueturn 's destruction along with the 0R-01 Enterprise ship, and that Oberon claims that the planet and ship were destroyed by an asteroid. The council's pride keeps them from expressing their shock, and Spark remains outward. Soon afterwards, before Stella leaves into exile space, she gives Gwen to Ross and he takes her to his homeworld of Alara, where he and his wife adopt her, while Oberon delivers Gary to his uncle and aunt, Kelly and Bella, on Earth before going into exile to watch over the boy.
Yoel, Lane, and Cheepo meet a space traveler Christopher Pine from earlier and promoted him captain and founded a new ship called the Galaxy One Enterprise. The Enterprise goes to warp as an elder Oberon speaks (offscreen) the "where no man has gone before" monologue. In a mid-credits scene, Slader and the Emperor Commander supervise the construction of the Death Ball. During the ending credits, the battle between the Galaxy One Enterprise and the Infinity Empire are shown, culminating with an image of Gary about to battle Slader, with the spirits of Oberon, Yoga, and the rest of the Astro-Knights watching.
== Voice cast ==
* Brad Pitt as General Oberon Kanary, an Astro-Knight Master, the general of the 0R-01 Enterprise and Adrian Starrider's mentor.
** Greg Baldwin as Bill Kanary (uncredited), an elderly Oberon.
* Mae Whitman as Stella Amadeus, a senator of Nara who is secretly Adrian's wife and pregnant with their children.
* Dante Basco as Captain Adrian Starrider / Dark Slader, the Astro-Knight captain of the 0R-01 Enterprise, hero of the Civil Wars and former cadet-squire of Oberon, who turns to the dark side of the Source and becomes a Smith Lord.
** Kevin Michael Richardson as Slader in his suit.
** Grey Griffin as Young Adrian
* Mark Hamill as The President Commander / Dark Hideous, the Supreme President of the Spacefleet Republic who is secretly a Smith Lord, and later the leader of the Galactic Infinity Empire. He takes advantage of Adrian's distrust of the Astro-Knights and fear of Stella dying to turn him towards the dark side, becoming Slader's master.
* Dennis Haysbert as Mane Windup, an Astro-Knight Master and senior member of the Astro-Knight Council.
* Sonny Strait as Bardrick, a low-level Astro-Knight soldier of the 0R-01 Enterprise who was given the power to see into the future.
* Martin Freeman as Ross Organitza, a senator of Alara.
* Christopher Lloyd as Count Doofus / Dark Tyranny, Hideous' Smith apprentice and the leader of the Galactic Organization.
* Harvey Fierstein as Yoel, an Astro-Knight and helmsman of the 0R-01 Enterprise.
* Gedde Watanabe as Lane, an Astro-Knight and Chief Engineer and Second Officer of the 0R-01 Enterprise.
* Jerry Tondo as Cheepo, an Astro-Knight and navigator of the 0R-01 Enterprise.
* John DiMaggio as General Genghis, the fearsome cyborg commander of the Organization's robot army. He is a parody .
* David Tennant as H.U.E., Adrian and Stella's personal protocol robot that Adrian created as a child.
* Dee Bradley Baker as:
** R.O.V.E.R., Anakin's astromech robot.
** Commander Zack and the rest of the space troopers.
** Karal, a Sehlat from his homeworld of Trilan.
** Hunter, one of the troopers in the 0R-01 Enterprise.
** Tech, one of the troopers in the 0R-01 Enterprise.
** Wrecker, one of the troopers in the 0R-01 Enterprise.
* George Takei as Yoga, an Astro-Knight Grandmaster and the leader of the Astro-Knight Council.
* Ethan Peck as Spark, a young grey alien scientist from the planet of Zeta Reticuli.
* Sarah Nicole-Robles as Celfhea, a young Astro-Knight and Adrian's former cadet-squire who survives Order 88.
* Troy Baker as Christopher Pine, an astronaut who helped out the remaining Astro-Knights survive Order 88 and would later become captain of the Galaxy One Enterprise.
* Amanda C. Miller as Zuva, the leader of the free Zephilim.
* Daniel Kaluuya as K'Rabi, A confidant to the 0R-01 Enterprise and Zuva's lover who is the head of security for the Bora Tribe, serving as the first line of defense for Cusueturn.
* John Swasey as Domick, an alien assassin and member of the Organization and later the Empire.
* Chris Sabat as Zadoc, a green alien and member of the Organization and later the Empire.
** Sabat also voices Brutus, a member of the 0R-01 Enterprise and member of Bardrick's team.
* Mike McFarland as Toron, Bardrick's best friend and a member of the 0R-01 Enterprise and member of Bardrick's team.
** McFarland also voices an Organization alien warrior who give Bardrick the power to see into the future.
* Chris Rager as Fugush, a member of the 0R-01 Enterprise and member of Bardrick's team.
* Linda Young as Sasha, a female member of the 0R-01 Enterprise and member of Bardrick's team.
* Winston Duke as M'Baka, a powerful, ruthless warrior who is the leader of Cusueturn's mountain tribe, the Wolfara, who joins the 0R-01 Enterprise crew against the Infinity Empire.
* Eric Bauza as Noob Banme, the alien Viceroy of the Trade Organization and one of the leaders of the Separatist movement.
* Rick Moranis as Cordin Librax, a young janitor at NASA who would later join the Inifinity Empire.
* Phil Parsons as Roider, a space bounty hunter who would later join the Inifinity Empire.
*Morgan Freeman as Qi-Gong Jarek, Oberon deceased Astro-Knight master.
*Minae Noji as Sheryl Starrider, Adrian and Kelly's deceased mother and John's wife.
*George Eads as John Starrider, Adrian and Kelly's deceased father and Sheryl's husband.
* Charlie Schlatter as X'ahmers, an Ikvean inventor who is Adrian's childhood friend.
* Matt Walsh as Max, an Astro-Knight who travels with Celfhea and to be one of the Astro-Knights to survive Order 88.
* Wesley Snipes as Wix, an Astro-Knight who travels with Celfhea and to be one of the Astro-Knights to survive Order 88.
* Kyle Hebert as Horned robot soldier
* Jack Quaid as Gary Starrider, Adrian and Stella's future son and Gwen's twin brother who Bardrick meets in his vision.
* Victor Caroli as the Narrator
== Music ==
=== Soundtrack ===
No. Title.......................................................................Music
# "Mr. Blue Sky"....................................Electric Light Orchestra
# "Dare"....................................Stan Bush
# "I Can't Help Myself (Sugar Pie, Honey Bunch)"....................................Four Tops
# "Flashlight"....................................Parliament
# "Second to None"....................................Styles of Beyond
# "Southern Nights"....................................Glen Campbell
# "No More Mr. Nice Guy"....................................Alice Cooper
# "(I Just) Died In Your Arms"....................................Cutting Crew
# "O-o-h Child"....................................The Five Stairsteps
# "Superstar"....................................Saliva
# "The Good Times Are Over"....................................Caviar
# "Makes No Difference"....................................Sum 41
# "A Bigger Mood"....................................American High-Fi
=== Score ===
No. Title.......................................................................Music
# "Space Wars (Main Title)"....................................Alexander Courage, Gerald Fried, Bob Karlan
# "Doofus Must Be Stopped"....................................Vince DiCola
# "Sanctuary"....................................Tyler Bates
# "Dark Slader"....................................Ludwig Goransson
# "Burn It All"....................................Ludwig Goransson
# "Trust"....................................Vince DiCola, Kenny Meriedeth
# "Adrian vs. Oberon"....................................Ludwig Goransson
# "Rise Lord Slader"....................................Hans Zimmer, Lorne Balfe
# "To Boldly Go"....................................Michael Giacchino
== Production ==
Greene said he conceived the Space Wars saga's story in the form of a plot outline in 2024. However, he later clarified that, at the time of the saga's conception, he had not fully realized the details—only major plot points. The film's climactic duel has its basis in Return of the Astro-Knight, in which Oberon recounts his battle with Adrian that ended with the latter falling "into a molten pit". Greene began working on the screenplay for Chapter IV before the previous film, The Civil Wars, was released, proposing to concept artists that the film would open with a montage of seven battles on seven planets. In The Secret History of Space Wars, Michael Kaminski surmises that Greene found flaws with Adrian's fall to the dark side and radically reorganized the plot. For example, instead of opening the film with a montage of Civil War battles, Lucas decided to focus on Adrian, ending the first act with him killing Count Doofus, an action that signals his turn to the dark side.
A significant number of fans speculated online about the episode title for the film with rumored titles including Rise of the Empire, The Creeping Fear (which was also named as the film's title on the official website on April Fool's 2047), and Birth of the Empire. Eventually, Revenge of the Smith also became a title guessed by fans that Brandon Greene would indirectly confirm. The title is a reference to Revenge of the Astro-Knight, the original title of Return of the Astro-Knight; Greene changed the title scant weeks before the premiere of Return of the Astro-Knight, declaring that Astro-Knight do not seek revenge.
== Release ==
Revenge of the Smith premiered on Amazon Prime Video on May 19, 2048.
== Reception ==
On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 80% based on 302 reviews, with an average rating of 7.3/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "With Chapter IV: Revenge of the Smith, Brandon Greene brings his second Space Wars quadrilogy to a suitably thrilling Star Wars parody and often poignant – if still a bit uneven – conclusion." On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 68 out of 100, based on 40 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A–" on an A+ to F scale, the same score as the previous three films.
== Trivia ==
* The film's poster is a merge between (2005) and (2018).
* The scene where Celfhea, Matt, and Wix were attacked by space troopers ending with an Master Pike's death is a reference to a Planters 2020 super bowl commercial where Mr. Peanut died. They even got Matt Walsh and Wesley Snipes to voice Max and Wix.
* The scene where Dark Sladers orders to "BURN IT ALL!" is a refrence to Killmonger ording the Wakandans to burn the bush in Black Panther.
* It is revealed how the Ikveans left their planet, mentioned in A New Frontier.
* Rose Starrider / Azura makes a cameo as an infant at the end of the film.
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