One of the earliest attempts at bringing the world of Star Wars to television, aside from the infamous holiday special, were two television films revolving around the Ewoks, the cuddly but fearsome bear-like inhabitants of the forest moon of Endor. While the Ewok films were originally meant to be aimed at younger viewers, the second Ewok film, Ewoks: The Battle for Endor, was much darker than its predecessor, so much in fact that the film aired on TV with a parental advisory because most of the cast of the previous film is killed off in the opening moments.
The first Ewok film, Caravan of Courage: An Ewok Adventure, aired on ABC in 1984 and follows the Towani family who crash land on the moon of Endor. Parents Catarine and Jeremitt are captured by a monster called the Gorax, while children Cindel and her older brother Mace escape and befriend a group of Ewoks, including Wicket, previously seen in Return of the Jedi. Together with their new Ewok friends, Cindel and Mace undergo an epic journey to the lair of the Gorax, where they defeat the monster and rescue their parents.
A year later, ABC aired the second Ewok film, Ewoks: The Battle for Endor, which takes place six months after the events of the first film. At the start of the film, the Towani family is finishing up repairs to their star cruiser and is preparing to leave Endor when the planet gets attacked by space marauders. Jeremitt, Catarine and Mace are all killed defending the Ewok village from the marauders, who want the star cruiser's energy cell. Many of the Ewoks are taken prisoner, though Cindel and Wicket escape and meet fellow castaway Noa. Initially gruff, Noa eventually warms up to the duo and helps defeat the marauders and rescue the other Ewoks, and at the end he and Cindel leave Endor after using the energy cell to repair his own ship.
According the 2016 biography George Lucas: A Life, George Lucas "never seemed content with a sequel unless it was darker than its forbear" and told writer/directors Ken and Jim Wheats that he wanted the second Ewok film to be "all about death." Previous sequels that Lucas had been involved in, The Empire Strikes Back and Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, were significantly darker than their respective predecessors and received criticism for the sudden change in tone. The Battle for Endor was no different and was not as well received or as successful as the first film. Despite the poor reception for The Battle for Endor, an Ewok animated series followed that same year and ran until 1987.
Though the second Star Wars film, The Empire Strikes Back, drew criticism for being darker than the first film, it was eventually praised as the best of the franchise, but unfortunately that wasn't the case with the Ewoks films. Killing off most of the cast of the previous film started The Battle for Endor off on a darker note almost immediately and prompted the network to run an advisory before the film stating that it might cause younger viewers emotional distress, and the negative reception to the sequel showed that making a darker sequel most likely wasn't the wisest move for a series intended for younger viewers.