Ahsoka has been a frustrating show to follow, not because any of it is ever particularly bad (save for one line in last week’s episode that still makes me want to scream), but because it seems to have a pathological desire to give its audience as little to grasp onto as possible. If you didn’t go into this series with at least some interest in simply seeing cartoon characters recreated in live-action, then there are moments every week that make me think there can’t possibly be anything to appeal to you here. To me, Ahsoka’s relationship to Star Wars often feels like Moon Knight’s relationship to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, which is to say that I’m not entirely sure why any of this is supposed to matter beyond the fact that it says the name of a big franchise I like at the beginning of each episode.
Maybe that’s why it felt so huge when Hera’s testimony to the senate oversight committee (a concept that George Lucas is probably furious he never got to write himself, and I mean that sincerely) was interrupted by the endlessly polite chirp of Anthony Daniels’ C-3PO. Finally, a guy we all know, whose motivations and backstory are not needlessly obfuscated or changed from the last time we saw him! He’s even there as an emissary for Senator Leia Organa with “proof” that she had actually approved Hera and Ahsoka’s mission to go find the map to the new galaxy, and everybody just “forgot” to mention it.
It was a little easy, considering that “the senate will be mad about this” has been Hera’s only real plot point so far, but this is at least probably the right way to handle the introduction of a key canon character like Leia without resorting to the kind of CG bullshit that happened on The Book Of Boba Fett with Luke Skywalker. We know Leia still exists in this universe (this is all taking place not too long after Return Of The Jedi), and she’s still impacting major events, but the creators have the good sense and good taste not to show her.
So, with Hera’s storyline completely wrapped up (apparently), let’s go back to the New Galaxy where all of the more important stuff is happening…at least in theory, because I’m not sure any important stuff happened there this week. Ahsoka and Huyang arrive at the planet in the space-whale’s mouth and immediately hear things exploding, because Thrawn has surrounded the planet with mines in order to stop Ahsoka from approaching. It doesn’t work, though, and as the whales fly back into hyperspace to escape, Ahsoka and Huyang hide in the rings of whale bones surrounding the planet.
Thrawn, given a chance to showcase his penchant for brilliant strategy, orders his fighters to just let her hide, knowing that she’ll try to contact Sabine and Ezra anyway. She does this almost immediately, reaching out to Sabine using the Force, which Sabine picks up, even though everyone is always criticizing her inability to do Jedi stuff (including Ezra, who correctly scoffs at the idea of Ahsoka making Sabine her apprentice). But the Great Mothers are able to pick up on this Force connection and the Bad Guys send a squad of Thrawn’s Night Troopers to hunt them down just as Baylan, Shin, and their team of raiders track down Ezra and Sabine on their own.
Curiously, Baylan chooses not to join the fight. Instead, he tells Shin to go on without him, to help kill Sabine and Ezra, and to then join Thrawn in his new Empire. He says his path lies in another direction, but he still won’t say what that is. For the rest of the episode, all he does his fight Ahsoka when she jumps out of her ship onto the planet surface. She tricks him and gets away, knowing she couldn’t beat him before and can’t beat him now, and then he just stands there looking…worried? Contemplative? It would help if we had any clue what he was up to.
But at least Thrawn has picked up on the fact that he’s up to something. I guessed last week that he may have gone mad while trapped on this planet for a decade or so, or that he’s being manipulated by the Great Mothers, but even if that’s true, he still seems to be on top of the ball more than he seemed to be last week. When Ahsoka joins her friends and easily fights off the Night Troopers (with Ezra refusing to take his lightsaber back and just using Force moves instead like he’s some kind of Avatar: The Last Airbender), Thrawn tells Morgan Elsbeth that he considers the little battle a success even though a bunch of his weird soldiers died. See, he doesn’t care about any of them; he’s just stalling until his Night Troopers have finished loading whatever they’re loading into his Star Destroyer, and then he can leave. That was already his plan last week, but here he is…saying it again.
Finally, despite the fact that nobody seems to have a real plan to get home, Ezra happily hugs his friends and says, “I think I might be going home after all,” and the episode ends. Okay, buddy. Sure you will.
So we don’t know what Thrawn is planning. We don’t know what Baylan is planning. We don’t know what the Good Guys intend to do next. And, while I enjoyed seeing it happen, one of the few plot points that isn’t a big question mark was just resolved by an offscreen cameo. I’m not saying every episode needs a big exciting cliffhanger, or for the characters to openly say their every goal, but anything would be nice—any reason to be excited to tune in next week beyond “well, you’ve seen the other episodes, might as well stick with it.”
Stray observations
- Mean Senator Xiono made a racist comment about droids during the senate hearing. What a jerk. He also dismisses the recent events on Madalore—in the last season of The Mandalorian—as one nutty ex-Imperial throwing a fit rather than a sign of the Empire’s potential return. He’s probably right.
- Ahsoka is introduced doing some lightsaber training with a hologram of Anakin. I liked this scene, both because it lets Hayden Christensen just kind of be there without it having to be some kind of holy shit epic moment, and it lets them show that Ahsoka is now calmed by his presence.
- On a similar note, I liked how excited Thrawn was to learn that her Jedi Master was Anakin. Would he know that Anakin is Darth Vader? I feel like he would, and I think it would be interesting if he tries to play Anakin’s fall against Ahsoka, only for her to turn it back around on him and be like “Nah, we’re cool now.”
- Ezra, catching up on what he missed with Sabine: “The Emperor died?” “That what they say.” I see what you’re doing, Star Wars.
- The episode was called “Dreams And Madness,” but I don’t believe a single dream or madness happened, barring whatever’s up with Thrawn (if anything).
- Next week is already the finale, and there’s a lot to deal with still. Why do I get the horrible feeling that very little is going to be resolved and Disney’s going to bump all of it to Dave Filoni’s big crossover movie?