Spoilers Tales of The Empire -- AKA: TotJ Season 2 [Spoiler Discussion]

Since we're less that one week out from release and they've started posting whole clips of the show, I'm started the spoiler thread now so those that want to go over every detail can do so here without inconveniencing anyone over in the non-spoiler thread wishing to go in blind.
Speaking of which, here are the two clips that are taking a non-zero amount of self-control for me not to watch.

 

Gizmodo interviews Diana Lee Inosanto about Morgan Elsbeth and Tales of the Empire.

https://gizmodo.com/star-wars-tales-of-the-empire-diana-lee-inosanto-morgan-1851447424

 

Another one? At this rate there won't be much show left to watch . . .

 

I ain't watching any of them. I can wait for the actual episodes.

 

Yeah, these episode are so short, it feels like even a minute or two long clip is to much.

 

OK, those just flew past! I'm a little sad it's over already!
Overall my first impression is very positive! Not a lot of surprises with Morgan's story, especially given that we know where it's headed, but it's a nice compliment to the Barriss episode. One path that goes down willingly into darkness, one that chooses the light.

I also like how restrained it all was about making connections. Don't get me wrong there were plenty of little bits of trivia that seemed to tie together 'The Mandalorian', 'Rebels', and even 'Kenobi', but they never felt out of place, and never more than was needed. For example; in the last episode Barriss mentioned an "old friend" she was sending the youngling to. The first thought is of course Ahsoka . . . but it knowing what we know now, Ventress of all people might actually be the more likely option! Wouldn't that be poetic and ironic all at once? Cere Junda and Tala are dead by this point, but I guess Merrin could also be a possibility? Or it's someone else we've never heard of; point is they didn't need to say who it was, and so left it up to our imaginations!

I'll probably do a more in-depth breakdown later, bit for now; am I the only one noticing that this show seems to feature a lot of women carrying other injured women around? Not sure if that's an intentional metaphor, or why that stood out to me in particular, but it did!

 

Pellaeon was voiced by the same actor who played him in Mando Season 3 which is neat.

Just like with Grevious, Ruhk was a lot more intimidating in this than he was in Rebels.

 

Well, I only had time to watch one of the arcs before going off to work and I chose the Barris arc. Despite her actions in the Clone Wars show, I didn't really think she was going to be a good fit with the inquisitors. I was happy to see her identify as a Jedi again. I have to wonder if her "friend" was Ahsoka. If so, I would love to know the details of that reunion and healing.

And was the ending meant to be ambiguous as to Barris' fate? We saw her stop breathing in the cave, but then we've seen more grievous wounds be healed with bacta and Droid modifications and, indeed, the Force itself. If this was indeed intended to be her end, I feel that she would have went out happy having brought Lyn back into the light.

 

This is exactly why I've been opposed in the past to just having her pop up in 'Rebels' or 'Kenobi' as an Inquisitor. Given what she expressed in her trial, going all in and serving the Sith wouldn't make sense for her character. Here we got to see the process of her reconciling with how she feels and what she's done, and that's the way the story should be told! Don't get me wrong, I'd rather have gotten this story a lot sooner, but I'm glad they saved it for the right time!

That would be the obvious choice, but I'm still inclined to think Ventress would be the more interesting option. I mean Barris was wearing an Inquisitorious version of the mask she stole from her. so there's a certain symmetry there.

I think if they were going to have her die, it would have been much more definitive than what we saw. This felt very much like leaving the door open for her story to continue at some future time (maybe in another 11 years!)

 

More. I want more.

 

One shot of the Dathomir mountain wasn't entirely CGI, they built a miniature https://twitter.com/joelaron/status/1786779101648544042


Also I noticed in Episode 2, Barriss and Lyn both referred to the jedi they hunted with gender neutral terms/pronouns, 'it' (Lyn) and 'they/them' (Barriss)

 

Tales of the Empire isn't bad. But.... I dunno if calling it "Tales of the Empire" really suits what this is. Both characters are hardly related to the Empire. And for a 6 episode series called "tales" it only focuses on two characters. It really should be called "Tales of Barris and Morgan". Anyway, I liked it. The last episode was excellent.

 

It's the same style as the anthology books in the Legends EU. Not every story connected exactly.

 

I only made it through 5 of the 6 episode today, but I really enjoyed them.
There weren't any huge surprises with Morgan's backstory, but it was still nice to get to see the major parts of it. Now, I kinda wouldn't mind a book or comic miniseries that expanded on what we got here. Maybe something covering what she went through between episodes 1 and 2. It's a pretty big step from surviving the attacks on Dathomir to being the magistrate of a city or planet.
After all this time it was nice to finally see what became of Barriss. The first episode gave us some nice new insights into the early days of the Inquisitors. I wasn't to surprised by her turn at the end of her episode, she pretty clearly wasn't as all in on the Empire and being an Inquisitor as the girl with her was. Had we seen her before ToE? They seemed to treat her like we were familiar with her, but I don't remember seeing her before. I mean to girl with the tentacles, not Barris.

 

@JD Lyn is the Fourth Sister whom which we met in Obi-Wan Kenobi.

https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Fourth_Sister

 

OK, thanks. I guess she must have survived her fall at the end of Realization then.

 

I liked how Morgan's story dovetails directly into her appearance in Mandalorian season 2. The voice cameo from Bo Katan was a nice touch and provides a direct link to Ahsoka's involvement. One could almost watch these three episodes and Mandalorian 2.05 as a single story.

I also thought it was a nice touch that even though Diana Lee Inosanto didn't play Morgan in the first episode, she did portray Selena, Morgan's mother.

May the 4th be with you everyone!

 

The show ended up being what I expected. The first three episodes (Elsbeth's episodes) were mostly a waste of time. except for the very beginning of episode 1 that showed that the droid army and Grevious could actually be threatening. Besides that basically nothing of value or even interest is learned, even if we didn';t know how she ends up the whole thing felt like a giant waste of time.

The Barriss episodes were a lot better. I think that Barriss turning to the light side was a bit too abrupt and out of nowhere though, she was in jail for going insane, massacring people and blaming Ahsoka for her actions and that is completely glossed over. I get why the Empire would actually find those actions a postive thing, but it makes her betrayal of the Empire feel weird because we don't see her actually redeem herself for her original actions or even really regret them. The story kind of acts like she made a small mistake but stayed a mostly good person, but I'd argue she went pretty far into the darkside long before she was an Inquisitor.

Still her story was overall decent enough, and it gave her character some closure. I didn't recognize the Inquisitor who recruited/hunted her while I watched the episode, but apparently "Lyn" was one of the minion Inquisitors in the Obi-Wan show, so I guess thats something.

I'd say that Tales of the Jedi was the better mini series overall, but the Barriss episodes of TofE were decent and worth watching.

 

These episodes were excellent. Definitely better than season 1 imo. I can't wait to do a rewatch of the whole shebang with these episodes interspersed.

 

The last episode was pretty fantastic. That was definitely not how I expected Lyn and Bariss's stories to end. I wonder if they'll pop back up anywhere later on?