Spoilers AHSOKA series [Spoiler Discussion]

[David cgc]

His connection to Vader.

IIRC, "Bloodline" never laid out explicitly what the status quo was, but it seemed that the public story was that Luke and Leia were siblings separated at birth, and that their biological father was Anakin Skywalker, but that Anakin Skywalker and Darth Vader were the same person was kept secret until the political arm of the First Order learned about it and released the information to discredit Leia.

That novel also had it that while Luke was certainly well-known, he wasn't a public figure or accessible in any meaningful way. I don't think Leia was even able to get in touch with him and Ben, and just had to assume Ben had seen the news about the galactic scandal and learned the family secret that way.

 

[Crewman6]

His connection to Vader.

No one would need know about that.

the facts are, canonically, the whole galaxy knew about Luke. Saying he was a "legend" but not famous is a meaningless distinction.

So, accept it or...don't?

 

[fireproof78]

No one would need know about that.

the facts are, canonically, the whole galaxy knew about Luke. Saying he was a "legend" but not famous is a meaningless distinction.

So, accept it or...don't?

Legend and household name do not strike me as equal.

It's a distinction meaningful to me.

Accept it or don't.

 

[Jedi Marso]

One thing that puzzeled me is how a General of New Repablic going around solo with out any escort. That looks very dangerous, especially with so many traitors around.

If you've seen Rebels, you know Hera is a force of nature all by her damn self. An escort is just going to slow her down.

 

[Set Harth]

Pasaana, of course, is a ST reference, for those who seem to insist that Disney is ashamed of the ST and intends to retcon it from existence...

 

[thribs]

That’s what you mean by “ST”. I thought it meant Star Trek.

 

[FreezeC77]

I mean, I don't see Ahsoka seeking Luke out. Not after the pain of her last confrontation with Vader/Anakin and worrying over the Empire.


At the risk of sounding contrarian, but why? Luke was not in the battle, he was not on Endor. He surrendered himself to Vader and then went and fought Vader with no witnesses. Lando, Han and Leia and Ackbar and them I could see as household names but Luke's is rather easy to downplay. We saw it, but that doesn't meant it was seen by the galaxy.

Even if she doesn't it still would have made sense for Hera or something to say like "So that's three lightsaber wielding enemies... Maybe contact the only known jedi?

 

[Reverend]

Even if she doesn't it still would have made sense for Hera or something to say like "So that's three lightsaber wielding enemies... Maybe contact the only known jedi?

Yeah because the last time every lightsaber wielding force sensitive she knew grouped up and went to go deal with something, nothing bad happened at all! I mean it's not like one came back blind, one came back haunted, and one didn't come back at all for years, and in the process unleased an ex-Sith Lord that hounded, kidnapped, and tried to execute them all. So why wouldn't she jump at suggesting doing this again?

Seriously though; it's a big galaxy and Luke is on his own path, doing his own thing. If the force calls him to help, then help he will. Plus for all we know Ahsoka already called him and all she got was R2 telling him that Luke's busy dealing with a crazed Sith cult Aphra accidentally freed from eternal stasis on Dromund Kaas . . . again. Not every story needs to be an Avengers team-up, nor do they ever have to explain why it's not every single time. That'd get old fast.

Let's also not forget that as Ahsoka said right at the top of the show; there is no more Jedi Order. That means any Jedi still running around are free agents. There's no council, no assignments, no bat signal. Honestly, the Jedi may be better for it if they remained decentralised like this; structured less like an army and more like an intelligence network (you know, like the one Ahsoka built and ran for a few decades.) Much harder to wipe out again that way. Indeed I like the idea that Luke's temple wasn't the only Jedi school in operation and that there were several scattered all across the galaxy. So when Kylo went off the deep-end and Luke's burned, all the others took all of their Initiates and Padawans into hiding. Something Ahsoka would have been very practiced at, and prepared for.

 

[Ithekro]

Well "Farmboy" did blow up a Death Star. Dragged Darth Vader's body back to Endor.

 

[Reverend]

Rewatching the episodes and there's some subtext about Sabine's mental/emotional state and her relationship to Ahsoka that's suddenly jumping out at me.

First off; Sabine's clearly not living her own life, but instead attempting to inhabit the empty husk of Ezra's. She's living at his old squat when she could just as easily have gotten a nice city apartment or an isolated farmstead out on the plains if she wanted. She's surrounded by his old stuff, and even wearing his colours. This feels like she's punishing herself.

Secondly; her drawings feel very telling. Plenty of loth cats and even the odd Chopper, but not one of her friends (or people in general) besides the mural. That's very out of character and speaks to a deep sense of isolation and depression. Something which I noted in my initial impressions is reflected in the score. When Ahsoka showed up, we got her theme, same with Hera, and Ezra. But when Sabine got home, all we get is a partial quote; just the first few notes of her leitmotif, and then it tails off. Also, the image of her helmet half stuffed in a bag and gathering dust under a workbench isn't exactly a subtle one either. She's incomplete.

Oh and one detail that's easy to miss; she said she hasn't seen Ahsoka in years, and yet when she goes to her old bunk on the T-6 her drawings are still there. That means Ahsoka left them there . . . for years. To me that says that contrary to what Sabine tells herself or what Ahsoka will even admit to herself; Ahsoka does think of her, and moreover, she wanted her to come back, or else she would have cleaned that wall.

Judging by what happened with Grogu, I suspect Ahsoka's reason for ditching Sabine wasn't anything Sabine did wrong, it was her own fears of attachment rising to the surface. Given how the two of them butt heads, it must have felt too similar to how it was with Anakin in the beginning, and that freaked her out.

Side note: If this in the anniversary of the Battle of Lothal, I guess that means Alderaan Memorial Day is coming up soon too, no?

 

[Ithekro]

Probably in another six months for Alderaan.

 

[Reverend]

Probably in another six months for Alderaan.

I'm not so certain. The impression I got was that the reason the Empire never retaliated against Lothal is that they very quickly found they had more pressing matters. So I'm thinking it's more likely a matter of weeks, if not days. I mean how long would it really take the Empire to muster a few ships to deal with one tiny planet if they didn't have a galaxy wide uprising to deal with already? Six months seems like an eternity to allow an Imperial world to fall into the hands of treacherous anarchists without making a swift example of them.

Also remember that Scarif was the first successful rebel fleet engagement, so there couldn't have been much else going on to keep the rest of the Imperial Navy busy between those two events.
Aside from perhaps the Mandalore uprising perhaps, but we still don't know exactly when the purge happened relative to RO/ANH. Personally I tend to think it happened just after. It makes sense that Palpatine planned to allow Bo Katan's little rebellion gain strength for a while, rally all the warrior clans to Mandalore, then just have the Death Star roll up and vaporise them. But after Yavin, that plan went out the window, so Gideon went and did it the old fashioned way, which is why enough of them escaped for the culture to still exist a generation later.

 

[Charles Phipps]

I'm not so certain. The impression I got was that the reason the Empire never retaliated against Lothal is that they very quickly found they had more pressing matters. So I'm thinking it's more likely a matter of weeks, if not days. I mean how long would it really take the Empire to muster a few ships to deal with one tiny planet if they didn't have a galaxy wide uprising to deal with already? Six months seems like an eternity to allow an Imperial world to fall into the hands of treacherous anarchists without making a swift example of them.

Also remember that Scarif was the first successful rebel fleet engagement, so there couldn't have been much else going on to keep the rest of the Imperial Navy busy between those two events.
Aside from perhaps the Mandalore uprising perhaps, but we still don't know exactly when the purge happened relative to RO/ANH. Personally I tend to think it happened just after. It makes sense that Palpatine planned to allow Bo Katan's little rebellion gain strength for a while, rally all the warrior clans to Mandalore, then just have the Death Star roll up and vaporise them. But after Yavin, that plan went out the window, so Gideon went and did it the old fashioned way, which is why enough of them escaped for the culture to still exist a generation later.

I think there's an Occam's Razor answer that the Empire could have reconquered Lothal very easily but the Emperor had it put on his Death Star list.

Because unlike Lothal, the Mandalorians were a symbol.

 

[Set Harth]

Well "Farmboy" did blow up a Death Star. Dragged Darth Vader's body back to Endor.

Don't you mean his empty suit of armor?

 

[Reverend]

I think there's an Occam's Razor answer that the Empire could have reconquered Lothal very easily but the Emperor had it put on his Death Star list.

Because unlike Lothal, the Mandalorians were a symbol.

On the other hand if you plot out the seasons and the time jumps starting around 5 years pre-OT, it neatly puts the end of season 4 right around the time of RO.

I'd also argue that it makes more sense for the Empire to wait for the Death Star to deal with Mandalore than it does Lothal. Mandalore after all is fortified, heavily armed, and filled with proficient soldiers. Lothal mostly just had a small Rebel force armed with a modified light freighter, and grass. Lots and lots of grass. Bringing down Mandalore conventionally would have taken a significant commitment of hardware and personnel. Glassing Lothal would have taken just two or three destroyers. So yeah, I tend to err on the time-span between Lothal's liberation being smaller rather than larger.

Honestly, just looking at it from a storytelling perspective, it seems way more interesting if this all happened in pretty quick succession; loosing Thrawn, the 7th Fleet, the TIE Defender Project and the Lothal Sienar factories; then less than a week later you have an open attack on not one, but two supposedly secure weapons research facilities, followed by the Death Star's destruction, the loss of Tarkin and the sheer chaos that likely followed both in the Empire at large, and the upper echelons of the regime. It'd be a hell of a signal to the galaxy that the Empire's grip on power was slipping, leading to open uprisings across the galaxy and setting the stage for the Mid-Rim Offensive (admitted followed by the Mid-Rim Retreat and later the route at Hoth, but still!)

Dark Jedi are certainly interesting villains, but again they are just too few to even bring this to a Galactic scale problem.
Feels like Star Wars is shrinking to small local conflicts.

Well you can't exactly have a galaxy-wide invasion and a rogue super-weapon ever other week. This isn't the EU after all! That said; the stakes of this show are very clear; if Thrawn returns a galaxy wide war may be exactly what follows, so best work to prevent that when when it is just a handful of rogue nutters, and thus rather more manageable.

Regardless; you don't need massive galaxy ending stakes to tell an effective story. What matters is the characters and how their stories play out. If you're framing this as a story about people getting into cool fight sequences, then you're looking at it all wrong; it's about people.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

Why no mention of where Hera's son is in all this?

 

[Reverend]

Why no mention of where Hera's son is in all this?

Where would he even have logically come up in either episode?
I'm sure he's on the Ghost, under strict instructions not to wander around Home One's hangar deck without Chopper to watch him.

What seems slightly more conspicuous is no mentions of Kanan, but that also makes sense, because why open even more old wounds all at once?

 

[Jedi Marso]

Even if she doesn't it still would have made sense for Hera or something to say like "So that's three lightsaber wielding enemies... Maybe contact the only known jedi?

What comic is this from? Just curious- I wasn't aware of any 'Rebels' appearances in the comics, but I haven't really been keeping up since the license went back to Marvel.

 

[Jedi Marso]

Dark Jedi are certainly interesting villains, but again they are just too few to even bring this to a Galactic scale problem.
Feels like Star Wars is shrinking to small local conflicts.

I am not sure Thrawn can pull Clan Invasion plot from Battletech Universe, to bring the force strong enough to challenge New Republic.

Well, regional conflicts are okay for SW as well. Like we often complain about in Trek, not everything needs to be a galasxy-wide or 'save the universe' kind of threat.

As for Thrawn, if they go with some of Zahn's original ideas, there is the real possibility that he doesn't return so much as an enemy, but as a vanguard against another, larger, unknown threat- the reason he supported the strength and unity of Palpatine's empire in the first place. Because Lord knows, Palpy had no love for non-human species. In the Legends EU, it eventually became apparent that Thrawn planned to use the empire as a hammer against the nail of a threat emerging from the Unknown Regions. The good guys gummed that all up.

 

[Jedi Marso]

Why no mention of where Hera's son is in all this?

We haven't seen the Ghost yet, except in the background in Home One's hangar. I suspect he's with the ship and we'll see him soon, unless Hera has seem squirreled away being raised on some planet somewhere. But he's Kanan's son, so you know what that probably means.