Star Wars Rebels Season Two (spoilers)

[Mach5]

(And why the hell are there so many bounty hunters in the SW universe, anyway? It seems to be one of the most common professions out there, which seems completely disproportionate.)

I'd bet there are trillions of chefs, speeder mechanics, plumbers, carpenters, architects, firemen, dentists, etc. in the SW galaxy, it's just that Lucas, Filoni or JJ don't have much use for them in their stories, so they focus on smugglers, bounty hunters or soldiers instead.

 

[Christopher]

I'd bet there are trillions of chefs, speeder mechanics, plumbers, carpenters, architects, firemen, dentists, etc. in the SW galaxy, it's just that Lucas, Filoni or JJ don't have much use for them in their stories, so they focus on smugglers, bounty hunters or soldiers instead.

Sure, but such a heavy focus on bounty hunters doesn't seem to be something that a lot of other franchises do, aside from ones that are specifically about bounty hunters, like Cowboy Bebop and Killjoys (although both of those may have been inspired by the prominence of the job in SW). I guess it's a response to the strange popularity of Boba Fett, but it just seems an odd emphasis to me.


Speaking of emphasis, I continue to be interested in the implied racial politics of this show. While the Imperial characters are overwhelmingly white humans (even though a couple are voiced by black actors like David Oyelowo and James Earl Jones), the rebel characters in this show are overwhelmingly aliens or non-Caucasian humans. Ezra looks sort of Middle Eastern (basically a CGI version of Disney's Aladdin), Kanan looks kind of Hispanic (like his voice actor) or even Native American, Sabine looks East Asian (and has a South Asian voice actor), Rex is a clone of a character played in live action by a part-Maori actor, and now their new ally Ketsu is an African-looking character played by Gina Torres. They answer to Commander Sato, played by Keone Young, and Bail Organa, who's basically Latino (played by Jimmy Smits in live action, voiced here by Phil LaMarr). And the one major human character from the movies who's an ally of the heroes is the lone black OT cast member, Lando Calrissian. Well, we've also briefly seen Obi-Wan Kenobi, but as far as I can tell, he's the one and only white human character on this show who isn't a villain. Which is rather interesting. It supports the longstanding implication that the Empire was basically racist -- not just human-only, but whites-only. That wasn't really evident in the OT because virtually the entire cast was white, but Rebels is certainly making up for that.

Of course, there should be humans of all ethnicities on the good-guy side even if the bad guys are all-white. And we've probably seen some white faces among the background rebel soldiers and pilots. But it's refreshing to see so much of the good-guy narrative being carried by people of color, and to see so much more diversity in this show than we've had in any prior SW incarnation.

 

[Mach5]

I guess it's a response to the strange popularity of Boba Fett

There you go.

 

[CorporalClegg]

I think the white humans angle is just to be in-line with the whole Nazi analogy--i.e. the Vader/TIE pilots' helmets, the SS-like uniforms, etc. I'm sure George's initial intention was to make the an obvious visual cue that the Empire is authoritarian and nationalistic, if not altogether fascist, and, of course, totalitarian.

Over the years, the artists/writers of all the various media have just run with the idea and imagery to where the Star Wars Empire has carved out its own place in pop culture.

 

[Reverend]

Child bounty hunters in Star Wars is not without precedent. Several times in TCW Boba is shown to be very much continuing the family business. Granted this seem to be mostly facilitated (at least at first) by a retinue of his late father's friends/colleagues/people willing to use him.

I can easily see Sabine & Ketsu going a similar path by falling in with an individual or group that taught them the trade. If I had to hazard a guess I'd say it was probably some remnant of Death Watch, maybe even Bo-Katan herself. I mean, Sabine had to get her armor from somewhere and her attitude about weapons and explosives seems to indicates she very much favours the martial traditions of the ancient Mandalorians, rather than the ill fated pacifist state that held sway until just prior to the end of the Clone Wars.

Indeed, going by the 'Padawan Lost' comics, this is pretty much how Kanan got started in the underworld after the Jedi purge. One imagines a lot of war orphans became criminals in the wake of the Clone Wars.

 

[Christopher]

I think the white humans angle is just to be in-line with the whole Nazi analogy--i.e. the Vader/TIE pilots' helmets, the SS-like uniforms, etc. I'm sure George's initial intention was to make the an obvious visual cue that the Empire is authoritarian and nationalistic, if not altogether fascist, and, of course, totalitarian.

Maybe, but it didn't really come across in the original trilogy, where Lando was apparently the only human in the galaxy who wasn't white. I like the diversity of the modern productions much better. Not only is a preferable portrayal of the human race (even a fantasy extragalactic version), but it adds another layer to the Empire's evil. I mean, humans being racist against aliens is one thing -- but in a galaxy with thousands of enormously diverse alien species, for one group of humans to exclude other members of their own species just because they have different complexions or eye shapes is staggeringly narrow-minded, petty, and hateful. It's a whole extra dimension of bigoted stupidity. (I wonder, is there any racial discrimination among Twi'leks on the basis of the 11 different skin colors that Wookieepedia lists?)

 

[sojourner]

Then again, we are getting a black storm trooper in the new movie.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

The Rebel X-wing pilot who shouted "She's gonna blow!" in ROTJ (Grizz Frix, so easy to Google) was a black human.

 

[Ithekro]

One thing I wonder about is Sabine in the Imperial Academy, then a bounty hunter, now a rebel. She's probably 17 at this point in the series. Ezra was infiltrating the Academy on Lothal at about age 14. Sabine's been with the Rebels for at least a year I would gather, and had to have had time to be a bounty hunter for a year to even try to gain a reputation (though I guess she might not have had much of a reputation if no one spots her as a bounty hunter of note right off the bat). Did she start at the Academy at age 12? Or do they start them on Mandalore early normally like with the Clone Troopers seeming to take up training at the visual age of 10. If Sabine started at the Academy at age 10 then went bounty hunter by say 13, four years is a long time ago for a 17 year old.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

Anakin had been a pilot all his life when Padmé met him.

 

[Reverend]

I'm pretty sure the clones were trained from a lot younger than what we saw in AotC. It's a fair bet they were even being conditioned in-vitro and I doubt there was a single aspect of their regimented upbringing that wasn't specifically designed to prepare them to be soldiers.

As for Sabine, it really depends on her background. If she was a war orphan or something and a ward of the state, then I can see her being indoctrinated at a *very* young age. Think 5-8 years old. On the other hand it really could be at any point up until she was about Ezra's age. When you're that young, even a year is a long damn time.

Small aside for what it's worth: over here military cadets can be as young as 12 IIRC, so there's that.

 

[CorporalClegg]

As to the apparent proliferation of bounty hunters in the Star Wars universe, I think it's more a matter of what "bounty hunter" actually encompasses in Star Wars parlance. I think it's just an end-all title for jacks-of-all-nefarious-trade.

It isn't just a matter of catching convicts and bail jumpers. (Although, I suspect the Imps pay them to do that too.)

They're mercenaries. They do assassinations. They're debt "collectors." I'm sure some probably do private security for Hutts. They're probably often hired to track down "missing" people. And, in a "world" where all the territory is divided between a might makes right government and unabated organized crime, there's probably a really big market for all that stuff--and career opportunity for anyone skilled with a blaster and thermal detonators.

 

[Hartzilla2007]

Then again, we are getting a black storm trooper in the new movie.

Not to mention Ezra's friend aka this guy

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Zare_Leonis

 

[Christopher]

And, in a "world" where all the territory is divided between a might makes right government and unabated organized crime, there's probably a really big market for all that stuff--and career opportunity for anyone skilled with a blaster and thermal detonators.

Sure, except there are just as many bounty hunters in the prequel era, when the Republic was still standing.

 

[Skywalker]

The Republic was also pretty weak by that point. And it didn't control the whole galaxy.

 

[Reverend]

I don't think we had anywhere near a clear census that would allow us to say whether bounty hunters were more or less ubiquitous in the Empire compared to the Old Republic.

That said, I think it a fair presumption that with the Empire under what seems like permanent martial law, most bounty hunting/mercenary activities would have been pushed out of the core worlds and on Corusant, restricted to the deep level slums where even the Empire probably still didn't fully control.

Also, as we saw with Hondo, it's not unreasonable propose that a lot of small criminal gangs that got much bigger and much richer through war profiteering (to say nothing a very distracted Jedi order) found the good times come to an abrupt end as soon as all the droid armies were switched off and the clones suddenly didn't have so much to do.

So basically, on balance there's probably just as many bounty hunters, smugglers and pirates as there ever was. It's just that things probably shifted even more to the outer rim than ever before.

 

[davejames]

Yeah this latest episode was easily my favorite since the season premiere. We got some more backstory on Sabine, a new bounty hunter with a really cool ship (and one of the original concept designs for Boba Fett's helmet), the fun of seeing a Gonk Droid play an important role in a story, and Chopper being used in the best and funniest way yet and completely cracking me up with his antics out in space.

 

[sojourner]

I thought her ship was a lazy bit of design. A Y-wing cockpit and engines stuck on a saucer. meh.

 

[Nociod]

Anyone else felt bad for that droid captain?

It makes me uneasy how people treat droids in the Star Wars universe.

 

[CorporalClegg]

It makes me uneasy how people treat droids in the Star Wars universe.

That's sort of the point.