Full Series Should Barriss Return in Rebels?

Again, there's no evidence that Barriss is a darksider. From her perspective, it's the Order that turned away from the light. We must be careful not to define "evil" as "anyone who disagrees with our interpretation of things". Barriss simply had a different interpretation of where light and dark were located in the last days of the Clone Wars than the Order did. Considering how events unfolded in the months afterwards, can we really say with any confidence that her interpretation was any worse than theirs?

 

Deeds, more than ideas?

I think it's been pointed out somewhere that Barriss's deeds were pretty reprehensible.

 

That's very arguable. The Jedi Temple she bombed was - bottom line - a military base in use during a war. The people blown up in it were - bottom line - soldiers of one form or another (yes, support personnel for a military base do count, even if they're technically civilians). The people she let take the fall for what she did were either willing accomplices (Letta) or wartime soldiers (Ahsoka). All of which makes them perfectly legitimate targets.

The point there is that what Barriss did is at very least far enough into a grey area that it isn't any more grey than what everybody else - including the Jedi Council - had been doing during that war. Remember: who may be a freedom fighter, who may be a soldier, and who may be a terrorist depends greatly on who you're asking and what their point of view is. Is Barriss any less of a soldier or freedom fighter that Lux, Saw, and Steela? Are they any less terrorists than Barriss is? Why? Because Tom Kane put on his Ted Baxter voice and told you that the people that L, S, and S were fighting were EVIL SEPARATISTS? Arguably, starting firefights - even with droids - on the streets of a crowded city does far more to endanger innocent civilians than putting a bomb in a military base, which is what Barriss did.

The wisdom about points of view that Obi-Wan passed on to Luke on Degobah was hard-earned wisdom, gained at the cost of a lot of pain.

 

Yes... ​

But only with a brain-worm/medical explanation for the bantha-poodoo that was the end of TCW.​

​

 

Yeah, they couldn't throw us a bone with the brain-worm?

Seriously, I would have bought it immediately and that would have been the end of it. I wouldn't have been terribly happy about it, but I would have kept my mouth shut. Any bitching I had done prior to the brain-worm reveal would have been retracted and crow would have been eaten.

 

Ditto.

~~Not saying I'm all keen on teh worm thing, but anything along those lines would have been better than:
"Barriss framed Ahsoka.. Just because."

 

It's like:

Why?
Brain-worm.
Oh. It was a brain-worm?
Yeah. Brain-worm.
Oh. Okay.

I mean, it's something. It's believable. She still had teh brain-worm, that explains that. Chalk it up.

It's an easy and convenient explanation for anyone who cares about continuity, or the actual character.

But that's not TCW's style. "That's how some things go on The Clone Wars."

 

I care.

 

Blaming everything on brain worms would be the biggest and lamest cop-out ever. It would take every ounce of dramatic impact away from this storyline, and leave it having no actual meaning whatsoever. It would drain all the moral complexity, thoughtfulness, and pathos away from this story. And all just to maintain the "continuity" of the EU, which never had any continuity to begin with.

 

Yeah, it would be a huge cop out, but a desirable one in the face of what is otherwise inexplicable.

 

What needs to be explicated? The Jedi have lost their way and made a lot of poor decisions since Geonosis. The strain of this finally made somebody snap. It's no wonder that it was someone who started off as an idealist and a true believer. That's usually who does snap in these situations.

There's a strong parallel between the fact that it was Dogma who finally snapped and shot Krell and the fact that it was Barriss who finally snapped and bombed the Jedi Temple.

 

What's inexplicable is the gap between the idea that the Jedi are flawed and the idea that Jedi are teh evilz that need to be terror bombed by one of their own. What's inexplicable is Barriss' ridiculous reasoning. What's inexplicable is that TCW decided it was Barriss who would be the one to bomb the Temple, despite no foreshadowing.

Actually, never mind. This can all be easily explained. It's simple, this is what happens when you set out to create a story by starting with an absurdly biased proposition and a desire to make it happen regardless of the obstacles. They started with the end of the story and worked backward, not caring what it took to get there. It's no surprise that it resulted in such bad storytelling. I would say shockingly bad, but this is to be expected from TCW, which began with an equally poor proposition.

 

Dramatic impact? There was none to begin with. Everyone watching the show knew that she had to leave the Jedi Order or die. Complexity? Thoughtfulness? Where was all that when they butchered Barriss' character? Its upsetting to me that the Council writer's didn't fully appreciate her talents back story.... Especially, the one they gave her. Talk about lame cop-outs? Her trial-rant was such a farce that I couldn't buy a word she said.

Simply put:
TCW used sacrificed Barriss to rid the Saga Prequels of Skywalker's disposable Padawan.
Smelled lazy then, smells even worse now. /End Rant.


PS. Where's eggnog and the Tylenol?

 

I'm not sure what to think of Barriss. I've always found her annoying and boring as hell.

But her bertayal of the OJO always made me wonder... In ROTS, Anakin is torn and he tells Padmé, that he is sometimes wondering what's happening to the Jedi order, because war seems to destroy their principles. He feels things are not as they used to be. I can't believe he is the only one. Especially, when that other one/those other ones is/are far from the Jedi High Council and have little insight in mportant decisions and "only" carry out orders given to them. Barriss, being a jedi who is not on the Jedi Council could possibly start having doubts too, just like Anakin. High ranking military officers like Tarkin started to take a distance from the Jedi, the voice of the public demonstrations was getting louder and louder... Maybe all these things slowly added up in her soul to a point where there was no return from.

We were told in earlier seasons that she allegedly has a brilliant mind, so coming up with a terrorist act like that would not be hard for her. The only thing questionable for me is Ahsoka. Why did she frame her? There was no sign of hate developing between them. Maybe envy. Maybe she thought Ahsoka - having a close connection to Anakin, Obi-Wan and through them directly to the Council - was turning away from the light side of the Force too and did what she thought was needed to be done.

Upon capturing, I'm pretty sure she got executed, so I have no reason to believe she's going to appear in Rebels.

Then again, stranger things have happened too.

 

I've read that. But that makes the whole arc less believeable.

 

Shame that Lux was such a softie...

it would have crushed Tano if he was the one to betray her.

 

anakinfansince1983: Deleted the last arc this weekend. Wasn't sad to see it go.

 

Huh? I think you misunderstood me. I meant the dramatic impact of Barriss's actions, not Ahsoka's.

Sorry, I don't see the "butchering". Then again, I knew that Lucasfilm never took the EU seriously, so I didn't take it seriously either.

I thought it was by far the best monologue in TCW, and maybe the best one in Star Wars since Yoda explained the Force to Luke in ESB. She laid out for the Jedi Order what a dysfunctional organization they'd become and how much they'd lost their way. And not only that, she was right. It was their very last chance to listen - to take what she said as occasion to start doing some serious reflection on their own actions. They didn't - and we all know what happened next.

Even if what you say is true, then they sacrificed a minor background character to wrap up the story of a major character. In the end, in TCW (and in the Star Wars universe in general), Ahsoka is a major character, and Barriss isn't. End of story. That you may like Barriss and hate Ahsoka doesn't change that fact.

As I've said before, I understand that there's this weird unique thing with Star Wars fandom where minor characters can develop a huge, passionate following among fans. Boba Fett was the first example of that. Barriss is another. And that's fine - all fandoms have their own quirks. I just don't see any need to share in it.

 

Maybe Cad Bane or Aurra Sing or some such person busts her out of jail for some reason best known unto themselves.

 

Gonna agree with this, and as i've said before, I don't even like Barriss so i'm not a fanboy raging over her. However, that doesn't excuse terrible writing. Any meaning the final arc could've had was ruined by derailing Barriss character to fit the antagonist mold needed for it. The entire time Barriss is ranting i'm just thinking in my head "This is a writer taking a character and turning her into a mouthpiece for his/her own ideas, and not caring at all about whether or not the character being the one to say this and do these things makes any sense." SMH, terrible.