A/V STAR WARS REBELS (show's over, spoilers allowed)

To be fair, it's not as if Lucas was particularly forward-thinking about that "first victory" line, especially when he started introducing the origins of the Rebellion into ROTS. I'd much rather see early rebellion battles than stick absolutely to a single line (not that there's literally or technically a contradiction anyway). But Rebels has clearly been working to keep continuity with it, just as Clone Wars did about Anakin and Grievous meeting (more short-sightedness by Lucas to establish two central characters can't interact during a three-year war), without sacrificing the action.

Sure, so Kanan's not technically a Jedi anyway, is a relic of that religion, and is dead before the Death Star gets operational. Works out fine. It's not like he'd take the loss of his Star Destroyer as "the Jedi are back in full force!" It was an outlier Vader was sent to deal with, in the same way Jedha was one of the last examples of the Jedi religion, and it was dealt with as well.

 

Mixed feelings on Rebels in general. In retrospect, I felt that Rebels should have done what Rogue One did in using faithful adherents like Chirrut instead of full blown Jedi. But they need lightsaber as a big selling point so yeah understandable. I'm in the camp that the series could have focused more on the Rebellion rather than Force-related stuff/lore even though I usually prefer Force stories over mundane stories. It just felt more fitting for a show named Rebels. In the end, I feel that Rogue One did the Rebels vs. Imperials angle better. But Rebels did have some great moments in its story. It's just that I prefer Rogue One's direction. And the animation and sound in Rebels especially S4 are amazing regardless of the story. Despite my misgivings, it is still quite a ride. And it brought a new generation of fans.

Still I have to complain about the final 3 episodes themselves:

Spoiler

1. Felt that the firefights dragged too long like the Mandalore episodes.
2. I felt that calling Purgills into battle opened up even more can of worms than lightspeed kamikaze. After all, you only need to tune to the correct frequency and doesn't even need to sacrifice a ship. Heck, just send a beacon transmitting the frequency and your enemies will be ravaged by nigh unstoppable Space Whales' tentacles! But whatever...
3. Ahsoka...

 

Staff and all.

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It's amazing how much restraint the 90s had, ironically. Keyan Farlander, Kyle Katarn, Rookie One--the Rebels of the old EU started out as regular Rebels. It was only later on after ROTJ that Kyle Katarn and Keyan became Jedi.

Here on Rebels, we had it backwards--start with Jedi and then get them out of the way before ANH starts. It seems awkward.

 

So it was presumably an intentional reference, same as calling the previous episode "A Fool's Hope".

 

Dave really needs to remember he's writing Star Wars and not Lord of the Rings.

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Lucas needs to remember he's not writing Flash Gordon, or Seven Samurai, or the Dambusters, or

 

I'm shocked that no one has mentioned the possibility of Ezra and Thrawn spending the OT fighting the Yuuzhan Vong. I mean, CW tried to canonize them...

 

Lucas isn't writing anything.

 

Am I the only one laughing at yet ANOTHER story group rationalization?

 

Spoiler

Ultimately, my response to this whole ending is underwhelming. The elimination of Kanan is something which I felt was dark but beautiful in its own way. However, the resurrection of Ahsoka is so ridiculously cheap you might as well have had it performed by a Lazarus Pit working with Superboy punching time.

Getting rid of Ezra and Kanan while also letting Ahsoka have apparently been a Jedi the entire time makes no sense to me from either a continuity preservation standpoint or a storytelling one. I will say, though, I'd like to see some Luke and Ahsoka team-ups but I don't know if I'm ever going to see that given the current system.

I'm glad Thrawn is alive but I also note I don't think we're going to be able to fit The Thrawn Trilogy into continuity--we COULD but I doubt we are going to.
Still, I don't know I feel about the ending to Rebels as it just didn't feel like a proper send off to our heroes. It felt more like ticking boxes versus giving an emotionally satisfying payoff for the characters involved. Ezra is literally ripped off the playing field and we time skip a massive portion of the story.

I do approve of Twilek/human hybrids, though.

 

Spoiler

Kenobi: You will go to the Malachor system. There you will learn from Ahsoka, the woman trained by your father. I'd suggest Yoda, but considering he's literally a year away from death, I think Ahsoka might be more useful.

Luke: Gee, thanks Ben!

 

Spoiler

Does it really need to be said again that Ahsoka is not a Jedi?

 

It’s amazing to me how many people post thoughts similar to my head canon


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Does everything that a Jedi does, just doesn't call herself a Jedi

Spoiler

Personally I am fine with (notajedi) Ahsoka surviving after ROTJ, only because some of my very favourite SW characters from Legends are prequel era Jedi that survived after ROTJ too.

 

Filoni forcing (no pun intended) the Gandalf analogy on Ahsoka is just cringe as hell. When I think of Gandalf I think of Ben Kenobi, Yoda, and Luke in ST, definitely NOT Ahsoka. Stop trying to prop up your already propped up pet character and pretending to be not heavily biased already. Sheesh!

 

Spoiler

Yoda: sent him to Ahsoka you did? Find out about his father and run off now he will!
Ben: Oh right, we were supposed to lie to him about that and Ahsoka's not in on it.
Yoda: yeeeeees. What now will I do here? Go crazy I will.
Ben: I'll just send that Ezra kid to you. He seems pretty powerful, he could control wolves and giant hyperspace whales. Heck he's already survived Maul and Vader.

 

Think my initial thought as the credits rolled, was: “It was so... inartistically done.”


Thoughts below are more about the series as a whole, not the finale specifically. It's a bit long for me, and I apologize in advance if it gets ramble-y

Spoiler

Having watched the show, from premier to finale, I feel that I can say this with at least some degree of certainty:

I don’t think Star Wars: Rebels is a “good” show.

I do want to emphasize this though, that is not to say it’s “bad” or “the worst thing ever.” There are positive aspects/merits that I can get behind. On paper, the cast of characters is good, and they voice actors are also good, sometimes reaching phenomenal levels (see: Sabine/Kanan sparring in Trials of the Darksaber. Also, I probably will never read any of the old books with Thrawn without hearing Lars Mikkelsen). The general concept (at least at the beginning) was not bad either, ie: a small crew living out day to day lives getting wrapped up into the Rebellion. Or as I called it, “Firefly, but Star Wars.” And that might be why I sort of have a positive view of the first season, despite my issues with it.

Ultimately, where the show failed for me, was in execution. The faults appeared within the first season, namely 1) Imperial characters being inept and 2) an over-reliance on film character cameos. After season one, a third fault appeared, which for the lack of better term I’ll call “identity crisis.”

For me, villains need to be at least one of three things: threatening, entertaining, or compelling. Given the sort of show Rebels was (ie: black and white/good vs evil), I wasn’t expecting too much of the third one. Unfortunately, outside of movie characters - like Tarkin or Vader - and Thrawn, none of the antagonists really did much for me except feel like metaphorical punching bags for our heroes. I also think it’s saying something that (with one exception) the best villain moments were not from the show’s original characters. And part of me thinks that the reason I remember the exception - Pryce killing Kanan - is because it felt like the only time one of the show’s original villains actually did something.

Part of the problem I started having with the number of movie characters that showed up, was how many of them knew about Kanan and Ezra being Jedi/Force sensitive. I know the argument has been done to death (no pun intended), but it was something that kept bothering me. Let’s take Tarkin. While I do view him as arrogant and vain, he wasn’t stupid. Two Jedi blow up his Star Destroyer and he’s going to hunt them down to the ends of the earth, if only for his pride. And while he would tow the party line of “The Jedi are extinct, ergo you did not see a Jedi” to underlings like Tua and Kallus, I have a hard time believing that he would do the same with Vader (in private, nonetheless), who he has a close working relationship with. I just don’t see him saying “The Jedi are extinct. Their fire has gone out of the universe. You, my friend, are all that’s left of their religion.” if he knows/suspects that two of them are running around.

For a second (and third) example, let’s go with Bail Organa and Mon Mothma. In Rogue One, Bail makes says something about getting allies together, and Mothma says, “The Jedi?” to which Bail responds about how “He served me well in the Clone Wars.” obviously referring to Obi-wan, and this is treated as a big deal. Other than it being Obi-wan (and ignoring the Ahsoka factor), why would it be such a big deal if they already had two Jedi running around fighting the Empire? Now, if she had said “A Jedi?” instead, that would have left a little more room for interpretation.

As for what I called the show’s “identity crisis,” I go back to what I originally described the show, “Firefly, but Star Wars,” which it started out as in the first season. By the second season our crew gets caught up in the growing rebellion (not The Rebellion, yet)... and random smatterings of Force mysticism and cleaning up Clone Wars leftovers. The issue I started having was that it never really left the “Firefly” one-off adventures with no real over-arching plot for the most part. By season three I was really starting the feel that the point of the show was to clean up stuff from Clone Wars at the expense of what was going on “now” and of the show’s characters. I would have thought that a show called Star Wars: Rebels would at least focus on, you know, the Rebel Alliance.

Again, it’s kind of why I snarked a little bit about the World Between Worlds episode about Ezra learning to “let go” of the past and “move on” from it. To me, it sort of felt like the writers for this show needed to let go and move on from Clone Wars. (There’s also Ezra’s bit in the finale about Thrawn “taking what others had created without the meaning” which I could also get into... but that’s another story.)

So I suppose in short, I thought the show had potential, but overall squandered. I get that many here do like the show, and I wish I could see it in the same light, but I can’t. Compared to other animated shows I’ve seen like Avatar: The Last Airbender, Fullmetal Alchemist (both versions), and The Legend of Korra, Rebels falls short. Given my thoughts and experiences with Rebels, I have little interest in going through Clone Wars, or the rumored “Star Wars: Resistance” show if the same production team is behind it.

All that said, I don’t really feel like ending this long post of mine on a negative note (lord knows there’s been enough of that recently on these boards). So I will close out with something from the show that I actually liked. Of all the characters and stories in the show, Sabine Wren was my favorite. The only real sort of negative thing I’d say is that I wish her family/Mandalore storyline was longer (okay there’s some specific things in those episodes that bugged me, but that was systemic throughout the show for me).

So yes, if there’s one good thing I can say about Rebels (other than bringing Thrawn back), it’s that I think Sabine’s great.

 

I guess we're back to why Snoke and Kylo aren't Sith. I'm sure if you asked Ahsoka she would tell you many reasons how she's different.

 

I kinda hope Ezra, Sabine and Ahsoka don't appear in canon again. At least not for a good long time. This finale really left a sour taste in my mouth. It was so clumsily done. We didn't even get an explanation as to what Palpatine's plan was.

 

It was to get Ezra to open the portal to the WBW, at least that's what all of Palpatine's dialogue suggested to me.

 

quacks like a duck etc

 

Filoni's comments in Rebels Recon suggest otherwise.

 

What did he say?