Full Series Grade the Episode 1.08: "Empire Day" (Spoilers Allowed)

Ratings scale seem to work for this - current averages below:

Fighter Flight: 6.62
Rise of the Old Masters: 8.73
Breaking Ranks: 7.57
Out of Darkness: 6.78
Empire Day: 9.18

I didn't go back past this bunch, but I think overall it is giving people a decent idea of how this community felt overall about a given episode.

 

10/10 I can't help it. I loved the episode, I really really did.

 

8/10. Definitely the best episode yet, the writing seems to be hitting a stride for the series.

 

Absolutely. Which is why we always encourage everyone to not just take the poll, but engage in an active discussion about the episode.


Rebels has had a certain narrative problem in that the season-long transition between the episodes has more often than not felt a little clunky. But we’re slowly getting more and more characterizations that make our protagonists complex, a welcome development that results in a gem of an episode like this one. Empire Day, which is in reference to a national holiday on Lothal representing the Empire’s fifteenth anniversary, is an episode primarily focused on making Ezra less annoying and a bit more impressionable. Okay, I kid. But the episode is about uncovering Ezra’s past, just as much as it is about our protagonists committing an act of terrorism to disrupt the highly awkward Imperial celebrations. For the first time, the series forays into a multi-episode storyline and this allows for the episode to actually breathe, not worried about wrapping everything up in a couple of minutes. And to top it all off, there wasn’t a single Ezra/Chopper/Zeb comedy moment that made me want to strangle all three characters.

As noted, this episode is a two-parter. The problem with the pacing of this show so far that this episode makes clear is that each story feels rushed by time and then the creators try to take individual plot points and characters into next week to establish a continuity. It’s a good effort, but it feels weak and uninspired. Not this week. There’s a quietness about this hour that works, allowing an organic sense of storytelling to rise. It is intriguing to note that unlike a decent chunk of the expanded Star Wars lore, the Empire isn’t as attuned to misogyny as one would expect in this show. Obviously there’s little effort to make sure that sexism as a whole is rooted out of the system, but both the Minister and Governor of Lothal being women is an intriguing sociopolitical angle for the show to introduce. I hope they get to do more with it later.

Terrorism is always a tricky subject to approach in a delicate and nuanced manner. By its basic definition, terrorism means using fear as a political tactic to advance your goals. Fear itself is a broad enough piece of verbiage that it could range from pure pacifism to the most extreme nature of violence. Within the context of twenty-first century warfare, terrorism has become synonymous with bombings and Islamic jihadists. It’s a narrow frame through which to look at the world yet it is undeniably a pervasive one. For antagonists to commit acts of terror warfare is perfectly acceptable within a fictional narrative. It is easily explainable with as little reasoning as “they are bad people”. For a protagonist to do so is a much, much tricker situation to navigate and I applaud the show for at the very least throwing that out there at the audience. Now, considering this is on Disney XD, I don’t expect them to loudly burst out the word “terrorism” and nor should they have to in order to drive the point home.

The site of their attack is as macabre and ridiculous and one would expect it to be. The minister is so thoroughly Imperial it’s morbidly hilarious but her surroundings are anything but. There is an extremely effective motif of combining the Nazi imagery at parades with the military showcases that have defined and do define autocratic nations. The proud showcasing of the latest super weapon technology, proudly manufactured on Lothal, is evocative of the numerous missiles paraded through the streets of Moscow, Beijing, and Pyongyang just to name a few examples in recent history. The crowd dutifully goes along with the Imperial celebrations, the risk of not doing so simply far too great. It’s a great moment of triumph for the concept of subtlety in a show that needs it. How quickly they’ve grown from fruit farmer harassment to a few nods and hands gestures to instill fear in the local populace. A gorgeous new TIE fighter is proudly put on display, moments before it shatters into smithereens, killing several stormtroopers instantly.

For Ezra, Empire Day is miserable for a primary reason out of the obvious celebration of a tyrannical government. It’s his birthday, a constant reminder of the parents who were taken away from him on account of them actually standing up against the Empire. The sequence where he hears their voices in intense conversation about their beliefs is one of the most harrowing the show’s ever done and it brought me to the verge of tears. Since the age of seven, Ezra has been out in the streets, trying to fend for himself in what was a turbulent, violent, dangerous world. It still doesn’t dissipate the connections to Aladdin, but it does provide Ezra with an additional depth of character and a powerful motivation against the most powerful of enemies. Perhaps even more importantly, it deepens the relationship between the Ghost crew by giving the original gang even more reason to care for their newest recruit. How successful the Ghost crew will be against the Empire remains to be seen, but for now, as they fly off into the night sky in unity albeit being chased by the Inquisitor, I have a feeling that for now at least they’re going to be pretty okay. And that’s a great feeling to have right now.


Great/Not So Great Moments Not Mentioned Above:

+The sequence with Kanan, Ezra, and the Lothal creature was amazing
+The animation of the landscapes is simply stunning
+Music
+The Imperial March being redone as a triumphant score is a nice touch
+Chopper is useless
+The reaction to “did you miss me”?
+The TIE sequence
+The Inquisitor’s entire costume, plus his helmet is rad
+Five-year plan for Lothal and other Outer Rim worlds
+The chilling arc of Seebo lends a promising start to an intriguing character
+The first effective stormtrooper possibly, that whole chase sequence was pretty great
+Ezra in his tattered home really reminded me of Numa, Waxer, and Boil in Innocents of Ryloth (The Clone Wars Season 1). That certainly helped in the emotion department

-To be continued… Really? That wasn’t necessary


Brilliant
9/10

 

I liked the episode, the city of Lothal needs some more paint though to make it look more alive.

Still, i went fanboy as soon as i saw the holo disc!
A replica of the one used in Jedi Knight Dark Forces II, albeit smaller.

 

I'm sorry, but I had to give this another mediocre grade. IMO, these Rebels episodes are really geared towards the Disney audience, lacking the violence and mature themes of its Clone Wars predecessor. Being shown on Cartoon Network, TCW had more liberties; and I'd venture to guess that its TV rating was at least PG; whereas Rebels is TV-Y. But I'm sticking to it anyway. I'm hoping that they pull a rabbit out of their hat and Ahsoka returns as an integral part of the show.

 

The average is 8.7 and that is good.

 

I suck at rating things on a numbered scale. I'll just say that I felt this episode was among the stronger ones, but I still have issues with how the imperials are portrayed. My main problem isn't so much that they're cannon-fodder (I know that's been discussed to death), but rather that they're portrayed as being too cartoonishly villainous. The imperial officers in the films never acted like these guys do. In fact, the imperial officers in the films rarely seemed particularly evil at all, they just seemed like, well, military officers doing their jobs. They weren't constantly sneering, cackling and doing other over-the-top "I'm a villain!" gestures. And what's with some of them looking like Nosferatu with their extremely pale skin? Did the animators think we needed to be hit over the head even harder in order for us to understand that they're the bad guys?

Maybe it's silly to complain about a cartoon being "cartoonish," but I just don't think it's necessary to stoop to that level. But then again, I freely admit that I am NOT the target demographic (wayyyyy to old! haha.)

Anyway, in spite of that, I mostly enjoyed the episode, and I look forward to seeing where they go with part 2.

 

Do we really need a "grade the episode" and a "discuss the episode" in separate threads? Seems unnecessary.

 

We have had this debate already go to the last grading thread to read.

 

Good Post. Glad I wasnt the only one thinking this.

 

Me, I hate the discussion thread. THey all seem more like speculation threads to me.

And they are a wall of spoiler tags. I never know when it is legal to discuss the Episode without the tags so I just skip over them entirely..

 

How can they not be speculation when the episode has not even come out yet.

 

Okay, I'm asking this in the sweetest, nicest, kindest possible way, so please don't take offense:

But for weeks now, I've read you sharing some terrific stuff. Your take on these episodes are almost always fun to read and insightful, but I have to ask: Why do you insist on posting your full reviews here in the 'Grade the Episode' topics (which is supposed to be, you know, limited to a number grade, followed by a quick summary), when your commentary seems so perfectly suited for the 'Episode Discussion' topics?

Okay, end rant. Hope you took it with a smile on your face.



Anyway, "Empire Day" gets my first 10/10 rating.

As I said elsewhere:

- The visuals keep improving.

- The Easter eggs were not only present this time, but bountiful. I mean, honestly, there was something to look at and exclaim "a-ha!" in reach and every scene. This fact alone may have made it my favorite so far (it certainly made it the most fun for me).

- The action sequences were the best yet.

- The Imperials were presented very well. And not only the likes of Kallus and the Inquisitor, this time. Even the Stormtroopers felt like a legit threat to our heroes.

- Not only did we get the answers to some of our burning questions, these answers turned around and presented all-new questions.

- Oh, and to top things off, we got a cliffhanger of an ending.


Terrific stuff, I tells 'ya.

This is what I was waiting for. I cannot wait for next week's offering.

 

Sure, but why spoiler tag everything?

It just ends up as a wall of spoiler tagged speculation about Ahsoka

People spoiler tag the current episode, spoiler tag the info from the previous episodes, spoiler tag the spoiler tags, etc.

Easier for me to just skip it entirely. If you enjoy it more power to you.

 

I understand that and I know your point about everything being spoiler tags about Ashoka.
This is why I wished the episodes would air the same time for everybody.

 

8/10

Very good episode. Cool imagery with Empire Day parade, the Imperial March theme, and it was great to see the TIE Advanced v1 makes an appearance. Imperial causalities still mounted up, but that Speeder Bike trooper almost seemed pretty component to me.

 

That guy was on his way up.

 

No offense taken. I'd rather post my thoughts with the grade once rather than post it in the discussion thread and then do an additional summary here or even post the same thing twice. To be honest, that question hadn't crossed my mind before. I don't mind posting the reviews in the discussion thread and just linking it here.

 

8/10. Best episode yet, by a long shot.

 

There should be a rule that after the day of it's Disney XD release, you are free to discuss spoiler free. If you haven't seen the episode then just don't go to that thread.

 

All users are entitled to rate the episode however high or low they want to. Just because you didn't think the episode was a 10 doesn't mean that other people have to share your opinion.

 

Gave it a 7. It probably was the best one yet, but I feel that isn't saying much..

I did like that this added more to Ezra though. I think people are too hard on him sometimes.