TCW Episode The Clone Wars - 5.19 - To Catch a Jedi - discussion thread

what if barriss IS letta!!! omgggg... yes, I'm joking, but you never know... Obi wan somehow turned into Rako Hardeen

I'm beginning to think Luminara Unduli is the mastermind behind everything. And canon goes Kablooey.

I've toyed with that concept myself. For an arc that seems more an more to heavily involve Barriss, Luminara seems suspiciously absent, even from council meetings. I understand she's got a cameo in Ep III for all of a few seconds, but still...we in IT never say 'never'.

The plan may not entirely of Barriss' own creation. Going by everything in The Jedi Who Knew Too Much up to Ahsoka parting ways with Barriss, it's probable that she is not acting alone or completely free of duress.



Why bother asking Ahsoka anything about her beliefs on attachments and emotions if she has already hatched a plan to frame her? Barriss seems to be very interested in what Ahsoka has to say on the matter. Similarly, her sadness at the death of her old friend in the bombing appears to be very much genuine. She might even be having regrets about embarking on the scheme, and if it was simply a plan of her own making, then there would be little stopping her from ending it right there. There would still be the loose end of Letta to tie up (by killing her) and that would be the end of it. She doesn't even need to put another Jedi in the same room as Letta if she doesn't intend to frame someone.

However, her subsequent actions seem to indicate more going on than simple arse-covering. Going out of her way to frame her friend Ahsoka as opposed to just any Jedi? Telling Letta to contact Ahsoka and so drawing Ahsoka into the snare? Again, a simple Force choke of Letta while she's alone would at most force the Republic and Jedi to be on the lookout for a morally dubious Force user, and possibly just prompt them to write Letta's death off as a mysterious accident resulting from an undiagnosed health condition ("She lost the will to live!")

Barriss' facial expression when Ahsoka runs off to the war room is revealing. In that one moment of Barriss opening up on her own, she's clearly feeling depressive emotions - closer to remorse and sadness than to sadistic grimness. At the very most, she's a reluctant evildoer.

Ahsoka's line about the Jedi traitor potentially being one of Dooku's new apprentices didn't need to be there. From her perspective, how does she know that other Force-sensitives don't use the Force choke? An unaligned, independent Jedi traitor could theoretically do this as well if they've been studying some unorthodox techniques. It wasn't needed for her to say this in order to draw Ventress into her proposal, since Ventress has largely wiped her hands of the Sith Order. This seemed like another of the script's obvious clues to the audience.

Barriss being under someone else's thumb would explain all the seemingly non-watertight steps taken. She isn't enthusiastic about framing Ahsoka for Letta's death. She could be ordered to do this by her puppetmaster, with this already in the works before the funeral, thus explaining her guilt and remorse. The puppetmaster then orders her to kill/frame (?) Ahsoka, which she complies with by sending her to a mutually known location at the Level 1315 weapons cache. Barriss is similarly unenthusiastic about this, so when she comes across Ventress, she decides to incapacitate her and grab her helmet and lightsabres. This is so that she can frame Ventress in Ahsoka's mind, not necessarily the Republic's. She avoids having to deal with Ahsoka discovering her treachery by getting her to pin the blame all on Ventress. In the ensuing duel, she tries to get the environment to do most of the work for her.

Unless it's intended to decisively frame Ahsoka, the explosion might not be a planned event. After the assailant knocks Ahsoka through the fragile floor, she looks down at her before lifting her sight to the incoming clones, upon whose entry she flees. It could be the case that the assailant was intending to kill Ahsoka but decided to escape instead. Again, she might not be entirely enthusiastic about the ambush if she lets her quarry live. This might be a mistake, and she might subsequently be hoping for the best that Ahsoka doesn't mention the name of a certain Jedi she contacted while on the run.

Yes, I think Letta faking her death would be an interesting development. Filoni might have been trolling the fans with that "you probably already know this" spiel. However, I can easily see why Barriss would do the things this mystery Jedi traitor does. It's far from indecipherable.

Unless her rank is mentioned in the final episode ("Padawan Barriss Offee, it was you! "), I think Luminara's absence could be taken as a sign that Barriss has already been knighted.

@QuangoFett

There's little I can say beyond, I disagree, at least in this point in time. A lot of assumptions have to be made, including the idea that she's under someone's thumb? Whose? What do they have to threaten her with? Why target Ahsoka? Most Jedi would sacrifice their lives in the line of duty, why is Barriss racking up the body count and doing something as gruesome as blowing someone up to save her own? Is Luminara captured and having her life threatened? The Jedi and her troops aren't aware that she's missing? etc.

So Barriss is going to get caught like Letta and just pass the buck up the chain further? "I had no choice, I was forced to do it by __________, because of ___________?"

Could you be right? Sure. But I think that would be a lucky guess in the same way that I'm impressed that so many jumped to the conclusion that Barriss was guilty just when she looks down and away during a single conversation.

The explanation that she's still infected with a Brain Worm has equal potential to explain everything, but I'm not yet prepared to accept that either, given no hint at that being the case yet.

Regardless, the Jedi are not cold and unfeeling, and neither is Luminara based on "Weapons Factory". I mentioned her reaction in the old episodes thread.

I'm not sure why people think the PT Jedi are emotionless, or aspire to be, since:

1)That's impossible. They're all emotional beings. Obviously Jedi philosophy would have to accept and incorporate this.
2) The Jedi express emotions throughout the PT, including joy, love, pain, anger, fear and even hate. None of them are expelled. I'm not sure how people miss this. Please don't make me go through the PT and show these expressions of emotions, I shouldn't have to, everyone should already be aware of them. Obi-Wan cries twice in the PT. Yoda basically cries. They clearly say they feel "joy", "love" and "fear".
3) Compassion is central to a Jedi's life.

How does one control emotions? By repressing them? By ignoring them? Even I know that doesn't work, that won't make them go away, and I'm emotionally stunted. I highly doubt the Jedi are so ignorant that they don't know something so simple. Again, Yoda doesn't seem to repress or ignore his emotions at all, he expresses them quite often. So does Obi-Wan, not as freely as Yoda, but to an extent.

There is more than scolding and "that's that".

In AOTC, when Anakin is obviously crushing on Padme, Obi-Wan says to Anakin, "Be mindful of your thoughts, Anakin, they betray you. You've made a commitment to the Jedi Order...a commitment not easily broken."

He doesn't even mention Anakin's obvious feelings. It's obvious Obi-Wan recognized Anakin's feelings, because he kinda gives him a little grin and a head shake, as if to say "ah, puppy love". It's not the most compassionate response, but he does tell Anakin to be mindful of his thoughts, and tells him why. Those thoughts would take him down the wrong path, because Anakin has a responsibility that doesn't allow him to pursue Padme. So it's better to recognize that and focus on the Jedi path. He doesn't just scream BAN THOSE FEELINGS NOW.

Then there's this:

Obi-Wan acknowledges Anakin's feelings, he doesn't scream NO FEELINGS. NO FEELINGS!

He asks him to come to his senses, to put duty ahead of his feelings, and even gives him a very logical reason why.

The threat of expulsion was a bit much, but hey, that's what should happen when you put your own feelings over your professional duty. No different than any other important job, really. But I doubt he would have been expelled anyway. It seems more like Obi-Wan trying to get Anakin's attention by threatening to take away his life as a Jedi.

Here's another commonly cited quote, I'll put my thoughts in bold.

The disappointing thing here is how Yoda doesn't seem to realize that this isn't going to work for Anakin. It's never worked for him. Anakin has been training for well over a decade now, Yoda should know by now what kind of person Anakin is and what his needs are. He should have tailored his response to suit Anakin, not deliver the same thing he'd tell other students who haven't been through Anakin's unique circumstances. Yoda's words probably work on Jedi who grew up in the Temple, so that's why he falls back on them. To Anakin, it just comes off as platitudes. Anakin is crying out for help and he doesn't get the help he needs. It's one of Yoda's worst moments, but I don't really blame him, because I'm not sure what Yoda was supposed to say or do. Is he supposed to give Anakin a hug and say "there, there" ? "Always in motion is the future" might have helped (as in, there's a possibility Anakin's vision simply won't come true), but at least Yoda remembers to tell Luke this. It seems that Anakin wasn't willing to settle for anything less than the power to save Padme, which is a ridiculous notion (imo) and about as far off the Jedi path one can get.


That said, Yoda doesn't scold him, he doesn't BAN emotions and it's not "that's that".

Incrimination. She might believe everything that Letta claims her Jedi contact believes: that the Jedi are corrupted, having become soldiers rather than peacekeepers. Good intentions get taken to extremes and she ends up signing a Faustian pact with someone like Dooku, who also has strong views and originally benign intentions regarding the role of the Jedi. She gets in too deep and the threat of Dooku revealing her pact with him looms over her, and it's not much skin off his back in that situation.

Anakin. Sidious would target Ahsoka to make him more susceptible to his influences, while Dooku would target Ahsoka to throw him off his game.

The bomb plot might not even be her own. She could be as much of a dupe as Letta, with Barriss being the intermediary between a superior and the pawn, Letta. She goes along with it for her political reasons, and could rationalise it as not much different to the Jedi and Republic ruthlessness towards Separatists. Republic military targets (including Jedi working with GAR gunships) would seem like valid targets.

There's no getting around the gruesomeness of the act and the traitor going along with the deception of Jackar, but it can be justified from the perspective of someone who has the interests of the "greater good" in mind.

Possibly. However, being the top of the scheme's hierarchy within the Republic and notably being a Jedi, even her being in league with a superior would be considered very serious. It would be damning against the Jedi in the public perception.

That lucky guess did turn out to be right, though. If the guilty look she had was of relevance, then other things in that conversation between her and Ahsoka - notably, her actual words, the topics she draws attention to, her mannerisms, her facial expressions and the emotions they convey - could easily be of relevance. They indicate that something might be going on beyond Barriss' criminal behaviour.

That would be like the third episode of Stargate: SG-1, when one of the airmen previously infected with a Goa'uld parasite still has its head attached to his brain stem, causing him to turn traitor. Another homage, then.

Of all the possible explanations for why Barriss does what she does, her being under some degree of duress makes more sense than her insanity or posession. The closest look we've had at Barriss in the arc so far provides plenty of hints at this, far more than there is to support either of those two explanations. They could be misinterpreted, but IMO it's unlikely that they have no relevance at all.

I was hoping for this myself, but I watched Brain Invaders, at the end the worm is lying on the floor of the bridge, cut in half at the middle, with both ends intact.

I was looking for a single severed piece, which would mean that the other half would still be inside Barriss, but that wasn't the case.

I'm sure they weren't thinking ahead to Season 5 at the time. If they really wanted to go that route though, they could just BS something like that the worm laid additional eggs or something.

Those nanodroids - what would have been the trigger? Letta would have wanted Jakar to explode only while at the Temple - I suppose a timer could have been incorporated if he had a certain work schedule he never deviated from...

If we can have Ziro/Snootles we can have an Abyssin/Human relationship. That said, our one example didn't turn out too well...

In fact, both of those relationships I think could safely be deemed as failures.

You know that an arc is doing something very well if Dan Grievous comes up and says: I LOVE ANAKIN in this arc!

Aaawwww... I really wanted to see an Abyssin in the show.

The whole idea was to make sure Ahsoka took the fall for everything. She broke Ahsoka out of the cell in the military compound to ensure that Ahsoka would look guilty - dead Clone Troopers and a suspect who fits the bill and is trying to escape. I suspect that She didn't expect for Ahsoka to make it very far before she was apprehended again. Yet, Ahsoka proved more resourceful than expected and escaped to the underworld. This altered her plan but actually became an opportunity for her to pin the bombing on Ahsoka with stronger evidence.

When she attacked Ahsoka at the warehouse - her goal was not to kill her - it was always to set her up. Fighting her there provided an opportunity to incapacitate her so that she could be apprehended again and finally brought to trial. She sent her to the warehouse to make sure that when she was found by the authorities, she would be surrounded by the bombs used in the temple blast. It was all designed to make Ahsoka look more guilty before she was finally captured again. What's the point in framing someone if they escape forever and never take the fall?

I suspect taking Asajj's "identity" during the fight was never meant to necessarily implicate Asajj in the totality of the plan - it was merely an easy way from the attacker to conceal her true identity and give Ahsoka something to be distracted about during the fight - after all, the two of them had just made a deal, Ahsoka would be taken aback by the apparent recanting of their deal.

The attacker's ultimate goal was to Frame Ahsoka (a Jedi) and have her take the fall. I'm guessing her motivations have to do with wanting to teach the Republic something about JEdi - maybe that they're not all alike, maybe that they have become war-mongers, whatever...but her ultimate goal still jives with everything that she's done so far.

The question is why? Why make Ahsoka look guilty? If she's guilty she's just going to be executed. Why not just kill her? Instead Barriss is creating a situation that she is likely to be dragged into by keeping Ahsoka alive and liable to mention that Barriss helped her. And again, dragging Asajj into it is self-defeating if Barriss wants to frame Ahsoka. It's not the brightest plan.

Plot armour. Ahsoka can't die and the attacker has to be found out at the end of the arc (they've obviously decided that), so instead of writing a way for Ahsoka to get out of this situation and outsmart Barriss, they've made Barriss into a complete moron.

That's kind of how I suspect this is going to play out. Ahsoka's going to go to trial, she's going to mention that Barriss gave her the tip on the factory. Barriss is going to be asked if this is true, Barriss is going to say no. That's going to be the big red flag to Ahsoka that she's been betrayed and accuse Barriss. Nobody is going to believe it except Anakin who pays Barriss a visit and solves everything, all because Barriss leaves Ahsoka alive and liable to drag her into it.

@TaradosGon I also thought it was odd that the person we're assuming is Barriss didn't just kill Ventress. It didn't bother me so much that she defeated her because she threw a huge object at her head with the Force from behind, it's not like it was a clean fight. Still, I didn't see any point in keeping her alive.

@Fives_Says_No_To_Sixes I was going back-and-forth on why Ahsoka was allowed to escape, especially if the plot winds up being as simple as it now seems it might be. If Barriss wanted to make the Jedi as a whole look really bad but not necessarily get her friend Ahsoka caught up in it, I don't see why it was set up for Letta to call her in and make it look like she killed Letta. It's hard to piece together. But your idea on how Barriss letting Ahsoka escape makes her look more guilty fits better than anything I've come up with.

[3PO]I'm so confused.[/3PO]

With all the depths Barriss has sunk to, I wonder if she'd actually kill herself if she thought that would make Ahsoka look more guilty.

So she choked herself to death and survived?

That's the one thing about this arc that's blatantly obvious. Other than making up **** as they go, I have no idea what the hell they're doing.

As far as Letta, I think it's possible to fake choking and death if Obi-Wan was able to take something that simulates a shut- down of his vitals so he could fake his own death. I'm hoping for something like that, as opposed to inexplicable out-of-character bull**** and a "that's just how TCW is" cackle from Filoni.

Sabotage:
After the bombing Letta Turmond shows herself to Anakin, "searching" for Jacear. Bariss passing by and looking into the room, if Letta doing as she ordered. Letta says her husband is innocent, that is correct. She does never say that she is innocent herself. She just wants Anakin to find Jacear. Demanding it and putting pressure on Anakin. It works. They find him. They find also the nanodroids and the Droids in his hand did not explode, like the rest...i dont think that was casually.

Letta wanted the Nano droids to be found. Bariss ordered her. Maybe even mind tricked her. When Anakin and Ahsoka arrive, there are boxes which look like the boxes in the warehouse. There are still Nanodroids and "CLEVER" Ahsoka and Anakin did not even ask themselfs why Letta did not throw away the only thing which shows her guilt...

Its clear that Letta wants to be captured. Thats obvious.

The Jedi who knew too much:
Bariss showing herself at the funeral. Showing anyone her sadness. Than she joins Anakin and Tarkin, listens carefully what they know or not. Ahsoka than talks harshly about the bomber. Bariss than decides to frame Ahsoka.

Letta calls Ahsoka in, just to be killed. It seems she get used with a mindtrick. Than dies by Bariss´s Force Choking. Tarkin must know this. maybe Bariss and Tarkin has an agreement. Both have the same goal. pulling out Jedi from the war. They did a conspiracy.
Bariss was planing the whole time to pull Ahsoka also in this game. But maybe she was not sure if Ahsoka would join or not. She asks if Ahsoka ever wondered about Emotions. Ahsoka clearly denies this and offers revenge against the bomber. Bariss decides that it is better to get rid of Ahsoka before she reveals her. I dont think Offee ever planed a self sacrifice. She just wanted the Jedi out of the war and live on with embracing her emotions.

How to catch a Jedi:
Bariss understands that Ahsoka managed to escape, she sounds upset that Ahsoka maybe could come behind her conspiracy. She decides to put a trap for the Togruta at that Warehouse. The nanodroids are ready to explode.

Unfortunately for Bariss, Ventress comes also with Ahsoka and Offee understands that she will have an eye vitness, even if she kills Ahsoka. So she decides to change her plan and knocks out ventress, stealing her mask and fight ahsoka by causing minor explosions at that warehouse. Than she kicks Ahsoka down right into the nanodoid boxes while the Clones arive.

Bariss does not give a damn about Ahsoka. She just cares for her own skin, thats becoming clear. She searched for somebody to blame. Because the Jedi would knew that it was an inside job and Bariss planned from the very beginning to set up a dumby inside of the order. Ahsoka was that dumby. Bariss knew how spunky and wild Ahsoka was and that she would go in her traps so easily..i mean taking that keycard from the ground was dumb, but passing the knocked out clones and thinking that somebody would "help" her to escape (LOL) is even dumber.

The wrong Jedi:
Propably Bariss will laugh about the naivity of the Jedi. I dont think she will be executed. Bail Organa, Mon Mothma, Chuchi will be against it. Also Sidious and Tarkin will be against it. Killing Ahsoka would be fun for them, killing Bariss is not necessary. A better "servant" inside of the order they could not find.