Full Series Ahsoka Tano: Jedi Knight

I'm going to posit something here that might be controversial. My belief is that Ahsoka Tano is a far better Jedi than Anakin. That is not to say that she's more powerful than him. Rather, she understands what it means to be a Jedi more than him. In my view, she was a Jedi Knight from the end of Season Three and onward. (I'm alluding to when she survived and helped others survive during Padawan Lost/Wookie Hunt.)

She was all right in Seasons One and Two, and she was excellent during Seasons Three, Four, and Five. Needless to say, I love this character. Ahsoka learns about how life and war are not always black and white, she becomes a teacher and protector, and overall she is amazing. The reason I say she is a better Jedi than Anakin is due to how she learns how to control her emotions, how to not let attachments corrupt her way of thinking, how to make alliances, how to change her opinions if necessary, and how to discern what compassion and justice are in different situations. I like how she became wise beyond her years without losing some of that youthfulness. She made mistakes and she was not always dealing with the most earth-shattering situations, but I believe she is a good role model for young people. She poses some good existential questions and lessons.

Now, I'm not saying that she's the most amazing or interesting female character in the Expanded Universe. I can understand why people would really like Mara Jade Skywalker, Nomi Sunrider, Meetra Surik, Bastila Shan, Kreia/Traya, Satele Shan, Darth Zannah, Shaak Tii, the Dark Woman, Asajj Ventress, Leia, Lumiya, or Jaina Solo. However, Ahsoka is one of my favorites, and I wanted to see if you agreed with my assessment of her as a Jedi.

For my part, I agree with this article here.http://io9.com/how-clone-wars-ahsoka-tano-made-the-star-wars-franchis-1537984315 I'll always adore Ahsoka. I've met a person like her in real life, and I must say it was inspiring.

 

Anakin was always a "bad Jedi", but he is an awesome warrior!

 

Well it's not hard to be a better Jedi than Anakin. Quite literally everyone was a better Jedi than Anakin.

 

Personally, I think that that, Anakinsfansince1983, is contrary to the point some Jedi like Ahsoka were making. The problem with the Jedi leadership was that they did think and behave in a manner that was too black-and-white or too absolutist regarding some issues. The Jedi had become stagnant and they should have changed and adapted. I like TCW Anakin better than movie Anakin, though I blame this on writing primarily, and I think that Ahsoka, despite being the student, was a good anchor in his life. As I got older, I became more critical of the Old Jedi Order. I certainly wouldn't agree with what Barriss Offee did in response to that. At any rate, I liked the development TCW gave to Ahsoka and other characters like Asajj.

 

It's not hard to be a far better Jedi than Anakin. A lot of Jedi were far better at being Jedi than Anakin. At least, if your definition of what makes a good Jedi is what the Yodaian orthodoxy would put out.

In that regard, he was pretty lousy. Full of himself, jacked up on the order practically fawning over him because of his supposed chosen-one, prophecied status, constant full-on alpha-dog behavior, acting like a jackass frat boy... his entitlement issues, his insecurities, his propensity to sudden rages... yup.

Ahsoka might have been a better Jedi than him, but that doesn't necessarily indicate something special about her. Just that Anakin was in many ways a pretty lousy Jedi, thus being a "better Jedi than him" would be easy enough.

 

Having read your thoughts on it, I personally didn't see Ahsoka being developed as a character to foster ant-Jedi sentiment but rather to further show's Anakin's frustration with the Council. His trust in Ahsoka forced Anakin to face the possibility that the Council was wrong.

I can understand the position, but you have to remember that i09 is basically just a blog in the end. Even with Ahsoka being used to highlight Anakin's frustration with the Order, and between Barriss Offee and Ahsoka being used to foster mistrust between the Jedi and the Republic, one must to recognize that the slaughter of the younglings, padawan, and other Jedi in the Temple and by Order 66 is a genocide.

 

I think the concept of one character being a "better Jedi" is a subjective decision, based on the viewpoint of the person making the comparison. We each have our own thoughts on what the "model" Jedi should be.

I'm not sure that the comparison is fair, either. Anakin was always destined to fall, and this would have been much harder to explain if he was an ideal Jedi.

 

I never said she was the only good Jedi. I like Obi-Wan and Plo Koon a lot in that series. In fact, I find things to like about most the Jedi except Krell. If I wanted to get really vexed with the Jedi Council, I would watch the movies. Yoda doesn't seem very wise in the Prequel films, Mace Windu mostly annoys me, and so on. I like those two a lot better in TCW and in novels. Two years ago, I met someone who had every reason to be complacent, cynical, and sad. She had every reason to fall. But instead she chose to do the right thing and be the best she could be. And that's what I like about Ahsoka. Now, I understand the argument that Anakin was destined to fall, but if you ever notice, there are times when Anakin would killed someone if Ahsoka wasn't with him. Case in point would be during the Slaves of the Republic arc. It is true that sometimes even a younger person will give an older person a reason to be a better person and to hope.

 

Ahsoka is simply Anakin 2.0.

She's Anakin, but "better". She gets all of Anakin's attitude, none of the downside.

She lives Anakin's life, but does it better. She goes down similar paths, gets put in very similar situations (sometimes nearly identical), is presented with the same options, but makes better choices and comes out better for it. She makes the same mistakes as Anakin, but doesn't pay for it, at least not nearly as harshly.

Not only does she have nearly all of Anakin's attitude and flaws without the downside, but she gets to hang out with the soon to be Darth Vader without being at all tainted by him, and is never on the receiving end of his dark side.

This is her existence, she is used to play out Anakin's life all over again, through her, and do it better.

 

I came to this thread thinking that Ahsoka Tano : Jedi Knight was some new book/comic

 

Lol, I must confess, I thought the same thing when I initially opened the thread.

 

This its not that hard to be better then Anakin at being a jedi.

 

I can't agree with you on the idea that they've gone down similar paths. While we don't know exactly what her very early years looked like, as far as we know Ahsoka entered training at the "appropriate" age for Jedi, and she was also never a slave. Anakin, on the other hand, has massive baggage including slavery, his attachment to his mother's (and her death), and his relationship with Padme.

I think this shows most prominently in the Slave arc, where the mere sight of the Zygerrian slaver sends Anakin into a near rage. Ahsoka, having no idea who the Zygerrians are, nor having any experience as a slave, doesn't understand Anakin's anger. Had she been a slave for most of her childhood, I think she might have had a similar reaction.

Being a good Jedi, in the general sense, also requires a good foundation in certain philosophies and ways of thinking. This is why the council objected to having Anakin trained in the first place. It's not enough to just train a guy to use the force for "good" and how to defend himself with a lightsaber. In this sense, Anakin is at a massive disadvantage to Ahsoka. She entered training, as far as we know, as a young child and essentially a blank slate to which a formal Jedi education would be more effective. Anakin was at a age where certain traits and behaviors were ingrained in his mind and would be near impossible to change through training.

I'm not trying to excuse Anakin's fall, so much as to argue that the comparison, from a technical standpoint, isn't fair. On the comparison as it stands, is Ahsoka better at controlling her anger? Yes. Has she learned to (for the most part) avoid attachment? Yes. Does she make better decisions? Sometimes.

 

If anything TCW made Anakin more of a tragic hero, the purpose of the show was to make Anakin likable and fix some of the issues the PT movies made and to also make his redemption I guess more believable. I dont really know about her fate, they filmed two endings, and then later Filoni changed the Jedi youngling dying in the temple to Asoka in the Yoda arc, which would rather imply she would die a Jedi and her destiny was still intertwined with a Jedi and light side ending and she was very dear to Yoda(but Jedi arent supposed to have attachments,lol). Why she was to pop up on Mandalore and call in the Jedi, is strange, maybe was to get killed by Maul or become his apprentice, who knows. The Jedi during the CW or TPM era were corrupted by the darkside with their ability to use the force gone or near gone whatever that meant. SO it was getting worse the Jedi. Anakin was not even knighted Master after killing Count Dooku, meanwhile Obi Was made Jedi Master at the end of TPM due mostly in part of supposedly killing a Sith Lord, Darth Maul. ROTS doesnt ever imply Anakin ever had a padawan, he still seemed pretty much the young padawan of AOTC, wasnt any growth at all.

The Dark Times seems to have been occurring for over a 1000 years, the Galactic Empire era could be called the Darkest times, not really sure Obi Wan realized the Jedi lost their way, Yoda acknowledged it in CW at the end in season 6 but acts completely different in ESB and ROTJ, the two narratives are conflicting.

Anyway, part of the blame was Anakin's and the other part the Jedi whom were themselves under the cloak of the Sith(there is Sith relic burial under the Jedi temple that has been eating away at them the entire time).

 

Indeed indeed.

 

I can't lie. I wish the Imperial March played when when I did stuff.

I don't think that there's really a doubt as to the Council's schizophrenic responses to Anakin's and Ahsoka's bad decisions in TCW. In an ideal world, there's a reason that the Council responds differently. Perhaps thinking that the two individuals need to be guided differently. Pure speculation, of course. In reality, it was more likely the biases of the writers that ended up with uneven treatment for the two.

When Ahsoka shows up on the scene, she's, as you pointed out, temperamental, headstrong and a disregard for the rules, i.e., the same or similar as Anakin. But Skywalker's got what? 8-10 years on her? Has he plateaued in terms of maturity? At the end, he seems like the same person he was at the beginning of Season 1. Conversely, Ahsoka seems to grow in maturity over time, or at least change.

Additionally, I think the writers/producers were a bit too narrow-minded or uneven on what they felt were "dark" actions by Anakin. "What? He was going to blow up the ship." (see S2E13 Voyage of Temptation) is a perfectly good excuse to skewer a guy in the back with a lightsaber, yet Anakin gets the "Imperial March" treatment for that as well.

 

There's more to a path than just the beginning.

But I think they intended to echo Anakin's beginning anyway.

Ahsoka wasn't brought to the Temple during infancy, she didn't get there until age 3. (source: Rising Malevolence episode guide)

I think this is late, but even if it isn't...

Then we have this line.

""It was Master Plo Koon who found me and brought me to the Temple where I belonged…"

Master Plo is her Qui-Gon Jinn, he saved her, and she has quite a bit of affection for him.

She got the better deal. She was a little late in training, but not nearly as much as Anakin was. She gets saved by her Qui-Gon Jinn, but her Qui-Gon Jinn doesn't die.

They're trying to connect the two. Show how they're the same, show how they're different. Compare and contrast. Ahsoka is Anakin 2.0, she's Anakin rebooted, revised, this time it will turn out better. It's a deconstruction of Anakin. This is the design, this is the intention.

Indeed, it does show in the Slave arc, where they play with the idea of Ahsoka being a slave...just like Anakin.

Only Ahsoka does it better. She handles it quite well, she gets to wear a cute outfit and be sexually objectified pretty strongly. She still gets to vent her anger on that one guy, mock killing him, and she gets away squeaky clean, free from the dark side. No aftereffects. Just no hint of the dark side.

Ahsoka is presented with an opportunity to get carried away emotionally due to the involvement of "her people". Only it never happens. At all. Attachments? Not for this version.

But let's go back to the beginning of TCW.

In the TCW movie, she's very much shown as Anakin 2.0. This is agreed upon, yes? Yes. Same attitude, same anger, same recklessness, same arrogance. This never gets her arm chopped off and she never comes close to the dark side. (don't bother pointing out Mortis)

She gets to threaten a droid with a lightsaber and call herself a Jedi Knight in the movie. In Lightsaber Lost, she physically assaults a petty crook and sticks her lightsaber to his throat and again calls herself a Jedi Knight, because he merely suggested she was a little young to a be Jedi. Didn't she also tell Grievous she was a Jedi Knight? Perhaps in the Downfall/Duel of a Droid arc? She gets to make these outrageous claims, like Anakin, but unlike Anakin there's just no dark side there, despite the arrogance involved. It's like Anakin, only better. The dark side can't touch her, despite all the similarities to Anakin.

Assassin. Do I have to explain this one? Ahsoka is having visions of Padme's death, real subtle. It's like watching ROTS with Ahsoka in Anakin's place (I can actually see George telling the writers this, "do ROTS, only with Ahsoka"). She's literally living Anakin's future in this episode. And, of course, Ahsoka does it better, she's so much more reasonable. It's basically "this is what Anakin should have done", or "this is what Ahsoka would have done". Which is my point, this is her character. This example is undeniable, but it's not the only one. The entire show is an example. The entire show is a deconstruction of Anakin's life, during Anakin's life, both with Anakin and his apprentice, instead of during a different time period and with different characters, as one would expect. They're deconstructing events that haven't even happened yet. It can be seen in episodes like Mortis (and more), where future events are done over, but different. I'm sure George thought this was genius, like his movies, messing with the order of things, flipping things around, I'm sure he thought this was very inventive. Personally I found it tiresome and insulting as a viewer.

Ah, Citadel. Ordered to stay put. Doesn't. Disobeys, no consequences whatsoever. No arm chopped off (despite the shocking brutality of the arc). No brush with the dark side, despite the horror of the setting. She's living quite a charmed life. Returns to the Temple, is not punished, Plo Koon literally lies to cover for her. She's living Anakin's life, only better. Not only does she get to disobey, the entire universe is bent to make it seem like she didn't, when she clearly did. A Jedi Master on the Jedi Council lies for her. Anakin wishes.

She gets a romance, she gets a kiss, she gets a love triangle, she sorta gets dumped...and gets over it, no problem. Living Anakin's life, only better. Attachments? That's for Anakin 1.0. This is the new upgraded version.

Ah, the final arc of Season Five. It could also be called "what Anakin should have done". There's an obvious connection between Ahsoka being "betrayed" by the Council, and Anakin feeling betrayed by the Council in ROTS. She's literally living Anakin's life before he does, only better. Ahsoka doesn't turn to the dark side, she doesn't even turn on the Jedi. Ludicrously, she blames herself for being a victim of betrayal, because unlike Anakin (we're comparing and contrasting here), she's a saint, and she's martyring herself for literally no reason. "I don't trust myself" AKA "It's not you, it's me", which is nonsense. She walks away from the Jedi, perhaps as Anakin should have done. If only Anakin had seen the flaws in the Jedi that Ahsoka saw (she sees what Anakin supposedly saw in ROTS, only before he did). Which makes you wonder, why didn't he? He saw what happened, why didn't he walk away, too? Why did he stay? He had even more reason to leave than she did.

There are many more examples of Ahsoka living the Chosen Life, I spent years pointing them out in this forum, I'm just not going to bother looking them up.

So Ahsoka is Anakin 2.0. Personally, I don't like it. I don't like the premise, and I don't like what came of it. It's better left to fanfiction, but instead it's an inserted canon deconstruction. This isn't really surprising, this is what George likes to do, so it's no surprise that he would use Ahsoka and the show in this way.

All my opinion, of course. Feel free to disagree.

 

There it is.

The producers of the show definitely reaped the benefit of being able to use iconic characters like Obi-Wan, Anakin and Yoda, but in order for the series to stand on it's own, they needed a new character, original to TCW, as well. And they needed for that character to be successful. Lucasfilm was aware of this, and they did their darndest to make sure that this is what happened.

Filoni, himself? He has his own, much more personal stake in Tano (but we'll get to that in a minute).

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As far as Ahsoka? Most here know how I feel. For my money, she's alright. I count myself a fan of the character. I enjoyed her and I'd welcome her return in some form (I've often said how I'd love a novel). And I suppose that I can understand how some fans who were only first introduced to the SW franchise through TCW would think Tano is the be-all/end-all. That they've never seen anyone like her. That no other character has accomplished the kinds of things Tano has, or has bravely made the type of decisions she has.

But I've been a fan since I was a child; a time which dates from all the way back in those black-and-white days when the OT films were in the theaters. And like every other SW fan who has been here from the very beginning, I've seen an awful lot of terrific characters come and go. I've learned to embrace and enjoy a great multitude of those SW characters over the decades, and to me, Tano works. She's a successful character.

But she's also nothing special, either.

Okay, maybe that's putting things too harshly.

No, what I mean is, Tano is nowhere near as... as "unique" a SW character as the article linked above would have one believe. Every one of the attributes the author so glowingly and lovingly lays at the feet of Ahsoka Tano -- every single one of them -- have already been exemplified in any number of other SW characters. And often times in, what has been for me, a much more satisfying manner.

The difference is, in TCW, Tano was the beneficiary of a much more high-profile gig than most of those characters (so, many, many more fans were there to see it). That and, in Dave Filoni, Tano had a co-creator and director who admits both to his personal attachment to the character and his desire to see her live on.

Not only in marketing to us, but worse, in how the show's characters related with one-another and in how the overall narrative of the series was shaped and executed, extraordinary efforts were taken on behalf of the character of Tano. Efforts which were not only aimed at making this all-important original lead character of the series a wise and powerful 'force' (sorry ), but also at justifying the decision to keep her around (far beyond the time when even the Maker Himself had deemed appropriate).

I personally find this kind of lame. But for others, it may not even register on their list of concerns. I get that, and it's cool.

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And please, don't take me wrong: I'm happy that the OP enjoys Tano as much as she so clearly does. Honest! I wouldn't begrudge her -- or any of Ahsoka's supporters -- that enjoyment for even one moment (any more than I might expect another fan to take me to task for loving Luke or Obi-Wan).

And I think the question of whether Tano or Skywalker were the "better" Jedi is an interesting one (even if neither were the Jedi Obi-Wan Kenobi was).

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However, I can unequivocally state that, for me, Ahsoka Tano is nowhere near "the best thing to happen to Star Wars in 20 years."

I understand the need for attention-grabbing headlines, but this is beyond silly. It's preposterous.


Tano one of the best newly-created characters of the last two decades? Yes, perhaps. She wouldn't top that list. Beings like, say, Captain Rex or Asajj Ventress each immediately spring to mind as characters I think are rather easily the 'better.' And there are others, too. But Tano would be among that list for me, at least.

But the best thing?

In other words, better than the sale of Lucasfilm to Disney (and so, better than the prospects of finally -- finally -- getting the sequel to the Star Wars Trilogy, the spin-off films, new novels, and everything else which are soon coming our way)?

Better than Rebels?

Better than the PT (and the multitude of things I love about it -- just one being Ewan McGregor's ability to inexplicably see me embrace anyone other than Sir Alec Guinness in the role of Obi-Wan Kenobi)?

Better than the video games, novels and comics I've so enjoyed?


Better than the new friends I've made here and in the real world thanks to SW? Better than the joy I've experienced introducing my daughter to Star Wars; sharing the stories and seeing things through her eyes as I once did?

Better than the million-and-one things I'm forgetting in my haste?

Better than TCW, itself?


Nope. Not even close.

**Apologies for the WOT (and perhaps straying OT), but this is the first I can recall ever seeing the above-mentioned fluff-piece (er, I mean, 'article').

 

Well put very well put I could not say it any better.