Animated Shorts Tales of the Empire (Spoilers allowed)

After barely playing a role in the Kenobi series, holy moly was the Fourth Sister such a presence in this. She's my MVP of the whole season.

 

Spoiler

Barriss couldn't have been the Seventh Sister, since the Seventh Sister was present when Vader met a group of Inquisitors on Coruscant, which happens before he goes to Nur. This group included the Fifth Brother, the Sixth Brother, the Eighth Brother, and the Ninth Sister. It seems like Barriss was part of the 'second wave' of Inquisitors.

Trilla wasn't captured by the Inquisitors until after Order 66 and it took time to break her. My theory right now is that Trilla wasn't the original Second Sister and Reva wasn't the original Third Sister. A Third Brother was actually mentioned once, so he was presumably Reva's predecessor. Right now, the Eleventh and Twelfth Sister and Brother are unaccounted for, so I think Barriss was either the Eleventh Sister, the Twelfth Sister, or the Fourteenth Sister. Marrok and the Tales of the Jedi Inquisitor could also be the Eleventh or Twelfth Brother.

 

Right , so that happened in the first episode, so what was the point of the rest of it?

 

I would genuinely be interested in those stories, but I do think they would work better in a novel than a show, especially a collection of shorts.

Kind of like the last Ahsoka short in Tales of the Jedi compared to the Ahsoka novel which covered the same story - pretty and all, and has some nice economically storytelling, but at some point all the economical storytelling in the world can't really match the amount of depth a full novel can.

Hmmm...

For me, I can't really compared the series entirely, but I think more in terms of individual story arcs, in which case Dooku's is my favorite, followed very closely by Barriss' the Morgan and Ahsoka in last place.

Well, if redemption is a choice to do good after doing bad, Morgan's is kind of an anti-redemption arc of continuing to double down and choose evil even when given a choice otherwise, and why she kept making that choice.

The death of her family started on her path, but the second episode made clear that she tried to find a new home on Corvus, but mutual anger and hatred between her and those she ruled ground away any positive feelings she might have and gave her a reason to keep working with the empire, and Thrawn in particular as one of the few people who saw value in her instead of dismissing her as a witch or a rube to take advantage in the case of the moff, hence why she is willing to throw everything into securing his return later on.

The third is a bit superfluous, but reinforces this theme by showing Morgan turn down one last chance to walk away and setting up the confrontations that will lead to her end. Also shows how genuinely devoted she had become by this time - in the second episode her approach to the empire is more pragmatic and a result of her own interests, yet here she remains an imperial loyalist even when the New Republic is ascendant and it would be more pragmatic to work with them. That, as the ambassador says, much has changed and many people have changed, but Morgan refuses to because she refuses to let go of her trauma, anger, and resentment at a galaxy that keeps taking away her sense of belonging (and refusing to acknowledge her role in many of those rejections).

 

While I agree Ahsoka is in last place I think Dooku is miles ahead of the rest.

probably Dooku









Barriss

Morgan

Ahsoka

and that isn’t a diss on the others. They are good enough even if I have problems with them. But Dooku? Now that was peak

 

I wish I could understand where that love for the Dooku arc comes from. I have trouble even remembering it.

 

I thought the TotJ guy was confirmed to be the 6th brother, and Marok the 8th…

 

Nope. Rise of the Red Blade, a novel which came after Tales of the Jedi, had the Sixth Brother in it and described him as he appeared in the Ahsoka novel and the Darth Vader comics, not how the Inquisitor in Tales of the Jedi appeared.

The fact that both the Tales of the Jedi Inquisitor and Marrok are shown joining the ranks of the Inquisitors in Tales of the Empire actually confirms that they are not the Sixth and Eighth Brothers, since the Sixth and Eighth Brother were on Coruscant when Vader was introduced to the Inquisitors and the ending of Devoted takes place after that.

 

I completely agree with this. She had a very effective role in the story arc.

 

I'm reading, willing but not able to love TotE. Barriss redeemed too easily. Morgan too boring. Morgan's ARC was more an expansion of The Jedi episode than it's own story.

I think Dedra from Andor would have been more interesting.

 

On the flip side, I’ve watched “The Path of Anger” and “The Way Out” a couple times since they dropped. Some of my favourite episodes of Star Wars animation. The solemn tone they went for here is more to my style than what they usually put out.

 

She had some good dialogue but I was not keen on her being redeemed so fast

 

The characters of Barriss and Lyn were entirely secondary to my enjoyment of the episode. It’s why the cliffhanger didn’t bother me in the slightest and why I’m not particularly concerned by its placement in the timeline or what will happen next. I don’t need to know that stuff, because the basic message was incredibly cathartic and the way it was presented visually and musically was beautiful.

 

Agreed.

 

These are Tales. Snapshots of people lives. Its meant be to short, and meaningful. So in that way Barriss Offee and Lyn 's redemption is not rushed.

 

Regarding this novel - it seems like the level of initial trust to a new Inquisitor manifests itself in whether this Inquisitor is allowed to chose own outfit. Probably the Plague Doctor was one of the first and most loyal ones, thereby got to chose the coolest mask.

 

This. We're not looking at full, complete arcs here. Just snapshots across long stretches of time.

 

Based on people's comments, I went in with very low expectations, and came out enjoying both stories. Obviously
no where near the brilliantly nuanced Dooku episodes, but enjoyable nonetheless. The only episode I didn't care for
was the last Barriss Offee episode, which was just cheesy. But overall, not bad. 7/10 for me.

 

This series was some of my favorite material of the D+ era to date. I wish there was more.

The Barriss arc felt a little like just finding a way to close the chapter on a character they no longer had plans for, but at least it's resolved.

 

Basically my thoughts although I may give it an 8/10 instead of a 7

 

Which for Elsbeth works well, her character isn’t very interesting but for Barriss, there was too much to tell or three eps, especially leaving her end unclear yet again. She should have been a mini-series or something like that, there’s too many gaps and silences.

 

Good call. Actually, I’d love to see a Tales From Andor animated series, that gives us more background on Dedra, Luthen and Mothma.

 

Tales of Andor / Rebellion
Tales of The Dark Times
Tales of The High Republic
Tales of The Sith
Tales of The Resistance
Tales of The First Order
Tales of The Final Order
Tales of Another Galaxy
Tales of Mandalore
Tales of The Senate
Tales of The Padawan
Tales of The Old Republic
Tales of The Purge
Takes of The Outer Rim
Tales of The Unknown Regions
Tales of Delta Squad
Tales of Ryloth
Tales of Kamino

and so on. So many possibilities

 

Tales of Rogue Squadron, live action.