Full Series The Bad Batch 2.08 - Truth and Consequences - Discussion Thread (Spoilers Allowed)

One of the best Palpatine scenes overall.

 

Loved this episode it was such a nice and unexpected twist what happened to Rampart.

Was also pleasantly surprised that Halle Burtoni from TCW returned, I’m glad they didn’t kill her off and hope they use her a lot more in the future she’s a lot more interesting now as she’s one of the last Kaminoans.

 

Great episodes! I really hope these episodes are a turning point in the show and that it is becoming the great show I always knew it could be. I liked checking in some lesser known TCW characters like Riyo Chuchi and Halle Burtoni. These episodes, especially the first one, really felt like a TCW sequel.

Some random thoughts:
- Great Palpatine scene! I love the juxtaposition of Palpatine's usual absence in the Senate and his showing up when he feels the need and revealing that the Senate is just a facade. And it's always a pleasure to see/hear Ian McDiarmid return to the role.
- Returning to Coruscant always feels like returning home for me. It's one of my favourite settings in Star Wars, so I always love going back there.
- Looks like Rampart might be done for. That was a surprise. I figured he would be the big bad of the entire show. I suppose he still could be, but probably not as an Imperial Admiral.
- For a second, I thought the clone assassin was going to be Boba Fett. He was a cool character. Cool armour and creepy, cult-like loyalty to the Empire.
- Echo finally went with his gut and went with Rex! I'm happy for Echo's character, but I'm a little bummed the entire squad didn't go. I guess we might get some more mission of the week episodes for Cid.
- On a related note, does anyone else wish this show was following Captain Rex, helping deserting clones and recruiting others, with the occasional appearance of the Bad Batch rather than the other way around? And this isn't just a desire to see more of legacy characters. I genuinely think what he's doing is more interesting.

 

I like the Bad Batch, but the show should have been about Rex.

 

But then you might just have Rex as he seems to move around alone. We already have 11 seasons of Rex as major character.

 

This was a fantastic pair of episodes, best one this season.

I loved all of the clone wars callbacks, Senators Butoni and Chuchi, 79's and the Coruscant guard.

Great to see clones finally realizing what's happening to them I'd be very interested to see what Slip and his friend were doing during the war.

Cool to see the senator from Taris, I think this series did the senate and politics in general better than Andor.

Another connection to Rogue One that I noticed was the labor droids around the Venator looked very similar to the labor droid on the Erso farm.

Great to see Rex back, I'm hoping he meets up with Cody soon.

That escape pod sequence was fantastic, really cool to see them use the engine trick from Braaca again.

Extremely good to see Rampart get his comeuppance, he has one of the most punchable faces in star wars. I think he might end up being reassigned to something more boots on the ground like being an ISB agent.

Seeing Palpatine give his speech was chilling. Sheev is an excellent Improviser.

Good to see Echo stop listening to Hunter and decide to help his brothers. I gives me hope that they might have two storylines going on at once.

 

Rampart is obviously still going to be the big bad going forward;

I’m sort of picturing a scenario where he gets transferred to Mount Tantiss and the final battle is going to be an army of renegade clone troopers vs. Imperial stormtroopers and he’s going to be more akin to a canon version of Atha Prime (maybe he’ll get a cool costume)

 

Superb, both episodes. Episode 3 is still my favorite so far, but 7 (especially) and 8 are very close.

 

No I count that as well. The battlefront novel if I recall.

there are a few others I recall. Such as that annoying police officer who appeared in a few episodes. Died when Alderaan blew up.

 

The Muun that always appeared in the Padme episodes.

 

Well played, Palpatine. Telling the truth doesn't always lead to good outcomes even though it was a foregone conclusion considering we already got glimpses of what happened to the clones. Kinda like Padme and her group's effort to end the war were destined to fail during TCW, but at least Chuchi and Organa keep trying to help them. This episode also mad Halle Burtoni sympathetic. It was very satisfying to see Rampart getting his comeuppance, finally!

 

I'm happy for Echo, who finally managed to escape Cid's mission of the week treadmill, but I'm also worried that we are not going to see him any time soon now, since next few episodes won't be plot-heavy.
One thing I don't quite understand, though. Why didn't Rampart get rid of the recordings? If they were trying to pass the destruction of Tipoca as a cataclysmic event, you'd think they would destroy all the evidence.

 

Arrogance,

 

I don’t see Rampart having much of a future being a main antagonist, don’t see what else they can do with him now apart from making him try to get revenge on the Empire.

I don’t see any of the clones caring over him being arrested, he was horrible to them and had no respect for orders.

The only one that would maybe care would be a Crosshair, but episode 3 hinted that even he was tiring of Rampart.

 

I think this is actually what the show needs. It needs to go to a more anthology style between the 3 “groups” of main characters. It is more likely for Echo to get character development this way

 

Rampart become a Death trooper

 

I thought it would be Rako Hardeen

 

Anthology style is what made Clone Wars great. I would throw in Cut Lawquine as one of the charactors the show needs to focus on.

 

Remember guys Boba Fett is 14 years old by now.

 

As I was musing between the episodes, I at first found it slightly odd that Chuchi, who'd never really interacted with many clones before, was now such a vocal supporter of their rights. It seemed like a case of the writers using a character simply because they were familiar to the audience. Which is no great crime, just something I noticed. Then I thought about Chuchi's role in her debut, way back in 2009. Trespass was a story where she argued for the sovereign rights of an indigenous people, in which clone troopers were reluctantly used to put down the insurgency at the whims of a tyrant. In effect, the exact plot The Bad Batch is now dealing with. Chuchi's actually the most appropriate character possible for this storyline after all.

Anyway, onto part 2 itself (and it's nice to get more serialised stories from time to time as with TCW, gives more time to breathe and expand details). As with the Ryloth arc last season, there was always the possibility for the decrease in quality from the excellent Bad-Batchless first part, which was so compelling on its own merits without needing the nominal leads. On the other hand, the mission they were sent on this time was actually quite enjoyable. Both this and last week show that actually having some major stakes and tying events into the larger tapestry make for much more interesting action scenes than random motivationless tomb raiding, to pick one recent example.

Bringing back Halle Burtoni was a good use of the character, one of the few established Kaminoans and one that made sense to be at the heart of things. I particularly liked the choice to not make her that sympathetic, she bitterly dismissed Lama Su as a failure of a leader and didn't seem to care all that much about her deceased compatriots back home. It really highlighted her corruption and decadence from living at the heart of the dying Republic for so long. Though, when she met Omega it did remind that her origins were still somewhat murky and shrouded in mystery. The show still hasn't really explained why Omega was created yet, despite that driving quite a few plot turns in Season 1. Maybe that'll come when Nala Se re-enters the picture.

Palpatine's monologue was excellent, robbing us of even a symbolic victory for the forces of good. In Pursuit of Peace back in TCW, Padme's rousing speeches could successfully hold back the tide and make even Palpatine wary, ineffective as they were in the long term. Here we barely got a moment to savour Rampart's downfall before Palpatine swooped in to take control and make him a fall guy. Now they can pin all the atrocities on one rotten apple, rather than a systemic problem with the new Empire (or, heaven forbid, it's perfectly innocent figurehead). The way he twisted the knife even further, implicating the clones who carried out the order to destroy Kamino was another amazing way to cap off his single moment in the sun. It especially hurt given that we already saw those same clones expressing their moral outrage at the action back in part 1.

Echo's decision to leave caught me off guard, but it was a twist that made sense given what happened in the season opener. His desire to help out more than the Batch were accomplishing made it perfectly logical that he'd choose the moment to jump ship with Rex. I hope that doesn't mean he'll be absent for too long. A Rex/Echo focus episode would be nice at some point, to show some more sides to the post-Prequel galaxy.

The swelling score over the final scene was some standout stuff, expertly merging Omega's theme, the TCW Clone theme, and the Batch's theme into one emotional outpouring. As an aside on the music, the 'believer' clone's theme from part 1 was also really strong, heavy on unusual electronic droning, especially when it dominated the credits over the usual theme.

 

Rampart obviously has a personal army of modified clones in reserve, probably at mount tantiss

 

Intresting that these two episodes dealt more with Ryio Chuchi then her other appearances in TCW.

 

I thought he did? The ones the Batch were after are backups that the clone made in secret. Backup implies the originals were deleted.

 

WAIT A SECOND

Rampart yelled he was “following orders”, and the clone assassin had the same cyanide capsule thing as the Imperial officer from Mandalorian.

Are we getting Giancarlo Esposito? Will this be the show to reveal why everyone thought he was dead??

The whole Mount Tantiss operation could be tied to Gideon and Palpatine’s plans for Grogu and they just use Rampart as fall guy when it gets exposed

 

No, he just be lower officer now.