I See What You Did There...

I see what you did there...

Both episodes are set on a moon the main characters get stranded on and then when they escape a parallel is established between the warm family the protagonist has and the cold emptiness of the antagonist's environment. Obvious set up for a redemption arc is obvious!

Parallel in The Bad Batch 1x03

Crosshair in The Clone Wars: “If your plans are so good, why did Commander Cody have to call us in?”

ES-01 in The Bad Batch: “If [clones] are so efficient, how come the Empire’s scouting soldiers like us?”

And then Crosshair gets pissed, like yes, you were this big of a dick too😭

I’d just like to remind everyone that Ursa Wren was in The Clone Wars season 7 and she was the one Ahsoka bumped into, not Bo-Katan.

Bonus:

If I don’t find out what happened to Clan Wren and Fenn Rau, I’m gonna be very mad at Jon Favereau😩

In The Clone Wars, we had Commander Wolffe and the Wolfpack. In Rebels, we had loth wolves. In The Mandalorian, Dave’s cameo character had the last name Wolf.

I am patiently waiting to see how Dave Filoni managed to incorporate wolves into The Bad Batch. I know he did, but how...

I agree with many people that Anakin’s story was kind of poorly developed, especially in the movies. However, I think what we have seen shows how his motivations were strong enough to join the dark side and become Darth Vader.

Anakin had no father, literally, and only had his mother until he was ~10y/o.

He and his mother were slaves for Watto.

When Qui-gon discovered how high his midichlorian count was, his force sensitivity was made into a big deal.

Qui-gon believed very early on that Anakin was the Chosen One and that he would fulfill the prophecy of balancing the force.

Anakin had to say goodbye to his mother and leave the only home he ever knew to live with and be trained by strangers.

When Anakin was first brought before the High Jedi Council, they refused to allow him to be trained. His confidence was built up and broken down within such a short amount of time.

As one of the only men that believed in him and cared for him up until that point, Qui-gon’s death must have been heartbreaking to Anakin.

The only reason Yoda agreed to let Anakin into the Order was because Obi-wan basically threatened to leave the Order and take Anakin with him and train him without the council’s supervision (and because he trusted Qui-gon’s judgement).

Anakin was raised by Obi-wan for the next 10 years, but probably in a very by-the-book way because Obi-wan was dedicated the the Jedi Code.

During this time, he was probably judged by everyone else in the Order. Everyone expected him to be the Chosen One. What do you think happened when Anakin failed at something? Made a mistake? He was probably held to such high expectations the rest of his childhood.

When he was 19, he saw force visions of his mother dying. He went back to Tatooine to find her just in time for her to die in his arms. He killed the entire village of Tusken Raiders out of rage, probably because he never had a place to vent his anger before. Jedi are taught not to let emotions control their actions, but for the first ~10 years of his life, he was raised differently. He probably had strong emotions but had to hide them to avoid further disappointment from his peers.

It is implied that Anakin was knighted because the Jedi Order didn’t have enough Jedi knights to serve as generals in the Clone War. They admitted that he hadn’t passed all of the trials but knighted him anyways. One of the most important achievements in any Jedi’s life was falsified in Anakin’s case for the council’s gain.

When the council entrusts him to train Ahsoka, and after he warms up to the idea of that responsibility, he grows very attached to Ahsoka. So when Cad Bane almost threw her out an airlock, she was almost killed by the Blue Shadow Virus, she was possessed (and killed¿) by the Brother, she was kidnapped by Trandoshans, she was framed for murder, she was expelled from the Order, and when she left the Order and Anakin behind...Anakin felt responsible, heartbroken, and maybe even betrayed. He missed her and resented the council for her deciding to leave.

Not to mention when the council decided to have Obi-wan fake his death and go undercover to prevent Eval from kidnapping Palpatine. Anakin genuinely thought his master, the man who raised him, “the closest thing [he had] to a father,” was dead. They had a funeral that Obi-wan’s closest friends and peers attended under the impression that it was real. After the mission’s success, Anakin finds out that the council lied to him in such a horrible and kind of unnecessary way.

Anakin also saw force visions of Padmé dying. Not only was padmé his wife and the love of his life, but she was also the mother of his unborn children. He wasn’t just trying to save her, he was also trying to save the twins from dying. He had three lives at risk that he was desperate to save.

When Anakin is inducted into the Jedi Council, he isn’t given the rank of master. This is the first time in the Jedi Order’s history that a member of the council was not ranked as a master. If Anakin wasn’t ready to be a master, he shouldn’t have been accepted onto the council. Later, Windu tells Anakin that if his intel is correct then he will have “gained [his] trust” meaning that Windu never truly trusted him before that.

So when Palpatine promises to help Anakin save Padmé, supports Anakin’s decisions throughout the war, and seems to want to help him, Anakin grows close to him. Anakin depended on him.

In the end, he was deceived. Padmé was dead (he probably assumed his children were dead by extension), the Jedi were dead, he believed his former padawan was dead (probably at the hands of Rex, who he also probably thought was dead), his master had left him to die, his life was basically ruined, and all he had was a man that engineered his suit to constantly cause him pain to ensure that he would never overthrow him.

Anakin’s story is a tragedy, and it’s shown beautifully if you pay enough attention.

hera syndulla survived a bad crash landing, multiple shootouts, capture and prolonged torture, an exploding fuel depot, the loss of her lover, and the entire battle for Lothal while pregnant. i need to sit down and think about this