Ahsoka Series

Looks like we're the only two watching this show!   

One more ep to go and we have no idea what Baylan is up to.

Is it confirmed that this series is basically a set up for something else? 'Cause it sure feels like it.

Agreed with everything you said. 

No, you didn't miss something about how Thrawn and the Nightsisters are in cahoot. Never mentioned. Just was. That would have been worth an episode. Show us what happened when Ezra and Thrawn arrive there, how Thrawn allies with the Nightsisters. But nope. Instead we get a random Clone Wars retro that doesn't add anything to the story except for dopamine hits to see Hayden(still not a good actor). 

Is it the same Dave Filoni? No. This is a Dave Filoni now under direction of a parent company. He seemed to have more freedom doing Clone Wars and Rebels. Admittedly, those weren't marquee series at the time. The switch to streaming shows has put an emphasis on content rather than story. It seems like many people can't tell the difference anymore. 

I can't say it reached the heights of seasons 2 - 4 of Rebels for me in terms of character development and entertaining SW lore, not by any means. It was uneven, sure, but neither was it the disaster that many articles on various online portals that I've seen have claimed. I actually really enjoyed that final episode, but yeah, it left me wishing they'd found Ezra a lot earlier and we'd have had more of him and Thrawn. I loved Eman Esfandi as Ezra - he was just perfect. He really felt like absolutely the same character as his animated counterpart, grown up a bit, more experienced but still with the same cocky charm. 

The relationship between he and Sabine was ridiculously underplayed though - which might've worked in animation. Alas, we are no longer animated, and with an audience of non-animation peeps coming to this expecting some dramatic tension from a set of characters they don't know the way we SW animation fans do, I felt this was really undercooked. Equally, we got no real backstory as to how Ezra evaded Thrawn once they reached this backwater planet - we're just asked to accept that he's thrown his lot in with the rockback snail peeps.  

Natasha Liu Bordizzo is fine as Sabine; she looks the part and does her best with what she's given, but as with Thrawn and Hera, I feel like they were less animated and believable as characters than their animated incarnations. 

Baylan and Shin, the most consistently interesting characters throughout, were also thrown away in that last ep, though. I dig a good cliffhanger, and noticing the old Mortis Force god statues behind him (no "sister" though!) as he gazes at something blinking on the misty horizon was a great and atmospheric moment. Surely he deserves more than a moment though? And yeah, with Ray Stevenson sadly no longer with us, I guess any continuation will mean a recast. He was tremendous, and certainly one of the highlights of the season. 

Which brings me to Ahsoka herself. One of the most detailed and fleshed out of all Star Wars characters, there's a hell of a lot we're supposed to infer, especially in this final episode with Papa Anakin moodily keeping an eye on his former padawan. It doesn't take a hell of a lot to imagine where Filoni is going with all this... Ahsoka is something new, an evolution, or something largely unseen for centuries in the SW universe. She's a humanoid force wielder who chooses no sides and is potentially a balance in the Force, much like the "sister" represented in the TCW episodes where she meets the Mortis gods. (Perhaps that's why the statue was missing behind Baylan?) Filoni loves his mythology, and he's great at it in a way that no-one else who has handled Star Wars is, but I wonder if the lack of a certain writing partner such as Simon Kinberg is what led to some of this show's weird structure. Some of the criticisms of it lacking an overall focus are somewhat justified.  

I really warmed to Rosario Dawson's performance by the end, too. It's restrained as hell for the first part of the season, and I can't help feeling this is a director/producer's choice rather than a performative one. After the live action TCW ep, she warms up a hell of a lot and finally I felt like I was seeing glimmers of Ahsoka proper and boy, was I glad to see her. It was a bit late, but better late than never. 

Fantastic score from Kevin Kiner (and offspring) too. Brilliant to hear that weird organ sound for Thrawn again, all the more sinister in full orchestral splendor. (Kind of needed it with Mikkelsen's understated performance). The music did a lot of supportive emotional work in a similar way that John Williams scores do in the movies, and I really appreciated that. 

Irritants: What was the point of Morgan Elsbeth, except to be kill fodder? Give us a glimpse, just the slightest of inklings of what's in the caskets, c'mon, or why am I coming back for S2? Why are the Nightsisters allied to Thrawn? (For live audience members only, explain more who and what the Nightsisters are!) Shin is what now, self-proclaimed queen of a bunch of scavengers on Boondocks-planet? If I were her, I'd go after Baylan with a vengeance. Overall, a lot of unexplained threads regarding character relationships which I find a bit sloppy. We're supposed to infer a lot. We get Ezra's reunion with Hera (who is basically his mom) but he turns up wearing a Stormtrooper helmet? Consistent with Ezra's fetish for collecting them, yeah, but really? He could've got his head shot off! I forgave it for Chopper - also brilliant and perfect throughout - recognising him and then raged that they faded/wiped it before Ezra even reached Hera. A lot of weird choices like this, minor irritants (which accrue) prevented the whole being satisfying. There's an art to cliffhangers and I'm not sure they pulled it off. However, Ahsoka and Sabine switching places with Ezra was a sleight-of-hand I didn't see coming, and I must admit, I really want to see how this gets resolved. 

I wonder how it all played to those who'd never watched Rebels? Will there be a season 2, ever, now that all the streaming services, even Disney+, are rationalising their product? I'm probably forgiving it a lot, as I think Ahsoka S1 should've been better than it was, but the fact that I'm still thinking about it means I'd be back for S2. 

I'm a bit surprised by this, as I thought the reception was pretty lukewarm.

I'm assuming they're building their next set of movies based on Mando, Ahsoka, BF, etc...