The Ahsoka Season Finale Reminds Us What's Wrong With Star Wars

Опубликовано 13 октября 2023, 13:15

Ahsoka wasn’t hamstrung by being a fifth season of a show not everyone watched, or people not understanding some character motivations or who other characters were entirely. In the end, the problem was that whether it was called Ahsoka Season 1 or Rebels Season 5, it didn’t end up being a season of television at all. Instead, it was individual nostalgia plays sprinkled through long patches of nothing. And what makes that so frustrating is that creator Dave Filoni absolutely rocks at delivering impactful, emotional, engaging and most importantly  original Star Wars stories. Or at least he usually does.

I want to be clear: I love the character Ahsoka. Hera Syndulla — criminally underused in this season — is one of the best contemporary Star Wars characters. I quickly grew to love Ezra Bridger after catching up on Rebels and meeting him in live-action in this new series. And there were even a couple of episodes of Ahsoka that really tugged at my Star Wars loving heart. The first two episodes really  felt like Star Wars, which never stops being a great feeling. And yeah, of  course the Anakin episode got me in my feelings (it’s the music, it’s always the damn music).
But getting me in my feelings is easy, as I’m secretly a huge sap (that’s between us), and television seasons have a job to tell a complete story regardless of whether or not they’re meant to lead into something else. Ahsoka doesn’t just not tell a complete story, but the fraction of the one it  does tell just hangs in the air like the big bad thing they were trying to stop all season — Thrawn returning to the main galaxy — doesn’t matter at all.

By the end of the season, not a single one of our main characters addresses the fact that the very thing that everyone was trying to stop happened. Ahsoka (Rosario Dawson) is completely at peace, seemingly indifferent to the threat the galaxy faces – despite the entire motivation of her character has been to stop Thrawn since her introduction into the live-action stories. Then Hera (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) and Ezra (Eman Esfandi) meet up and neither exchanges a word about what his return means. The excitement these characters show to be reunited is important, of course, but not at the cost of engaging with your series’ own stakes. It would have been as easy as following up their tear-brimmed smiles with the dawning realization of what seeing each other again truly meant, or Ezra pointing it out to Hera who may not have realized that his return included the return of Thrawn.
Watch the video for all our thoughts on why Ahsoka Season 1 reminds us what's wrong with Star Wars!

#IGN #StarWars #Ahsoka