Star Wars Rebels - Season 3 on September 24 : Will Grand Admiral Thrawn destroy them all??

[Fullbuster]

Still 3 days to wait

[Porthos]

Who wants more Rebels clips?  You do! You do!

 

Thrawn peers into hearts and minds in new Star Wars: Rebels clip (clip at the link)

 

Interestingly enuf, this one ISN'T from the season premiere, but a later episode. Should be fun.

 

edit

 

And the clip by itself, courtesy of SW's YT page:

 

 

Edited September 21, 2016 by Porthos

[Fullbuster]

12 hours ago, Porthos said:

Who wants more Rebels clips?  You do! You do!

 

Thrawn peers into hearts and minds in new Star Wars: Rebels clip (clip at the link)

 

Interestingly enuf, this one ISN'T from the season premiere, but a later episode. Should be fun.

 

edit

 

And the clip by itself, courtesy of SW's YT page:

 

 

 

Thanks

[Porthos]

 

What is she referring to?  Well I'll let you be the judge.

 

 

No one can say that Disney/LFL aren't promoting the crap out of the new season, that's for sure. 

[Fullbuster]

On ‎22‎/‎09‎/‎2016 at 10:08 PM, Porthos said:

 

What is she referring to?  Well I'll let you be the judge.

 

 

No one can say that Disney/LFL aren't promoting the crap out of the new season, that's for sure. 

 

Yep that's great to see them promoting it like that, this season could be a real success.

 

Today is the D-Day

[Porthos]

Decided to watch the premier early on the XD website as I'm going to be busy tonight.

 

Some thoughts:

 

Spoiler

Introductory setup episode is introductory and setupy.  But good.

 

Don't expect a mythic confrontation or even something as dramatic as the Season Two premier, but this was a VERY good character piece.

 

For those wanting Thrawn?  Sorry, he's barely touched on in this episode.  But the few scenes he is in set up his character nicely indeed (more on that later).  

 

This was mostly a Ezra showcase, with a secondary focus on Kanan.  Ezra is... not taking the events of the finale well.  But the perhaps surprising this is how much they affected Kanan as well.  The Ezra story follows mostly predicable beats, though well done.  The scene where he takes over the imperial walker (as teased by clips) was suitably chilling.  It was the way he acted after  that scene as the episode aired, however, which shows just how much he is flirting with the dark side.  Quick to anger.  Quick to throw away lives.  Quick to wanting an immediate solution.

 

As it turns out, his instincts are mostly correct. The immediate solution let them achieve their goals. But it came at a cost.  And just because the results might be acceptable doesn't mean the motivations behind it were.  More to the point the hints are already being laid that just because this time things turned out more-or-less OK, acting this way in the future is asking for trouble.

 

The Kanan storyline?  That's what really piqued my interest.  The scene with where he walked right into the space-spiders was exceptionally well done.  As was every moment with Bendu.  Tom Baker knocked it out the park here, and I'm looking forward to seeing where it goes as the season progresses.  Just everything about it, really.  For me, easily the highlight of the episode.  But then I'm usually a sucker for spiritual Force centric stuff.

 

Hondo, for once, was a little underplayed.  Understandable, I think, given the story being told.  But he was still enjoyable.

 

As for Thrawn, while he is barely in the episode, he does establish immediately that he is a Different Kind of Imperial. One who cares about the long term as opposed to the short.  There might even be an intentional contrast here between Ezra and Thrawn.  Ezra immediately leaps to a short term gain while putting his future at risk, while Thrawn is willing to have a short term defeat to serve longer goals.  Of course, Thrawn is in a position where he CAN be patient and sacrifice, if only because of resource advantage. Still, an interesting contrast and one I suspect will be visited again as the season develops.

 

Overall I think I'd give it a 8.5/10.  Nothing earth shattering, but some very juicy things set up.

 

Edited September 24, 2016 by Porthos

[4815162342]

I'll watch it online tomorrow

[DAR]

Overall pretty good episode

 

Spoiler

Like mentioned before we didn't get a lot of Thrawn but what little came from it tells me they got him.

 

But easily my favorite part of the episode 

Spoiler

 

 

[Porthos]

1 hour ago, DAR said:

Overall pretty good episode

 

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But easily my favorite part of the episode 

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Spoiler

Oh, yes.  Easily.  A strange hybrid of Yoda and Tom Bombadil that actually worked.  And considering how ambivalent I am toward Bombadil, that's high praise indeed. 

 

[Porthos]

Do have to laugh a bit though that

 

Spoiler

because of Thrawn's very logical 'let the Rebels have a small victory to get the Empire into position for an overwhelming victory later' he inadvertently helps sow the seeds of the Death Star's destruction.  Sure, none of those Y-wings will be the one to make the fatal shot.  But every fighter and bomber in that famous trench run bought enough time for the eventual winning shot to be made.

 

Maybe that's why the rebels 'fight so hard for so little'.

 

[4815162342]

9 hours ago, Porthos said:

Do have to laugh a bit though that

 

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because of Thrawn's very logical 'let the Rebels have a small victory to get the Empire into position for an overwhelming victory later' he inadvertently helps sow the seeds of the Death Star's destruction.  Sure, none of those Y-wings will be the one to make the fatal shot.  But every fighter and bomber in that famous trench run bought enough time for the eventual winning shot to be made.

 

Maybe that's why the rebels 'fight so hard for so little'.

 

Spoiler

 

That's a very stretched chain of causality though, that doesn't take into account obtaining Y-wings from other sources over the next roughly 5 years.

 

 

I thought the episode was pretty good. Ezra as always kind of blurs the line a little between true dark side influence and more generic teen angst rebelliousness. But obviously things are going to go further south for him before he comes back up to the light. Assuming he actually does fall and get redeemed.

 

Really enjoyed the Kanan subplot. I bet we'll see Mr. Bendu again, quite possibly in a meeting with Ezra.

 

Also, maybe it is just me but Governor Price looks like she is modeled on Cate Blanchett from Indiana Jones 4.

 

 

[Fullbuster]

IGN ABOUT PILOT OF SEASON 3

 

8.5/10 - GREAT : Rebels: Season 3 kicks off with the introduction of key new characters (including one hell of a villain!) and some very notable new directions for a couple of our heroes. The stage is set for what looks to be a very big season...

[RandomCat]

 

Spoiler

I enjoyed it a lot, even If I was at first taken aback by how almost regular episode it felt, unlike the Season 2 premier.

 

Ezra flirting with the Dark Side of the force is a good way to show a power jump, and you can see that those around him are even off put by this.

 

Kanan looks to be on his way off the Jedi path, towards a Grey center, and the Bendu is great. Including the Ashlan and the Bogan made me happy.

 

The rest of the Ghost Crew played second fiddle, but that's fine right now, hoping to get more Hera this season Rebels! and I'm the only shocked they destroyed the Phantom? It'd making me dread the end of this series when the Ghost will probably bite the big one.

 

Thrawn was spectacular, the seeds of a greater battle that I hope actually has Season 3 end with him winning in destroying the Pheonix Squadron. I don't think you can show Thrawn lose here, his ultimate loss should be his death due to that unforeseen action, and I don't want to see that in Season 3.

 

 

 

 

Edited September 28, 2016 by RandomJC

[Porthos]

Preview of the next episode, Holocrons of Fate:

 

 

 

FACT: Sam Witwer as Maul is one of the best casting decsions animated SW has ever made.

[Porthos]

"I want to destroy the Sith"

 

"(I want) Hope"

 

Not telling who said what.  Not outside of spoiler boxes at least.

 

 

Spoiler

"Twin Suns."  Yeah, I bet. 

 

Should have seen that coming when Maul said that he sought 'hope'.  I ABSOLUTELY should have seen that they were talking about the same thing:  Tatoonie.

 

Ezra saw Luke Skywalker, and/or Ben Kenobi.  At the very least,  Tatoonie. Which makes sense, since Luke Skywalker is in fact the key to destroy the Sith.

 

As for Maul?  Oh, yes. No doubt at all what he saw. There is no way at all that's not getting addressed. 

 

Really great episode, that built and built and built.  Little iffy on how Kanan got back into the hanger, but I guess he Force Pushed himself from the docked spacecraft to it. 

 

This season is already firing on all cylinders.

 

 

Separate observation:

 

Spoiler

Loved the little bit where Ezra shows incredulity that Kanan can do something HE could not (tame the Space Spiders).  Now, I get it, it's because he's good with animals.  Still, check your force privilege, Ezra.  Turns out some folks might know more about the Force than you do.

 

And still Ezra seeks power.  More and more power.  Okay, he deferred to Kanan.  That's good.  A positive step even.  But still the never ending thirst for power.  Might get him into trouble one day.

 

So let's say 9.25/10.  On a curve since it isn't an earth shattering episode, but it absolutely succeeds at what it sets out to do.  Little iffy on one point, as mentioned in the first spoiler box.  But otherwise, perfectly played.  Can't wait to see how this is all addressed.

Edited October 2, 2016 by Porthos

[75Live]

yeah this last episode was good.

 

I was debating about what they saw too.  Ezra is pretty easy to figure out, but Maul's vision could be taken a few ways, but I can see him seeing the same place but a different 

Spoiler

person as in maybe Obi Wan since he is the one that cut him in half.  So with him saying "he's alive" over and over, I can see it being for revenge.  That could be why his vision was different.  But No I wouldn't be surprised if they both saw Luke either

 

[Porthos]

2 hours ago, 75live said:

yeah this last episode was good.

 

I was debating about what they saw too.  Ezra is pretty easy to figure out, but Maul's vision could be taken a few ways, but I can see him seeing the same place but a different 

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person as in maybe Obi Wan since he is the one that cut him in half.  So with him saying "he's alive" over and over, I can see it being for revenge.  That could be why his vision was different.  But No I wouldn't be surprised if they both saw Luke either

 

Spoiler

In regards to Maul, I think there's exactly two people who would qualify as "he" who would elicit such a strong reaction from him:  Savage Oppress and Obi-Wan Kenobi.  If the Rebels crew are trying to fake us out, it's the former.  If they're trying to say, "Yes, this is obvious, but it's also going to be AWESOME", it's the latter.

 

The near maniacal glee at "he lives" makes me think it's Kenobi.

 

Can't see him caring in the slightest about either Luke or Anakin, so they're off the table from Maul's side of things.

 

And it also works from another angle.  One of the behind-the-scenes points brought up about Maul is that at the moment, he lacks a purpose in life.  All his dreams have been constantly shattered.  It's one of the reasons he's trying to latch on to Ezra:  To build a legacy.  

 

IMO, it's why he said: "Hope."  He wants a reason to keep fighting.  To keep pressing.  He wants to see that there is something out there for him to strive for.

 

Which makes it very interesting that the first thing he saw was Oblivion.  Maybe he should take the hint.

 

A bit of a deeper read is that, in the current canon at least, oblivion is what awaits all darkside users as they don't have the selflessness required to be apart of the Living Force after death.   But that's probably just an easter egg for real obsessives.

 

As it is, the need to have something to strive for could read either Kenobi or Savage.  The latter would be to build a new faction with his brother by his side.  The former would be to finally finish off the degradation and revenge against Kenobi, which he presumably thought was denied to him thanks to Order 66.

 

---

 

An interesting point that I saw someone make on Twitter is that Maul allegedly usually referred to Obi-Wan Kenobi as just 'Kenobi'.  If he never ever says "Obi-Wan" in their hypothetical fateful meeting, that famous line in Star Wars, won't be invalidated.  Sure, it'd be technical truth (making it seem like this was the first time in a long long time he was facing his past), but that's a now well established trait of the character.

 

 

 

Edited October 2, 2016 by Porthos

[4815162342]

Spoiler

Maul definitely is referring to Obi-Wan. We're gonna get a Tatooine Throwdown.

 

[Porthos]

 

[Porthos]

Been there, Maul.  Been there.