Star Wars: The Clone Wars Season 7, Episode 8: On to the next one
The second arc of The Clone Wars revival dies as it lived, wallowing in an uninspired underworld while promising something greater.
With the conclusion of this season’s second major arc, it’s hard not to feel a sense of emptiness. Not only do we have to deal with the fact that this show is truly coming to an end, but the arc itself wasn’t particularly good. Granted, it’s far from the worst that The Clone Wars has to offer. That dishonor still goes to droid episodes with the miniscule colonel in Season 5, but these recent episodes with Ahsoka and the Martez sisters didn’t lead to anything compelling.
The plot of this week’s episode basically wrapped up the storyline with the Pykes, covering our heroes’ escape from the crime syndicate. Along the way, they reveal hidden truths and discover a larger threat beneath the surface.
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The narrative starts well enough. Ahsoka tricking the Pykes into letting the Martez sisters go settle their debt—using herself as collateral, no less—is a clever move. In addition to eliminating any leverage they have over Trace and Rafa, it allows Ahsoka to cut loose with her Jedi powers. As much as she’s tried to distance herself from her past life, she can’t hide from the noble knight she was raised to be.
Seeing her come to terms with that is a powerful step for her as a character, and it sets things up naturally for her role in the upcoming conflict. Sacrificing oneself to save another is indeed something a Jedi would do, but this should have also led to significant character growth for the Martez sisters.
Sadly, that potential is undermined by the rushed pace of the exchanges. Ahsoka and her new friends aren’t given much time to discuss this new development, and what conversations they do have are incredibly basic and even truncated. Trace and Rafa don’t seem as deeply affected as they should by their friend’s past, and they get over their initial animosity within seconds.
Part of the disappointment can be attributed to the voice acting. Brigitte Kali Canales and Elizabeth Rodriguez don’t come off as naturally as Ashley Eckstein. To be fair, she’s had over a decade of experience playing Ahsoka in The Clone Wars and Rebels. However, Canales and Rodriguez mostly sound like they’re reading lines from a script. This makes the comedic bits in this episode feel awkward and stilted. More grievously, it causes the drama to fall flat.
It doesn’t help that the writers continue their preoccupation with the next story arc and connecting to other Star Wars products. Darth Maul being revealed as the head of this criminal organization was fitting due to his takeover earlier in The Clone Wars. I don’t know why he’s still running things after the Emperor supposedly dethroned him, but maybe that’s one of the many plot points that will be explained later. Of course, Maul then had to specifically mention Crimson Dawn, the branch of his criminal empire seen in Solo: A Star Wars Story. I would say this is fan service, but it’s hard to know if any fans are being served since that movie flopped.
Even the final scene, which should have been a touching goodbye between Ahsoka and her new friends, is given no time to breathe because the Mandalorians quickly come to whisk the former Jedi off on another adventure. As intrusive and superfluous as these elements were, it often feels like you’re watching a Marvel film. True, they were often more interesting than what was going on in the main narrative, but said narrative might have been better had those references and setups not been there in the first place.
Perhaps this entire arc would have been more engaging if it wasn’t latched onto a separate storyline and was allowed to truly develop as a self-contained tale. You could have progressed Ahsoka’s character to this point without trying to connect the episodic plot to a supposedly bigger picture. As it stands, though, the whole exercise feels like filler, something for her to do before the season’s eventual climax.
What did you think of this episode? Did this story wrap up on a high note?
Star Wars: The Clone Wars is available for streaming on Disney Plus.