Tales of the Empire
I know that this is not what I had initially said I was going to do and I promise that next time we will finish off the prequel era with "Revenge of the Sith" etc. But on May the Fourth, Disney+ decided to go ahead and drop the second season of the Tales series. And I thought, well, I just did "Tales of the Jedi" so why not do this second season right after that. Much like "Jedi" focused on Count Dooku and Ahsoka Tano, this season splits episodes between Morgan Elsbeth and Barriss Offee. I decided to do these recaps a little differently. Rather than review each episode individually, I am going to review the three episodes that feature Morgan and the three that feature Barriss. I figure that way, I won't be repeating myself as much. Let's get to it.
 |
| She set fire to the... trees. |
"The Path of Fear," "The Path of Anger" & "The Path of Hate"
Morgan Elsbeth was first introduced in the second season of "The Mandalorian," which was also the episode that gave us the introduction of Rosario Dawson's live action version of Ahsoka Tano. She was also one of the main antagonists of the first season of "Ahsoka." I think she is the first live action Nightsister that we've ever seen and I think she's generally really cool. So I was glad that she was getting a showcase like this. I'm all for integrating these new characters more in to the Star Wars universe as a whole.
It's too bad that she doesn't get a better showcase than these three mini episodes. Any "Star Wars" fan knows that fear, hate and anger lead to the Dark Side so looking at the titles of these episodes, you probably have an idea of where this is all hading. "The Path of Fear" takes us back to the Separatists slaughtering the Nightsisters on Dathomir. After witnessing General Grievous kill her mother she is taken in by the Mountain Clan. But Morgan can't let go of her fear and her need for revenge. This leads her to trying to hawk her fighter tech to the Empire. They aren't interested in her costly designs but they are interested in the resource rich planets that she is magistrate over. The villagers are not happy that Morgan isn't able to keep her promises, but she has caught the attention of Grand Admiral Thrawn. After the fall of the Empire, Nadura, a former Corvus resident, returns to bring Corvus into the Republic. But Morgan refuses to give up her magisterial power and leave and instead attacks them, killing the entire delegation. Bo-Katan receives a distress signal, but is it too late?
I'll start with what I enjoyed about these vignettes. One thing the animated "Star Wars" properties know how to do is action and there are two really cool action sequences in these vignettes. The first is the fight between Morgan's mother and General Grievous. It's super dynamic and it's great to see Grievous in action, multiple arms spinning with each one holding a different lightsaber. I enjoyed seeing him fight against someone who wasn't a Jedi. It made this battle feel more unique and not like one that I'd seen a few times before in "The Clone Wars." The Nightsister magic really added something to it and visually it was, of course, stunning.
The same can be said for Morgan's duel with Ruzh in the second vignette. It's awesome to see Morgan showing off her skills here. I love how it's nighttime and everything is kind of in silhouette, but it's not so dark that you can't make out what is going on. The villagers watching from below and actively rooting for her defeat add another element that we haven't really seen before. It is stellar and it is probably my favorite thing from the Morgan storyline.
Everything else about these three vignettes feels very run-of-the-mill. This doesn't feel fresh or new. It feels like a story we've seen over and over again in the "Star Wars" universe. Even naming the episodes after the path to the Dark Side feels kind of lazy. And like you're leading the audience. One thing I hate is when shows/movies/books don't trust their audience. Everything about this feels extremely perfunctory. We don't learn anything new about Morgan really or her motivations. I don't think I understand her or see her any differently than I did after watching "The Mandalorian" and "Ahsoka." It all just feels like a wasted opportunity. The fight scenes and animation are stunning though.
Grade for Morgan's vignettes: C
 |
| The reluctant Inquisitor |
Barriss Offee was a relatively minor character throughout "The Clone Wars." She was a friend to Ahsoka and they sort of paralleled each other in certain ways. And then Barriss, disillusioned with what the war had done to the Jedi order, framed Ahsoka for murder. She was eventually taken down by Anakin, but it was too late. Bariss's actions are pretty directly responsible for Ahsoka leaving the Jedi order so deciding to focus on her for the last three vignettes in "Tales of the Empire" seem like a solid idea. Much like Morgan, here's a character we don't know much about and this is a way to flesh them out a bit more.
We meet Barriss in jail shortly after Order 66 is executed. Lyn, a former Jedi, comes to her and tells her that the Jedi Order attempted to have Chancellor Palpatine assassinated. She makes Barriss an offer, one that is extended to two other former Jedi, Ahmar and Dante. They are met by the Grand Inquisitor who basically tells them they are there to become Inquisitors themselves. Ahmar says fuck this and tries to leave but is killed. Barriss and Dante are trained but there is only one spot and Barriss is forced to kill Dante. Barriss is paired with Lyn on a mission to find a Jedi in a poverty stricken town. After the mayor lies to them, Barriss gets the information out of a scared boy. Lyn slaughters the rest of the town. They find the Jedi and it looks like the Inquisitor's have killed them. Lyn wants to leave the Jedi to die but Barriss wants to take them with them since they had surrendered. Lyn says no. The women clash and it seems like Barriss has killed Lyn. Many years later, Barriss helps a couple escape with their Force sensitive child. Lyn shows up and the two face off with Barriss still believing she can save Lyn.
Again, I have to give it up for the fight choreography in these vignettes. It is really well done and exciting. There are two scenes with Barris that I really enjoy that sort of mimic each other. When she fights the Grand Inquisitor and when she fights Lyn. In both fights, Barriss's roles are reversed. In the fight with the Grand Inquisitor, he is unarmed and is egging her on to embrace the Dark Side. Trying to get her to fight not like a Jedi. In the fight with Lyn, Barriss is calm. Very much fighting like a Jedi while Lyn is lashing out with her hatred and anger and fear. I also love how this final fight kind of mimics the fight in the final vignette of "Tales of the Jedi" with Ahsoka and the Inquisitor.
I do like that they are spending some more time in this era and showing us more of the Inquisitors. I think they are really interesting and I love getting more into the psyche of it and how it all went down. I have to give it up too with how smoothly the writers tell us that the Jedi that they find in the mountains is non binary. It isn't a big production, Barriss just uses they/them pronouns to describe them. I love that. And it didn't feel like pandering which I really appreciated.
The rest of the episode was kind of a big "huh" for me. It seems like the writer's were wanting to craft a sort of redemption arc for Barriss Offee, but it didn't really pay off for me because we had to take a lot of things on faith. When Barriss leaves the Order, she is angry. She no longer believes in the Jedi Order. It makes total sense that she would embrace the Inquisitors and want to join their ranks. But even in the first vignette, I don't understand why she is telling Dante they don't have to fight. That they won't kill them. It feels like the writers are unwilling to make Barriss a villain. They are worried that if she is too unsympathetic then we won't root for her so they tone everything down. But that really takes all the wind out of this redemption arc they are selling us.
It's surprising that Barriss seems shocked when Lyn kills the townspeople or when she sees that this town is in such squalor. It doesn't make a lot of sense that she is surprised when Lyn wants to leave the Jedi on the mountain to die. This is what the Inquisitors are doing and she has had to have seen this before so why is it so much for her to take this particular time. This all very feels like character being written to serve story and not the other way around.
That being said, I was kind of bummed when Barriss is killed by Lyn at the end. I'm not a huge fan of self sacrificing for character development and to save another person. I feel like we were robbed of a confrontation between Barriss and Ahsoka. Which is something I would have really liked to see and something I think would have resonated more than this drama with Lyn, a character we've hardly seen and who is hard to care about when she's had like 10 minutes of screen time total.
Grade for Bariss's Vignettes: C+
All in all, much like "Tales of the Jedi," this all feels very disjointed and kind of feels like a shrug. I think they are still struggling with how to tell stories in this shorter format and if they do a third series I hope it comes together.
Tales of the Empire Grade: C
Next up we really will finish up the prequel era with "Revenge of the Sith" and the "Age of Republic" graphic novel.
What did you all think? Am I being too harsh here? Are there folks out there that really loved this? What am I missing? Let me know in the comments.
No comments:
Post a Comment