Long before the prequels started filming, George Lucas announced that R2-D2 and C-3PO would be in all six “Star Wars” films, so we had time to accept the huge coincidence that these two droids just happened to be owned by two generations of Skywalkers who never knew each other.
The prequels fell back on classic trilogy connections a couple more times with a young Boba Fett and a surprisingly big role for Yoda. And, of course, Chewbacca appeared in “Episode III,” and I think fan reaction to that fell somewhere between groans and cheers; most people just kind of giggled at the silliness.
In his video prequel reviews, Plinkett of Red Letter Media pounced on the opportunity for a joke and pasted a young Han Solo into scenes from “Episode III,” arguing that one of the film’s positives was that at least Lucas didn’t go this far.
With the “It’s a small galaxy” precedent set by the prequels, “The Clone Wars” then gave us a young Greedo and Tarkin — not to mention further adventures of Boba Fett and now Chewbacca, who made his series debut in Friday’s two-episode Season 3 finale.
Still, when I ranked my top 10 favorite “Clone Wars” characters recently, only three had their roots in the original trilogy (Obi-Wan, Boba Fett and Tarkin). This show has excelled at developing characters, so it shouldn’t have come as a surprise that — while the previews hyped up Chewbacca — Anakin’s Padawan Ahsoka Tano was the true star of “Padawan Lost” and “Wookiee Hunt.”
In perhaps the most technically impressive arc of the series so far, Ahsoka gets dumped on a Trandoshan hunting world, where the lizard-like beings track down and kill poor souls like game, going so far as to mount their heads and display their pelts.
The unnamed world (perhaps Trandosha itself) is a cross between the beauty of “Avatar’s” Pandora — Ahsoka and her new Jedi youngling allies climb a gravity-defying tree into a cave hideout — and the misty creepiness of Dagobah. The one hurdle that the animators haven’t leaped yet is the ability to create a forest world like Endor: Although these episodes take place in a tree-laden forest, the ground appears hard rather than grassy.
Not a talky pair of episodes by any means, “Padawan Lost” and “Wookiee Hunt” give us efficient, visceral moments. These Trandoshans are villains that I immediately loved to hate, with the way they gleefully lust for the killing of innocents. And they are fairly competent at it. There’s a moment where Ahsoka Force-plasters herself to one side of a branch as we see a blood-lusting Trandoshan yelling that he will kill her in the background, and it’s more palpably intense than anything you’ll see in a modern summer blockbuster. (“The Clone Wars” a kids’ show? I think we can put that perception to rest now.)
For once, Anakin is unable to rescue Ahsoka, and yet she will survive this ordeal because of his training. The animators may struggle with ground surfaces, but dirt is in their wheelhouse: Ahsoka gets grimy as the story goes on, visually emphasizing that this is not a standard “mowing down clankers with a lightsaber” mission.
The appearance of Chewbacca in “Revenge of the Sith” may have smacked of desperation to make a classic trilogy connection that the film’s quality wasn’t achieving. But when Chewie appears in “Wookiee Hunt,” Lucas’ team earns the otherwise absurd coincidence that the friend of the friend of the classic trilogy’s main character once knew the apprentice of the main character’s dad.
Chewbacca has plenty of “Star Wars” street cred, but what’s notable about these episodes is that Ahsoka does, too. They team up as equals, not only in skills but also in iconography. In fact, it’s Ahsoka — using her natural fearlessness and everything she’s learned from Anakin — who takes the lead on the mission, with Chewbacca as, appropriately enough, a valuable sidekick.
Chronologically, this is the first time we meet Chewbacca, and — despite having seen the original trilogy 476 times — I was actually able to watch this episode as if I was just now learning about Wookiee culture. The writers, animators and voice actress Ashley Eckstein had me viewing events through Ahsoka’s perspective. I was impressed that the Togruta teen recognized the value of this apparent brute, communicating with Chewbacca (either she knows rudimentary Wookiee-ese or she used the Force) to learn not only his name, but also his plan for building a makeshift communication device to call his nearby home planet for help. And while the other younglings are understandably wary, Ahsoka and Chewie are on the same page about taking the fight to the Trandoshans and getting off this rock.
In a nicely subtle bit of continuity at the end, we see (in the background of Anakin and Ahsoka’s happy reunion) Chewbacca and his fellow Wookiees chatting with Yoda, thus establishing their relationship for “Episode III.” (On a side note, it’s too bad that the same attention to continuity wasn’t paid in the recent “Citadel” trilogy when Even Piell dies, contradicting previous continuity that had him dying in the “Coruscant Nights” books after “Episode III”). Still, the Yoda-and-Wookiees meeting illustrates that “The Clone Wars” and its original characters are as firmly ingrained in “Star Wars” lore as the movies.
And yet, with three seasons complete, connections to the “Star Wars” movies are no longer needed to make “The Clone Wars” appointment viewing. I’ll take the adventures of Little ‘Soka any day.
What are your thoughts on the season finale and Season 3 as a whole? Was this the best season yet? What do you hope to see in Season 4? Share your thoughts below.