Episodes are always better when something is at stake and the heroes are on the run from a threat they can’t handle. Sending the younglings to rescue Ahsoka from Hondo as Obi-wan is forced to abandon ship after an ill-timed siege by General Grievous is a perfect recipe for “battles I do not think that we can win.”
It’s great to see General Grievous back on the show, I feel like he’s been underutilized since almost season 2 (though his business at the beginning of last season was fantastic, too). I would love to see him marauding the Jedi in a way that makes him lethal once again instead of almost a joke. This episode certainly went a long way in bolstering that reputation.
With the younglings and their rescue of Ahsoka there are a lot of classic cinema motifs present with the travelling circus. For one, it’s instantly reminiscent of Ingmar Bergman films, though this is presented in a much more lighthearted fashion than The Seventh Seal. My kids told me it felt like A Bug’s Life (itself a remake of Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai), but I felt it was the most similar to Octopussy. In the 13th official EON Productions James Bond, both the bad guys and Bond have to infiltrate the circus to both enact and foil plans. And it’s funny, there are no less than three Star Wars alums in Octopussy, including General Riekan, Admiral Motti, and Boba Fett.
Overall, I felt this episode was very good. The lighting of the circus and their masks through the performance was so dynamic and, despite the colors, had the soft filters and lights you’d expect out of that Bergman sort film.
My one problem with this entire arc is Hondo. He’s acting completely out of character from every other time we’ve seen him, both in this season and in others. I don’t think he’d cross the Jedi so lightly, especially not Anakin Skywalker. I feel like the writers know it, too, otherwise they wouldn’t continue giving him lines explaining, “I change my mind a lot when profit is involved.”
There’s two explanations for this: one, this is how they’ve decided to shoehorn his involvement to fit the rest of the story, or two, there’s someone or something pulling his strings forcing him to act in this manor. I think the second is the much more compelling story, but we’ll see if that actually plays out.
This episode leaves us hanging in the middle of the rescue and there are still plenty of things that can go wrong before Ahsoka and the younglings are in the clear, and Hondo is certainly going to be forced to answer for what he’s done.
Until next week!