But is it up to and including two? Or are there more?
Just in time for Halloween, Star Wars Rebels delivered a rather spooky episode. “Always Two There Are” finds Zeb, Sabine, Chopper, and Ezra on a mission to salvage medical supplies, and they end up meeting new Inquisitors.
The first few scenes of this episode we see the Kanan vs. Rex dynamic; each one wants Ezra to learn from them to be a Jedi or how to be a soldier, respectfully. I have a feeling this is will be a constant theme through the season (if Rex remains a major character). Their bickering and debating is going to have an adverse effect on Ezra–he’ll end up rebelling against both of them (as teens are wont to do). In fact, we see this in the preview for the next episode. How will this effect Ezra’s training? Will he find that being a Jedi isn’t what he thought? No one seems to ask Ezra what he really wants, they only want to teach him what they feel he should learn. This could make it easy for someone else to influence Ezra…tell him what he wants to hear and let him feel he’s guiding his own destiny. Which sounds like something a Sith might do…
Chopper gets in trouble during the mission, he’s basically hacked into by a parrot droid that is used by the Seventh Sister (Sarah Michelle Gellar’s long-awaited debut). She makes an impressive entrance, taking on Ezra and Sabine with her dual bladed lightsaber. They run, and end up meeting the second Inquisitor, the Fifth Brother. Ezra sacrifices himself to save Sabine, telling her to run and find Zeb. (Excellent animation here when Ezra gets pulled backwards by the Seventh Sister. Very eerie). The Fifth Brother immediately wants to kill Ezra, but the Sister stops him.
She’s very talkative and calculating when holding Ezra captive; she wants to lure Kanan by using Ezra as bait. It seems odd that she talks so much during this scene, I think she may be compensating for something…buying time for her plans perhaps. A lot of her conversation with Ezra seems to focus on telling him there really isn’t anyone left to train him (to be a Jedi), and I think she leans toward perhaps giving him despair about his training. She also says they know about Ahsoka Tano, clearly from Darth Vader.
The Seventh Sister also mentions the death of the Grand Inquisitor in season one (who knew he was Grand?), and that there are many (other Inquisitors) hunting Ezra and his master. How many Inquisitors are there? It’s obvious they don’t particularly work together (as shown by the Fifth Brother being easily dissuaded in killing Ezra by the Sister, and also later on when she doesn’t want to share any of the information she gets while interrogating Ezra). Will we be seeing Inquisitors turn on one another in bids to become the next Grand Inquisitor? Dave Filoni suggested on Rebels Recon that they are more of a ‘strange cult’ than Sith, and that there are a small number of Inquisitors that will be competing for advancement. While both new Inquisitors seem imposing, I still feel they were lacking the kind of intense dark power the Grand Inquisitor had. Hopefully we’ll see a darker progression in them, something more to fear, if you’re a Jedi.
The crew does escape, thanks to a great plan by Zeb, and they make it back to the Ghost. Kanan is particularly distraught when they inform him that there are more Inquisitors. He seems really disheartened; it wasn’t easy to kill the first Inquisitor they met. Also, what happened to Chopper when the parrot droid got ahold of him? We haven’t seen anything yet, but I wonder if that’s not entirely Chopper… perhaps he has a tracker planted on him, or something more sinister?
The title of this episode, “Always Two There Are,” raises some interesting questions. The title isn’t referring to Sith, as there aren’t any in this episode, and I don’t think it’s referring to the Inquisitors either, as it seems there are definitely more than two. I have a few thoughts on this: One, that it’s referring to teachers – like Kanan and Rex. It often seems there are two (or more even) teachers around for Jedi in training (such as Obi-Wan and Yoda for Luke). Ezra does say in this episode that he’s becoming stronger (in the Force), which sounds almost exactly like a young Anankin Skywalker. My other thought is that the title is a reference to Ezra’s growth in becoming a Jedi. Often times we see Ezra unsure of himself, or at the least cautious to use his new found abilities. Other times, such as in this episode, we see him much more confident, evidenced in the way he sacrifices himself to let Sabine escape, and also in how he interacts with the Seventh Sister. Perhaps the title suggests there are always two sides to a Jedi, the calm, cautious side, but also the firm, no-nonsense side that gets things done.
Overall, this episode poses a lot of new questions, and only time will tell how they pan out. Next week’s episode already looks to address the Kanan and Rex relationship, with a rebellious Ezra. We’ll also get to see a fan favorite – Hondo Ohnaka! Looks like we’ll be in for some pirate fun!
Courtney Martin is a graduate of Indiana University and works in publishing. She’s an avid Star Wars fan and wrote the recipe blog Courtney Cooks Star Wars on suvudu.com. When not enveloped a science fiction or fantasy novel, she is watching television with her husband and son, doing crossword puzzles, or playing with her Shih Tzu, Burt.