Jedi Business! Kanan, Ezra and Zeb protect those who can’t protect themselves, and take on Inquisitors in the process.
“The Future of the Force” is a darker episode for Star Wars Rebels, dealing with the Inquisitors on a mission to abduct force sensitive children. I mean, how evil is that?
The Fifth Brother and Seven Sister return in this episode with ferocity. The opening scene shows them boarding a civilian vessel to take a force sensitive baby (Alora) from her grandmother. The scene closes out with the Fifth Brother tossing his spinning lightsaber down the hall, and into the civilians. We knew they were evil before, but this just shows how evil and remorseless the Inquisitors can be. This also brings up the question of exactly what the Inquisitors are doing with the captured children. According to Pablo Hildago and Dave Filoni on Rebels Recon, it’s nothing good. (Yikes!)
Ahsoka Tano dispatches Kanan, Ezra, and Zeb to Takobo to try to find out the Inquisitor’s mission, unknowing they are attempting to capture children. Zeb and Chopper end up finding baby Alora on an Inquisitor’s TIE, while Kanan and Ezra move into the city to look for the Inquisitors themselves. They find out they are searching for a baby Ithorian (Pypey). Once Kanan puts the pieces together and figures out the Inquisitors are after force sensitive children, the look on his face is, well, just stricken. Again, the animation is so good in this series.
The cat and mouse chase between Kanan, Ezra, Zeb, Pypey and the Inquisitors is well done, very suspenseful. We get a dark, almost eerie, location for the chase, not to mention a feeling of dread when Pypey starts crying. I just didn’t want the Inquisitors to find them! The music is great here too; high action, but not really upbeat. It really adds a lot to the suspense.
We get to see some more interaction between the two Inquisitors as well. When searching for Ezra and Pypey, the Inquisitors emphasize their ‘ranks’ to each other with disdain (and a bit of bickering) – for example the Fifth Brother says, “You would question me, Seventh Sister?” Her reply, “Only when you’re wrong, Fifth Brother.” There is certainly some type of hierarchy within the Inquisitorial; only time will tell us specifically what it is and how it’s applied.
Kanan and the Seventh Sister duel with lightsabers while Ezra and the baby escape. This is pretty cool as the two characters are voiced by husband and wife team Freddie Prinze, Jr. and Sarah Michelle Gellar. Seeing these two fight characters against one another is, well, awesome. I love that they made Sarah’s character the antithesis of Freddie’s Jedi Kanan.
The most important scene in this episode is once Kanan, Ezra, Zeb, and Pypey arrive at ship, the Inquisitors are hot on their trail – and an epic fight ensues. Kanan and Zeb are, surprising, taken down by the Inquisitors. The Inquisitors use a mix of lightsaber skills and Force use to knock the others unconscious (even though Kanan manages to hold his own against the Seventh Sister). Ezra bravely stands up against the two Inquisitors (while holding baby Pypey); he was ready to defend the child no matter what. This is a main theme throughout the episode really – that Ezra is able to see just how evil the Sith and dark side are.
As Ezra prepares to fight, the hanger doors open with a brilliant while light, and out comes Ahsoka Tano. Listen to the music here especially; it’s the theme from Revenge of the Jedi softly playing in the back ground. Great throwback to The Clone Wars.
Now we get to see how skilled Ahsoka’s fighting skills have become. The fight between Ahsoka and the Inquisitors is AWESOME. It’s worth watching again and again, seriously. Ahsoka has become much more in control, not as chaotic as a fighter as she was when younger. I really can’t say enough about this fight; it was jaw dropping. Really just perfection seeing a beloved character like Ahsoka take the stage for an epic duel. I can’t wait to see more from her in future episodes (and aren’t we all ready for an Ahsoka/Vader showdown??)
The crew of the Phantom (plus babies Alora and Pypey) manage to escape Takobo, and Kanan and Ahsoka agree it’s now the Jedi’s responsibility to protect the force sensitive children. At first you’d think this episode has a basically happy ending, but we find out one of the Seventh Sister’s parrot droids overheard Ezra saying Pypey could live with the Rebels on Garel. So, unfortunately, we’re probably going to see the wrath of the Inquisitors, and possibly the Empire, go up against the Rebels stationed at Garel.
The next episode of Rebels is titled “Legacy”, and is going to deal with Ezra having Force visions of his parents. He wants to go find them, whether they are alive or dead. Again, we’re getting a parallel between a young Anakin Skywalker and a young Ezra Bridger. One only hopes Ezra doesn’t follow Anakin’s same path.
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.