Ahsoka

Ahsoka is, for most of the first episode, fairly decent. Rosario Dawson is a rather muted hero, but there's a good fight scene early on and I thought the general was an appealing character.

But the character of Sabine makes no sense. She starts by doing something rebellious for no other reason than to show that, yeah, she's a rebel just for the sake of being a rebel. Later she does something blatantly idiotic that results in exactly what you expect to happen. And once again, the reason for her decision makes no sense.

If the rest of the episode were great then I might forgive it a blitheringly stupid turn of events, but nothing else made up for that foolishness.

I hadn't planned to watch anymore, but then someone on social media raved about how the series really took off in episode 4, which was directed by the guy who did the first Spider-verse movie. So I checked that out. And it was not remotely better than episode 1. Sabine was still stupid, the characters were still bland, and I was generally bored throughout.

Should have gone with my first instinct.

I usually don't write a series review if not all episodes are released yet, but with Ahsoka, I feel like I have to. So, just as a warning, this review gets a little ranty.

I keep seeing these amazing reviews of people praising this show to be some masterpiece and I honestly don't get it.

I have been a fan of Ahsoka's character since I was a child. I grew up with her and I am so nostalgic about her, especially because she is practically what introduced me to Star Wars, and I appreciate Filoni's handling of her character in Clone Wars and Rebels as much as anyone else. She began as an immature student and grew to be a very wise and independent person. I was thrilled when they announced her live-action show. The cherry on top was that Thrawn would be the antagonist. That being said, I do know her character and liked her from moment one.

And now, with this show, I feel incredibly gaslit by fans who claim this show (especially episodes 4 and 5) is Christ's second coming and praise Filoni for his genius. But I also feel gaslit by Filoni and the show itself. I am certainly confronted with a character I know nothing about whatsoever. Sabine is a different character; Hera is a different character. I get that animation and live-action are different, but naming this difference as an excuse for stale and emotionless characters is just a cheap ploy. All of these strong female characters that were written so well in the animated shows are now blank, emotionless slates with a history Filoni keeps hinting at but never fully explains and it honestly annoys me so much.

With the live-action show, Filoni's lack of writing skill on a line-level becomes painfully apparent, and to distract from that he keeps jangling shiny keys in front of the viewer with these callbacks and nostalgic moments like the Clone Wars or Anakin wanting to teach her one last lesson, which I still don't know what that was supposed to be. When I watched some YouTube videos of fans breaking the episode down and theorising what the lesson could be, I found myself painfully laughing at myself (in a sad way). How come the writing in this show is so bad and opaque that they have to rely on the fans to pull at loose strings and tie them together and hope that everyone then ends up thinking that this was what Filoni had intended from day one? When I tried to think of a possible explanation of what Anakin's lesson was supposed to be about, I couldn't think of any answer that matched what other people were thinking. It is not only that, but I feel like everybody has different answers and not in a way where a writer writes didactically to leave it for free interpretation but in a way where the writer had no idea what they even wanted the lesson to be.

So far, in this show, I have only seen bad writing, bad dialogue, stale acting, characters that are intriguing (Skoll and Shin) but are left so vague for so long that by the end I don't even care where they came from. You can't leave the mystery open for so long and then explain it at the end of the season (if their character will even be explained at all). If there is nothing for me to get emotionally attached to at a certain point, I will not care for the rest of it, even if it does end up being explained. The same is true with the history between Sabine and Ahsoka. What is it? Why aren't we seeing it? Why are the characters just talking about it like it is general knowledge the viewer already knows? (Again, if it is supposed to be written to keep it open for interpretation, it has sorely failed.) There are only two more episodes left and if it does end up being explained in the LAST TWO EPISODES the pacing will be off so freaking bad!! Why wait so long?

The issue I have is the writing. And the writing in a show is everything, so I have an issue with the show. And with everyone pretending this is "the best Star Wars since..." If this is the best Star Wars since the Disney area, then it's pretty bad to begin with.

I don't want to tell anyone that they are supposed to dislike this show. If you enjoy it, great. But I feel so sorely misrepresented in my opinion of this show. It seems like everyone keeps falling for these cheap callbacks and nostalgia bait moments and cheap execution of some character arc I wasn't even sure Ahsoka was on, because, again, nothing about the writing has led me to think that! I get that a lot of things about a story are supposed to be shrouded in mystery to keep the viewers' interest, but at one point, when everything is just plain vague and so unsatisfyingly touched upon and then poorly executed, I really have to ask myself if anyone working on this show had any idea about what they wanted this show to be!

I hope the last two episodes will prove me wrong, but I doubt it. You can't rely on the last two episodes to remedy an entire season of bad writing.

Ahsoka may not the best thing from Star Wars that I've seen but it's still worth watching. I was really looking forward to this when I first read about it and the even more so after I saw the trailers. It did not disappoint! I don't consider myself a huge Star Wars fan but I'm a normal fan who does enjoy most of them. Like by most, I really liked The Mandalorian and Andor. I thought those two are some of the best things Star Wars has put out since the original trilogy. I even thought The Book of Boba Fett and Obi-Wan Kenobi were both worth watching. I don't understand most of these negative reviews, it's like most of the people writing them didn't want to like this. What were you expecting that you didn't get? Anyway, if you're a fan of Star Wars I definitely recommend you give this a try.

What I've seen in the first two episodes is the definition of mediocracy. It's not bad, it's not good, just hanging somewhere in between.

The story so far is non-existent. There are some bad guys and... that's it.

Writing is horrible. The character interactions were pretty much the most boring I've seen in a very long time. It was painful to watch sometimes. It was that bad.

Forced wisdom... is the worst kind of writing.

Logic has left the show. When I saw Sabine, one of the smartest fighters in the SW Universe, punching a robot in the face, I immediately lowered my expectations. After that, it even got worse. She's definitely NOT the Sabine I knew from the Rebel series.

Acting is also generally ... bland. Even Rosario Dawson seems off as Ahsoka.

But there are also good things.

CGI and scenery are breathtaking.

David Tenant is amazing as the voice of Huyang. God I love this man.

The show has some promise of mystery in the distant horizon, and that's what encourages me to watch more. If they can deliver, the show can get a lot better.

After Andor showed how amazing a Star Wars show can be when competently written by people with talent, directed by people with creativity and performed by actors with passion for their roles, this show comes along to remind everyone that Andor was a one-off occurrence, an anomaly. Ahsoka exemplifies the (few) strengths and the (many) weaknesses of recent Disney Plus Star Wars shows. It wastes time, it has bland characters and it exists to remind you of better things Star Wars has done.

The plot of Ahsoka can easily be summarised as being stretched beyond belief. The story of Ahsoka and the Rebels crew trying to prevent the return of Thrawn and rescue Ezra could have easily been told in at least 3 or 4 episodes, with the other 4 being used to build to an epic battle with Thrawn. Instead it takes us 8 episodes to set up the next season or movie, instead of resolving the plotlines of this season. It moves at an agonizingly slow pace wherein it doesn't build any of its characters and just serves up meaningless action and fluff.

The characters are mostly bland and one-note. The returning Rebels characters are all far less expressive than their animated characters and the actors all look bored and confused. It's clear the direction they were given was poor since most are competent actors in other projects. Rosario Dawson is wooden as Ahsoka which is a real shame. She reacts to everything with bored indifference. Sabine is now insufferable who basically screws over the good guys more than once and is never called out on it. The only exceptions are Baylon played by Ray Stevenson, and Shin played by Ivanna Sakhno. They're dynamic is legitimately interesting but that is all there is. Interest. They're characters are given lackluster wrap-ups.

Of course this show contains all the fan-service you'd expect. It is all there to hide the clear lack of any substance in the script. The show is visually pretty great but the costumes look so cheap and bland. When the volume is used it is very obvious. Another issue is that no casual viewer can really enjoy this show without having consumed 7 seasons of Clone Wars and 4 seasons of Rebels. The show keeps telling us that Thrawn is dangerous but we are never shown this. Thrawn does barely anything in the overall plot and there is no reason to fear him.

In the end, this is another show with nothing to say. It lacks substance. Two decent characters, pretty visuals and fan service can't save this show from the pool of mediocrity/stupidity of its fellow TV show brethren. Just re-watch Andor.