Chris Cooper reviews the third and fourth episodes of Star Wars Rebels season 4…
I didn’t know we were getting two episodes of Rebels each week? Are they trying to get through it before Star Wars: The Last Jedi comes out? We’ve not had this frequency of releases before so it does make we wonder. Whatever the reason I’m really pleased we’re getting so much Rebels.
Last week’s ‘Heroes of Mandalore’ was a decent start to season 4 that seemed to wrap up the Mandalore arc as far as Rebels is concerned (I hope it did anyway as we’ve got other things to cover). But to get this out of the way early, I preferred ‘In the Name of the Rebellion’ overall.
Perhaps it’s the heavy Rogue One influence. Perhaps it’s because I saw so many things I think are cool. Either way there’s a lot to delve into…that I can’t because of my damn spoiler rule! I’ll tread carefully and try to get across the main points.
The main point of the two parter, to me at least, is to give Ezra and Sabine perspective. Ezra in particular is absolutely on one about Lothal. I get it, we all get it, Lothal is his home and he won’t leave it to suffer. But Lothal isn’t the centre of the Universe, and he needs to learn that every time he helps someone, he’s getting closer to helping everyone. Ezra has grown as lot but he’s still a kid and it’s important that the show still displays that.
There are ways of going about things, and I don’t think anyone in this show has it completely figured out. From Mon Mothma to Saw Gerrera, there are flaws to be found in their arguments and actions. It’s all flawed, and that’s what I like the most about the whole thing.
I did find the second episode to be stronger as it well ‘look at Ezra in a bind’ and more about him asking questions. But I am really enjoying this more serialised approach to story telling. If anything it shows that some of the stories that being told could do with even more time to play out, but I keep reminding myself that Rebels isn’t just for me, a 32 year old whose first Star Wars cinema experience was the Special Editions. 10 year old me would want them to get on with it, and Rebels is doing just that.
Chris Cooper
Originally published October 30, 2017. Updated October 31, 2017.
