Star Wars: The Bad Batch: Season 2

Earlier Reviews of the season:

Star Wars: The Bad Batch "Tribe"

A kid Wookiee is a cute enough idea, but he's also a Jedi! Good deal!

And he mistrusts Clones (for good reason).

On the downside I found the Wookiee platitude at the end of the end meaningless and a case of the producers trying to tack on a satisfying ending to a scenario where one isn't actually possible.

But Junior Wookiee Jedi! Too cute! ***.

Star Wars: The Bad Batch "The Clone Conspiracy"

Another episode in which NONE of the Bad Batch appear. Have they been pushed out of their own show or has this show simply always been larger than them? I'm leaning towards the second idea.

That poor foolish Senator Chuchi has NO idea what she is dealing with, and is in way over her head. In fairness, this is pretty much true of every single critic of the Empire before the actual Rebellion was formed.

I told myself I was going to be disappointed if one of the Bad Batch didn't step out of the smoke at the end after rescuing Chuchi. I was wrong. Rex was a MUCH better surprise.

For the record, Galactic Senate scenes remain this franchise's poison and I don't see why they keep going back to them, even knowing how much fans hate them. It's almost as annoying as them repeatedly bringing back Jar-Jar Binks on The Clone Wars just to spite the audience, but worse because at some point they simply stopped doing THAT when they realized it was gaining them nothing. Senate hearings under the Empire are exactly as dull as Senate hearings under the Republic.

Solid week otherwise though. ****.

Star Wars: The Bad Batch "Truth And Consequences"

Two episodes this week! A treat!

Rex cynically say Palpatine has been several steps ahead of them this entire time and that they just played right into his hands. I have a different interpretation.

That was NOT the outcome the Emperor wanted or planned. It's because he's such a devious bastard he can improvise a scapegoat and excuse on the fly, but if you ask me, he NEVER wanted the truth of that massacre to become public knowledge. Him actually appearing in the Senate shows how badly things have actually gotten outside of his control and plans. Yeah, Palpatine's a slippery viper with the Devil's luck. But don't tell be he planned that or that he's David Xanatos. He's just super lucky, and when he was going up against the Jedi, going up against a group of stupid people. I refuse to give Palpatine more than he's due. He's not exactly what you'd call a subtle villain with that cloak and voice, is he?

I think the Clones damaged him so badly he actually had to put in a personal appearance to smooth things over. That's unheard of and shows that this was NOT his plan all along. It's a pity the Clones are too cynical to see it that way.

Dee Bradley Baker is a voicer-over wizard. It's amazing all of the different voices, tones, and inflections he can give all the different Clones. The most impressive thing is the dude isn't even British and his fake accent is flawless anyways. More credible than Klaus' German accent on American Dad! at any rate.

This show is more of the high quality of The Clone Wars, rather than the skakey quality of Rebels, and poor quality of Resistance. Although to be honest, the nice thing about it is it isn't repeating many of The Clone Wars' most obvious mistakes. I like it. ****.

Star Wars: The Bad Batch "The Crossing"

Maybe Tech was a little insensitive as to what he said to Omega, but the truth is, they were in a life and death scenario and she was focused on the wrong thing.

That being said I like their heart-to-heart at the end and his clarification that although he reacts to things differently he still feels things.

At this point I'm trying to think of a redeeming virtue Cid possesses and coming up entirely empty.

It was all right but only all right. Not great or anything. ***.

Star Wars: The Bad Batch "Retrieval"

I like the constant contrasts the episode does between how Makko and the Bad Batch do business and treat their respective crews. Truthfully, it feels a bit heavy-handed, and like Bennie should be getting the message sooner than he does. But it's obviousness can be forgiven because it IS a kids show, and I only think it's obvious as an adult viewer. For kids the clarifications might be necessary, and I think the contrasts are certainly not going overboard in preachiness either.

I like Bennie saying they obviously weren't Epsiem miners and Omega quipping he stole the wrong ship.

I never heard of the guy who played Mokko before but he has a great voice.

The cool thing about Hunter's trapeze rescue of Omega is that she trusts him to make it. It's a crazy stunt for a kid to do unless they totally trust the adult. And it's edge-of-your-seat exciting for that reason.

A good week, I think. This obviously isn't "Andor" or anything, but not everything Star Wars needs to be. It was Good Enough. ***1/2.

Star Wars: The Bad Batch "Metamorphosis"

Jimmi Simpson gave a fabulously understated performance as Dr. Hemlock. He whispers his lines which makes him scary. That was the exact reason we loved Thrawn. Now Hemlock does NOT have a spooky design to go with the creepy voice. But as far as Thrawn goes, it you ask me, the voice actually did 90% of the work. The spooky design was just gravy.

When I saw the monster for the first time I was like, "Feed me, Seymour!"

The bananas climax affirms that there are two types of CGI shows done on a TV budget: Badly animated cheap ones, and Lucasfilm. Those are the only real types of variety there are.

Pretty damn good week. ****.

Star Wars: The Bad Batch "The Outpost"

Amazing on every level.

For those keeping score at home, this show IS technically a TV-PG kids cartoon. That just delivered THAT. It's not that the show is inappropriate for kids. It just believes kids can handle different things than most action cartoons used to believe.

I can't take people talking smack about the Disney era of Star Wars seriously, as long as this show remains superior to The Clone Wars in every way. Honestly, I think it's mostly the dialogue. I don't believe you'd hear the following exchange on The Clone Wars.

Mayday: "I don't know what's more disturbing, the fact that this guy is wearing the gear of one of my men they killed, or the fact that they left him behind."

Crosshairs: "He just would have been dead weight to them."

Mayday: "Remind me not to die on your watch."

That dialogue snaps. It crackles and pops. It's part of a complete breakfast. It's my everything and everything I wish Star Wars was 20 years ago and more and never was. I will seriously argue this episode is of a higher quality than the original film or The Empire Strikes Back. Those seem to be the go-to for Disney haters to throw in our faces. Without being able to admit that Disney+ episodes have topped BOTH of those films on multiple occasions. In almost every one of the Disney+ series.

Also want to give special attention and praise for the great facial expression the CGI animates Crosshairs with. CGI is a notoriously bad medium for animating facial expressions. The fact that Lucasfilm is the only other studio besides Pixar and SOMETIMES Dreamworks that can regularly pull them off well is the selling point of Lucasfilm.

Great episode. I love this show and defy anyone who watches it to call the Disney era of Star Wars inferior. It's not. It's amazing. *****.

Star Wars: The Bad Batch "Pabu"

I had some gripes about the episode as it was going. It seemed beyond convenient the planet seemed to be shaking apart the same day as the Bad Batch visited, and were pondering setting down stakes. I thought "This is only happening because them staying is a GOOD idea, and the planet being destroyed will preserve the status quo, no matter how dumb or coincidental it really is."

But lo, and behold, the planet is NOT destroyed after all, and the Bad Batch DO decide to stay at the end, so I can't stay mad at it for that reason. I'll probably be pissed if and when the show wrecks that nice little world to get The Bad Batch back on the run again, but for this week we were permitted a rare nice ending, and I appreciated that. ***1/2.