S03E11-12, S02E15 - Heroes on Both Sides / Pursuit of Peace / Senate Murders - Important
The first episode is probably the best politics episode in the series. With almost no action, it’s still tense and interesting. Padme and Ahsoka’s secret meeting with separatists is interesting and makes our opposition far more than cackling villains and faceless armies. And the terrorist attack is a great step for the Republic on the path to Empire. It also introduces Lux, who’s important later to the Mandalorian storyline and gives Ahsoka some more development. Important.
The second is less interesting because it’s more about banking negotiations, votes being short of a majority, and buying more faceless soldiers. It’s nice to see Bail but his character trait is basically “does the noble thing” which isn’t fascinating. Padme gets targeted by bounty hunters hired by Dooku but this just isn’t very interesting, and she behaves quite unwisely too. We also see Palpatine (not Sidious) being villainous, which I’m not a fan of in advance of the reveal. Excludable.
In the second, Padme does give a fantastic speech at the end, which I’d like to preserve, but I think it’d fit nicely connected to some other episode.
The third focuses on Padme’s friend Onaconda, who I’ve never found interesting, and starts with another big speech, which is weird after the prior episode ended on one. It also features that obnoxious investigator character. These three episodes in total are way too heavy on politics and also kind of muddled in their political direction, which I think continues to justify that we only keep the first.
I don’t think we need to care that Onaconda dies in this episode. He was always very minor, I’d just happily let him fade back into the background.
We get some Mon Mothma in episode three, and I would like to see some of her in the clone wars, to be followed by her presence in Hal’s Ep3, the upcoming Cassian Andor series, and Rogue One. But she barely acts here. She’s better in the earlier episode where Ahsoka helps save Padme from Aurra Sing- which also might be a good place for the second episode’s speech.
Excludable, though I’d almost call it Objectionable for that investigator guy.
I think the first episode belongs right after the Nightsister arc, so as soon as all of our major plots are in play, the central politics of the war deepen and as an audience we realise there’s going to be far more to the show than battle after battle.