S07E01-04 - Bad Batch Arc - Unsure

Tricky one to make a call on. I like this arc, though it does need trimming. The heart of it is of course the introduction of the Bad Batch, and Rex’s relationship with Echo. Echo looking nice and emaciated is cool - again we’re humanising clones. The natives are pretty same-old.

Aesthetically it’s not much - lovely lighting, but it’s on dull planets with the goofy Techno Union aesthetic and some weird new flimsy battle droids.

I’m really not sure on this one.
In favour of quality cut: A nice callback to our opening episode via CF99; new clones are interesting; development of Echo; nice Anakin/Padme scene; has everyone but the big three so I guess you’re putting them all to bed here.
Against inclusion in quality cut: Echo was last seen in the Citadel which isn’t very strong; very much a backdoor pilot; might not want to focus on brand new clones this near to the end; Anakin and Rex aren’t very interesting in this; it doesn’t escalate the war mysteries or other plots; it kind of becomes a Mace Windu episode at the end.

I’m actually tending towards not including it in the Quality Cut, since it’s neither core to Ahsoka/Maul/Mandalore, nor is it one of the more interesting episodes that comes this late in the show’s chronology.

I reckon you’d cut out all the native stuff. Start with the intro of the Bad Batch, have them learn Echo’s location, go straight to Skako Minor beginning at the elevator, fairly snippy Echo rescue, show them jumping onto the keeradaks (why? can’t explain well but they’ll have to just go for it), then wipe back to Anaxes for the return and second fight there. You’d lose a little character dev for the Bad Batch but they’re not really the focus unless they’re getting their own show, in which case they’ll repilot anyway.