It’s a lame cliffhanger. Especially if you can watch the following episode right away!
yeah its kinda dumb, it happend with kenobi with releasing 2 ep in one day but that show did not have a cliffhanger
idk
I agree with much of what has already been said. Some of my early random and rambling thoughts on the two episodes.
There is a lack of tone or atmosphere to the show. Filming on a stage set or on the volume, as opposed to the outdoors on location, does take away from that immersion of believability for the viewer when not executed well, and more importantly appears to zap the actors of emotion or urgency to their scenes. Wexter put it well: like a stage play, but only more dry.
Rasario’s muted performance, barely a flicker of emotion at times so far, has in my mind also somehow affected other actors sharing scenes with her. They are a little one note, without pace, tension or emotion. As rocknroll41 posted, a little wooden. Dramatic pauses and talking slowly don’t make for engaging scenes that have little or no tension in them (see Andor for how that is achieved, especially for building tension). There is quite a notable difference between Ashley’s performance of Ahsoka for Rebels and Rosario’s for this. So I am hoping for that performance to kick into life, now we have moved past these set-up episodes. We know Rosario is a good and talented actress, but she is not showing much of this, as yet.
The staid dialogue isn’t helping and is quite clunky in places. I wish as much effort had gone into the pacing, emotion, and dialogue as there obviously was with the call-backs, fan service and mirroring or homages from previous Star Wars content.
I have to agree with Emre that the background characters, and the background “bad guys” being moustache twirling and lazily written for does not help and appear to become a staple for Filoni shows. The point about the droids announcing the “self destruct” announcement giving Ahsoka just enough time to narrowly get away is spot on. That scene was eye-rolling. The map MacGuffin yet again? Really?
Impaled by a lightsaber yet everything is okay, soon after, yet again? Do lightsabers have a “stun setting” now?
As Z6PO said, why make that impalement a cliff-hanger for the end of the episode? We know from the promo material Sabine has a lot of appearances and footage to fulfil. What would have been surprising, shocking, and a welcome change of pace and tone would have been for Shin to have killed Sabine. It may have even been reason to kickstart Rasario’s performance as Ahsoka, and out of the subdued somewhat aloof-ish characterisation this far. To shake things up, put the viewer on edge, give the story some oomph, feeling, some emotion. Instead, Emre’s “barely an inconvenience” line from the Pitch Meeting videos made me laugh out loud, thank you for that.
No mention at all of Luke, Leia, or Han yet. Even mention of Lando, Chewy, Ackbar? For the whispers and rumours of Thrawn returning to galvanise the Empire and throw the New Republic into turmoil, we just get Ahsoka and some casual interest from Hera? Well so far, anyway.
I did like the speed racer scene, a neat introduction for those not aware of Sabine or her character. However, it did feel like a car TV advert with their being no other traffic on the road out of a major city! Just a minor gripe.
A shout out for the sound design and score, ship design too. End credits are tidy too. The main villains, notably Shin & Baylan have stood out for me. Followed by the droids, and LothCat! Like Humby says, there was a lot of work to do get audiences up to speed with all of the characters and plot lines, it has now done that, so let’s hope it does things more elegantly from now on in.
Like others, I hope the series improves as we go on. Ahsoka is better than Kenobi, BoBF, and recent Mandalorian for sure. Yet nowhere near quality and execution of Andor. I eagerly await The Mandalorian to turn up for two episodes about him, and maybe another episode focused on Dr Pershing and the Imperial sidekick. Just kidding, just kidding! I hope we get more of “show, don’t tell” mantra for the rest of the story, especially for viewers who haven’t experienced those events from The Clone Wars and Rebels. The exposition was little clunky, like the other dialogue in places, and so flashback scenes would be more preferable.
I can see why critics are saying fans of Rebels will love the show as it does appear to be Rebels season 5. And I’m happy that it has scored so well on the review sites. I don’t usually give too much credence to them, but given the history of toxic aspects of fandom since 2015, the politicisation of fandom, review bombing, and hate-for-$$$ online, it is pleasing to see a show receive a high number of positive comments and reviews. And that other fans are obviously enjoying this so far.
That’s enough of my rambling on, and saying nothing that nobody doesn’t already know.
Some mainstream (non-toxic/non-FDM) reviews and explainer videos:
www.rollingstone.com/tv-movies/tv-movie-recaps/ahsoka-premiere-recap-star-wars-dave-filoni-rosario-dawson-disney-1234809424
www.esquire.com/entertainment/tv/a44889043/ahsoka-star-wars-disney-review
www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-reviews/ahsoka-review-rosario-dawson-disney-1235570414
www.indiewire.com/criticism/shows/ahsoka-review-star-wars-series-disney-plus-1234897711
https://edition.cnn.com/2023/08/22/entertainment/ahsoka-review/index.html
www.youtube.com/watch?v=R_Th-of7_zI - HelloGreedo Ep 1 Review, 5 minute video
www.youtube.com/watch?v=UL3sPxcNgA4 - HelloGreedo Ep 2 Review, 5 minute video
www.youtube.com/watch?v=eKyPkuxdG7o - IGN 5 minute review for both episodes
www.youtube.com/watch?v=DTnPVN6jLs0 - Star Wars Explained, 20 minute review for both episodes
www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZeoo8rQO3s - EckhartsLadder 5 minute spoiler-free review
www.youtube.com/watch?v=LN3IoG7Glgs - ScreenCrush, 35 minute Breakdown video.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=-dveuEHoFGs - Heavy Spoilers, 30 minute Breakdown video
“In the future it will become even easier for old negatives to become lost and be “replaced” by new altered negatives. This would be a great loss to our society. Our cultural history must not be allowed to be rewritten.” - George Lucas
Do lightsabers have a “stun setting” now?
😄
The Imperial need for control is so desperate because it is so unnatural. Tyranny requires constant effort. It breaks, it leaks. Authority is brittle. Oppression is the mask of fear.
Formerly Emre1601 - computer hard drives are brittle too!
Sounds… not great. Pass until the series is done and maybe I will give Disney another month’s worth. Or not I suppose.
The series is not great, but I will say that it is somewhat fun to watch. It feels like an odd mixture of Rebels and some of the old EU books, particularly Outbound Flight.
“Vader! Hologram, now!”
I had a hard time staying awake during the third episode. I think this is gonna be another series that’ll end up working better as a fan edited single film.
I actually loved the third episode and thought it was the best so far. 1 and 2 were decent but the pacing dragged - not a problem here.
“Remember, the Force will be with you. Always.”
yeah 3rd one was the best for me. Pace was much better than the other 2
Ashoka in space was sooo Clone Wars, the villans is the best aspect of this show
idk
Great episode! My excitement for this show has gone up a whole bunch now.
All of the live-action characters are starting to feel more and more like their animated counterparts to me, thankfully.
I’m not going to watch a single episode before someone in here, who despise Disney Star Wars as much as me, give it tremendous amount of praise. I’m eagerly awaiting, and hopeful!
WHAT HAVE I DONE?
The Ancient Lore
Kenobi: A Star Wars Story
Harry Potter Revisited
Game of Thrones Film Edits
Titanic Restructured
… and more.
I’m not going to watch a single episode before someone in here, who despise Disney Star Wars as much as me, give it tremendous amount of praise. I’m eagerly awaiting, and hopeful!
tbh I think it’s better to wait for the season to end. HBO is the only one IMO who’s able to pull off a weekly show. Most of the others should be dropped as one. I saw some leaks around ahsoka and it seems much more interesting than all the Mando/Boba Fett stuff we got. I guess we’ll see how it goes but I’m not overly optimistic. Burnt to many times by Disney SW
I’m not going to watch a single episode before someone in here, who despise Disney Star Wars as much as me, give it tremendous amount of praise. I’m eagerly awaiting, and hopeful!
I absolutely despise Disney Star Wars, but I’ll say the show is just okay so far. One of my biggest issues is the god awful pacing, which hopefully a good fanedit can fix.
Another problem is that a bunch of stuff happened off screen between Ahsoka and Sabine that soured their relationship a tad. Makes it hard to connect with the characters when we saw none of this.
There’s some cool moments and some obvious headscratchers, but I don’t think it’s anywhere near as bad as Obi-Wan, Boba, or Mando S3. If you liked Rebels, give it shot. If not, wait for an edit or skip it all together.
This show is pretty bad. The only reason anyone is positive about it at all is that it’s about Ahsoka and Rebels characters. The lightsaber fights are okay and that’s it.
The direction is awful. At least for the first two episodes, it seemed like there was either a mandate to have a certain episode length, or Filoni thought he could execute a “slow burn” by making everyone take unnecessarily long pauses while talking, or take long walks everywhere.
The actors are all good actors. It’s not their fault. You can literally tell that they’re being told to be “stoic” and quiet and reserved, and avoid emoting.
The worst parts for me are the horribly dumb decisions the characters make:
*New Republic captain not hailing, not talking to the dark jedi on a screen, just letting them aboard with no other checks or basic precautions. What was their plan if he said no, you can’t come in?
*The droids tell Ahsoka they’re going to self destruct in advance, and they self destruct in a way where they blow up the entire temple complex. How do they know they won’t incinerate the map they’re after? If Ahsoka has it and she gets blown up, they lose the map, and if she didn’t get it, the temple collapses and they still lose the map.
*Ahsoka gives the map to Sabine. Not to a New Republic cryptography expert, or I don’t know, Luke Skywalker, or someone with expertise in the Force or in solving puzzles. To her friend that she had a falling out with several years ago, because she’s a graffiti artist. It kind of worked out because it’s basically at the level of a Skyrim puzzle, but anyone could have done it.
*Sabine takes the map to her house, alone, because she “needs space to think.” There isn’t any special equipment there. It’s just working on it on a table at her house versus working on it on a table in Ahsoka’s ship. Guess what? It immediately gets stolen.
*The droids leave no trace, except for one of the droids, so that the heroes can conveniently get information from it.
*Even though she’s a general, Hera also forgets that the New Republic has a military, so they don’t bring any troops or backup or ships to Corellia. Something that might have come in handy when they need to prevent a single ship from escaping.
Then you have the lightsaber stab wound, but everyone knows that’s already a recurring theme in Disney shows.
I’m sure a lot of this could get fixed in fan editing but a lot of it can’t be fixed.
This TV series being favourably compared to Rebels is really discouraging me from giving Ahsoka a go, because I absolutely despise Rebels.
Filoni did say it was a continuation.
Based upon some of the reviews here, it appears this show is becoming what I somewhat expected - disappointing. I was expecting it to come across as boring, and use the characters primarily for nostalgia baiting those who liked Rebels rather than telling a compelling story.
We know the folks of Disney can tell a good story if needed (see Andor). Andor also benefited from the fact that there was no motivation to force nostalgia in your face. Also, thanks to some of the good folks around here, the weak points of Andor were edited out to make it better (with Smudger’s being my favorite, but I believe all the Andor edits are solid). I will only watch an edited Ahsoka, but I was hoping a fanedit would be used more for tweaking a few weak areas rather than having to “fix” it. I would like the show to stand on its own merit.
I am happy for those who enjoy it. It is fine to have different tastes. However, based on the spoilers I read and saw, this is probably not the show for me.
I’ve only watched clips from Rebels, but I have a general idea of the characters and plotlines.
For me, this show is slightly less fun than Mando s1 and s2 but a much better experience than Boba Fett or Mando s3. As far as I’m concerned, Andor is a whole different thing tonally and shouldn’t get compared.
I think Ahsoka will improve with editing, mainly to improve the pacing in places and make the rabbit-trails/roadblocks leas obnoxious and arbitrary. I’m thinking specifically of the amount of time devoted to the map puzzle and to “General” Hera trying to get people to do anything.
What I like:
Dislikes:
And in the time of greatest despair, there shall come a savior, and he shall be known as the Son of the Suns.
I think it’s kind of funny that this show is so women-centric by accident. Rebels had over 50% male characters (if you also count Chopper), but when the show closed, one was dead, one was lost, and the other would be pretty expensive/complicated in live action. Add in Ashoka herself to the survivors, and it just happens to be very female-heavy.
Welp, looks like this is the first live-action Star Wars installment that I’ll be skipping entirely. Between my disillusionment with the recent state of the franchise, the fact that it’s a sequel to a series that I have zero passion for, and the overall lukewarm reception even from superfans, I don’t see any reason to waste my time with this. It doesn’t even sound bad enough to hate-watch.
My preferred Skywalker Saga experience:
I II III IV V VI VII VIII IX
I’m enjoying it for what it is, but if I want to talk about gripes, I have a lot of similar thoughts as Vladius.
One issue that is bothering me a lot is how these shows are deciding to explore the New Republic. I feel like they are bending over backwards to make the New Republic seem incompetent with very little nuance. It feels like the writers don’t really know how to write politics, or putting such little effort to it that the New Republic plot feels very two-dimensional.
On the surface, it makes zero sense why the New Republic wouldn’t grant Hera’s request to allow her to follow a lead. They act like Hera has nothing to back up her claims, but a New Republic ship has just recently been attacked, a prisoner escaped and several officers killed. That would warrant a follow-up. I guess it just feels forced to me.
I’m not really wanting to argue about if this was the right direction narrative wise for the New Republic, I’m just trying to think from a writer’s perspective. If I had to write this story, make it so the New Republic can’t intervene, how would I write it?
For one, they could’ve made a point about how the dark Jedi released several prisoners when they also released Morgan Elsbeth, causing extra chaos the Republic is having to clean up, and adding deniability to whether or not Elsbeth herself was the primary target for this rescue mission.
I do think it was a nice touch to bring up Hera’s personal interest in the search, but I felt the Senators could’ve made a better excuse than, “We just don’t want to investigate.” It could been something like, “Our forces are spread so thin and we currently have several pressing situations we have to resolve first before we can green light an investigation into this.” Then Ahsoka could go ahead with the mission because she knows this is a pressing matter.
Also, I find it funny how we’ve already had three stories about New Republic ships being attacked, officers killed, and only one of them was followed up on by the Republic (and neither of them were the high ranking Imperial escapees).
EDIT: Someone else online mentioned that the now-cancelled Rangers of the New Republic may have helped show the positive side of the Republic more than what we’re getting now.
Random thought, but this time period would be really funny setting for a tabletop rpg. Could make the story go whichever way you want.
Random fan-edity idea: What if the attack on the Republic ship came after the map and Corellia stuff? Morgan Elsbeth isn’t actually involved in any of it very much, so breaking her out of jail could be reordered as a later step in their plot.
Random fan-edity idea: What if the attack on the Republic ship came after the map and Corellia stuff? Morgan Elsbeth isn’t actually involved in any of it very much, so breaking her out of jail could be reordered as a later step in their plot.
This honestly may be a great idea to radically edit the show. The only problem you run into is you can’t use the scene of Huyang talking about Baylan and Shins lightsabers to Ahsoka. So we’d need some other reason for Ahsoka to walk to another room, so Sabine can have the opportunity to take the map to progress the plot.
Has Ahsoka always had Psychometry (aka ‘force echo’) as a force power or is it a new ability of hers for this show? (in episode 2).
I thought it was something you were born with, and that it was a power that couldn’t be learned or achieved through training. Only a few individuals outside the Kiffar have it?
“Don’t tell anyone… but when ‘Star Wars’ first came out, I didn’t know where it was going either. The trick is to pretend you’ve planned the whole thing out in advance. Throw in some father issues and references to other stories - let’s call them homages - and you’ve got a series.” - George Lucas