‘Ahsoka’ Part Eight Review – ‘The Jedi, The Witch and The Warlord’ Sticks The Landing in a Thrilling Finale
Ahsoka has received something of a mixed reception with the release of every episode. It’s had definite highs, like Parts Four and Five — the latter of which we called a Star Wars classic — while our review of Part Seven described it as an editing mess. I’m happy to say that the season finale hits those highs once again, finishing the series on a surprising and thrilling note.
Fans looking for all the answers will be disappointed, as it is clear that Dave Filoni planned for a second season to answer everything that was raised during this season, particularly things concerning the newer characters. If you were concerned that we were running out of time to tell Baylan and Hati’s stories, you’ll need some patience because their stories aren’t over by a long shot.
We do get specific clarification on what Ahsoka’s character arc was this season, and I’m pleased to report that Sabine and Ezra take vital steps in their journeys too. There is plenty of well-choreographed and eye-popping lightsaber action — well-directed by The Mandalorian veteran Rick Famuyiwa — as the episode ramps up the tension with our heroes desperately trying to prevent Thrawn’s escape. It all ends in a slightly heartbreaking ending that I’m not sure I saw coming.
While this episode is a strong showing for Thrawn, I don’t think we saw anything that showed off his skills as a master tactician, but that is difficult to do in a live-action limited series without the huge set pieces and naval battles that a movie or animated series would otherwise offer.
Nitpicks aside, “The Jedi, The Witch, and The Warlord” is a solid ending for Ahsoka Tano’s first live-action series and I’m dying to know what comes next.
Spoilers ahead for “The Jedi, The Witch, and The Warlord”…
The finale kicks things off with Thrawn, Morgan Elsbeth, and the Great Mothers, immediately setting the stakes for the finale. Thrawn is very nearly ready to leave and time is against our heroes. He orders two TIE Fighters to attack Ahsoka’s ship in an attempt to delay them just long enough for him to escape in the Eye of Sion.
In the interests of stalling the enemy, the Great Mothers decide to reward Morgan for her devotion to the cause, imbuing her with a wellspring of Nightsister magick and handing her the Blade of Talzin (a burning sword named after the Great Mother of the Nightsisters on Dathomir). Morgan is left behind with a small army of stormtroopers as Thrawn and the Great Mothers prepare to leave.
Following that cold open it was a tad frustrating to cut to our heroes and seeing Ahsoka’s ship crawling along at a snail’s pace to protect the Noti migration. Of course, this fits with their characters; Ezra is very attached to these people and would want to help them before he leaves and Ahsoka would be a poor Jedi to abandon a people in need. But considering time is very much not on their side, it does feel like they’re wasting what little they have left stuck with the Noti.
On top of that, neither Ahsoka, Sabine, or Huyang seemed to consider the possibility that Thrawn might send more reinforcements and are taken completely by surprise when they’re attacked by the two TIEs. Ahsoka’s ship doesn’t have any shields up and suffers critical damage, preventing them from flying directly to the Eye of Sion. It’s a win for Thrawn, but only because our heroes are shockingly naïve. There must have been a better way to put Ahsoka’s ship out of action.
There’s a bit more downtime as our heroes prepare to make haste to Thrawn’s location. Huyang stays behind to fix the ship with the Noti, while Ezra constructs a new lightsaber with the ancient droid’s help. This is a wonderful scene, as Huyang learns this is Kanan’s padawan and Ezra learns that Huyang was the one who taught Kanan how to build his lightsaber. Huyang’s reveal that he saved a duplicate of the emitter Kanan used was very emotional.
It’s interesting to see Ezra revert to a blue blade. Obviously, this is supposed to be reminiscent of Kanan’s blade, but he created his green blade at a time when he was tempted by the dark side during a time of war. His time with the Noti in relative peace has allowed him to find his center and reattune to the light side of the Force; it’s a clever way to depict the journey he’s been on during all these years offscreen.
Meanwhile, Ahsoka and Sabine finally get to clear the air. Sabine is expecting a lecture on her decision-making in Part Four, but Ahsoka waves it all away. She seems to believe that Sabine was right to prioritize Ezra’s recovery and that everything that has happened was the will of the Force, though she doesn’t say it in as many words. You sense that she has forgiven Sabine’s rash actions and things are good between master and apprentice.
The action steadily ramps up after this. Ahsoka, Sabine, and Ezra take two wolf creatures and ride for the Nightsister fortress. Thrawn sees them coming and orders the Star Destroyer to rain turbolaser fire down upon them, which brings back memories of his assault on the rebel base in Star Wars Rebels season 3.
We see him smirk, knowing that this tactic should work, but our heroes manage to evade every blast, using the Force to open the doors to the fortress and squeeze through. His reaction upon learning that his plan didn’t work is a reminder that Force sensitives can be rather difficult to kill, even for someone as tactically astute as him. That tactic should have worked, but the Force is a powerful ally.
We then get a wonderful sequence as the three Jedi fight off against several squads of night troopers, expertly batting their bolts away and cutting swathes through them with their lightsabers. I do wish that some of Sabine and Ezra’s actions with the blade were a bit more visceral, but there were some great moves in here all the same. There was similarly some great choreography in Ahsoka’s fight with Morgan a couple of scenes later.
After learning that their initial defences have fallen, Thrawn orders the Great Mothers to resurrect the night troopers. Finally, we get payoff for the undead theory. The night troopers haven’t always been undead, as many including myself once theorized, but seeing them reanimate into stormtrooper zombies was fantastic. It’s a concept I’ve always wanted to see on screen since the Star Wars Legends novel Death Troopers and it didn’t disappoint. It was amazing watching them shamble towards our heroes and knowing that Thrawn now has access to an unkillable army immediately shifts the odds in his favor.
Sabine and Ezra’s realization that the Star Destroyer had already left led to the perfect culmination of Sabine’s arc. Dave Filoni has put in a lot of work to tell us that anyone can use the Force if they work hard enough, and Sabine finally uses the Force in a big way. Before they can board the ship, they are attacked by Death Troopers, in what is possibly the best depiction of them so far. These hulking brutes nearly prove too much for the two of them. A close-up reveals they’re already zombified; were they reanimated by the Great Mothers, or perhaps a callback to their rumored origins (Rogue One‘s visual dictionary suggests Death Troopers might all be undead).
Sabine manages to use the Force to pull the lightsaber into her grasp and then Force-pushes Ezra across the gap to the Star Destroyer. It does seem like a bit of a leap to go from pulling her lightsaber a couple of meters away to pushing a human body across a huge gap, but thematically it works so nicely that I can believe she found strength in the moment.
After another great fight scene, with Sabine using blaster and blade to take down more night troopers and Ahsoka finally killing Morgan once and for all in a visceral fight, our heroes jump off the top of the fortress and land on Ahsoka’s ship, fixed by Huyang and the Noti in the knick of time. It was a very predictable reveal that didn’t really work for me but it wasn’t quite deus ex machina so I can forgive it.
They chase after Thrawn into space, but it is all for naught as he has won. They tail him just long enough for Thrawn to taunt them on the comms, in which he nicely sums up Ahsoka’s character arc this season, wondering “just how similar you might become” to Anakin. Of course, Ahsoka has already dealt with this fear thanks to her time in the World Between Worlds, but it’s nice to get that confirmation.
In a surprising turn of events, Thrawn jumps back to the known galaxy with Ezra aboard and Ahsoka, Sabine, and Huyang are stranded at Peridea, a conclusion I did not see coming. The rest of the episode is a collection of scenes setting up what is to come for our remaining players. Our three heroes stay with the Noti and it is unclear where they go from here, whether it’s finding a way home or preventing Baylan from unleashing some new evil on the universe.
It’s remarkable that Baylan’s only appearance is a single scene at the end of the episode, standing amid statues of The Father and The Son from Mortis (a startling revelation in itself) as he gazes at a flashing light on the horizon. Sadly, Ray Stevenson will be unable to reprise this role going forward so presumably a recast is on the cards. They are huge boots to fill for anyone after Stevenson’s fantastic performances.
Similarly, Shin’s only appearance is in a scene where she returns to take command of the local raiders. Full of rage, it seems we’ll be seeing more of her in a potential second season coming into conflict with Ahsoka, Sabine, and the Noti.
Meanwhile, Ezra escapes off the Chimaera and returns to Hera. It’s a stupid decision to have him keep the stormtrooper armor on when stepping onto a New Republic vessel, but at least it gave us the touching moment of Chopper being the one to recognize him. I cried when he revealed himself to Hera. Eman Esfandi is the perfect person to cast in this role; I could see Ezra’s animated form in everything he did.
We last see Thrawn orbiting Dathomir with the Great Mothers. The Force has always been Thrawn’s Achilles heel, so to see him with access to dark-side magick is a terrifying prospect indeed that bodes well for future stories in the MandoVerse.
The Ahsoka finale wrapped this season up well enough while leaving plenty open for a second season. There are plenty of questions to answer, but since when does Dave Filoni give us all the answers in one go anyway?
For more on Ahsoka Part Eight, stay tuned to SWNN Live! on Thursday night on our YouTube channel.
Josh is a huge Star Wars fan, who has spent far too much time wondering if any Star Wars character could defeat Thanos with all the Infinity Stones.
