This week’s Star Wars Celebration ceremony promised a flurry of new and exciting announcements about the future of Star Wars storytelling on both the big and small screen. The news about three new Star Wars theatrical films planning to tackle three completely distinct eras in the timeline gave the series a sense of direction that it had lacked following the underwhelming critical and financial performance of The Rise of Skywalker; similarly, it was nice to hear that there was a clear roadmap planned for the future of the Star Wars shows in production or currently airing on Disney, including The Mandalorian, Andor, Ahsoka, Skeleton Crew, The Acolyte, and the potential of a second season of Obi-Wan Kenobi. However, it was just as important to hear about the next steps that Star Wars animation was taking.
It was officially confirmed that the animated spinoff series The Bad Batch, which just recently wrapped up the end of its second season, would be returning for a third and final installment in 2024. The Bad Batch was a spinoff series that took inspiration from a key storyline in the last season of The Clone Wars, focusing on the genetically modified clone troopers Hunter, Wrecker, Echo, Tech, Crosshair, and their young ally Omega. While some fans may be disappointed that the next season of The Bad Batch will be the last, it has become the right time for this entry in the saga to retire.
A Natural Ending to the Story
The Bad Batch actually had a relatively strange road to its creation; after The Clone Wars was officially canceled by Cartoon Network in 2013, Lucasfilm released a few “rough test reels” of uncompleted storylines that were intended for future seasons. Among them was a four-part storyline that set up the characters of “The Bad Batch.” Anakin Skywalker (Matt Lanter) and Captain Rex (Dee Bradley Baker) team up with the elite, specialized clones that make up the covert “Clone Force 99.” The Bad Batch continues the adventures of this special squad once the Galactic Empire has taken over and the other clones have executed their Jedi leaders.
The first season of The Bad Batch came out at the perfect time, and helped transition between the end of The Clone Wars era into the darker storylines that would later be introduced in Andor. While the rise of the Empire had been seen through the eyes of the surviving Jedi in Rebels, seeing it from the perspective of the clones was a wholly unique take. Unlike the other clones, the Bad Batch troopers do not have the same chips that forced them to follow orders blindly. Due to this, they refuse to execute the Jedi, team up with Rogue One character Saw Gerrera to avoid Imperial forces, and even save the young Jedi apprentice Kanan Jarrus (Freddie Prinze Jr.), who fans knew as one of the main characters on Rebels.
The first season of The Bad Batch did a great job at explaining how the clones fit within the new Empire. As fans knew from the later stories, the clone troopers based on Jango Fett’s DNA were cycled out of the Imperial Military and replaced with brainwashed stormtroopers who were trained and recruited in Imperial facilities. The series showed the complex emotional crisis this puts the clones in; many of them have fond memories of their service with the Jedi, and consider rebelling against their new leaders. The first season of The Bad Batch ended with the shocking destruction of the cloning facility on Kamino, but unfortunately season 2 didn’t really do much to change the stakes. While it’s revealed that the Empire is investing more into other cloning ventures, potentially teasing Emperor Palpatine’s personal research in extending his life, it seems more likely that this story arc will be wrapped up on The Mandalorian.
Limited Character Arcs
The Bad Batch is clearly modeled after classic action shows like The A-Team or World War II B-movies like Force 10 From Navarrone; it pulls together an eclectic group of distinct soldiers, each defined by their special abilities, and places them on a dangerous mission against incredible odds. While this is a fun way to pay homage to classic storytelling, it doesn’t result in a series that has a lot of depth. The characters in “Clone Force 99” are defined by their most overt qualities, and there’s little below the surface that suggests that they’ve grown.
Echo remains the skeptical rebel he always was, Hunter remains the active and decisive leader, Crusher is still the force of nature with a heart of gold, and Tech is still more comfortable solving puzzles and technical issues than communicating with others. While the young girl Omega has inspired them each to open up, the moments where the clones truly try to evolve often feel cheesy and shoehorned into a story that’s more interested in action. It also has begun to increasingly feel like there is a lack of stakes, as the clones seem to survive every mission without facing major repercussions. Even though Omega is captured by the Empire at the end of season 2, it seems like her rescue is almost guaranteed to happen at the beginning of season 3. Ending the series now is the right way to give these characters closure.
Making Room for Other Star Wars Animation
Star Wars animation has evolved significantly since the early Ewoks and Droids cartoons in the 1980s. The 2003 miniseries Clone Wars showed that stylized, action-packed storytelling was a potential future for the franchise, and Dave Filoni’s The Clone Wars only deepened and improved the entire saga thanks to the character of Ahsoka Tano. While The Clone Wars and Rebels both had clear story arcs planned out that reached powerful conclusions after several seasons, The Bad Batch doesn’t seem to have the same foresight. It would seem strange to see the franchise continuing to focus on the show when it might be exciting to open up the doors to an entirely different era.
Star Wars Celebration also teased that a new series of Young Jedi Adventures shorts set during the High Republic era would be coming soon, per The Direct, and that a second season of Tales of the Jedi was in development. Investing more time in these newer, and frankly more exciting shows seems like a good bet for Lucasfilm as The Bad Batch reaches its conclusion.