It Took Me Four Episodes Of The Bad Batch To Put It Into Words One Of The Big Reasons Why I Feel So Disconnected

It took me four episodes of The Bad Batch to put it into words one of the big reasons why I feel so disconnected from the show (other than All The Other Stuff, you know), which is because the show itself is disconnected from its own setting. I’ve talked a lot about how it’s taking the story away from other characters that should be getting their own story set on their own character–most notably what they did to Kanan’s story, but even more so egregiously with the “reg” clones themselves–that by making the regular clones low-key antagonists in the background, stripped of their individuality and how that was one of the major points of The Clone Wars, leaves a bad taste because it’s both disconnected from the show it’s trying so hard to say it’s a continuation of, and because it’s flattening the clones’ story.  All for the sake of these new characters. But it’s more than that, it’s disconnected from its own setting in that this could also have been a story about how the Empire is affecting the galaxy.  The setting is immediately post-Revenge of the Sith, which is an incredibly fertile area to play with, given the immediate rise of the Empire.  But The Bad Batch isn’t really doing much with it.  There are bits and pieces of it, there’s the brief scene of how people are cheering the end of the war, there’s the brief mentions of the new chain code thing, the exchanging your money for Imperial credits, etc. But they’re not part of the story in any foundational way.  This story is set in the dawn of the Empire, but it’s not doing anything major with the galactic upheaval of that, instead it’s about The Bad Batch being on the run for their own reasons, it’s about protecting Omega, and these aren’t bad elements, but they’re not strong enough to get me invested in the story in the way something like TCW or Rebels did. Because those shows were designed around the galactic circumstances that were necessary to the premise, Rebels had to be in the Empire era because it was about the Rebellion and the Empire, The Clone Wars had to be in the final days of the Republic, because it was about that specific war and showing how the galaxy was ground down by it. Smaller, more intimate stories absolutely have their place.  But when you bill yourself as being the successor/continuation of TCW, when you are bringing in all these familiar characters and mentions of worldbuilding, to connect it to the bigger epic stories of Star Wars, unless you’re bringing your A-game, it feels disconnected.  It’s not bad, but it’s nowhere near what it could have been.

In a galaxy far far away...

“you’re just mad your grumpy fave wasn’t there to glare at everyone”

No, I’m mad that this show doesn’t seem to be going anywhere. What is The Bad Batch doing? What is their end goal? What is this season slowly working towards? I can appreciate a slow burn when I can get some idea of what it’s building up to, but literally what is the end destination for The Bad Batch? Like yeah, the Clone Wars had filler episodes but it also had self contained multi-episode arcs and we knew it was going to all lead up to the end of the war, Order 66, and the rise of the Empire. But what is the Bad Batch doing? It doesn’t seem to be going anywhere and we don’t even know if it’s gonna get more than one season.

We all thought they’d make the end goal getting Crosshair back, especially after they seemed to be pushing it so heavily in the first 3 episodes, but now the Batch don’t seem to care about him at all. Out of 13 episodes, Crosshair has been in like 5 and one of those was only for literally a minute. You separated him from the Batch for… what? The angst? They don’t seem that broken up about it. Because Crosshair is gonna do something important with the Emprie? He’s barely been on screen. And we know the squad is not going to fight the Empire or help the rebellion because Hunter has said they’re not interested in that to both Rex and the Syndullas when offered. So what exactly are they doing? Protecting a Omega from the Kaminoans? Cool. We haven’t heard anything about the Kaminoans in multiple episodes. Figuring out what Omega’s purpose is? Nothing. Just trying to survive Imperial rule? Great. So is the rest of the galaxy. Why are you showing us their story specifically?

I can appreciate a slow burn as much as anyone, and I don’t mind filler episodes (I think more shows these days should have them), but you still have to be careful of moving too slow or else interest in your project is going to fizzle and die out before you actually get to the bits you’ve been building up to. And it’s even worse with The Bad Batch because we as an audience don’t know what the heck you’re trying to build up to. Every time we think we’ve figure it out, a new episode comes and changes the direction. This show has no direction.

So yeah, obviously I’m sad when my favorite character isn’t in an episode, but mainly I’m getting tired of the way every episode only gives us half an inch of plot, character development for Hunter and Omega while Wrecker, Tech, and Echo are just kinda… there, and Crosshair offscreen somewhere being vaguely “eeeeeviiiiilll” when we have absolutely no idea if the story is supposed to continue after one season or not. Every time they’ve set up what could be considered a “main plotline” they then completely ignore it for 4-5 episodes. At this point I really hope they do get another season because I don’t see all those loose ends tying up in a satisfying way in 3 episodes.

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"Place where all stars born" Master Qui-Gon Jinn and padawan Obi-Wan Kenobi trowelling near stars cauldron. For @kyber-erso as a part of May the 4th exchange