Star Wars Rebels is back from its last hiatus of season three (thank the maker) and it’s back with a bang! Titled Legacy Of Mandalore, we continue to explore Sabine’s backstory and Mandalorian heritage and man has it paid off in spades! Again, lots and lots of character development for Sabine and a ton of mythology exploration once again, and I have to say, Rebels is bonkers good right now. If you aren’t watching it, you need to catch up like yesterday. Having said that, Legacy Of Mandalore does have an unexpected twist, so as always ***SPOILERS*** abound after the image, you’ve been warned….
So in summary, Sabine returns to the snowy Mandalorian planet of Krownest where Clan Wren’s stronghold is (with Chopper, Kanan, Ezra, and Fenn Rau in tow) with the Darksaber in hopes of mending fences with her family and brining Mandalore into the fight against the Empire. Well, she’s greeted about as you would’ve expected – with a troop of Mandalorian warriors who promptly use their jetpacks and weapons to bring down the crew in the Phantom. It’s revealed that the main Mandalorian guard is Sabine’s brother, Tristan, who takes them to Clan Wren’s stronghold (which looks like a dope-ass ski lodge) to meet with the leader of Clan Wren – and Sabine’s mother – Ursa Wren. She listens to what Sabine has to say and is genuinely surprised and taken aback when Sabine pulls out the Darksaber.
Sabine shows the Darksaber to her mother Ursa
After some discussion and history (which was VERY informative) about what happened the Clan Wren after the Imperial weapon that Sabine worked on was used against Mandalore and she subsequently fled (leading to Sabine’s father being a hostage), we learn that she’s double-crossing our heroes and turning them as well as the Darksaber over to the Mandalorian Emperor’s Hand (!!!, more on that in a minute), Gar Saxon. Of course, he turns on Ursa and threatens to kill Clan Wren for collaborating with enemies of the Empire, and long-story-short Sabine duels Saxon (using Ezra’s lightsaber) and bests him, but will not kill him. He jumps up and prepares to shoot her in the back when Ursa Wren shoots and kills him in a very tense and emotional moment. From this point we know there will be a power vacuum on Mandalore with Saxon being dead, and there will be repurcussions for the Clan moving forward. And now we have the surprise – Sabine decides to leave the Ghost crew (at least for now, hopefully…) and stay to help her family to free her father and find the Mandalorian that will be worthy to wield the Darksaber and unite all of Mandalore. Yeah, I didn’t see that coming…..
What worked for me:
- Sabine, again – I love Sabine, you love Sabine, we all love Sabine. Her character arc and development in season three has been epic and impressive to say the least, as she’s become not only a formidable warrior but also a great leader. I was hoping SHE would be the one to wield the Darksaber and possibly become the new (and first in canon) True Mand’alor, but it’s not to be. I do have an idea who it will be, so let’s talk about that….
- The Darksaber and (possibly) the True Mand’alor – with the revelation that Sabine will not be the wielder of the Darksaber I’m going to guess it’s going to be Bo-Katan Kryze. Why? She was part of the Death Watch and broke off after Maul seized power of the group and Mandalore in season five of The Clone Wars. She’s also the sister of Duchess Sabine Kryze, who was the last leader of a (fairly) united Mandalore. We know Katie Sackhoff is coming back to reprise her role, so my money is on her. Hopefully we find out before the end of the season, but time will tell.
- Ursa Wren – I liked the ice-queen portrayal of Sabine’s mom, Ursa Wren. She toed the line of loving her daughter and being loyal to family and clan, but also being loyal to Mandalore. Great job on the casting, it worked well. I am admittedly a little disappointed that Sabine’s mom wasn’t Rook Kast, but whatever, maybe she’ll show up at some point….
- Kronest – cool world, and a different environment than we’ve ever seen in Mandalore space. I also really dug the ski chalet look of the Clan Wren stronghold, but it did seem a little fragile for a military base, but hell, maybe it’s got heavy shields… Either way, it looked super cool.
- The Emperor’s Hand – OK, so this is most likely nothing more than a casual Legends reference by Filoni and crew, but the mention of The Hand of the Emperor was a cool nod. And who was the most famous Hand you might ask? Well, that would be Mara Jade. No, I do not think she’ll be coming into canon, but you never know. Either way, it was a cool nod to Legends, even though I would imagine it drove the EU purists nuts on Reddit…. LOL.
- The use of Mando’a – the language of the Mandalorians is spoken in canon! We didn’t get much of it, but it was super cool.
- Poetry in Star Wars – we all know George LOVED these harmonic and poetic callbacks in Star Wars, and we got a great one in the duel between Sabine and Gar Saxon. As the duel finished and Sabine disarmed Saxon, the Darksaber flies up and out of his hand and as Sabine catches it she uses it and Ezra’s saber to threaten to scissor his head off. Yes, it is EXACTLY what transpired with Anakin and Dooku. Like exactly. I thought it was pretty cool.
- Sabine choosing family over family – this was honestly pretty sad, but it makes sense. I totally feel like Sabine will return before the end of the season (most likely in the season finale) but this unexpected turn was great for the series in general, as it keeps us on our toes as we near the endgame of the series in general. Congrats to the story group for having the guts to split up the Ghost crew.
- Ursa being skeptical of the Jedi – you can tell that at least some on Mandalore still harbor bad feelings toward the Jedi, most likely because of the Mandalorian Wars we heard about in the last episode. Please, let’s get more of this story!
- The Clan Wren painting behind Ursa – just a small detail, but it was very cool. I want one!
What was meh…:
- Tristan – what a lame name for a Mandalorian. Overall, he was a decent character and him turning on Saxon for his family and Sabine was great, but Tristan? Really?
One last thought. We know that Lucasfilm has another animated series in production, although it hasn’t been formally announced. Could this episode (and Sabine’s arc in general) be setting this new series up? Total speculation on my part here, but could this series revolve around Mandalore, it’s history, and the power struggle hinted at in this episode? Possibly, and although I wouldn’t hate this I would rather explore another time period – most notably either The Old Republic or the time in-between Return of the Jedi and The Force Awakens. I would imagine we will start hearing something about this new series soon, possibly as soon as Star Wars Celebration in April.
In the meantime, enjoy this week’s official episode of Rebels Recon below:
