Rebels! Seasons 3 & 4

I like to also keep notes about other Star Wars media I consume on here (not that I'm enough of a super-fan for that to happen a lot), and back in February I noted down my early impressions of Rebels seasons one and two. I've since finished watching the show and wanted to make one more entry about seasons three and four.

First off, I really liked that they started season three by giving people new haircuts. For Ezra in particular in helped to visualise his growth and increasing maturity, of which there was a lot. I honestly feel that he had one of the best "slightly annoying kid grows up" arcs over the course of the series that I've ever seen, in the sense that it wasn't completely linear and he did relapse a bit occasionally, but you could always tell that he was trying.

In general, while I liked the first two seasons well enough already, they really stepped it up with season three. Also, a lot of the little niggles I had about artistic choices in the earlier episodes, such as that awful "using the Force" sound effect, went away... I guess the producers, too, realised that these weren't so great. (There will be some spoilers from here on by the way, so consider yourself warned.)

Agent Kallus' arc was great and a logical follow-up from that season two episode where he and Zeb were stuck on that frozen moon together. Thrawn made for a much better villain than any that had come before. Sabine's growth and everything surrounding the Mandalorians was really good (and that's coming from someone who's not a huge Mando fan normally). And I really enjoyed Maul's final end and the stunning sharpness with which it was delivered, considering these shows' love for crazy lightsaber battles.

Finally, season four was basically one giant arc about the crew coming to terms with the fact that the Rebellion as a whole couldn't focus on their little home world and taking local matters into their own hands. I was wondering how the writers were going to handle the fact that ultimately this little crew of Rebels couldn't be delivering a decisive blow against the Empire unless they were involved in the Battle of Yavin somehow, and I think it was ultimately solved quite elegantly.

That said, the grand finale didn't resonate that much with me emotionally because it all got a bit too mystical for my taste. I appreciate that it's a tough balance to strike with Star Wars - most fans didn't like Lucas just "science-ing away" the Force in the prequels with the introduction of the Midi-chlorians (including me) because the Force is magic, mkay? I do think there's such a thing as taking it too far though, when characters can basically wave their hands and do anything "because the Force". I believe the Dread Masters arc in SWTOR faced that criticism to an extent... and yeah, I just wasn't really on board with things like "the world between worlds" and Ezra going full-on Disney princess at the end with his pet wolves and space whales. I wouldn't say it was bad; it just wasn't really my cup of tea.

I will say that Kanan's death was still a powerful punch, even though I knew it was coming. (It was one of those spoilers I had read about back in the day.) Though the idea of human plus green Twi'lek equalling human with green hair still kinda weirds me out...

It's just a bit of a shame that the final episode had such an open ending. I'd really like to know what Sabine and Ahsoka ended up doing and if/how they found Ezra. Someone give me a shout if/when they ever make another show or release a book or comic that tells that story...