Nothing Compares to The ‘Star Wars: The Clone Wars’ Series Finale — Review
Star Wars, as a whole, is iconic. There’s hardly anything that comes close to the caliber of the franchise. This is why it’s so hard for newer films or series to top that original magic and feeling. It’s also why some fans might not feel as strongly about newer movies or the ones they didn’t grow up with. But Star Wars: The Clone Wars has done the miraculous job of uniting a lot of different facets of the fandom to bring something universally everyone enjoys. And the series finale proves why that is; it delivers some of the best moments fans have ever seen. [Spoiler alert: Spoilers ahead for all of Season 7 of Star Wars: The Clone Wars].
The fight to get off this murderous ship is rough
When last we left off, Ahsoka had just gotten Rex’s chip out with the help of the ship’s droids, and someone was laser-cutting through the door. It wasn’t Maul; it was just the clones using special tools. Ahsoka waits until the last moment to use the Force and pushes through with Rex and the droids.
At this point, Maul is also trying to escape, and he’s a boss with just his Force, per usual. But he goes about his escape in a more ruthless and murderous way, unlike Ahsoka. And for Maul, it’s all about stopping the ship from finishing its intended travel to Coruscant so that he can escape before getting to the capital of the new Empire.
To do this, Maul completely destroyed the hyperdrive system, throwing the whole ship out of hyperspace and severely damaging it. When we said “ruthless” above, we mean it; Maul did this without knowing where they’d end up. They stopped right above a random planet’s moon, but they could have ended up in the middle of an asteroid field or worse.
Regardless, the ship is still falling apart and now they’re being sucked into the moon’s gravitational pull. Ahsoka and Rex find themselves in the command center, trying to find a shuttle to leave on when they also find that the ship is tightly on lockdown. “If they weren’t trying to kill us, I’d be proud,” Rex says to Ahsoka, in one of the last funny moment of the series.
Up until the very end, Ahsoka stays true to herself and puts lives above everything else
This whole segment has you on the edge of your seat, clutching your heart at every turn, not knowing what happens. Now, this may seem silly because we do know how this ends, with Rex, Ahsoka, and Maul all surviving Order 66. But that’s how good the storytelling is here. Their race to live is so consuming and well-articulated on-screen, that the audience forgets that outcome. You’re overtaken by what’s going down in the present, and that’s what makes this one of the best things to come out of the Star Wars franchise.
Moving on, Ahsoka and Rex are bombarded with clone troopers. Jesse guessed that they would come this route, and will shoot on command, at any moment. This moment shows Rex desperate for a way out. Despite his urging, Ahsoka refuses to do anything that would kill the clones, frustrating Rex who points out that they are willing to die and kill them in the process.
When Ahsoka takes Rex’s helmet off, and he’s crying, it already wrecks you. But then Ahsoka says, “They may be willing to die. But I am not going to be the one who kills them.” That line goes to show just what kind of person Ahsoka is. This season has really shown how Ahsoka’s matured since we all first met her in 2008 as a snippy 14-year-old. Now, she is a kind, good person. And Jedi or not, Ahsoka is not going to take down men who she knows don’t deserve to be slaughtered. Regardless of what they’re doing to Jedi around the galaxy. She doesn’t succumb to the Dark Side or her feelings of hurt or betrayal.
Their escape almost doesn’t work
Jesse, who fans know very well since he’s one of the oldest and because he had a pretty prominent role in this arc, is now in charge of everyone. Ahsoka has an idea to escape, which is that Rex plays the part of holding her hostage. He tries to talk them into letting her go because she’s technically not a Jedi. Now, Darth Sidious specifically called her out to be killed, probably for her connection to Anakin. This is also mostly a diversion for the droids to pull the floor out from under the clones.
More fighting ensues, and Maul steals their shuttle. Ahsoka goes after him, and her Force is strong. She almost brings him back, however, it’s not enough. Especially with Rex losing his battle in the background. She lets Maul go, so she can help Rex out, and that’s how Maul escapes Order 66.
Back on the ship, Ahsoka and Rex are fighting for the lives, again, trying to get to another shuttle. The clones destroy the droids that were helping them, which is a surprising heartbreak fans might not have been expecting. And now Ahsoka has to fend off the whole 332nd company as Rex heads to the ship. This imagery, of Ahsoka losing stamina as she’s getting gunned down by clones with her facial markings painted on their helmets, is haunting, to say the least.
Ahsoka and Rex honor the dead
At the last minute, Rex gets the ship working and is able to swoop in and pick Ahsoka up from all the falling debris of the ship. And with that, the whole spacecraft goes down on the moon, with no survivors except Ahsoka and Rex, thanks to their individual shuttle. When Ahsoka is saved, she looks dejected, as it’s obvious all of the clones — Rex’s brothers and her company — are going down to their death.
Rex is shown with parts of the droids that helped them, possibly to put them back together if they can? The shot pans over to Ahsoka, in a cloak that’s reminiscent of her final Star Wars Rebels look. She’s in front of a massive makeshift grave for the fallen soldiers. It’s truly a heartbreaking, somber scene.
She and Rex painstakingly buried all the clones and marked their graves with their helmets. As she looks on, she’s grieving for them, of course. But she’s also mourning the loss of everything. The Jedi, Anakin, and any semblance of her former life. She leaves her lightsaber at the site too, so that if anyone comes looking, they’ll assume Ahsoka was killed as well. She’s done.
The final moments of this show are probably the most breathtaking in the whole series
This brings the audience to the last moments and shot of the series, ever. Just like the series started with Anakin Skywalker, it ends with Darth Vader. Very familiar cold assault stormtroopers are surveying the scene, obviously sometime later because it’s blanketed in snow and it’s a bit more worn-down. And Vader’s breathing is easily noticeable. He finds Ahsoka’s lightsaber, ignites it, and takes it with him, wherever he’s going.
This is literally nothing short of genius. It evokes so much emotion from the audience. Ahsoka is not able to have any final moments with her former master. And now this iconic character is brought to life in this series for the first time, and all the “what ifs” hang in the air. Again, we knew how this ended. But this final shot with Vader evokes more sadness than probably expected. As he walks off with her lightsaber — the one he gave her and changed to match his blue one — you’re left with the view of his figure in the helmet of one of Tano’s fallen soldiers. Neither of them truly finds out what happened to each other until more than a decade later.
“Victory and Death” means so much more here. The moment just stands still. There’s nothing left, except for a bird overhead, which is most likely Morai symbolizing Ahsoka’s life, which still lives on, unknown to Vader.
