The seventh episode of Ahsoka has dropped, meaning there’s just one left in this fantastic season. This penultimate episode is light on answers to some of our burning questions (leaving those for the finale or beyond), but it was filled with plenty of great moments. This series continues to hit all the right notes, and this was another tremendous chapter.
Let’s dive in to a review of “Dreams and Madness”, but be warned that full spoilers are ahead!
The episode begins on Coruscant, where Hera Syndulla stands trial for her rogue actions on Seatos. At this point Coruscant is actually not the capital planet of the New Republic, whose Senate is convened in Mon Mothma’s home world of Chandrila. It was Mothma’s goal both to move the capital away from Coruscant (the seat of power for the Galactic Republic and Empire) and establish a rotating capital world, in an effort to help the people of the galaxy see that this government would be different. Yet both The Mandalorian and Ahsoka have shown us Coruscant, suggesting that the historic planet still plays a major role in the galactic scene. Mothma herself presides over the trial, and Senator Xiono continues to be a real jerk as he lays into Hera for her actions.
Carson Teva tries to cover for Hera (and in doing so finally gives us confirmation about this show’s timeline, as it takes place after the events of The Mandalorian season three), but it’s the arrival of another who turns the tide: C-3PO, bearing a message from Senator Leia Organa in which Leia officially states that she sanctioned Hera’s mission. It’s also noted that Leia is leading the defense council, and her pulling that rank is a satisfying moment where Xiono is put in his place. Mothma seems relieved that the trial is thus ended, but she privately speaks with Hera afterward. Mothma knows that Leia didn’t really sanction it, and that Hera and Leia are up to something, and Mothma wants to know just how real the threat of Thrawn’s return is. After seeing the New Republic reject Hera’s request earlier in the season, I think this is a nice moment. It shows that Mothma is sympathetic to Hera and her concerns, but is burdened by the layers of bureaucracy. It’s not an excuse for her, but I do like that it paints her in a bit of a different light.
But in response to Mothma’s question, Hera responds that they must prepare for the worst but hope for the best. This seems to be a fitting summary of what this series has been building toward. There have been two threads running simultaneously for the heroes: there is the hope for the best of finding Ezra Bridger, and the preparing for the worst of Thrawn’s return. At risk of over-simplifying things, it could be said that Sabine is focused so much on hoping for the best that she hasn’t yet given full consideration to preparing for the worst. She’s all after Ezra, but probably isn’t reckoning with the threat of Thrawn’s return enough. Ahsoka, though, exemplifies the opposite. She’s been driven by preparing for the return of Thrawn and trying to stop it no matter what, and that’s led to her being overly callous and careless as it pertains to finding Ezra. She’d stopped hoping for the best – but I think that’s changed. When Ahsoka arrives on Peridia, there’s an important acknowledgement from Thrawn: Ahsoka is headed for Sabine, not the Chimaera, and that’s the way he wants it. But it’s also different than what motivated Ahsoka at the start of the series. Then, she may have headed right for Thrawn. Now, she’s headed to help her friends. It’s a subtle shift, but I think it’s an important one.
Hera is right: the heroes must prepare for the worst, but cannot lose sight of hoping for the best. They’re all coming to demonstrate that, and it’s especially evident in Ahsoka’s journey. We see her training in her lightsaber skills on the way to the planet, and she’s learning from a recording of Anakin Skywalker (with Hayden Christensen back for the episode!). It’s from the Clone Wars, and he’s preparing her for the battles she’ll face ahead. And after the recording ends, Ahsoka tells Huyang that he was a good master. This is a major moment, because it shows that she’s come to embrace the past in a way she hadn’t before. She’s able to recognize Anakin was a good master without being overcome by what he became. She’s able to celebrate the good of who he was and not dwell solely on the horrors of who he became. As Anakin told her earlier in the series, he was more than Darth Vader. And so too is Ahsoka more than that. She’s embraced that, and it’s brought her back to a joyful, playful spirit and a demonstrable trust in the Force and in herself. But I think it’s also this ability to forgive Anakin, and remember the good in him, that helps Ahsoka rejoice at seeing Sabine. She was frustrated at Sabine’s decision to go after Ezra, but that needn’t determine her whole destiny. There’s more to Sabine than that, and there was more to her decision than that. Though I will say it’s interesting that by the end of this episode Sabine still hasn’t told Ezra about this. I’m surprised by that, but I wonder how Ezra will respond when he hears that, after he gave up so much to remove Thrawn, Sabine has now allowed Thrawn to return.
Sticking with Ahsoka for a moment longer, this episode also shows her growth in embracing the Force and herself in how she approaches combat. She faces off against Baylan Skoll again, but this time it’s Baylan who is the aggressor in pursuit of his goal, a complete reversal of their prior meeting. This time, Ahsoka realizes she doesn’t need to try to kill him, and that her goal is something bigger, so she escapes. And then when she faces Shin, Ahsoka doesn’t even ignite her lightsabers but uses the Force to fend her off. In the aftermath, Ahsoka offers to help Shin. This is all showing a remarkable Jedi-like attitude, and Ahsoka has come to peace with that.
Ezra also shows off his ability in the Force, using the Force to fight off Thrawn’s forces. Sabine offered him the lightsaber, but he refused – and I loved that he did. It’s Sabine’s now, but also Ezra has spent a decade without it. A Jedi is more than just a lightsaber, and in fact the purest expression of the Jedi is using the Force to defend life. That’s precisely what Ezra is doing here, using the Force to defend the Noti and Sabine. The fight scenes of him and Sabine defending the Noti against Thrawn’s forces were great.
The episode puts Thrawn’s abilities on display too, and I think does so in a mostly effective way to help audiences quite simply and quickly catch up to what makes him such an intimidating villain to face. There are a couple of moments in the episode that are important to this regard.
First of all, a key moment is Thrawn learning that Ahsoka’s master was Anakin Skywalker. There’s a recognition in his voice, and a recognition that also seems to heighten his concern ever so slightly. Thrawn actually knew Anakin; during the Clone Wars, the two of them teamed up on an investigative mission together. Thrawn also later deduced that Darth Vader was Anakin Skywalker, but never said anything, making him one of few in the Empire who knew that reality. But Thawn here demonstrates that he knew Anakin to be unpredictable, and that makes him approach Ahsoka with the same level of caution. This is how Thrawn works: he relentlessly studies his opponents and learns everything he can about them, and based on what he knows, he predicts and deduces their next step. So this serves as a simple way to catch audiences up on that general premise.
Second, though, there’s a realization that Thrawn is more calculating and less careless than previous villains we’ve seen. Ahsoka flees his fighters into an asteroid field of sorts (only this one’s made up of purrgil bones), and we can think back to when Darth Vader’s forces were in pursuit of the Millennium Falcon into an asteroid field in The Empire Strikes Back. In that movie, Vader sent TIE Bombers and Star Destroyers into the field after them; here, Thrawn pulls his forces back to regroup and determine the next moves. He’s not as careless with his resources (especially given his limited resources currently), and he’s far more thoughtful in his approach. The fact that he manages to find Ahsoka in a matter of moments (with the help of the Great Mothers) is further meant to show us how much of a threat he is.
Third, Thrawn views his efforts as a success even though to most anyone else they’d be a defeat. I’ll admit that this can come across a bit like he’s just naive or sugarcoating things, and that seems especially true with how it’s handled in this episode. But further knowledge of Thrawn’s character lets us know that Thrawn is willing to endure temporary setbacks if it means he learns valuable lessons from it. He’s fascinated with the art of war and he’s a collector of information, and if a ‘defeat’ will get him valuable information that he can put to good use to win the war, he’ll view that as a ‘victory.’ This tends to come across better in some of the other stories about Thrawn than it does here, but I nonetheless think it’s clear enough that Thrawn believes he can use even setbacks like this to win.
The only thing that, in Thrawn’s mind, doesn’t go his way is Baylan’s defection. Timothy Zahn (the author who created Thrawn and has written numerous Thrawn stories) has been clear that Thrawn really only gets defeated by something that he doesn’t can can’t predict, and perhaps Baylan defecting will be the sliver of surprise that allows the heroes to escape Thrawn’s clutches. That all remains to be seen, but Baylan’s motivations are still extremely interesting – and still extremely mysterious. But in this episode he, essentially, says goodbye to his apprentice. He knows that she wants a place of power in this new Empire, so he tells her to go take it. He, meanwhile, turns the other way in pursuit of whatever is calling to him, whatever power he is after. This is maybe the major question left to be resolved in next week’s episode, but Ray Stevenson just continues to nail every scene he’s in. It will be bittersweet to see next week’s episode, knowing that it will surely have some major moments with Baylan but also will be the last time we see Stevenson in the role.
There are actually quite a few threads that still linger out there entering the finale, and I’m skeptical that the final episode will tie all of them up. After all, it seems that this is supposed to serve as the beginning of the Thrawn crisis, not wrapping it up. I’m surprised that this episode ended on a real feel-good note, with Ahsoka reunited with Sabine and Ezra, and the heroes are all together again. But perhaps that’s because the final episode will end on a more nuanced note: the heroes may have some victory, but Thrawn will also return to the known galaxy. All of that is for next week; for now, I’ll just wrap this up by saying that Ahsoka continues to be a thrilling, joyous ride, and this was another terrific episode.
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