The Uninvited Wookiee

Normally I like episodes of The Bad Batch written by Matt Michnovetz. But while elements of Wednesday's episode, "Tribe", felt like a classic Clone Wars episode, I was mostly underwhelmed.

The episode was directed by Steward Lee, who also teamed with Michnovetz for the "riot racing" episode, "Faster", so I am a little surprised to find myself disappointed by this one.



I do like how things start out with a deal going sour when the Batch meet with a group of droid smugglers. It's a little moment that expands the world a little more, but I wish the smugglers hadn't been droids. It's the kind of thing that feels like it was necessitated by budget or moral codes. It turns out the droids are taking in a young Jedi for a bounty, the wookiee Gungi, who was among the young Jedi in the fifth season Clone Wars story arc starting with "The Gathering". Ahsoka chaperoned Gungi and the other younglings in their quest to build lightsabres.



There are far too many Jedi shown having survived Order 66 at this point. Let's see, there's Ahsoka (yeah, she left the Order, but let's not split hairs), Kanan, Yoda, Obi-Wan, Grogu. Whoever's in the video games. Now they've brought back another one and it's this annoying wookiee kid. What a waste. The episode felt uncomfortably close to the Star Wars: Holiday Special. Lumpy would not have seemed out of place.

The Bad Batch is available on Disney+.