The Bad Batch Season 3 Episode 15

The Series Finale of The Bad Batch

The Clone Wars (plural, as ever) has existed as a sort of parallel saga to the currently-christened Skywalker Saga for 22 years, if you start counting from their first reveal in Attack of the Clones in 2002. We have seen their inception, discovered their origins, watched them evolve from a sinister army meant to destroy the Jedi Order to a band of brothers. We’ve watched them struggle to assert their individuality, to be more than bred for war. From “Rookies,” where we’re introduced to characters we follow for the entire Clone Saga (Echo survives even this finale) to The Clone Wars and all its seasons, to a stark appearance in Obi-Wan Kenobi begging for change as veterans, to a appearances later in the timeline in Rebels, we have truly come to know the clones, individually and as a community, across vast swaths of storytelling.

So, let’s imagine that The Bad Batch stands as the final word on the clones as a part of the Star Wars story: that after all this time, this wish-fulfillment, final unwritten thought of Dave Filoni’s has reached an end and that “The Cavalry Has Arrived,” the super-sized finale of The Bad Batch, serves as the coda to this long piece of music. What does it have to say? Where does it leave the clones?

It leaves them liberated.

Hunter, Omega, Batcher and Crosshair sit together on Pabu, having lost quite a lot, but having gained one another. And, perhaps equal to that, they have reached the end of their war. They’re free. When Omega asks Hunter what will become of the freed clones? Hunters answer is that they can now do whatever they want.

In this moment, Hunter is no longer defined by being a soldier. He’s defined, instead, by being a dad. "The Cavalry Has Arrived” reaffirms what seems like the primary objective of current Star Wars stories: make parents cry.

From the hyperspace jump, Star Wars has been about family, but often about the children seeking resolution or answers from their parents. Over the last decade or so of Star Wars storytelling, the heroes are the parents. Han and Leia become parents trying to bring their lost child back to the light. And, of course, The Mandalorian is about being a space-dad. The Bad Batch is a similar story: parents raising their daughter in a galaxy of conflict, until she’s ready to leave the nest.

I suspect that the final scene between Hunter and Omega, a flash-forward, is meant to make my friend Dave cry, specifically, for example. He’s the father of two precocious and powerhouse girls. We find Omega as a young woman, about to board her ship and join the Rebellion. Hunter is waiting there for her. He’s got grey in his hair, looks a little bent, like a fisherman. Omega says she’s not a kid anymore and he doesn’t have to worry about her. Hunter tells her that she’s their kid, and they’ll always worry about her. They hug and off she goes, into the future, to join the next war. Not a dry eye in the house, especially if you have kids of your own.

I’m not a parent, so I more understood more than felt this scene. I did, though, love the sense that Omega, Hunter and the Batch really do get years of quiet on Pabu, to grow up, to live, without having to shoot anyone, or lose any more arms, or test their loyalty in a galaxy at war.

The war will go on, or at least, change shape. We see Tarkin arrive to find the destroyed Tantiss and declare that it’s resources should be redirected to Rogue One, I mean, Operation: Stardust, I mean the Death Star project. In the big picture, the end of the clone wars is just the beginning of the Galactic Civil War.

But for these characters, it’s time to take a step back. The next generation is there to take up the mantle and fight. Maybe that’s okay. One is not meant to be at war perpetually. Maybe we’re meant to hand the baton and strongly support those who take it and run.

I think about this sometimes watching the student protestors today in the US. I marched against the war in Iraq, and marched to support Occupy Wall Street. I spoke to a gentleman yesterday who protested the war in Vietnam and thought that criticisms levied against these students were eerily similar (“outside agitators!” “they don’t understand what they’re saying!”). Each generation is both enmeshed in the political struggles of their day, but also, enmeshed in one long interlocking struggle. This is what Maz Kanata means in The Force Awakens when she talks about seeing the same eyes in different people. She’s saying thtat there is really just one fight: against the Dark Side.

I know there are people who find the cycle of war in Star Wars a little bleak: one battle becomes the next battle and enemies previously defeated somehow reemerge. But that’s very human. This is how the fight for liberty works. At my day job, at the ACLU, we say “the battle for liberty never stays won.” That’s not hopeless. That’s generational. If you look at the history of the US, the Constitution now applies to more people than it did at the founding. It’s been an uneasy march to a better day, with setbacks and wins, and it’s taken more than one generation to accomplish any meaningful, lasting change. And, each generations fights reemerge. “Woke” is just a new name for what was called “political correctness” in the 1990s, after all.

To protect those hard won gains, a new generation must be engaged in the struggle. There will always be those who see one person’s new ideas as a threat to their own. Roe was settled law until it wasn’t; now we must fight for reproductive rights all over again. Drag has never been more popular, less underground, and that success story has unearthed prejudice. That doesn’t mean the fight is some never-ending cycle, it just means it will always matter, and that what we do matters. That good things happen, if we don’t give up, and if our children learn to care too.

But it also brings up the question: when do we get to rest? And I think The Bad Batch finale has decided that it’s time for the clones to rest. They have been fighting since they were grown in a lab. They were, essentially, George Lucas’s version of the Trojan Horse. In the Skywalker Saga itself, they’re nothing more than a ticking time bomb. They’re a storytelling miracle in that way, far more than their original intention, but they’ve done enough.

All that’s left for them is rest and freedom, in the end. So it’s a kindness that The Bad Batch leaves it there. Pabu is a metaphor for a place of peace, a home. (Next year in Pabu!) Yes, there’s a political movement to secure them benefits being played out on Pantora, which I’m sure will result in a very good book, but as far as animation goes, we’ve reached a good stopping point.

On a side note, there’s another related and satisfying ending for the Kaminoans themselves. Nala Se, as she destroys the Empire’s lab says that the research will not fall into the Empire’s hands, and that it will remain “Kaminoan.” In this one fell swoop, she achieves revenge for the destruction of the Kamoinoan clone facility at the end of Season One; and provides a practical reason that the Empire stops cloning en masse (beyond disdain for the clones as a caste). It’s an elegant ending to Kamino as a part of the Star Wars story, a death with a clear and substantive purpose. And it’s connected to the clones final arc as well, as Kamino was their homeworld. The Clones are Kaminoan, if they’re anything.

I realize I haven’t spent a lot of time on the details of the episode itself, because, as I say, I’m not a recapper or reviewer, I’d prefer to bring up what the show brings up for me as a person. But I will say that this episode was the most fun to watch of Season 3 for me, and I loved the video game style boss-battles and levels, the way it leaned into Star Wars tropes (I mean, why else cut off Crosshairs hand other than the world’s weirdest in-joke), the Zillo Beast Kaijuing, and The Bad Batch’s signature look, which is moody and well-lit, cinematic and vibrant. There’s lots here we’ve seen before, from the time jump at the end (Rebels) to Project Necromancer (The Mandalorian) to Tarkin (everywhere). The Empire chasing around a special kid for their blood isn’t even new, it’s the plot of Mando. Even the Operatives feel derivative of The Knights of Ren (they last about as long, too).

But for all the cloned material, it was a very good story, very well told, with great creative action. It was cathartic and fun, and gave folks who have followed these characters for twenty-plus years a good way to say farewell. (It reminded me a bit of the new ending that was given to David Tennant’s Doctor in another long-standing franchise.) I know that nothing ever ends (thanks Dr. Manhattan), but as an ending, it’s fitting.

Omega is safe and well. The Batch is reconciled and have a home. They have saved their brothers and saved themselves. The fight goes on, but not for them.

It’s time to pass the baton.

It’s time to be something other than a soldier.

It’s time to eat sushi and look at the sea.