Even more of your favorite Visions

Visions Vol 3

A fifty year old franchise is burdened with expectations. One waits for decades to see Luke Skywalker again, so when how he’s presented draws years of debate. If an audience member spends hours watching Lucasfilm Animation, that means if Ezra Bridger in Ahsoka doesn’t seem like Ezra Bridger in Rebels, someone’s is bound to feel a way about it. Then again, if he does seem like he’s exactly the same, have you expanded and stretched your story?

It’s the cost of mattering quite a lot to people. Whatever storytelling route Star Wars takes, because of the paths already worn, the importance of things jiving and connecting, the Iconic Characters, it can be hard to surprise the audience. Partially because we know what to expect (Rey isn’t showing up in The Mandalorian, because that’s not how time works.) But also because people like being surprised far less than you’d think. They like their expectations met.

Visions was, I would say, entirely outside the game of fulfilling expectations. It was just a burst of creativity. There were adorable creatures that looked like they were made out of felt; notes of claymation; incomprehensible oddities; Star Wars reinterpreted through different cultural touch points.

Visions Vol 3 is the first of these anthologies that has heard the audience and has decided to give them more of what they want. According to StarWars.com, we’re set to enjoy the “return of Ronin from the Emmy®-nominated “The Duel,” F from “The Village Bride,” and Lah Kara from “The Ninth Jedi,” three shorts available in Volume 1, streaming now on Disney+.”

And who can argue with these choices? One could grow an entirely new Star Wars universe from any one of these seeds. In fact, a spin-off limited series of The Ninth Jedi has already been announced for next year. (The Ninth Jedi is my favorite favorite so I’m a very happy fan.)

But for all these returning faces, it’s the weird that defines Visions. I love the flashes of inspiration that excite my imagination and then leave my imagination alone. The psychedelic and strange is what Visions gives Star Wars fans: the freedom to wipe a big slash of paint across the canvas just because it feels right, not because it connects to the last brush stroke.

The gravitational pull of pleasing the audience is strong, of course. And the returning characters and stories aren’t exactly about to wear us out: it’s a few more minutes with them.Still, what I can’t anticipate, what I have no idea I’m about to see, is what thrills me most.

Surprise is, in fact, one of the best feelings you can have as an audience member. Simply getting the soup you ordered is great; trying something you’ve never tasted and falling in love is even better. Even in the main Star Wars story, it’s dashed expectations that are most memorable. I don’t think anyone really anticipated what Episode I would be like, it was so unlike the original trilogy it took years for people to just receive it as its own film. No one expected Grogu at the end of the first episode of The Mandalorian. A younger Yoda was not even speculated about, which is why it was such a fantastic moment. And my beloved sequel trilogy pleased me most when I was most shocked: when Luke Skywalker tossed away his lightsaber, when Yoda appeared before the burning tree, when Snoke was split in two.

Visions doesn’t have to carve surprise out for itself: it lives free. I hope it can maintain its focus on that strength, even as the series begins to respond to audience favorites. It’s a sign of its success as a project that audiences are clamoring for more, but expectations can be both traps and treasures.