By Ben Wright (@iamzavagno | www.xgeeks.co.uk)
This review is spoiler-free.
Last week, The Bad Batch returned for its final season and the three-episode arc was an outstanding reintroduction for the characters and the story as a whole. With that opening episode drop feeling, very much, like an isolated story, I was highly intrigued as to where we would go next!
So, onto the episode… You can’t beat starting an episode with a crashlanding to get the vibe of The Clone Wars!
Sticking with Omega, Crosshair and Batcher, the trio must find a way off-world to escape Hemlock’s clutches. While I did enjoy the majority of the part of the story, there was a little concern that this was going to be a second “escape” episode in a row. At this stage of the story, we can’t afford side missions, as with the first two seasons. Luckily, the episode navigates to where it needs to go satisfyingly and I think the ending was perfectly executed! It sets up a great hook for next week’s episode. Sticking with the ending of this episode for now, I genuinely loved the emotional notes delivered in terms of the storytelling, the visuals and the score. Kevin Kiner finds yet another way to rework the main Bad Batch theme!
Dee Bradley Baker and Michelle Ang were wonderful as always, and the relationship between Crosshair and Omega is genuinely fascinating due to its complexity and layered emotional beats. The episode also introduced Captain Mann, played by Harry Lloyd, who was a different type of antagonist that we are used to seeing from the Empire, in some ways. I thought Lloyd did a wonderful job in this “one and done” role and seemed to be having a lot of fun chewing up the scenery.
As for what happens next week? I feel many tough and emotive conversations are ahead of us, but with Hemlock so set on retrieving Omega, these conversations might be shelved for the time being, if more danger heads the way of our Bad Batch.
What did you think about the latest episode of the final season of The Bad Batch? Let us know in the comments!
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