Base Breaking Character / Star Wars Rebels

• Sabine. Some like that she's an Asian influenced graffiti-artist, Mandalorian Action Girl who likes the color pink, while others dislike her for these exact same reasons. And of course there are those who cringe at the mere thought of a Mandalorian wearing pink armor, or, similar to the New Mandalorians in the previous series, contradicting anything established about Mandalorian culture. Her voice actress has since said the character will have Hidden Depths, and so far she's wonderfully lived up to the previously established traditional Mandalorian culture, so it seems like time will tell how well the character is executed.
  • With two episodes to herself in Season 2, there have been complaints that her struggles did not invoke enough Character Development for her in comparison to the rest of the crew. However, writers and voice actors regarding Season 3 have said that it will be more centric to Sabine (namely that Fenn Rau will return and more Mandalorians), with enough coverage that rivals Ezra in plot-importance (with implications in Season 2 that Hera is training her to be a leader). So once again, time will tell if she'll move out of this trope.
  • In Season 3, opinions on her taking up the Darksaber and a possible path to becoming leader of Mandalore, as well as the reveal that she was involved in the making of an Imperial pseudo-superweapon as a part of her Dark and Troubled Past, were divisive. Some feel that too much is going on for her character without any major consequences in the present day, while others feel like this makes her solid and helps redeem the Mandalorian plot thread from The Clone Wars. Complaints that Sabine did nothing to earn the Darksaber and may not be fit for leader (at least not yet) were actually addressed in the show, the justifications being that she's the only Mandalorian personally trained by Jedi to handle a lightsaber and that she's holding on to it so she can give it to who she believes is the best fit leader for Mandalore, though none of this completely ends the criticism. Some of her detractors were moved by "Trials of the Darksaber", particularly her catharsis scene at the end, however.
• Chopper. There are plenty of people who love his role as The Gadfly, but there are also people who think he goes too far and endangers the crew. "Out of Darkness" is a particularly bad example, as one of Chopper's pranks nearly kills Hera and Sabine. One other such example is the opening sequence of "Rise of the Old Masters", in which he playfully mocks Ezra after nearly killing him while helping Kanan train him (granted, Zeb was just as responsible, but he at least looked uncomfortable about the incident). Kevin Johnson of AV Club cited this scene as the reason why the episode did not receive a solid A from him.
• Kallus, starting from "The Honorable Ones", regarding his Heel Realization and setting up for a possible Heel–Face Turn arc in the future. Does he deserve one, after his actions that showed him as more of a cold-blooded fascist? And then others point out that the episode showed that Kallus is not good, but still human, as well as that the possibility of him being Fulcrum II means that he isn't going against the Empire because one Rebel cell was nicer to him, but because he sees the Empire as no better than the worst of the Rebels he has met.
  • As of the Season 3 trailer, if Kallus is Fulcrum II, then should the title of Fulcrum just be dropped, because Ahsoka is the one and only holder of the title and associating it with Kallus would ruin the Incorruptible Pure Pureness of everything she's been associated with, or is it a good use of an old plot, used cleverly to tie in with his redemption arc and leading his story down an interesting path?
  • In the eve of "Through Imperial Eyes", should Kallus live to continue his Character Development and becoming a member of the Rebellion, or die so that Thrawn's credibility as a villain can be drilled in by showing that he can change the status quo by killing off a main character? Especially because Thrawn had already shown foresight in Kallus' shift and not doing anything about it would cause severe Villain Decay, but then there's the fact that Kallus had hardly done anything since the season started besides showing signs that he is Fulcrum and could use more coverage. However, the airing of the episode as well as pre-release images and footage of "Zero Hour" has somewhat lightened the concerns of Kallus' lack of activity, with the implication that due to Kallus staying behind in the Empire to continue his operations as Fulcrum, this ends up causing problems in the finale when Thrawn attacks Chopper Base due to using him as a tool, though people are still torn about whether he should survive the season or not. In addition, the previous episode had involved the status quo changing death of Saxon in the middle of the season, which means that Rebels isn't afraid to get rid of rather major characters that aren't Force-users.
  • A large majority of fans after watching "Zero Hour" have said that despite being very certain that Kallus was going to die, they're happy that Kallus survived and is joining the Rebel Alliance, mainly because the entire episode managed to preserve Thrawn's credibility in spite of everything in the episode including the situation with Kallus being a Pyrrhic Victory for the Empire, as well as people being glad that they didn't have to deal with a Gut Punch from seeing Kallus meet a Downer Ending after struggling throughout the entire season to redeem himself for his actions while under immense stress.
• Ezra was this from the beginning, as his whininess and arrogance can outshine Luke and Anakin. His blaster/lightsaber is either an awesome new idea or else taking an elegant weapon for a more civilized age, an expression of a Jedi's very self, and mixing it with a blaster, removing the mystique of the traditional lightsaber. As Season 3 goes on Ezra really started to turn into this, as many viewers grew tired of his arrogance and insistence that he was right, while never really seeming to learn anything. A big factor was “The Wynkahthu Job”, where he spends much of the episode sulking, aiming snide jabs at Zeb — particularly calling him "captain", which he knows full well Zeb doesn't like — and generally acting very unprofessionally. And all this because Zeb was made the leader of a mission instead of him. At one point Zeb gets captured and Ezra snarks that it might be the last time he's put in charge for a while, never mind the fact that Ezra had been captured three times already this season. He's also upset that the crew doesn't trust him because of his past reckless actions — and yet he does nothing to remedy that by bringing them once more into contact with Hondo Ohnaka, who has screwed them over multiple times in the past and who they all understandably hate, while Ezra just keeps making weak excuses for his behavior.
  • It also doesn't help his case that he allies with Darth freakin' Maul, who could be the poster boy for Obviously Evil. Admittedly, he doesn't know who Maul is or everything he's done, but surely he would think twice about trusting someone that strong in the Dark Side.
• Grand Admiral Thrawn to a lesser extent. For the most part, Thrawn is well-liked for being every bit the cultured and manipulative villain that he was in original Legends continuity. However, several fans disliked Thrawn's more villainous personality in Canon as he doesn't have have any altruistic motives and is willing to kill civilians. To them, Thrawn in Rebels comes off less like the nuanced Anti-Villain and more of a typical Imperial with better tastes and more competency.