This episode aired February 17, 2019.
Yeager, coming inside after watching TIE fighters fly by the Colossus, finds Kaz trying to build a transmitter to contact Poe. He points out it's not going to work due to the communications blackout the First Order has instituted, but Kaz activates the device and tries anyway. And it seems to have worked when Poe responds... except that he's actually in the room, having slipped in without being noticed. Kaz doesn't immediately notice, but he and BB-8 are happy to see Poe, and curious about how he got onto the Colossus without being caught. Poe explains that he's there to pick up BB-8, as they're going on a mission to Jakku tomorrow. In response to Kaz's concern, Poe says that CB-23 will be replacing BB-8, but they have to get back to Poe's X-wing first, and getting off the Colossus is going to be harder than getting on it was. Kaz has some intel to show Poe, however. In Yeager's office, Kaz and BB-8 show the holomap with the First Order fleets and explain their suspicions about what the Order wants with the Colossus. And there's one more thing: a system Kaz learned about that the First Order seems to have been active in recently. Poe decides that he's got time before he's supposed to be on Jakku for a small investigation, and invites Kaz along. Yeager groans about Poe's "Widowmaker" maneuver, which confuses Kaz as he has no idea what it is and isn't married anyway.
The Fireball, with Kaz flying, BB-8 in the droid socket and Poe, wearing a breathing mask, hanging on to the outside, is lowered through the floor of the hangar as a freighter passes by below. Poe tells Kaz to land on the ship and stay there until the larger ship is out of range of the First Order's scanners. After having done so, as the freighter passes under a flight of TIE fighters, Poe wishes that the Fireball had a less conspicuous paint job, and Kaz points out that it's a racer. Once the freighter is far enough away, the Fireball detaches, but the engines decide to act up again, causing the ship to plummet until the engines reignite not far above the surface of the ocean, to Kaz and Poe's relief. They rendezvous with CB-23 in the clouds, and Poe boards his fighter. Kaz is worried about the Fireball's condition, but he and Poe head off.
Arriving at the coordinates, Poe detects something off with his fighter's scanners immediately: they're in what appears to be a star system, without a star. The sun that used to be in this system has simply vanished. And that's not the only creepy thing here, as Kaz notices that several of the system's planets have been cored out, reduced to rubble. They eventually come across another planet, this one with a perfect hole bored through the middle, and Poe and Kaz decide to fly into it. Kaz suspects that the First Order is responsible for the devastation in the system, but neither pilot can begin to guess the how or why. Partway down the bore, Poe notices some of the floating rubble acting oddly, and immediately tells Kaz to turn around, but it's too late: they're caught in a gravity well. He tells Kaz to just go with the flow to get through this, although Kaz is initially reluctant to do so. Eventually, the two ships make it through the well and out the other side, where they spot an intact moon. Poe, detecting a signal coming from the moon, decides to land and investigate, especially since the moon has a breathable atmosphere.
The signal is coming from in the vicinity of a destroyed village. Kaz, disembarking from the Fireball, shivers, and Poe gives him a blaster with a reminder not to shoot himself in the foot with it, but Kaz remarks that it's so cold he probably wouldn't notice. As BB-8 accompanies the pilots into the ruins, Poe tells CB-23 to stay with the ships in case they need to leave quickly. Unbeknownst to any of them, a probe droid spies on them from within the ruins. The central point of the village is a large temple, which Poe describes as a relic of an older time. Noting blaster marks and other evident damage, Poe concludes that a massacre took place here, and Kaz finds a child's toy under a fallen pillar and retrieves it. At this point, Poe realizes they're likely being watched, and has to tell Kaz to focus a few times as he's distracted by the toy. When they confront the probe droid, it releases several smaller droids, and as Poe deals with them, he orders BB-8 to make sure the mother doesn't escape. BB-8 tags it with one of his cables, and hangs on to a pillar with another, before Kaz manages to shoot the probe droid, nearly hitting BB in the process. Poe is relieved that his droid is okay, but the destruction of the probe droids brings a squadron of TIEs, led by Major Vonreg.
Kaz and Poe escape in their ships and, outnumbered, Poe decides to lead the TIEs into the bore of the cored-out planet. In the dangerous gravity well, Kaz and Poe manage to destroy the regular fighters, and Poe goes back to deal with Vonreg, shooting down his two escorts. This causes the red-armoured pilot to retreat from the gravity well, but Poe doesn't see it and returns to Kaz, thinking Vonreg is dead. On the other side of the planet, Poe tells Kaz it's time to swap out their droids, because he has to leave for Jakku. Kaz says goodbye to BB-8, thanking him for his help, before he and Poe position their fighters for a droid-swap. As BB-8 and CB-23 pop out of the droid sockets and swap ships, they wave goodbye to each other. Kaz asks Poe how he's going to sneak onto the Colossus alone, and Poe reassures him that CB-23 will tell him how to do it. As Poe leaves, he remarks that he's going to have quite the report to give General Organa.
Back on the Colossus, it's evening, and Tam, Neeku and Bucket are working on a ship in the repair shop. Bucket is offended by Tam referring to the ship as a "bucket", and Tam tries to explain herself before expressing her frustration that Kaz is never around when there's work to be done. She's startled when Kaz, behind her, speaks, and turns to see him and CB-23. Tam, unhappy that Kaz has been allowed to take the Fireball out again, is not particularly mollified when Kaz explains that it's parked below. And on top of everything else, what's the deal with the new droid? Kaz claims that BB-8 got damaged, so he dropped him off on Takodana for repairs and got CB-23 as a temporary replacement. Neeku buys it, saying he's going to miss him, but Tam is suspicious. Kaz quickly excuses himself by saying he promised to show CB-23 around, as she nods. Outside, Kaz remarks that, based on what he saw that day, the First Order can do worse than he ever imagined.
Tropes:
- All There in the Manual:
- The starless system is called the Dassal system, and the perfectly-cored planet is Najra-Va.
- "Resistance Rewind" confirms that Najra-Va and the other planets were cored out as tests for the construction of Starkiller Base.
- The Alleged Car: Despite all the work that's been put into her, the Fireball is still kind of a piece of shit. It handles well enough against the First Order's fighters, but it has significant functional difficulties.
- Bad Liar: Kaz claims that he took BB-8 to Takodana to get repaired, which is why he now has CB-23. Tam is not at all convinced.
- Being Watched: Poe says something like this when he realizes something, namely the probe droid, is spying on them.
- Book Ends: In the first scene, Poe sneaks into the repair shop and makes his presence known by speaking. In the last scene, Kaz and CB-23 do the same.
- Call-Back: There are several hints that the formerly-inhabited moon in the starless system might be Tehar: there's a symbol on the temple similar to Kel's charm, and evidence of a massacre being carried out, not to mention the First Order's interest in the system.
- Call-Forward:
- In the Poe Dameron comic, Poe recalls having to make a "quick stop to pick up BB-8" before heading to Jakku. It is revealed here that he was picking him up from Kaz.
- Poe says that he and BB-8 are going on on a mission to Jakku tomorrow.
- Chekhov's Gun: Poe and Kaz escape their First Order pursuers by using the gravity well that troubled them while flying through the cored-out planet the first time.
- Comically Missing the Point: When Yeager mentions that Poe's method of sneaking himself, BB-8, Kaz and the Fireball off the Colossus is called the "Widowmaker", Kaz protests that he's not married.
- Continuity Nod: Poe says that he's having Kaz fly the Fireball during the Widowmaker maneuver because Kaz both knows the ship better, and the word is still that he's "the greatest pilot in the galaxy", which causes Kaz to sigh.
- Dope Slap: Kaz gets one from Yeager when he says he's not married in response to hearing about the Widowmaker maneuver.
- Dramatic Irony:
- Kaz and Poe think Vonreg is dead after the skirmish in the gravity well, but he escaped instead.
- As Poe leaves for Jakku, he quips that, due to what he and Kaz saw in the starless system, he's going to have quite the report for General Leia. He has no idea...
- Ghost Planet: The dead moon Kaz and Poe land on used to be inhabited once, but then the First Order came.
- Gravity Screw: Kaz and Poe are caught in a gravity well while flying through the perfectly-cored planet.
- Interesting Situation Duel: A starfighter dogfight inside a gravity well at the centre of a cored-out planet.
- Late to the Tragedy: Kaz and Poe arrive in the Dassal system after the First Order has finished destroying it, with the aftermath giving little clues as to the First Order's motive for doing so.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Attacking and killing the probe droid only alerted Major Vonreg, whom Poe and Kaz have to escape.
- Oh, Crap!: The Fireball has some engine trouble after Kaz detaches from the freighter, which causes him and Poe some alarm before the engines start up again and they can rendezvous with CB-23.
- Outside Ride: Because the Fireball is a single-seater ship, Poe has to hang on to the outside when he, Kaz and BB-8 sneak off the Colossus.
- Put on a Bus: BB-8 is taken back by Poe, with CB-23 replacing him.
- Right Behind Me: Poe enters the repair shop while Kaz is working on his transmitter, and when he responds to Kaz trying to contact him, Kaz initially thinks that the transmitter is working.
- Shattered World: Kaz and Poe see several planets that have been reduced to this in attempts to core them out.
- Space Is Cold: Downplayed. The planet Poe and Kaz land on is really cold, but not fatally so. How realistic is this? Well, a significant fraction of Earth's warmth comes from the dissipating heat of the Earth coalescing or from radioactive decay of elements in the Earth, so it's not unreasonable that a significantly large object would be cold, but not immediately fatal, even without a star to help warm it.
- Star Killing: Poe notes that the system he and Kaz visit is missing its star, with implications that the First Order did it somehow.
- Stealth Hi/Bye: Poe, at the beginning, and Kaz, at the end, enter the repair shop this way.
- Tempting Fate: At the end of the episode, Kaz reflects on what he and Poe discovered in the dead star system and says that the First Order can do worse than he ever imagined. It won't be long before they'll make that even worse.
- Tragic Keepsake: Kaz picks up a tooka doll from the massacre that took place in the abandoned village and brings it back to Colossus.
- The Unreveal: Poe's method of sneaking onto the Colossus, which Kaz employs at the end, is not shown to the audience.
