Recap / Star Wars: The Bad Batch S1E1 "Aftermath"

The Bad Batch adapt to the Republic being reformed into the Galactic Empire.

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Tropes:

• Action Prologue: The episode starts with the Battle of Kaller, one more element of the Outer Rim Sieges.
• Air Vent Escape: To escape their prison cell, Tech has Wrecker punch a wall panel to loosen it, then Omega (due to being small enough to fit) is sent into the ducts behind it to reach the control lever on the other side.
• All for Nothing: The Bad Batch's heroic efforts to save Depa Billaba and her clone squadron are rendered completely pointless a few minutes later, when Order 66 is activated and the clones proceed to gun Billaba down in cold blood.
• All There in the Manual: The Star Wars Databank confirms the training droids used against Clone Force 99 ARE the DT-Series Sentry Droids.
• And Here He Comes Now:
  Hunter: Tech, power up the ship. The rest of us will go after Crosshair.
  Omega: (looks at the door) I don't think we'll have to go far.
  (Crosshair arrives with a squad of clones)
• Arc Words: "Good soldiers follow orders."
• As You Know: Tech goes into detail about how the Kaminoans programmed the clones with psychological behavior (aka microchips) to get the clones to obey given orders without question, as it has been well documented. From there, he theorizes this is what made the regular clones carry out Order 66. The Bad Batch is immune to this programming because of their altered physiology and Echo's cyborg modifications have rendered the chip's programming useless.
• Back for the Dead: AZI, who had previously helped Fives back during the Order 66 arc, is taken offline by a stun shot from a clone's blaster. He shows up checking up on Crosshair 2 episodes later, though.
• Bait-and-Switch: The episode opens up like a traditional The Clone Wars episode, complete with opening narration, theme, and the typical clone-versus-droid action seen in the predecessor series. And then Order 66 goes out and the episode drops the lighthearted action and veers right into much darker territory.
• Bandage Wince: Wrecker of all people winces continuously when he gets injections from Echo to recover from the final fight.
• Big Brother Is Watching You: Tarkin sends a probe droid to monitor the Bad Batch during their mission to Onderon and see whether they're loyal to the Empire or not. They end up shooting it down when they realize it's been watching, but by that point, Tarkin has seen what he needs to.
• Big Damn Heroes: The Bad Batch's Establishing Character Moment has them swooping in to save Depa Billaba and her clone battalion from an army of battle droids.
• Big Guy Rodeo: At the Combat Parkour, Echo jumps onto the back of one of the huge droids and disables him from there.
• Bittersweet Ending:
  • The bitter: the Jedi have been eliminated, the Republic has become the Empire, Crosshair has been completely brainwashed, and the Bad Batch are on the run and branded traitors. Worse yet, all of the other clones, who were once relatively decent people, have become nothing more than mindless slaves to the Empire.
  • The sweet: Omega has joined the group, and Hunter is planning to have his team survive.
• Blasting It Out of Their Hands:
  • Depa's lightsaber is shot out of her hand just before she's killed.
  • Omega shoots Crosshair's rifle during the Bad Batch's escape.
• Blatant Lies:
  • Hunter claims to have stunned Caleb and watched him fall to his death. Crosshair easily spots the holes in his story and calls him out on it. Hunter, for his part, doesn't even try to maintain the deception.
  • Likewise, when the Bad Batch tries to bust out of prison, Wrecker goes into a lie about how his extra weight is making it difficult for the retrofitted prison to hold him up, in order to cover Omega's escape. The guards aren't buying it.
• Blessed with Suck: Echo has been so thoroughly fucked by the shit he went through with the Separatists that he's immune to the brainchip and its programming.
  Echo: Lucky me. I guess.
• Brainwashed and Crazy: Order 66 compels the clones to execute the Jedi, as it did in The Clone Wars. Crosshair is also affected to an extent, even though the rest of the Bad Batch isn't. When Tarkin learns of this, he orders the programming dialed up to make Crosshair completely obedient.
• The Bus Came Back: AZI, the droid that helped Fives in the Order 66 arc back in The Clone Wars Season 6, returns.
• Call-Back:
  • References to the Citadel arc are made, with Echo remembering that Tarkin isn't fond of clones.
  • At the end, the Bad Batch make their way to the galactic coordinates J-19. It was established in The Clone Wars episode "Grievous Intrigue" that the Saleucami system is in J-19. Saleucami is home to the clone deserter Cut Lawquane, whose self-titled episode "The Deserter" showed him as one of the earliest clones to leave the army—something the Bad Batch are also explicitly doing in this episode.
  • The episode starts out similarly to "Old Friends Not Forgotten", with a Jedi Master and clone troops pinned down and a younger Jedi coming with reinforcements.
  • Crosshair repeats the Madness Mantra "good soldiers follow orders" like Tup and other clones affected by Order 66 in Star Wars: The Clone Wars.
  • The Coruscant Guard Shock Troopers waiting for Clone Force 99 to come "home" from sparing Saw Gerrera when they should've killed him are positioned similarly to the Commando Droids on Rishi, which was also Echo's first^note  Chronologically second appearance.
  • Crosshair complaining to Hunter about not killing Saw Gerrera when the Bad Batch had the chance, as well as letting Caleb Dume/Kanan Jarrus live is similar to Dogma's complaining about not executing Fives and Jesse for disobeying Krell's orders in "Carnage of Krell".
• Call-Forward:
  • In a Broad Strokes of the Star Wars: Kanan comic, the Bad Batch help Caleb escape Order 66, directly connecting the show to Star Wars Rebels. It also helps establish Caleb's hatred of Clones further by showing that Crosshair effectively ruined any chance to calm down the scared boy.
  • When discussing the Empire's needs in the wake of their rise, Tarkin feels that recruited soldiers would be sufficient to maintain order and cost half as much compared to the more creative (but far more expensive) clones, setting the stage for the eventual transition from Clone Troopers to Stormtroopers.
  • Tarkin's combat test has the Bad Batch facing off against what appears to be early prototypes of the DT-Series Sentry Droids, though these versions are owned by the Kaminoan government under Lama Su.
  • Saw Gerrera telling Hunter that he and the Bad Batch can either adapt and survive or die with the past is similar to Iden Versio's motto for Inferno Squad. Likewise, Crosshair wanting to kill Saw Gerrera and his proto Partisans is similar to Gideon Hask murdering all the remaining Dreamers, though here he's ordered by Hunter to stand down.
• The Cameo:
  • Freddie Prinze Jr. makes a brief return as a young Caleb Dune/Kanan Jarrus.
  • In the opening roll, we briefly see Anakin, Obi-Wan, General Grievous, and Palpatine still as Chancellor during Anakin and Obi-Wan's rescue of Palpatine at the beginning of Revenge of the Sith. Palpatine, in his Sith guise, later cameos twice—first during the issuing of Order 66, then again for his speech announcing the transition from the Republic to the Empire.
• Combat Pragmatist: Crosshair shoots and wounds Wrecker as the Bad Batch is trying to escape, the damage just enough to keep him from moving. He then waits for the others to assist their fallen comrade so he can gun them down once they leave cover.
• Continuity Nod: Wrecker's tooka doll is named Lula, the same name as one of the protagonists of the Star Wars: The High Republic Adventures comic.
• Day of the Jackboot: We see the days following the events of Revenge of the Sith, as the Republic officially transitions to the totalitarian Galactic Empire.
• Dead-Hand Shot: When the Bad Batch return to Kamino after Order 66 was issued, two clones go past with a stretcher bearing a body covered by a sheet. As they pass, a hand holding a lightsaber slips out from beneath the sheet, highly implying that the body beneath is that of a murdered Jedi.
• Death Faked for You: Hunter lies about Caleb's death so Crosshair and the other clones will stop hunting him. Crosshair still files a report indicating Caleb likely survived, drawing suspicion on the Bad Batch as a potential problem for the Empire.
• Diner Brawl: Technically, a "mess hall brawl" but the same spirit with the Batch taking it to scores of other Clone troopers after an insult to Omega.
• Disability Immunity: The genetic aberrations of the Bad Batch render the obedience chips useless on them, though Crosshair's works at reduced effectiveness. Echo's extensive cybernetic modifications have likewise given him independence and disabled the chip's effect.
• Doomed by Canon: Star Wars Rebels already established that Depa Billaba was killed during Order 66, so when we see her at the beginning of the episode shortly before the order is given, we know it's only a matter of time.
• Downer Beginning: After a short action sequence, the Supreme Chancellor invokes Order 66, Depa Billaba is killed, and Caleb Dume is forced to go on the run. From there, Palpatine creates the Galactic Empire and the entire clone army is depreciated in favor of conscripts.
• Dramatic Irony:
  • When Tech develops a theory as to how the inhibitor chips forced the Clones to carry out Order 66, he notes that his squad wasn't affected due to their mutations (or in Echo's case, his modifications). However, when he notes that this may not be the case for most of them, he thinks Wrecker is the one being most affected (of course, Wrecker isn't helping disprove this), when the audience has already figured out Crosshair is the one affected.
  • Really, a large chunk of the episode's plot revolves around the fact that the Bad Batch have absolutely no idea what's going on, and are scrambling to find out answers to questions the audience already learned about years ago, like what Order 66 even is and why Palpatine has suddenly chosen to activate it.
• Dramatic Thunder: When Hunter refuses to surrender and turn himself in, courtesy of Crosshair, lightning can be seen in the background and adds to the weight of the moment.
• Dynamic Entry: Rolling a boulder onto a bunch of battle droids and then shooting the crap out of the others is pretty dynamic, all right.
• Establishing Character Moment: The Action Prologue serves as a perfect opportunity for the Bad Batch to display their various skills when they come in as The Cavalry for Depa Billaba and her clone battalion.
• Evil Costume Switch: After Tarkin orders him to undergo further "reprogramming", Crosshair is next shown wearing dark grey Imperial commando armor, though carrying over some design elements of his clone commando rig.
• Evil Is Petty: Upon their return from Onderon, Tarkin deliberately misinterprets the Bad Batch's conversation with Saw as "conspiring" with the future leader of the Partisans simply because he wants an excuse to kill them.
• Exact Words: When Tarkin asks Nala Se how many defective clones there are, she responds with five. Tarkin assumes the five to be the Bad Batch, but as Tech notes, Echo is a regular clone turned Cyborg. The fifth defective clone is, in fact, Omega.
• Expospeak Gag:
  Wrecker: It's good to be home. How long has it been?
  Tech: 180 rotations in a standard cycle, but galactic zone changes put the adjusted figure at around 205.
  Wrecker: (Beat) What?
  Echo: (sighs) A long time.
• Face–Heel Turn: Thanks to the effects of the obedience chip, with some help from Tarkin, Crosshair sides with the Empire against his fellow clones.
• Fantastic Racism: It turns out the Bad Batch's animosity towards "Reg" clones goes both ways, as the other clones on Kamino look down on them for being "defective" and call them the "Sad Batch". The Regs also mock Omega for being nothing more than a lab specimen.
• Faux Affably Evil: The Coruscant Guard Shock Trooper Quartermaster that informs the Bad Batch that the Clone Wars ended is pretty polite, if a bit rude, telling them that a mandatory general assembly is set to start at 15:00 and that they're being summoned by Tarkin for a training exercise. When Omega and AZI are caught snooping around their barracks, however, his true mean colors surface.
• First-Episode Twist:
  • The Bad Batchers aren't affected by Order 66 — except Crosshair, albeit to a lesser degree than the "regs". His programming is then intensified until he's fully compliant.
  • Omega is revealed to be an enhanced Jango clone, as well as the only known female created from him.
• Food Slap: Omega spitefully throws her food at a group of "Regs" in the Kamino mess hall after they insulted the Bad Batch. Despite Hunter's attempts to calm things down, it naturally devolves into an all-out Diner Brawl between the Bad Batch and Omega vs. all the regular clone troopers.
• Foreshadowing:
  • Crosshair insisting on following Order 66, even though he doesn't know what it entails, foreshadows his eventual turn against his squad.
  • Similarly, the opening battle has everyone save Crosshair in the middle of the melee with the droids. Crosshair is away, sniping from an overlook. It symbolizes his division with his team.
  • The Kaminoans claim to have five modified clones left. One might think the fifth is Echo, but he started out as an ordinary trooper and was later modified by the Separatists. The real number five is Omega.
  • Also foreshadowed when Hunter asks her if she has parents. Her confused reaction to the word "parents" suggests an unfamiliarity with the word itself, hinting that she wasn't conceived and born naturally.
  • During Tarkin's briefing to Clone Force 99, he mentions that Nala Se speaks highly of her 5 enhanced clones, despite the fact no else mentions it. During Return to Kamino, it's revealed that she created them.
  • When the Coruscant Guard Shock Trooper Quartermaster catches Omega and AZI snooping around Clone Force 99's barracks, they try to tell him that they're Kaminoan medical personnel, but the clone overrides their authority by blasting AZI with his blaster, hinting that the Empire's authority on Kamino will be much harder than the local government's...
• Gory Discretion Shot: Depa Billaba's last stand against her men is only briefly seen, with her death being audio-only.
• Hand Signals: Hunter uses hand signals during the battle sim, to Wrecker's frustration.
  Wrecker: Oh, I hate hand signals!
  Tech: Perhaps if you memorized them.
  Wrecker: Why don't you memorize them?
  Tech: I have.
• He Didn't Make It: After Hunter lets Caleb escape. Crosshair doesn't buy it.
  Crosshair: Where's the Jedi?
  Hunter: I stunned him when he jumped. He didn't make it.
• Heroic Sacrifice: Depa fights against the clones to give Caleb time to escape, all while yelling at him to run. He reluctantly does so (and ends up regretting it, thinking of himself as a Dirty Coward).
  Depa: You must run! RUN, CALEB!
• Hey, Catch!: In the opening fight scene, Echo tosses an EMP grenade at a droid which the latter catches only to get disabled by it.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: When Tarkin orders the training simulation switched to live fire, droids are released that are impervious to training weapons. The Bad Batch adapts by tackling and reprogramming one droid to puppeteer it against the others, while using their still-deadly vibroknives to take out the stragglers.
• If You're So Evil, Eat This Kitten!: Tarkin orders the Bad Batch to travel to Onderon and eliminate a "Separatist holdout" as a test of their loyalty to the new Empire. In actuality, it's a fledgling resistance cell led by Saw Gerrera, made up of former Republic-aligned fighters and innocent refugees (including children).
• Improbable Aiming Skills: Omega is a crack shot with a blaster despite never having fired one before.
• Incoming Ham: After the boulder smashes through the first batch of droids, Wrecker charges in while shouting "MAKE A HOLE!!"
• Just Following Orders: Frequently discussed. The Bad Batch is known for disobeying orders, which Tarkin finds disconcerting. Crosshair, however, insists on following orders as his chip takes hold of him.
  Crosshair: Good soldiers follow orders.
• Kick the Dog: The Coruscant Guard Shock Trooper Quartermaster shoots AZI just for touching him.
• Killed Offscreen: Just like the Jedi Council noting that Grievous will eventually be killed, Tech mentions to Depa, Grey, and Caleb Dume that Grievous will be defeated on Utapau by Kenobi, thus bringing the Clone Wars to an end. Sure enough, when the Bad Batch return to Kamino, they learn from a Coruscant Shock Trooper that the General was killed on Utapau, and peace has returned to the galaxy. Tech lampshades it.
  Tech: Just like I said.
  Wrecker: (Gasps) It is just like you said!
• Kill Tally: A variant. The Batch keeps a count of their successful missions via tally marks on a board. Wrecker comments that they need 11 more successful missions.
• Late to the Realization: After the Bad Batch return to Kamino, the Coruscant Guard are present on Kamino^note  despite the fact it had its own batch of Clones in the form of Kamino Security, making Hunter wonder why they're here. Thankfully, a Coruscant Shock Trooper fills him in on what happened.
  Wrecker: Aw, man! What'd we miss now?!
  Coruscant Shock Trooper: The end of the war.
  Hunter: Say again, Trooper?
  Coruscant Shock Trooper: General Grievous was defeated on Utapau. The Separatist leadership has collapsed. The war is over.
• Let's You and Him Fight: Tarkin sends the Bad Batch to take out Saw Gerrera's new insurgency. Either he eliminates one of his problems... or both of them. Except it doesn't work out that way and now he's got two worse problems, with the latter getting off the hook to start something far worse.
• Literal Metaphor: When discussing why the obedience chip isn't affecting Echo despite him being a normal clone, Tech notes that he's more machine than man, adding "percentage-wise" to make it clear that the description is literally true. Also doubles as a Mythology Gag, since Obi-Wan describes Vader as just that in Return of the Jedi.
• Loophole Abuse: When the Kaminoan Prime Minister Lama Su protests that their contracts with the Republic assure continued clone sales, Tarkin tells him that, because the Republic no longer exists, those contracts are now null and void.
• Manly Tears: According to Tech, Wrecker cried Tears of Joy when he saw the new armory. Surprisingly enough, according to Wrecker, Crosshair was also crying.
• Mood Whiplash: With the Bad Batch having turned the tide of battle, Caleb eagerly joins them for their counterattack... and then...
  "Execute Order 66."
• Most Definitely Not Accompanying Us: Omega begs Hunter to let her come on their mission to liquidate the insurgency, which he denies. Subverted when she actually doesn't sneak onto the ship but stays behind.
• My Significance Sense Is Tingling: Depa clearly senses something wrong when Order 66 is issued.
• Never Found the Body: Tarkin points out that only Depa's death has been confirmed from Kaller, not Caleb's.
• New Era Speech: Palpatine's declaration of the Galactic Empire from Revenge of the Sith is played for the clones on Kamino, letting them know who their new boss is.
• No One Gets Left Behind:
  • Upon learning that Omega is an enhanced clone, Hunter decides that they need to go back for her.
  • While the team is making their escape from Kamino, they also intend to find Crosshair, who'd been taken away on Tarkin's orders. Unfortunately, his Face–Heel Turn is complete, and they're forced to escape without him.
• No Sympathy: One of the main elements of Crosshair being affected by the control chip is him being more callous than usual, brushing off things like the wholesale slaughter of the Jedi and Tarkin using live rounds in a training exercise.
• Not Himself: Crosshair visibly begins to act in a manner that the other Bad Batch members find odd, with them noting that while his amped-up killer instincts and abrasive manner are nothing new, his sudden adherence to orders is very out of place for him.
• Nothing Is the Same Anymore: Not only is the Republic over, but Crosshair betrays the Bad Batch, who was a valuable member and whose skills will be hard to replace.
• Obligatory Earpiece Touch: Grey, the commander of the clone troops in the opening scene, touches the side of his helmet when Order 66 comes through.
• Oh, Crap!:
  • Echo is rightfully concerned when he sees Admiral Tarkin is the one reviewing the clones, knowing he's biased against them.
  • Everyone in the Bad Batch gets this to some degree when Order 66 goes out, because they don't understand why the clones have suddenly done a complete 180 on the Jedi. So do Depa and Caleb when they realize that the clones have turned against them.
  • Hunter is shocked when the droids in the battle simulation switch to live rounds.
• Oh, No... Not Again!: Echo's initial reaction (complete with a facepalm) when the brawl in the mess hall starts.
• Opposite-Sex Clone: Omega is a female clone, one of the five enhanced clones to survive.
• Overly Long Name: AZI-3 gives his full name as AZI-345211896246498721347.
• Pet the Dog: Nala Se, the Kaminoan who was responsible for playing a role in the execution of Fives and the covering up of the Order 66 conspiracy in The Clone Wars sixth season, helps the Bad Batch escape with Omega.
• P.O.V. Sequel: The opening scene is Order 66 from the perspective of the Bad Batch, who also happened to be fighting at the Battle of Kaller with Depa Billaba, Caleb Dume, and their own clone legion at the time. The Bad Batch also join other clones on Kamino in watching Palpatine's declaration.
• Pragmatic Villainy:
  • When Tarkin calls to increase the challenge of the training exercise, Prime Minister Lama Su objects despite normally viewing clones as mere products. His attitude hasn't changed, rather objecting on the grounds that switching to live-fire could result in damage to both the valuable clones and the training facility. Tarkin subsequently promises to compensate Kamino for the damages, similar to how Vader promised compensation to Boba Fett if Han Solo died during the carbon-freezing process in The Empire Strikes Back.
  • Despite his dislike for the clones, Tarkin does recognize the value of them as effective combatants. That's why, upon noticing his staunch loyalty to the Empire, he has Crosshair reprogrammed with a fully-functioning inhibitor chip to serve the Imperial Army.
• Punch! Punch! Punch! Uh Oh...: When the new droids appear during the training exercise, Wrecker shoots one of them several times before punching it — and every hit is a No-Sell.
• The Purge: Order 66 is executed, resulting in the slaughter of the Jedi.
• Quality over Quantity: This is Lama Su's argument to Tarkin regarding the continued use of clone troopers for the new Imperial Army, whereas Tarkin believes that natural-born conscripts can fill the ranks in greater numbers, and at half the cost to boot, especially since the conflict for which the clones were made is officially over. Of course, Tarkin's argument wins out in the end, since the Empire uses conscripted forces rather than clones, but Lama Su's argument ultimately proves correct when the Stormtroopers prove to be highly ineffective against opponents trained to fight back.
• Reforged into a Minion: Crosshair undergoes a procedure ordered by Tarkin to "amplify" the programming of his inhibitor chip, solidifying his loyalty to the Empire and turning him into a perfectly obedient Elite Mook.
• The Remnant: Subverted. Admiral Tarkin sends the Bad Batch to wipe out who he claims to be some Separatist stragglers. They're actually Onderon guerrilla fighters protecting innocent civilians.
• Retcon:
  • Star Wars: Kanan is retconned to feature the Bad Batch as witnesses in the assassination of Depa Billaba and the attempted assassination of Caleb Dume, although otherwise the story isn't significantly contradicted, allowing it to play out as it did without any further continuity troubles.
  • Depa's lightsaber color is changed from green to blue.
  • Also in the comic, Kanan and Depa experienced Order 66 at night during a break in the fighting, while in this episode it happens at daytime shortly after a battle sequence.
  • Clone Commander Grey's armor color palette is changed from red to green, while Captain Styles is omitted.
• Rock Beats Laser: A literal example. How does the Bad Batch deal with a phalanx of battle droids? By rolling a giant boulder right through them!
• Screw the Rules, I Make Them!: Loophole Abuse aside, this is the Empire's approach to the Kaminoans. They are free to use transparently thin excuses to justify breaking their contract because they have just established themselves as the only real power left in the galaxy.
• Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right!: Hunter keeps disobeying orders given by the Empire, particularly Order 66, and Tarkin's order to wipe out Saw Gerrera and his insurgents on Onderon. Once Crosshair orders him to turn himself in, he gives this answer:
  Hunter: Well, I guess I'm disobeying that one too.
• Secret Test of Character: Tarkin sends the Bad Batch to eliminate a group of "insurgents", not telling them that they're mostly civilians and not droids. A probe droid is sent to monitor them, seeing how they'll react to the situation. Naturally, they fail that test, and Tarkin has them arrested for failing to carry out orders.
• Simultaneous Arcs: This episode takes place concurrently with the second half of Revenge of the Sith and the final arc of Star Wars: The Clone Wars.
• Sincerity Mode: To reassure Caleb that he means no harm, Hunter draws his pistol by the barrel, instead of the grip, and throws it out of his reach.
• Special Edition Title: This episode starts with the logo for Star Wars: The Clone Wars, which gets burned away to reveal this show's logo. (Future episodes have a Title-Only Opening.) It's also the only episode with Tom Kane's Clone Wars-style narration, further demonstrating that this is a Sequel Series.
• Spotting the Thread:
  • Crosshair notes that Hunter was looking across the ravine after claiming to have stunned Caleb mid-jump, causing him to fall into the ravine, as opposed to into the ravine to confirm his kill. From that, he deduces that Hunter let Caleb go.
  • Tech figures out that Omega is a female clone based on Nala Se mentioning that five enhanced specimens survived. Echo is a cybernetically-enhanced normal clone, so that statement would only make sense if someone else were one of the five.
• Staring Contest: Hunter and Crosshair like to engage in these. The final time, it doubles as a Showdown at High Noon in the scene where Crosshair tries to prevent the batch from escaping the station.
• Starter Villain: The Separatist battle droids serve as the initial antagonists before Order 66 goes live and the nascent Empire takes the stage.
• Tactical Reminiscence: The Bad Batch defeat the training droids by using a tactic that they previously used on Felucia. Nothing else is actually said about it, but it apparently involved taking control of one droid and setting it against the others.
• That's an Order!: When Crosshair tells Hunter to stand down.
  Hunter: Is that an order?
  Crosshair: [smirks, amused] I guess it is.
  Hunter: Well, I guess I'm disobeying that one too.
• Thought They Knew Already: When Echo demands to know why Tech didn't say anything about Omega being a clone, Tech simply shrugs "I thought it was rather obvious."
• Token Evil Teammate: Crosshair, due to his inhibitor chip at least partially activating when Order 66 is declared. He tries to kill Caleb Dune on Kaller, and later has no problem trying to gun down Saw Gerrera's resistance group, including unarmed women and children. Tarkin later orders him to undergo further brainwashing, causing him to go full on heel and fight against the rest of the Bad Batch.
• Took a Level in Jerkass:
  • The effect of the obedience chip on Crosshair makes him much more irritable, questioning Hunter's choices at every turn because Hunter isn't affected by the chip. He isn't as mindlessly obedient because his aberrations make it less effective, at least until Tarkin orders the programming be amplified to rectify that. His conversation with Omega strongly suggests that he knows something is wrong with him, which is in part causing him to lash out at the others.
  • After Order 66, the regular clone troopers have similarly become much more easily agitated, physically brushing off attempts to speak with them, becoming very irritated if looked at for too long, and demonstrating much shorter tempers than they possessed during the events of The Clone Wars. To hammer the point home, very few of them are seen with their helmets off, they've all started acting as a collective more so than individuals (to the point that they also start addressing each other by their serial numbers instead of their nicknames, despite the previous series hammering home multiple times how important nicknames were for clones, since it helped them build their own individual identities) and they cheer at Palpatine's reorganization speech.
• Trauma Button: When Echo wakes up after the Food Fight, he panics at the sight of medical equipment near him, likely remembering what the Separatists did to him.
• Unfamiliar Ceiling: The blurry vision of the ceiling of the medical quarters when Echo wakes up.
• Unusually Uninteresting Sight: Crosshair's reaction to the mess hall brawl is to sigh and ignore it, until Echo being thrown into his food brings him into the fight.
• Uriah Gambit: Tarkin is displeased at the Bad Batch's combination of independence and badassery, and twice seems to invoke this trope, though with some genuine testing as to how useful they could be if they survive.
  • He orders the training drill to switch to live fire when the Bad Batch only has training weapons that are ineffective against the tougher droids, and is clearly somewhat disappointed when the Bad Batch succeeds in winning anyway.
  • Alongside the Secret Test of Character in the mission to Onderon, Tarkin misleads them into thinking they're attacking remnant Separatists, not Jedi- and clone-trained guerrilla fighters. Saw's men easily surround the Batch and would have inflicted heavy casualties if not for Hunter's conscience.
• Villain Has a Point: Saw believes Palpatine unjustly installed himself as Emperor. Tech chimes in and claims that Palpatine's seizing power was justified due to the Jedi attempting a treasonous coup against him. Saw doesn't buy that for a second.
• Villain Respect: When the Batch takes out several of the training droids despite being at a significant disadvantage, Tarkin looks visibly impressed despite himself.
• We've Got Company: Line said by Hunter when he realizes that the batch is being followed by Omega in the corridor.
• Wham Line: For those who watched The Clone Wars' Order 66 arc, Crosshair saying "Good soldiers follow orders." This reveals that among the Bad Batch, he alone is being affected by his inhibitor chip.
• Why Am I Ticking?: In the opening fight, Echo attaches a ticking bomb to a Battle Droid who first wonders what it is but then realizes what's gonna come.
  Battle Droid: Oh, no...(BOOM)
• The Worf Effect: While Wrecker gets to bash plenty of droids and brainwashed clones, he also gets shot twice with live rounds, but they don't put him down for very long.
• Wrestler in All of Us: Wrecker breaks out a frog splash during the mess hall brawl, and then a German Suplex on a training droid.
• You Have Outlived Your Usefulness:
  • The Bad Batch sans Crosshair are "rewarded" for their services by being targeted by the Empire, no thanks to their immunity to the Order 66 protocol.
  • On a non-lethal note, the Kaminoans and the Clone Army as a whole are deemed by Tarkin as "no longer essential", now that the Clone Wars have been won, and that the job of the Clone Troopers can now be fulfilled by natural-born human conscripts at half the price. At the end of the episode, after the Bad Batch escapes, Lama Su is clearly paranoid that worse is to come.

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