The strong survive, the noble overcome.
Count Dooku puts the bounty hunters and Obi-Wan in a box designed to test their capabilities for the upcoming mission, and Obi-Wan must survive without using the Force.
Tropes:
- Big "WHAT?!": Derrown, upon hearing that "Hardeen" used to kill Parwans for a living, makes a noise that sounds like this.
- Chekhov's Gun: Sinrich, one of the bounty hunters, is stated to be the inventor of the Holographic Disguise Matrix, which would be used in the following episode.
- Deadly Gas: The first challenge involves a lethal gas called dioxin. Obi-Wan, who had encountered this gas before on the Trade Federation ship with Qui-Gon in "The Phantom Menace", is able to solve the puzzle by using the air filter in his helmet.
- Death Course: What Eval's creation runs the bounty hunters through to find the best of the best.
- Disproportionate Retribution: One of the bounty hunters, an Ithorian named Bulduga, appears to be attempting to impersonate Cad Bane, despite their species looking nothing alike. And he has a hat just like Bane's old one. For this, Bane kills him and takes the hat. Bane's comment about it implies that he just wanted the hat.
- Dwindling Party: The express purpose of the Box is to whittle the bounty hunters down from eleven to five, and Dooku outright admits before they begin that he will execute any extra survivors to maintain the secrecy of the mission.
- Even Evil Has Standards: When Moralo Eval tries to dispose of Hardeen/Obi-Wan in a cowardly way, he is called out by both Cad Bane and Dooku, who give Hardeen a chance for a fair fight.Moralo Eval: How dare you defy Moralo Eval?!Cad Bane: If you're gonna kill him, do it like a man!Count Dooku: You heard him, Eval. Why don't you show us what you're made of?
- No Biochemical Barriers: Averted when the third challenge involves a serum that is lethal to all but one of the participants. Presumably, if Derrown hadn't made it through the first two rounds, a different challenge would have been used...
- Reused Character Design: With the exception of Derrown, all of the bounty hunters that debuted in this episode are remodified from pre-existing character models. Out of these reused designs, Twazzi is the only survivor.
- Save the Villain: Obi-Wan does his best to keep all the other bounty hunters alive, even though they're criminals and the Box is a free for all.
- Secret Test of Character: An evil variant. In the
Undercover Episode Featurette, Dave Filoni explains that Dooku already knows in advance who will be selected for the mission, something that is tipped off but not outright explained by the fact that one of the challenges involves a Parwan having the correct blood type (seemingly a 50/50 chance). The Box is designed to filter out any undercover Jedi, and by the end Dooku knows who The Mole is (though it’s left ambiguous if he knows it’s Kenobi specifically). - Shout-Out: One of the bounty hunters is a Weequay woman named Kiera Swan, winner of the Obsidian Sphere.
- Spotting the Thread: Dooku becomes suspicious of "Rako Hardeen" when he sees him doing far better than the bounty hunters in The Box and starts being onto him when he finds out that he killed Obi-Wan Kenobi with only a sniper rifle which shouldn't be possible given how Obi-Wan is the greatest defensive lightsaber duelist in the galaxy and would have definitely seen something like that coming.
- Villainous Rescue: Cad Bane saves "Hardeen" from being roasted alive when Eval tricks him into failing his test, saying that if he's going to kill him, then do it like a man.
- Whole-Plot Reference: The Box is a much less graphic version of the Cube from the film series of the same name.
