Awesome / Ahsoka

As a Moments subpage, all spoilers are unmarked as per policy. You Have Been Warned.

An apprentice of the light and one of the dark clash for the first time.

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In General

• For the teaser, there was a lot to get the fandom rejoicing:
  • The Reveal that Magnificent Bastard Thrawn has returned, with Ahsoka name-dropping him as the "Heir to the Empire," referencing the Timothy Zahn trilogy that introduced him. Also, the fact that Lars Mikkelsen will be reprising his role as Thrawn.
  • The live-action appearance of most of the cast of Star Wars Rebels.
  • Every shot of Ahsoka cutting loose - literally in one scene - with her lightsabers.

Season 1

Part One: Master and Apprentice

• Baylan and Shin cutting down the New Republic Captain Hayle and his crew while rescuing Nightsister Morgan Elsbeth. Special mention to Baylan for his Hallway Fight massacre of the Republic forces, similar to Vader (Rogue One), his son Luke (The Mandalorian, episode 16), and Maul (in the penultimate episode of The Clone Wars.)
• Sabine riding her speeder bike and evading a roadblock and interception by two E-Wing fighters by cutting her repulsors, drifting while she slides Under the Truck, then fishtailing and speeding away.
• Ahsoka seems to commune with the stone when analyzing the ancient temple on Arcana containing the Star Map.
• Ahsoka fighting off and escaping five HK-87 assassin droids. She uses the force to manipulate her lightsabers as a Circling Saw to cut the floor underneath three of the droids as Kanan Jarrus did when rescuing Hera in the Rebels episode "Jedi Night".
• The visually splendid Star Map, the key to which is a sort of spherical Rubik's Cube.
• The fact that Sabine manages to crack the code to the map.
• Sabine managing to hold off Shin as long as she did, compared to Shin massacring everyone else she came up against.

Part Two: Toil and Trouble

• Ahsoka appears to be using something like Force Psychometry similar to Cal Kestis in his adventures when she hears Force Echoes of Sabine's fight with Shin when she visits the communications tower where Sabine lives following the fight.
• Hera and Ahsoka being Back-to-Back Badasses and fighting off the shipyard crew's ambush in the control room after Hera caught on to their true loyalties.
• Compared to when the Seventh Sister and Fifth Brother both fought Ahsoka simultaneously in Rebels, Marrok fares much better against her in a straight fight, even after losing the HK-87 Assassin Droid he started the fight with.
• Ahsoka continues her prominence as one of the most powerful and combat-capable individuals facing down the Empire and its adherents. So far, the consistent response to Ahsoka showing up has been for Shin and Marrok to aim to escape. In much the same way Darth Vader was once a threat the heroes could only flee from, Ahsoka has established herself as The Dreaded to those serving the Dark Side.

Part Three: Time to Fly

• Hera doesn't mince words with Senator Xiono about him sitting out the war and waiting to see which side won. The New Republic is incredibly incompetent with thinking the Empire's forever crippled, but even with them blocking her from helping Ahsoka, Hera isn't going to tolerate their stupidity.
• When Ahsoka's ship is disabled by the Eye of Sion's turbolasers with Shin's fighters still on their tail, Ahsoka steps out onto the ship's wing and effortlessly deflects the blaster bolts, then takes out one of Shin's wingmen by slicing off their fighter's wing as they fly by.
  • She beat starfighters. In space. ON FOOT.
    • She's seen Vader do it before, in Twilight of the Apprentice. Even now, she's still learning from her Master.
  • The space battle takes up the bulk of the episode, and it's a masterful display of steadily escalating tension and action. Sabine takes the tailgun, and because of her and Ahsoka's rocky past, they're at a disadvantage against the starfighters trying to shoot them down. Ahsoka, in true Jedi fashion, sets aside her doubts and issues and asks Sabine what she needs, the two then work together and splash one of the fighters. The battle swings in their favor, with them effortlessly destroying two more, then they start approaching the Eye. Huyang needs scans, so they have to get uncomfortably close to the massive ship's turbolasers. They get the scans but take a hit that disables the ship, leading to Ahsoka going outside and taking down another fighter with her lightsabers. Sabine gets the ship working, but barely, and they have to try and lose their pursuers in atmosphere, unable to turn about and flee the system. This leads to a tense cat-and-mouse chase among clouds and gigantic purrgil, with some deft piloting by Sabine finally shaking their pursuers. At every turn, just when you think the sequence can't get any more tense or exciting, it does. Any leg of it would have made a fully satisfying action setpiece on it's own, but here each is stacked atop the other.
• After a brief appearance in The Mandalorian, the Purrgil return in full in live-action. They're even more amazing than they were in Rebels. They utterly dwarf starships, and they're beautiful.

Part Four: The Fallen Jedi

• Once again, Ahsoka takes out an Inquisitor with very little effort. When Marrok tries to charge her with his spinning lightsaber, she sidesteps him and cuts him down with a single blow to the chest, much like how Obi-Wan took down Maul in their final showdown.
• Now decked out in her beskar armor and wielding her full arsenal, Sabine fares considerably better against Shin than she did in the first episode. She even manages to disarm the Dark Jedi with a few well-placed whistling bird darts.
  • This bears elaboration. Sabine's saber technique is much improved, and even though Shin is still quite clearly an apprentice, Sabine is at a notable disadvantage. Shin disarms Sabine and sends her sprawling. Sabine flips onto her back, hand outstretched, there's the whoosh we've come to associate with a Force push, Shin braces herself. . . and nothing happens. Shin smiles, thinking she has all the cards, telling Sabine "You have no power." Then Sabine fold her hand down and fires her dart, and while Shin blocks it, it knocks her lightsaber away (and if she hadn't blocked it, the dart would have gone into her face). A Mandalorian always has tricks quite literally up their sleeve. Not to be outdone, Shin throws a smoke bomb, retrieves her lightsaber, and flees. Sabine made a Dark Jedi turn tail and run.
• Huyang managing to hold his own against one of the assassin droids that ambush him while he's working on the ship demonstrate that even after the fall of the Empire, he's still capable of kicking ass.
• Three villainous examples that exemplify Morgan and Baylan's victory:
  • The entire Ahsoka vs. Baylan fight. Baylan manages to become one of the only few foes who actually bested Ahsoka in a duel (something that even Maul didn't achieve). Even if it's also because Ahsoka is distracted by trying to get the Star Map and ends up burning her hand after retrieving it, she still gives as good as she gets and Baylan still manages to outfight her with his sheer brute strength and strong lightsaber strikes.
  • Baylan successfully using nothing but words to compel Sabine into giving him the map. He could no doubt just take it from her with relative ease, but instead, he opts to simply talk her into doing it willingly, proving him to be a savvy foe who doesn't need to rely on brute force.
    • This is also demonstrated by his saber technique. Baylan's a big, heavy guy, thickly built, and in their fight he brings all this considerable force to bear, overpowering Ahsoka's more agile fighting style. When Sabine tries shooting him, Baylan's deflections are precise, tiny movements or no movements at all, his blade exactly where he needs it to be. Going by the old Legends Forms, Baylan is as good at Djem So as Anakin, and as good at Soresu as Obi-Wan. Baylan has great power, but more than that, he knows precisely when and how to apply it to maximum effect.
  • As the Eye of Sion prepares to jump away to find Thrawn, Morgan just smiles at Hera's renegade squadron, knowing that they can't stop her. Indeed, all they can do is watch while the Eye of Sion jumps away in a breathtaking spectacle that leaves Hera and her X-Wing escort barely able to get their ships back under control.
• The World Between Worlds makes its live action appearance, as Ahsoka awakens, in that eldritch and ethereal realm, after a possibly-fatal fall while dueling Baylan, to the voice of her former Master Anakin Skywalker, greeting her as, "Snips."

Part Five: Shadow Warrior

• Anakin manages to help Ahsoka overcome her guilt.
  • The duel between Dark Side Anakin/Vader and Ahsoka at the tail-end of this is a visual Wish-Fulfillment of seeing just how a non-cybernetic Vader would have performed if he survived with his limbs intact. Hayden Christensen adopting Vader's notable lightsaber stances and powerful strikes (while coupling them with Anakin's original athleticism—in sheer contrast to the erratic style of his grandson Kylo Ren) helps visualize just how much more of a terror we were spared.
  • An acting one goes to Hayden for managing to convey, through body language and facial expressions alone, the shift from Anakin to Vader, and back again, all without a single spoken acknowledgment of the change.
• We see the Clone Wars in live action for the first time, and while the Force vision makes the details a bit hazy, the fact that we get to see the Clones, Anakin, Ahsoka, and the Siege of Mandalore in the flesh is absolutely awesome.
• The entire sequence with the Purrgil is awe inspiring. Ahsoka communing with the largest one to get them to take them to the other galaxy. How they weave though the New Republic fleet with the crews' mouths agape. Then flashing into hyperspace with Ahsoka and Huyang in tow.

Part Six: Far, Far Away

• Grand Admiral Thrawn returns... The Heir to the Empire makes his long-awaited live-action debut in the episode, and it's treated as every bit as intimidating and awe-inspiring as you'd think his entrance would be with armies of Roman-like Stormtroopers chanting his name. And Lars Mikkelsen still conveys Thrawn's calculating, stoic menace as well as he did in Rebels.
  Thrawn: What was first just a dream has become a frightening reality for those who may oppose us.
• The Chimaera, Thrawn's flagship Star Destroyer, also makes its live-action debut, and it's terrifying. A gargantuan vessel from a terrible, bygone era that evokes images of a ghost ship; appearing out of nowhere from the fog, covered in battle scars and carrying what resembles a crew of undead soldiers. Even its signature ventral engraving, though faded and damaged in areas, is still there and as intimidating as ever.
• Not to be outdone, Sabine finally reunites with Ezra himself when the crab people take her to their village, and though his presence is naturally far more understated, the Savior of Lothal is doing quite well for himself.
• When last we saw Ezra, he had trapped himself on the bridge of the Chimaera with Thrawn in front of him and a squad of Stormtroopers banging on the door behind him. Somehow, Ezra not only managed to escape the Star Destroyer after the purrgil dropped it off, but has evaded both Thrawn and the Nightsisters for nearly a decade, to the point where Thrawn isn't even sure if he's alive or not (though he clearly believes he is). When Sabine is led to him by the Noti, he's less than a day's ride away, hiding right on their doorstep.
  • It gets better. Remember that Thrawn told Morgan that his numbers had dwindled, to the point that he would only send two squads to support Baylan and Shin? Take a close look at Ezra's character poster. He's wearing a chain shirt that seems to be made out of stormtrooper dog tags.
• Sabine also gains back some badass points after being ambushed by local bandits by not only holding her own against them with her blasters but then going to town on them with her lightsaber.

Part Seven: Dreams and Madness

• Leia saving Hera Syndulla from being stripped of her rank. She sends C-3PO to deliver the evidence that she sent Hera, making Xiono look bad.
  • The fact that Leia, completely behind the scenes, beat Xiono at his own game: not only (retroactively) authorizing Hera's mission, but revealing to the committee she was very aware that Xiono went behind her back to deny Hera's request to investigate the rumors of Thrawn's return, effectively sandbagging her. Threepio's polite tone belies the fact that Leia essentially calls Xiono out and tells him the next time he wants to pull something like that, he can come to her, the head of the Defence Council. All Xiono can do is seethe as Mon Mothma declares the trial over.
  • While the obvious reasons for Leia not showing up are clear, the point remains: Leia owned Xiono by proxy. One gets the impression of just another item on the to-do list. . . manage supply shipments, organize recruitment, send Threepio to save Hera and cut Xiono off at the knees, check on training standards, pick up dry cleaning, find supper.
• Anakin Skywalker took not only the time to train Ahsoka, but also the time to record at least 20 holograms for her training sessions when he was unavailable for her, both preserving his teachings for her and other Bokken Jedi who might come after her. Sure, most of them were made for her, but others could learn from them as well.
• Although he tries to hide it, Thrawn is visibly and audibly rattled when he learns that Ahsoka was trained by Anakin Skywalker, and immediately pulls his troops back from pursuing, opting to ask for the assistance of the Great Mothers to flush her out. For context, Thrawn is one of the few to know that Anakin Skywalker was Darth Vader (having worked with him as both), and knows that this makes Ahsoka a dangerous opponent indeed. Thrawn even calls both Anakin and Ahsoka "unpredictable and dangerous". Think about that a second. Thrawn can predict everyone. And he considers Anakin "unpredictable," and presumes Ahsoka to be cast from the same mold.
• Presumably having had time to train without his lightsaber in the years since Rebels, Ezra's definitely upped his prowess. He actually encourages Sabine to keep his old lightsaber, instead battling Shin and the bandits with his bare fists and Force mastery. He even manages to stop her lightsaber with just the Force, a la Vader vs Reva in Obi-Wan Kenobi, albeit not as effortlessly.
  • Ezra also saves Sabine's life from Shin while he is the only one of the three completely unarmed, by pulling Sabine out of the line of fire.
• Ahsoka manages to put up a far greater fight against Baylan than she did on Seatos, and while he boasts that she can't beat him and she agrees that may be true, she gets one over on him by distracting him long enough to steal his howler via aerial support from Huyang. He even seems impressed.
• Ahsoka proves that Shin is nowhere near her weight class by effortlessly fighting off the Dark Jedi without drawing either of her lightsabers.
• On a villainous sense, Thrawn continues to demonstrate his mastery of the Xanatos Speed Chess by actively indulging Sabine and Ahsoka's effort to rescue each other and Ezra—committing men and resources to give our heroes a fight, all while ensuring their being occupied means the rest of Thrawn's preparations remain undisturbed. Even Baylan's unanticipated disappearance is at best a hiccup.
  Thrawn: In the grand scheme of things, one might even call this first match with Tano a success.
  Morgan: I see only our enemies reunited.
  Thrawn: Let me show you what I see. With our enemies distracted, the cargo transfer is now almost complete. Which means we shall soon leave this forsaken place. Ahsoka Tano has lost the one thing she could not afford to lose today. Time. Time is very much on our side now. And I shall keep it that way.
• Another subtle villainous one: the stormtroopers put on a much better showing than they usually do, both in tactics and marksmanship. The only reason they're mostly losing is because they are fighting two Jedi and a fully-kitted and armored Mandalorian... who also happens to be a Jedi Padawan. In fact, several of them end up pulling back on their boss's orders without so much as a scratch.
  • Indeed, it truly speaks of Thrawn's strategic genius and his capabilities to keep his soldiers in line that not only do the Stormtroopers maintain pretty much perfect unit cohesion throughout the fight, but also the fact that they react to fresh orders almost instantly.
  • Again, they were fighting two Jedi and a Mandalorian. Any other stormtoopers anywhere else in Star Wars media, that would be a complete rout for the Stormtroopers, if any made it back at all. Thrawn's troops keep their opponent's occupied exactly as long as Thrawn needs them to, then retreat in good order. Thrawn may be no ordinary Imperial commander, but his troops are no common Imperial Mooks, either.

Part Eight: The Jedi, the Witch, and the Warlord

• Ezra constructing a new lightsaber, including an emitter that was a matched pair for Kanan’s blade.
  • Even more so as his first lightsaber took him weeks to build. Now it only takes him a few minutes.
  • He, Ahsoka, and Sabine all demonstrating their saber skills together against the Night Troopers.
• Thrawn's response to the enemy coming in horseback? Bombard them. Had any of them been a normal person, they wouldn't have survived. Ezra also has to open the doors with the Force.
• Sabine explicitly taps into the Force here. First, calling her lightsaber to herself to take out the Death Trooper pinning her down, then using the Force to boost Ezra’s jump.
• Ezra managing to hide aboard the Chimaera and then steal a shuttle to escape once they reach home territory.
• Ahsoka's epic fast-paced, no-holds-barred rematch with the newly empowered Morgan. Despite an entire squad of Night Troopers breathing down her neck and Morgan destroying her second lightsaber, thanks to some aid from Sabine, she manages to cut the Nightsister down using both her remaining lightsaber and the Blade of Talzin, which the three elder Nightsisters had just bestowed upon Morgan when they empowered her.
• The simple fact that Thrawn won. Through careful, strategic planning and the sacrifice of loyal soldiers and allies, Thrawn manages to get everything he wanted- escape from exile, with a mysterious unknown cargo, and stranding Ahsoka and Sabine in a far off galaxy. The only mitigating factor to keep it from being a total victory is the fact that Ezra stowed aboard Thrawn's star destroyer and managed to escape back to the New Republic, meaning that surprise is no longer on his side.
• Hera, learning from last time, has her entire security force ready with guns when the shuttle lands.
• Anakin appears to Ahsoka as a Force ghost. Judging by Sabine's "shadows in the starlight" comment, he may have appeared to her as well.