Review: Star Wars Rebels “Path of the Jedi”

Watch this episode, you will.

path of the jedi

 

Spoilers!

Every Star Wars fan has that one moment that was their favorite. There’s always that moment, that while it’s badass, felt like that it could have went further. My moment was when Luke was training on Dagobah with Yoda, and Yoda sent him into a cave. In the cave, Luke found a vision of Vader, and it turned out to be himself. I wanted to see more. What happened when someone succeeded in this training? What happened when someone didn’t succumb to fear and anger? Well, If what I think is true, we got those answers this week.

This was a fantastic follow up to “Gathering Forces,” because it immediately addresses the dangerous connections to the Force that Ezra made while trying to defend himself against the Inquisitor. From when Kanan took Ezra to this abandoned temple, my immediate thoughts went to that very scene. The episode would have been great just with that. However, we got a great cameo from Frank Oz, and Yoda put Ezra and Kanan on the right track so that the duo can both grow and learn from one another. And hot damn, I actually got excited. I can’t say enough about Oz bringing Yoda to life again.

The entire segment of “Path of the Jedi,” when Ezra was trying to run from the Inquisitor was so well done. You weren’t sure what was going on, because it was like Ezra was tripping out. For most of the episode, if you didn’t know about the cave scene from The Empire Strikes Back, you would think that there was some advanced mind control from the Inquisitor. I know I almost thought it. This was a perfect time where the confusion worked great, because it added suspense. And that’s what Rebels needs from time to time.

This was a clean up episode of sorts for the first arc of the series. Ezra got to build his lightsaber and have a stronger connection to the Force. This is a long time coming, because Ezra’s training has been sputtering, kind of like the plot. However, the payoff from the weeks of stalling, because Ezra did his training so far his way, so he made his lightsaber his way too. It’s a complete representation of what Ezra is.

I’ve said it before during reviews for Rebels, but it’s worth saying again. It’s the little things, like Frank Oz reprising his role as Yoda or Anthony Daniels coming back as C-3P0, that do a fantastic job to tie Rebels to the greater Star Wars universe. To go deep into lightsaber parts, like Kaiburr Crystals and energy gates was something the movies didn’t even do. The writers need to be commended with how they’re going deep on aspects that are only lightly touched upon in the movies or other series.

Star Wars Rebels has the opportunity to be a great companion series to Episodes III and IV, because there’s 20 years to go through, and a lot to explain. I mean, name another instance where they went deep in Lightsaber construction, or the training that Jedi go through? Clone Wars did,  and it was done well. This episode trumped the training episodes Anakin went through in Clone Wars. This is definitely worth the time. Yoda’s in it!

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