This STAR WARS: THE BAD BATCH article contains spoilers.
In “Decommissioned,” the Bad Batch continue performing odd jobs for Cid. This time, they have to travel to one of Star Wars‘ most famous planets to retrieve a tactical droid’s data-filled brain. Along the way, they’re joined by two unexpected rivals, who want the information inside the tactical droid for their own fight against the Empire.
The Bad Batch fight their way through the police droids guarding the facility, passing some Star Wars canon connections along the way. Take a look at all the Star Wars easter eggs and references we found this week:
Rafa and Trace Martez
The Martez sisters first appeared in the season seven episode of The Clone Wars titled “Gone With a Trace.” At the start of the arc called “Ahsoka’s Journey,” Rafa and Trace take Ahsoka in after she leaves the Jedi Order and finds herself in the lower depths of Coruscant. It’s an unlikely alliance considering the sisters’ feelings towards the Jedi.
They dislike and have little trust for the Order after their parents were killed during a Jedi mission that also destroyed their home. Bounty hunter Cad Bane had been fleeing from the Jedi when he shot a transport ship, knocking it off its flight path. A Jedi, possibly Luminara Unduli, was in pursuit. She steered the transport ship away from a heavily populated landing platform, but didn’t seem to realize or care that people also lived in the lower-level apartment block where it ultimately crashed.
The orphaned Martez sisters found no solace in the Jedi after the accident, thought. She simply left them with an assurance that the Force was with them. After that, Rafa and Trace were forced to fend for themselves in Coruscant’s dangerous Level 1313. It’s understandable, then, why the sisters resent the Jedi.
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But in the course of their adventures with Ahsoka, Trace and Rafa befriend her despite her past. She hides her identity from them at first, but by the end, they’re loyal to her despite where she came from, and know she left the Order. The trio eventually part ways after a run-in with the Pyke Syndicate and the Mandalorians, with Ahsoka going off to help free Mandalore from Maul.
Trace and Rafa have clearly joined the fight against the newly-founded Empire since then, but who are they working for now? Their mysterious employer allegedly wants to use the tactical droid’s data for the greater good, but an ominous ending throws doubt on what the ultimate goal is. More on that below…
R7 Droid
The droid traveling with the Martez sisters looks a lot like R7-A7, Ahsoka’s Tano’s navigation droid. You can even see he has the same green dome and purple-red body in “Decommissioned.” So, is this really Ahsoka’s droid? It’s hard to tell.
Afrer all, R7 was destroyed after Ahsoka and Captain Rex crash-landed a battleship in The Clone Wars series finale, but it’s possible Ahsoka rebuilt the droid and gave him into the Martez’s care at some point. As of now, it could be the same droid but it’s not been confirmed.
Bail Organa? Maul?
– The Martez sisters call a mysterious figure at the end of the episode, saying they’ve acquired the tactical droid data. Rafa also considers the existence of a rogue group of clones interesting enough to tell her employer. The music in this scene is ominous, slightly reminiscent of the music from when Maul was captured during the Siege of Mandalore. And Rafa’s tone and expression are ambiguous, too: is she afraid of this person? She certainly doesn’t seem relieved to see them.
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So could this really be Maul, former Sith Lord turned gang organizer, who is now disguised as a rebel? The Bad Batch takes place only mere days and weeks after Maul was caught up in the crumbling of the Republic. Despite being capture by Ahsoka and the clones, he managed to escape in The Clone Wars finale. Thanks to Solo: A Star Wars Story, we know Maul went on to rebuild his criminal organization once again, this time as the shadowy leader of Crimson Dawn. Could the Martez sisters be unknowingly working for the criminal group?
– Another possibility is Bail Organa, rebel senator and Princess Leia’s adopted father. He’s likely already working on the underpinnings of the revolution against the Empire, since he opposed Palpatine politically even before the Sith Lord declared himself Emperor of the galaxy.
It wouldn’t be out of character for Organa to be working as a secret contact for spies trying to gain intelligence on the Empire. After all, he was one of the key sources of information for the crew of freedom fighters on the Rebels animated series, a role he continued to play in Rogue One.
– Or could it be Cassian Andor, a Separatist on his way to becoming a Rebel spy? Or Sabé, one of Padmé’s Handmaidens, who hid some of the senator’s incriminating recordings after the events of Revenge of the Sith and recently reappeared in the 2020 Darth Vader comic series?
Corellia
– Han Solo’s home planet has long been a staple of the saga. Solo: A Star Wars Story detailed its dirty cities and underworld gangs, although the planet has appeared countless times before in the books, comics, and video games over the decades.
– The most famous Corellians of all, Han Solo and his partner Qi’ra, are children at this point in the timeline, but we know they’re already embroiled in the White Worms gang. They don’t make a cameo here, which is surprising, since Star Wars rarely avoids opportunities to bring in classic characters to new properties.
– We’ve seen the reverse of this droid decommissioning facility before, when Anakin and Padmé got caught up in the factory where battle droids were being built in Attack of the Clones. Scenes on the conveyor belts full of droid parts really evoke similar action scenes on Geonosis.
– In order to get into Corellian airspace, the Bad Batch use a classic Original Trilogy trick, attaching their ship to the side of a cargo hauler to hide their position — the same way Han clamped the Millennium Falcon onto a Star Destroyer in The Empire Strikes Back.
