Star Wars:Tales of the Jedi sought to explore the lives of certain prequel-era Jedi further and understand their future decisions with small stories from their past. Now, Lucasfilm follows up this animated anthology series with a dark side twist in Star Wars: Tales of the Empire. The season features three episode arcs of two memorable dark side baddies – Morgan Elsbeth and Barriss Offee. The episodes offer short, connected stories that reveal more about their central character’s thought processes. As with the previous iteration, the season finds split success, with one of the arcs being significantly stronger than the other.
Morgan Elsbeth was first introduced in The Mandalorian season two, in which she faced off against the live-action version of Ahsoka Tano. She then expanded her role in the first season ofAshoka, where she was revealed to be a Nightsister of Dathomir. The Nightsisters were a powerful coven of witches who used the force as the source of their magic. The reveal made her character more critical to the future of Star Wars stories since fans know the power that the Nightsisters possessed, having gone toe to toe with the Jedi in the prequel era. This was proven true in the Ahsoka finale, where the Great Mothers of the Nightsisters were seen using their magic to assist Thrawn in his quest to re-conquer the galaxy. The Nightsisters were thought to be all but extinct, but Lucasfilm had future plans for this previous big bad.
In Tales of the Empire, we see the genocide of the Nightsisters from the point of view of a young Morgan Elsbeth. Surviving this trauma leads Morgan down a dark path of revenge and cruelty against anyone who stands in her way. The arc features her attempt at rising in the ranks of this new Galactic Empire by impressing a newly minted Admiral Thrawn, who refuses to ignore the potential of a great mind. Morgan’s arc concludes with her ruthless rule over the people of Calodan, which leads them to call for help against her. This will lead directly into her first appearance in The Mandalorian. Morgan’s arc starts strong but slowly digresses as her motivation becomes unclear. Thrawn seeks to harness her quest for revenge, but as she brutally rules over her people, the subject of that revenge becomes muddy. The arc concludes with a “bad because I’m mad” progression, undoubtedly overplayed in the Star Wars universe.
The second arc drew the most attention from fans after the trailer drop. Barriss Offee is one of the most controversial characters in Star Wars. For many, her dark side turn in the Clone Wars animated series felt forced and insensitive to her character’s fans who knew Barriss as a kind, passionate Jedi. The turn felt unnatural and was one of the first examples of Star Wars’ failure to understand its characters. The continuation of her story, naturally, sparked a lot of anxiousness. The arc begins with Barriss being recruited into the Inquisitor training program, where former Jedi are pitted against each other in a dark side style of force training.
As Barriss goes on her Inquisitor missions for the Empire, she realizes that the Empire is no better than the Republic and offers nothing for the people in need. Although more open-ended and noncommittal, this arc had much more meat on the bone story-wise. Barriss’s thought process was always centered on helping others, even in her rapid dark side turn, so her disillusionment of the Empire felt organic. The sometimes confusing rules of what the dark side is and what isn’t will certainly have fans in a tizzy with this arc, but its more expressionist perspective felt suitable with a character that always harbored a lot of confusion.
Star Wars: Tales of the Empire is a fascinating opportunity for fans to dive deeper into the mindset behind questionable characters. Although some of the episodes fell flat, there were still plenty that offered a lot of interesting questions. The dark side has always been a mystery that fans have loved to explore, and Tales of the Empire offers a unique in-canon analysis that will surely get people talking. The quality of animation, music, and acting all remain top-notch and only add to the intensity of each episode. Let’s hope we see more of these short stories about a wide range of Star Wars characters.