By Eric Goldman
Warning: Full spoilers for the episode below.
I have to keep this review short, as I’m out of town doing set visits, so let’s get right to it! On the heels of last week’s Hera-centric episode, we got a Rebels focused on Sabine and it was a lot of fun. In fact, it actually did an even better job of letting us know one of the Rebels crew a bit more, as this episode felt more specifically focused on Sabine and her dynamic with her former friend and ally, Ketsu Onyo, than Hera’s episode was for her.
Finding out Sabine had once been a bounty hunter was a cool piece of information. It would have made her a rather young bounty hunter, but that’s not uncommon in this galaxy, as we saw with Boba Fett on The Clone Wars. And having her old partner – who was more like a sister – show up, as an enemy, was a good set-up for conflict, as the two fought both each other and the Stormtroopers they encountered.
Ketsu Onyo (voiced by Gina Torres) got an awesome solo fight scene too, showing just how formidable she was. From using one Stormtrooper as a human shield, to her flip off that ship, that was an especially cool action scene.
I just wish the reconciliation between Ketsu and Sabine felt a bit more earned. It happened rather abruptly, after one short conversation between them, and it felt like a scene or two was missing that could have bridged the gap between Ketsu threatening to blow up Sabine’s ship and her admitting she missed her and still cared for her.
Still, this was a very entertaining episode of Rebels… and that’s on top of the involvement of a Gonk droid as the courier Sabine had been sent to retrieve! Chopper had some great moments here as well, both circling the Gonk droid and when he was sucked out of the ship (while the Gonk’s girth saved both himself and Sabine) and managed to save himself with his jets.
All that, and an amusing cameo by R2-D2!
Looking back on the episode, I’m not quite sure what Ezra was doing there, as his role was almost entirely reactive. But that didn’t really take away from this appreciated focus on Sabine and a look at the life she left behind for a nobler calling with the Rebellion. And I liked that Sabine got to overtly say that, yes, Ketsu will be back… Because come on, you wouldn’t want to waste someone cool like that without a return appearance, right?
