A Lot of Disappointing Follow-Ups

At its conception, Star Wars: Visions was designed to let animation creators run wild with the concepts and iconography of the Star WarsThe modern blockbuster: it's a concept so commonplace now we don't even think about the fact that before the end of the 1970s, this kind of movie -- huge spectacles, big action, massive budgets -- wasn't really made. That all changed, though, with Star Wars, a series of films that were big on spectacle (and even bigger on profits). A hero's journey set against a sci-fi backdrop, nothing like this series had ever really been done before, and then Hollywood was never the same. universe. Through season one and season two the episodes presented wildly different ideas, new realms of possibility that still used bits and pieces of Star Wars to present all kinds of stories. Nothing had to be connected, not to the greater Star Wars universe’s stories or, in fact, even to other episodes. Each tale was one-off, unique, and interesting all on its own terms.

Sadly, much of that has been lost in season three. While the first two seasons each had different animation studios playing in the Star Wars pond, season three diverges from that. Instead of finding more new studios to team with on more new stories of Star Wars, season three frequently lets previous Japanese studios from season one revisit their works, creating sequels to episodes that feel less like necessary continuations and more like addendums that didn’t really need to exist.

Worse, these stories feel more connected to the main Star Wars continuity and lore than anything we saw before. Gone is the magic and wonder that came from a universe with unlimited possibilities. Sequelizing episodes limits where a story could start and how it could end. Tying these tales back into actual Star Wars continuity makes the universe feel smaller, not larger. In all ways, with few exceptions, the stories in this third season feel held back, limited, and lacking in the scope that this series, before now, seemed to cultivate. It’s a sad shift for a series that felt, like the universe it was creating, that it had unlimited potential.

The series starts with its sequels almost immediately, revisiting the starkly drawn and sparsely colored “The Duel” with “The Duel: Payback”. This short finds the Ronin, the hunter of Sith warriors, chased by the Grand Master, a Jedi knight sworn to kill the Ronin. As we learn, though, the Grand Master has given up much of himself, and his soul, in his unending pursuit which, in a way, leads him farther away from the Jedi code of honor than even the Ronin himself. It’s an interesting idea that is marred by many bad decisions. For one, the Grand Master isn’t really in the story for much of its short runtime, with the Ronin instead battling a different Sith knight, Aneé-san, who is far more annoying and far less interesting. Plus, this sequel doesn’t really have anything new to say about the Ronin or his mission. It’s an interlude at best, a short tale of his journeys that neither conveys a beginning nor an end. It feels like the creators simply liked the character and wanted to do more with him even though they didn’t have an idea of what that sequel should really look like.

Of note, if you actually do want to see a sequel for the Ronin that goes far more in depth on his character you can read the Star Wars: Visions: Ronin novel, which takes place somewhere between the events of the first short and the second.

We actually get a much better short for the second episode, “The Song of Four Wings”. Here a princess with the Rebel armies stumbles on a destroyed village on a backwater moon where a sole, child survivor remains. She takes the kid under her wing to transport them off the rock, only to be attacked by Imperial soldiers, leading to a thrilling escape sequence, one where her droid turns into an X-wing style jetpack to help her escape. It’s ridiculous and amazing, backed by a thumping, bopping soundtrack, creating one of the better tales in this whole season.

This high point isn’t well matched for some time. The third episode is another sequel, “The Ninth Jedi: Child of Hope”, and it finds our heroine, Lah Kara, stuck out in space, accidentally ejected from her ship, while the Empire pursues her compatriots. Taken in by a lonely droid, Teto, Kara agrees to aid the droid in reaching its master, who is trapped in his bacta tank. Sadly the man expired years before, and Teto is alone. But when the Empire comes back to capture Kara, Teto helps her escape, giving his life to stop those who would do evil.

I was honestly expecting more from this episode since “The Ninth Jedi” is getting spun out into its own series. Lucasfilm saw something in this story that I simply did not. I don’t hate Kara but there’s nothing exceptional about this episode that makes me think, “yes, she deserves her own series.” She’s a padawan stuck on her own, working with a droid to survive, and it’s not a story that feels exceptional or new for the franchise. If I were to spin off any story I’d make it Princess X-Wing and her magical soundtrack droid, but clearly Lucasfilm doesn’t have the guts to make something that awesome. “The Ninth Jedi: Child of Hope” is fine, but that’s not really good enough.

“The Bounty Hunters” comes next and it’s another bog-standard Star Wars tale. Sevn is a bounty hunter, although she is currently on the outs with her organization. She and her droid, IV-4A (who has multiple personalities after Sevn installed an assassin droid protocol in its head), are desperate for cash and on the run. That’s what leads her to take a job with Jin-Sim Canbelon to hunt a group of “insurgents”. But when Sevn learns that Canbelon is actually kidnapping kids and using them as slave labor, she turns against her employer to save the kids and do the right thing. She’s a bounty hunter with a heart of gold, just like every other bounty hunter with a heart of gold we’ve seen, and that doesn’t make up for her being an utterly unlikable character stuck in a contrived and dull story. The art here may be pretty but the episode as a whole fails to deliver.

“Yuko’s Treasure” marks the halfway point and it finds a lost boy, Yuko, on Tatooine with his bear droid, BILY, waiting for a day when his parents return. Except they won’t because his parents are dead. But when a villainous pirate, Fox-Ear, comes looking for treasure he suspects Yuko’s parents stole, it puts the young boy, her new friend Sola, and BILY in grave danger. Again, I wouldn’t call this episode exceptional as the basic story is another bog-standard tale. It’s lightened up by a lot of comedy and some fun art, but it didn’t really hook me. I could see this one, which is very child-friendly, appealing to younger audiences with its tale of a big stuffed bear droid and a couple of young heroes, but it feels too basic and too silly to be more than a filler episode for general audiences.

Another sequel comes sixth with “The Lost Ones”, the follow up to first season’s “The Village Bride”. This story finds padawan F helping a couple of refugees escape a quake on a cursed planet, only for the Empire to come sniffing around after. Knowing, somehow, that F is on their ship or refugees, the Empire threatens to kill everyone unless F gives herself up. Which she does, only to come face to face with her old master, who is now a Sith, ready to turn her to the dark side. And, honestly, I couldn’t care less. The episode doesn’t do enough to get us back into the story of F, or really invest us in any of the refugees. This is a tale that needs more time, and more breathing room, to really work, especially since we have to be reminded of who F is, what happened to her master (did we ever even really learn that before?), and why we should care. I never managed that last part, so while I enjoyed the action and art in this episode, the story fell flat for me.

“The Smuggler” is a better tale, even if by degrees. Here Chita, a smuggler desperate for money to get her ship back, takes in two refugees who need to escape the planet. As it turns out, one of the refugees is the planet’s former prince, Arluu, and the other is his Jedi guardian, Gleenu. Together, the three have to evade capture by the Empire, who want Arluu imprisoned all for having the audacity of standing up to Imperial rule. This episode works because it’s light and fun and moves quickly. Sure, its characters aren’t deep and its story isn’t spectacular, but it provides enough action and adventure that you don’t care as much. Sometimes it’s fun to just get on a wild ride, and “The Smuggler” does provide that. It doesn’t provide a lot else, so it’s not exactly a great episode, but that still puts it head and shoulders above most other stories we’ve gotten in this season so far.

The eighth episode is, in my opinion, the absolute worst. “The Bird of Paradise” is a self-serious and overly dramatic tale about a padawan, Nakime, who gets into trouble and then suffers for her mistakes. She tries to fight a Sith warrior, despite her master’s warnings, and ends up blinded and lost in a forest without any way she can find to escape. Her self doubt overtakes her and she whines and complains for a few days until, suddenly, she finds her inner peace in the Force and rebuilds herself. I hated every minute of this. Nakime is obnoxious and annoying, far too unlikable as a character for me to bond with her. She spends most of the episode wallowing in self-pity before, like a switch, suddenly she figures everything out and becomes a Jedi master. Her character is annoying at the outset, and her sudden redemption comes out of nowhere. It’s terrible writing, start to finish, and the season as a whole would have been better without this episode at all.

But then we get to the last episode and here’s where things get controversial. “BLACK” is a freeform, jazzy exploration of life and death for a stormtrooper, and it’s told in a very loose, psychedelic fashion. It’s the kind of animated short you’d expect in the middle of a 1970s sci-fi film, marking a key turning point in the emotional growth of a character, while the rest of the film was more normal and sedate. Except here it’s the finale of the season and it comes out of nowhere. Depending on your tastes you might either love it or hate it, and critics online seem to be split. I hated it, personally, but I do credit the episode for at least trying something very different. I don’t think it worked, but different is better than more of the same.

And that’s the issue I had with this season: much of it was just more of the same. Too many episodes fell back on stories we saw before, either literally saw in previous seasons or just feel like stories from Star Wars because we’ve seen so many like them before. The few episodes that were different were generally good, or at least tried something new, but those weren’t enough to lift up this season as a whole. It feels too safe, too predictable, which isn’t at all like what we got in the first two seasons.

I wanted to like this season of Star Wars: Visions, but I just couldn’t. A couple of good episodes do not elevate a flat season as a whole. I’d still give a future season a chance, sure, but Lucasfilm really needs to find new studios, with new ideas, to hand this universe over to. Another bog-standard set of tales just like we’ve seen before won’t cut it. Star Wars: Visions should be, well, visionary and season three was almost as far from it as you could get.