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Warning: SPOILERS for Star Wars: The Bad Batch’s first two episodes are ahead!
The premiere episodes of Star Wars: The Bad Batch haven’t wasted any time featuring familiar Star Wars faces beyond the core quintet, who we first met in The Clone Wars Season 7. In “Aftermath,” Admiral Wilhuff Tarkin visited Kamino to evaluate Clone Force 99, and we also saw young Caleb Dume, who will grow up to become Kanan Jarrus. “Cut and Run” brought back the defected clone Cut Lawqaune, and The Mandalorian’s Fennec Shand is also confirmed to show up in The Bad Batch, but will any other important characters appear in this new Star Wars animated series?
That was one of the questions I inquired about while recently interviewing Star Wars: The Bad Batch head writer Jennifer Corbett and producer Brad Rau, specifically asking how much crossover there would be between the new Disney+ series and the other Star Wars TV shows and movies. Here’s how Corbett responded:
Well we can’t give away too much about who you might see, but we can say that anytime we do bring a character that fans know, it’s for a reason. They serve a specific purpose in The Bad Batch’s story and where they’re going. But along with that, we do have some new characters that hopefully fans equally love.
So there’s no specifics to chew on with the above quote, but if I had to guess, we can count on more established Star Wars characters to appear on The Bad Batch beyond the aforementioned individuals. We may be exploring a galaxy far, far away, but as seen many times over the year, this galaxy can be a “small” place. So while it stands to reason that most of the characters who appear in The Bad Batch will be fresh additions to the Star Wars lore, surely more familiar faces will be brought in. Personally, my money’s on Darth Vader entering the picture.
It’s just like Jennifer Corbett said: there needs to be a reason for any character’s involvement. It made logical sense why Tarkin was the Imperial officer sent to determine Clone Force 99’s usefulness, and why he’s now overseeing the efforts to have the group eliminated (excluding the reprogrammed Crosshair). And since Fennec Shand is early into her bounty hunting career during Star Wars: The Bad Batch, naturally she’d be after the main clones if there’s a price on their head. It’d be easy enough to come up with rationale for why the newly-cybernetic Darth Vader would hunt them down, but he’s just one possible candidate out of a large pool.
Star Wars: The Bad Batch has only just kicked off its 16-episode run for Season 1, and with the potential for more seasons to be ordered, there will be plenty of opportunities for Clone Force 99 to cross paths with characters we’ve grown to like/love over the years. However, unlike on their missions during the Clone Wars, Hunter, Echo, Tech and Wrecker now have someone to look after: the young female clone named Omega. That’ll make survival more difficult, although as we saw in the premiere episode, Omega has the potential within her to be a skilled combatant.
New episodes of Star Wars: The Bad Batch premiere Fridays on Disney+, which you can subscribe to with this link. You’re also welcome to browse through our guide detailing upcoming Star Wars movies and TV shows.
