The last episode of Star Wars: The Bad Batch showed us just how bad things are for Omega at Dr. Hemlock’s Mount Tantiss Mad Science facility. This time around, we check in with Hunter and Wrecker as they doggedly search for their missing teammate/family member.
As always, the recap portion of this review will contain plenty of spoilers along with some brief explorations of Star Wars lore. The order of events has also been streamlined a bit for the sake of clarity.
Horn for a Pyke
Star Wars: The Bad Batch (Disney+)
The episode opens with Hunter and Wrecker delivering a Pyke Syndicate member to a crime boss named Isa Durand. Turns out she’s the mother of our old friend Roland Durand, who lost his horn to the captured Pyke. In exchange for bringing him in, the Durands provide the pair with unconfirmed intel about the location of Hemlock’s base.
On their way there, Wrecker acts as the surprising voice of reason, pointing out that the two of them should wait for backup before storming an Imperial facility. Hunter won’t hear it, though. As far as he’s concerned, every day Omega waits for them is one day too long.
The pair land on a planet (Setron) that’s clearly not the one where the Mount Tantiss facility is located (Weyland). Instead, they find an Imperial base that is overrun with vines and had been bombarded from orbit at some point. Despite what appears to them as a grim and likely possibility of Omega’s death, Hunter decides they should check out the lab’s ruins.
Star Wars: The Bad Batch (Disney+)
On the way there, they’re confronted by a pair of teenage clones (Deke and Stak) who escaped the lab before it was destroyed. Turns out the poor kids were taken from Kamino (before Tipoca City was destroyed) and brought to the lab to be experimented on. As if that weren’t bad enough, they were abandoned when the Empire left, leaving them to survive against an Imperial experiment gone horribly wrong.
That experiment (or part of it at least) arrives in the form of something called slither vines, which are predictably hostile and aggressive. After fighting some of them off, the group heads to the Lost Clone Boys’ cave, where a third survivor (Mox) greets them. Despite his brothers’ objections, Deke agrees to help Hunter and Wrecker search the lab.
After going back to the Maurader and retrieving Gonky (to use as a power source) the trio of clones strikes out for the vine-infested Imperial ruins.
Slithering Toward the Inevitable
Star Wars: The Bad Batch (Disney+)
As expected, the nighttime trek into the bombed-out lab results in even more slither vine shenanigans — this time with them turning to creatures that look like a cross between John Carpenter’s Thing and the Flood from Halo. After reaching the control room, they encounter even more aggressive vines that manage to trap them.
Thankfully, Mox and Stak had a moment of clarity which led to them stealing the Maurader and flying it to the base just in time to pull Deke and Hunter/Wrecker up. At this point, the source of the vines reveals itself to be what looks like a vegan-esque sarlacc with even more teeth. Following a brief firefight, the group uses an admittedly badass maneuver with some explosives to escape.
As they depart the planet, Hunter tells the boys that he’ll take them to Pabu so they can live out their lives in peace. While it’s certainly better than Setron, the young clones still appear unmoored at the thought of living a life that isn’t centered around combat.
When one of them asks what Hunter will do, he replies that they still have one more mission before he retires from the fight.
The Verdict
Star Wars: The Bad Batch (Disney+)
Yes, the animation and fight scenes were gorgeous. But that doesn’t change the fact that this was a filler episode — something I was hoping would be scarce in Star Wars: The Bad Batch‘s final season. In addition to not moving the narrative forward in any meaningful way, it left a bunch of potentially fascinating subplots unexplored or unseen:
- The Empire evacuating the base as the slither vines took over would’ve made an amazing opening sequence.
- The Lost Clone Boys could’ve given us much great insight into the experiments Hemlock is doing on the Kaminoan-grown soldiers — especially since we’ve hardly ever seen them at this age.
- It would have been great to learn how they reacted (or didn’t react) to Order 66.
Instead, we’re left with a painfully average narrative that still looks absolutely gorgeous. Let’s hope the final chapter of the three-episode season three premiere brings us back to the captivating story from before.
Next Episode: ‘Shadows of Tantiss’
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