Star Wars: Rebels

[SAMAS]

I'm going to go ahead and say space is three dimensional.

You don't think the hazards were just on the X/Y axis, did you?

[Rogue 9]

There's a collapsed star cluster between them and where they're going. Go around it. Problem solved.

[bilateralrope]

Except that the planet looked to be inside the star cluster.

[Vympel]

Okay, that episode was dumb as shit.

I'm really not digging the second half of this season at all so far. Every episode has been pretty mediocre. Of the upcoming episodes, my thoughts:
Spoiler

The Call: "While on a mission to obtain fuel for the rebel fleet, the crew works to protect space creatures from the Techno Union asteroid mining operation that threatens the creatures' lives."

Will be garbage.

Homecoming: The rebels contact freedom fighter Cham Syndulla, who needs help to fight off the Imperial bombing attack on his planet. While coordinating a plan to overtake and steal the carrier that houses these Imperial bombers, the rebels discover that Cham may have a plan of his own.

Has potential to be fun.

The Honorable Ones: Zeb and Agent Kallus find themselves stranded on an ice planet after a failed Imperial ambush of the rebels. With Kallus injured from the escape pod crash, he and Zeb must work together to survive the harsh conditions.

Also has potential.

That's leaving aside all the stuff we saw in the trailer, which I am still waiting for.

[Rogue 9]

Man. Multiple spoiler tags are really screwed up; the stuff you wrote under the third one is showing up underneath your avatar.
Spoiler

Stranding Zeb and Kallus (I still can't believe they named him that) can't be anything but messy; even if they're forced to work together, whichever one of their sides rescues them first will be bad for the other one, and I really don't see Kallus defecting so I doubt it will serve as a redemption story for him.

[Vympel]

Man. Multiple spoiler tags are really screwed up; the stuff you wrote under the third one is showing up underneath your avatar.
Spoiler

Stranding Zeb and Kallus (I still can't believe they named him that) can't be anything but messy; even if they're forced to work together, whichever one of their sides rescues them first will be bad for the other one, and I really don't see Kallus defecting so I doubt it will serve as a redemption story for him.

Weird - just made it all one spoiler tag - did that make it better?

I miss XenForo.

[Rogue 9]

Well, now your spoiler tag won't open. Putting the quote above it screws it up. Having read it by quoting, though, I do have this to say about "The Call."
Spoiler

Since the Techno Union was on the Separatist side, I'm honestly surprised they still exist as an independent entity under the Empire.

[Vympel]

Well, now your spoiler tag won't open. Putting the quote above it screws it up. Having read it by quoting, though, I do have this to say about "The Call."
Spoiler

Since the Techno Union was on the Separatist side, I'm honestly surprised they still exist as an independent entity under the Empire.

I give up with the spoiler tags. But anyway, yeah that is surprising - but they might exist in name only - i.e. their holdings might've been entirely nationalized, which was an early idea for the ANH novel.

[Lord Revan]

It's possible, another possibility is that said asset were sold to loyalist companies so that Spoiler

they have the rights to "techno union" trademark (or what ever is the SW equilevant) but have little to no connection to the Techno Union of the Clone Wars era

[Vympel]

On SB.com, before this episode came out, I mocked this episode by reference to the Rick and Morty episode about 'Fart' the sentient anti-matter cloud.

I couldn't believe how on point this criticism would be. The main joke in that episode was that Morty's attempts to save the life of this being resulted in the wholesale slaughter of many, many more people (you can see some of the mayhem in that episode), and while this episode wasn't exactly the same, it was close enough.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TgqiSBxvdws

You've got the Mining Guild being unconvincingly painted as the bad guys because they're defending their mine against space animals widely believed to be a menace (including by Hera, who wanted to attack them for like the first third of the episode) and what are obviously thieves (our protagonists). Nevermind they're just workers for a commercial entity, our gallant heroes kill them with abandon (what, no stun setting?) for having the audacity to defend their mine, and to add entirely unnecessary murder to injury, destroy the entire mine and everyone in it as they leave.

It's just a clusterfuck of an episode, and thoroughly awful.

[Galvatron]

You've got the Mining Guild being unconvincingly painted as the bad guys because they're defending their mine against space animals widely believed to be a menace (including by Hera, who wanted to attack them for like the first third of the episode) and what are obviously thieves (our protagonists).

You're forgetting that the first two Mining Guild TIEs immediately attacked the Ghost while it was just coasting through the asteroid field with the space whales. No attempts at communication. Not even warning shots. Their initial laser blasts actually hit the Ghost.

Attempting to destroy what looked like a civilian freighter in distress kinda painted them as murderous dicks from the get-go.

[Vympel]

You're forgetting that the first two Mining Guild TIEs immediately attacked the Ghost while it was just coasting through the asteroid field with the space whales. No attempts at communication. Not even warning shots. Their initial laser blasts actually hit the Ghost.

Attempting to destroy what looked like a civilian freighter in distress kinda painted them as murderous dicks from the get-go.

That's a potential justification for shooting down those two fighters, nothing more than that - even that is tenuous, since the Ghost is hardly a convincing civilian freighter (given its covered with gun turrets and has its own fighter) and is possibly at this point a well known rebel/pirate ship.

Nevermind that they're absolutely right to fire on the Ghost, even though they didn't bother to find out.

[Galvatron]

And if the Mining Guild is officially aligned with the Empire and tries to destroy known rebel ships on sight, does that not justify the crew of the Ghost treating their base like a military target?

By contrast, the cloud cars that escorted the Falcon to Cloud City were downright friendly.

[Vympel]

And if the Mining Guild is officially aligned with the Empire and tries to destroy known rebel ships on sight, does that not justify the crew of the Ghost treating their base like a military target?

Who cares who the Mining Guild does business with? At the end of the day, you've got a tiny mine out in the middle of nowhere operated by hapless employees of a commercial entity. They're not the military. Morally, what they did was no different than ISIS walking into an oil refinery and slaughtering every single worker in the place. And for what? Minor inconvenience to the intergalactic regime? Its disgusting.

[Galvatron]

Sabine said their mission was to steal the fuel because even one shipment of it would power the Ghost and all of Phoenix squadron for a "full cycle." It started out being less about hurting the Empire than it was about supplying their own cell.

Hurting the Empire was just a side-benefit of stealing from the Mining Guild. Had the Mining Guild not tried to kill them on sight, I might have sympathized with them more.

[Vympel]

Sabine said their mission was to steal the fuel because even one shipment of it would power the Ghost and all of Phoenix squadron for a "full cycle." It started out being less about hurting the Empire than it was about supplying their own cell.

Hurting the Empire was just a side-benefit of stealing from the Mining Guild. Had the Mining Guild not tried to kill them on sight, I might have sympathized with them more.

I don't have a problem with them stealing the fuel, or even them shooting and killing Mining Guild employees who are shooting at them. What I have a problem with is the Ghost firing torpedoes at the facility as they leave and killing everyone there. Its senseless, unnecessary slaughter - and the fact is the Mining Guild guys were fully justified in shooting at them. They're thieves stealing their labor and livelihood. That they fired on what they would have good reason to believe was a thieves' ship shouldn't impose a death sentence on every single Mining Guild employee.

[NecronLord]

I think this episode is morally pretty indefensible. Hells bells, the Mining Guild are painted as ensuring their members independence from the Empire in ESB:

LANDO
So you see, since we're a small operation, we don't fall into the... uh... jurisdiction of the Empire.

LEIA
So you're part of the mining guild then?

LANDO
No, not actually. Our operation is small enough not to be noticed... which is advantageous for everybody since our customers are anxious to avoid attracting attention to themselves.

I always read that as the Mining Guild being standoffish to the Empire. It certainly doesn't sound like they're imperial bosom buddies; the first thing Liea thinks when she hears about a mine outside the 'jurisdiction of the Empire' is mining guild. Now there's what, ten years there, their policies may have changed, but treating the Mining Guild as Imperial lackeys is... questionable given how they were first mentioned in canon.

I liked the Mining Guild modified TIEs, by the by.

And I don't really have any problem with a bit more moral ambiguity in the series, but it does seem like this was unconcious, rather than an actual decision to make the Ghost Cell start behaving like terrorists... Who's killed more innocent people now, the rebels, or Agent Kallus (personally)?

[Purple]

Why must there be any standoffishnes? The only thing we can really infer from the dialogue there is that the empire does not directly administer a large enough number of mining facilities that an alternate body is required. The mining guild could just be a private organization that works for the empire. Or it could even be an imperial government agency that happens to administer the mining sector and has enough leeway that it's not a direct control thing. Or it could be the equivalent of a NGO.

[Rogue 9]

You know, if it wasn't for the torpedo strike at the end I could have bought it. I really could have. But the guild's fighters were neutralized and the Ghost was making a clean escape; there was no call to do that except spite and bloodthirstiness.

[Batman]

And maybe saving the space whales.

[Rogue 9]

What, exactly, was the refinery going to do to the space whales? As far as the Ghost cell could ascertain, all their fighters had been destroyed, and the whales had eaten their fill and were leaving. That and Hera is driving the ship, and she had to that point still shown no particular concern for said space whales beyond wanting to do exactly what the refinery boss planned to do to them.

[Batman]

I kinda got the notion this wasn't a one-time incident and future generations of space whales would go there too. Whereupon they'd get shot on .

[Rogue 9]

And that gas deposit isn't valuable enough to start a new mining operation that will do the same damned thing? All they did was commit wholesale murder as an afterthought to their escape.

[Zixinus]

Really don't like that the creators do not seem to understand what "vacuum" means. Just helmets wouldn't be enough,
Also, dislike how the fuel is handled.

They did plan on blowing the thing up: they wanted to deny a source of fuel for the Empire. The scenes kind of implied that the only crew was the ones they already killed but yeah, just shooting a torpedo in may not have been the best idea. Especially considering that the thing was on a fuel reserve and the explosion could have spread.

But yeah, they shouldn't have done that on the possibility that there could have been non-hostile staff inside.

[AMX]

Really don't like that the creators do not seem to understand what "vacuum" means. Just helmets wouldn't be enough,

I thought they were inside the atmosphere already?
ISTR Kanan said something to that effect right before the scene where he complains about the painted helmet.