"Don't be afraid - be ready."
Hello everyone!
Tonight's choice is third in this new format Disney's been producing for a little bit now - or well, I say third, but it's actually been since 2008 with The Clone Wars that things have been in motion.
Every once in a while, they take a look at someone who's not necessarily a Skywalker, too.
Or a Kenobi, come to think of it.
Tonight, we're headed back into the belly of the beast to look at two of the fandom's favourite characters, who're potentially either morally grey, or straight up evil, depending how you look at it.
When all's said and done though, they're awesome characters and it's no wonder the fans love them so.
Without further ado, let's take a look at Star Wars: Tales of the Underworld!
Following its predecessors, Tales of the Jedi and Tales of the Empire, Tales of the Underworld comprises two three-episode arcs, and Ventress' one is up first.
After her death, her body's taken back to Dathomir by Quinlan Vos and Obi-Wan Kenobi; but because she's from a powerful clan of Dathomir witches, and because she and Quinlan genuinely love each other, she's given the choice of returning to life, only she'll be giving up her heart's desire, which I take to mean she gives up her love for Quinlan, or Quinlan himself?
Either way, she comes back to life, and next time we clock in with her she's working in the galaxy's version of a train station when Stormtroopers and an Inquisitor march onto the planet looking for someone.
A young Jedi, that is. His name's Lyco, and he quickly becomes a pain in the butt for Ventress, but as he's trying to find 'The Path', established by none other than Quinlan for surviving Jedi (those who survived Order 66, that is), she agrees to help him.
Their path takes them straight through the Inquisitor - whom the pair kill together - and working with some old buddies of Ventress', trying to steal some tech from the Empire.
The heist goes very wrong very quickly, and when the bounty hunter wants to claim the bounty that's out on Lyco instead, Ventress once again proves just why she's such a fan favourite, by outsmarting the lot of them and demanding directions to the Path regardless.
This eventually leads the pair to yet another desert planet (apparently there's a few of them in every galactic Rim lol) and a retired Separatist, who's been fighting a local tribe for water ever since his arrival. He also recognizes Ventress, which gives her a leg up in dealing with him, but then again it's Lyco who understands the native tribe's language and brokers peace, for the tribe as well as the Separatist and his granddaughter.
One of the tribe members takes them to the Path, where Ventress leaves Lyco without actually going through with it herself, making me wonder why she'd been so insistent on finding them, and Vos, and whether she'd actually given up her love for him or what.
Either way, she doesn't board the starship fleeing the planet - but neither does Lyco, who'd instead decided that he's going to turn into Velcro and continue sticking to Ventress for as long as he can.
And probably for as long as she's willing to humour him, haha!
But with that we switch over to Cad Bane's trio of episodes, which initially find him and his best friend, Niro, surviving as orphans on the street of their home planet. Oh, and Cad's first name is Colby at this point in time.
They're approached by someone in a cowboy hat who gives them some money to buy food. He later on offers to pay them more if they're willing to do a job for him, so they create a diversion outside an illegal underground casino, allowing him and his cronies to rob the joint. But they're intercepted by police on their way out, and while Colby flees with the gang, Niro's caught and arrested.
Years later, Bane has now been in the gang ever since, has a girlfriend named Arin, and vows vengeance when his mentor gets shot and killed back on the same planet he'd once lived on.
He runs into Niro again, who's now the deputy marshall, and who tells Bane he doesn't want any trouble. But Bane's on a quest for vengeance and he won't stop until he sees it through, which leads to a shoot-out with the marshall who took out his mentor, but which ends in both a stalemate and betrayal, of a sort:
yes, he kills the marshall, but after Arin arrives to try and talk him out of doing something crazy, and they find themselves surrounded, she disarms him so he can be arrested because she doesn't want to see him killed.
Imprisoned, and absolutely feeling both vengeful and betrayed, Bane eventually gets released on a technicality and heads straight for the planet where everything started, and where he'll see everything end.
He knows it, his former crew who're congregating on the planet know it, and Niro and the city council know it, because the council warn him - as the now-marshall - to either flee or lie low or SOMETHING.
Niro insists he can handle Bane - but in truth he handles about zilch, getting himself shot and killed by his former childhood best friend (I have no clue how any lawman thinks they're going to outshoot and actual gunslinger, really I don't), and this in front of his son.
Oh yes, there's a little boy in the picture Isaac - who's as blue as Bane to his mom Arin's and dad Niro's green skin ...
DOT DOT DOT.
Even Bane connects them all when Niro mournfully whispers that he didn't take EVERYTHING from Colby - and it turns out Arin was pregnant with Isaac, which was why she disarmed Bane back in the day, but also why she married Niro to ensure her son wasn't born a bastard, but as she'd died some years earlier she couldn't exactly have a face-to-face with Bane herself (looks like galactic prisons don't allow for mail deliveries or anything ...).
But even as Bane hesitates to comfort the crying child, the town mayor, who'd been close to Niro and Arin both, arrives to take the kid away, telling Bane to not come any closer, so he shrugs the instinct off and walks into the sunset to continue bounty hunting.
And we all know he keeps on doing it until one fateful day on Tatooine, when he runs afoul of Boba Fett ...
But that's another story.
This one ends right here, and is again a banger.
Not that Dave Filoni can ever really do a whole lot wrong if you ask me, but I'm honestly entertained and have enjoyed every single one of these Tales that have been released so far, so I'm hoping they work on more in the future. The episodic, and short sequences, mean that we can have a look at other characters outside the mainstream media, which makes for really great storytelling if you ask me.
10/10 recommend, and I hope you all had a chance to watch this, or you'll sit down to do so!
xx
*images and video not mine
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