'The Bad Batch' S1 Finale Pt. 1 - Awkward handling of storyline leads to big bust

Did we just see the end of an era in the Star Wars canon?

In my mind, we all were in the endgame now with The Bad Batch.

I assumed too much.

The announcement of a second season earlier this week (as opposed to revealing it through story and a teaser at the end of the season) did more harm than good for me. Already knowing there will be a second season going into the final two episodes perhaps made my feelings on this matter unclear as to whether they truly would resolve this season's arc. Sure, we'll likely get a fun surprise character or two - I'm betting heavily on young Boba - who may end up anchoring Season 2, and there honestly was some decent plot movement this week, but now I'm doubting the Clone Troop 99's story will resolve with much conviction or satisfaction.

What compounds my negative sentiment toward the finale is the decision to break it up into two episodes. Part 1, which released today, may have lined up pieces on the board to make some big moves next week, so to speak, but the sting has already been taken out of what's been building the previous 14 episodes, so belaboring the outcome only makes it worse.

And that's not even mentioning yet that the twists/key moments in the Finale: Part 1 were incredibly clumsy and contrived.

Let me explain. The storylines I've been most invested in revolve around Crosshair (especially after developments during the most recent episodes) and around Omega. We got a little bit more lore for Omega this week, but it didn't amount to anything concrete (more on her later); I doubt that we're going to get any more grand revelations about her significance in the final episode next week, either. I'm now inclined to think she's merely a young kid with some Force traits who will be around for a while, and that's more or less it (this is a kid's show, after all). Kind of a bummer, but her arc really reminded me to temper expectations when they throw in those misleading fallacies, like sparking the "Ooh, who will she turn into later on?" theories, a la Rey in the sequel trilogy.

The way Crosshair was handled in this episode, though, was a total joke. Here's a guy who feels betrayed by his "brothers" and comes up with this elaborate scheme to lure Wrecker, Tech, and Echo into a trap after capturing Hunter - and by elaborate, I mean he simply turned on a comm device to telegraph where the entire trap was going to happen to the rest of the crew (allowing them to spring the trap) - all with the goal of exacting his revenge and making them feel his pain and hurt. The emotional weight of the moment when he was explaining his pain to Hunter was incredible. But the tension was short-lived and cheapened moments later: Crosshair gets weak and has a change of heart, then starts shooting down the troopers pointing their guns at Hunter and his team because, for some reason, he now feels he wants to earn back their trust. Then, Crosshair helps shoot down some droids that Omega secretly sent in to help her team (which makes no sense because the droids all start shooting at the Bad Batch, anyway). Not only that, but Hunter stuns Crosshair in a shootout anyway (sure, he carries him out of the facility to save him, but that's just going to mean Crosshair will rejoin his brothers out of obligation because he'll feel like he owes them). This entire moment was supposed to serve as a huge payoff for several emotional journeys, but the wishy washy, haphazard switching of allegiances and sudden heart change coupled with the silly droid fiasco completely undermined any opportunity for true character growth or revelation. The short, careless scene was so clunky and rushed that it wasted my investment in a story that had so much potential.

Okay, rant over.

As for the Empire's story, we finally saw the culmination of their scheming the past few episodes. After transporting all the clones to an undisclosed location, they send in the big guns to destroy the cloning facility once and for all, leaving no chance for anyone else to come in and learn what the Kaminoans know about cloning. Even Tarkin was brought in to give the order, kind of like how he did in Rogue One. After destroying the facility, the Empire presumably has the monopoly on cloning technology, which seems ironic considering that the Empire is moving away from using clones and is enlisting real TK soldiers to form their new army. As a side tangent, in The Force Awakens, Kylo Ren talks to General Hux about possibly needing a clone army, which suggests the clone troopers don't disappear. But I'm guessing we won't see clone troopers on a grand scale, especially since the current line of clones probably won't stay around much longer anyway since they age twice as quickly. This isn't to say more clone troopers can't be created on a mass scale again (as eluded to in TFA), but we never get an indication of that during the OG trilogy or The Mandalorian. I suppose that could change in the future, though.

Speaking of the future, what's in store for Part 2 of the finale? It's hard for me to say. Like I've previously guessed, we could see a young Boba leading some of these other bounty hunters we've briefly seen this season (Cad Bane, Fennec, etc.) in a group effort, maybe to try and save Clone Troop 99. Or maybe something happens to Omega; maybe she gets captured because the Empire finds out about her abilities and wants to keep her for testing purposes (heck, this could lead to cameos by Palpatine or Vader himself); that could be when Clone Troop 99 calls for help from Boba and his gang to retrieve Omega. That would fall in line with beats and patterns eluded to in The Mandalorian. What I know will not happen now is the end of Clone Troop 99. Again, the announcement of Season 2 really took the suspense out of how this ending shakes out; I was under the impression this group - much like the core group in Rogue One - needed to die at worst, or fly away in seclusion at best, never to be seen again. Now it seems silly that they would kill them off. Like I've been saying, nobody dies in these shows/movies anymore. Heck, at this point, another possibility in the finale is the discovery of more members of Clone Troop 99, which will give the current group a thread to pull at the start of Season 2, which could unravel other grander schemes at play.

I'm kind of burying the lede here, but I will say that the destruction of the cloning facility certainly felt heavy and delivered more of a finality than I was expecting. Shots of abandoned rooms signaled the end of the cloning era, which, going back to my earlier point, further suggests we won't see much more of the clone troopers any more. In retrospect, we saw this moment coming a mile away, but in the moment, it was truly sorrowful, like losing an old friend. Maybe this will signal a shift in focus onto a new era in some way. Hopefully this leads to more time spent post-Return of the Jedi.

Notes:

-The music that played when the Bad Batch arrived to Kamino was the same music when Obi-Wan found his way to Kamino in Attack of the Clones.

-We know that Nala Se is in the custody of the Empire, and there are a lot of obvious theories as to why that's important. Nala Se has a wealth of knowledge when it comes to the cloning process, and we very much could find out that Palpatine himself wants her to make a clone of himself, an idea, of course, we sort of see in Rise of Skywalker. This could be the beginning of that process. I've mentioned before that we've already seen scientific interest from the Empire in The Mandalorian, and by then, the Empire's science division is much further along. Nala Se may unwittingly end up being instrumental in the development of that division.

-It was interesting that Omega said she was there when the Bad Batch was created in that secret test chamber. That suggests she's older than they are, which could confirm that Omega, like Boba, is a clone/experiment who did not receive the growth acceleration like the other clones did.

-The droids Omega sent in to help her team came out of hatches that looked similar to the ones the Dark Troopers emerged from at the end of Season 2 of The Mandalorian. Of course, those droids fought much better than these ones.