The Inquisitors were finally back on the latest episode of Star Wars Rebels, and they had a whole new mission: They were on the hunt for Force-sensitive babies, and it was up to the Rebels to stop them.
What’s a “Force-sensitive” baby? Well, it’s a child who is strong with the Force and, under the old Jedi Order, would have been identified and trained as a Jedi. But, as we know, there aren’t many Jedi left in Star Wars Rebels. So this is huge.
At the start of the episode, The Future of the Force, the Rebels didn’t know that though. Ahsoka Tano only knew she heard some rumblings about the Inquisitors as she was searching for information on “The Sith Lord,” aka Darth Vader. So with two sets of coordinates she went to investigate one and sent Ezra, Kanan, Zeb, and Chopper off to check out the other.
Ahsoka found a civilian ship already in ruins, with a mother desperate to tell her story. Kanan and his crew shot off to another planet where they found an Ithorian mother who had sent her baby off with a droid. Zeb quickly found the baby, making a joke that he’s great a “baby hunting,” and as the Seventh Sister and Fifth Brother caught up with them, a massive action scene ensued.
Amiss the big chase scene, Ezra made a crucial mistake. As he was attempting to return the baby Ithorian to its mother, he mentioned where the Rebel base was–and one of the Seventh Sister’s probes recorded it. Uh oh. That’s not good.
In the end, Kanan and Ahsoka realized that the babies were being hunted because they were strong with the Force and the Inquisitors, and their boss Darth Vader, don’t want anyone to grow up to be Jedi. We all remember what Vader did to a group of Force-sensitive kids last time he found them
On the surface, The Future of the Force was a more or less a straight-forward action episode with some great lightsaber battles and chase sequences. But one layer below, the ramifications are huge.
Who are these babies? Where are they going to go? Who will they grow up to be? How long can the Rebels protect them? Will the Rebels even be able to protect them? It didn’t seem as though there were anymore Jedi just a few short years laterm when Luke Skywalker was around. Are these children actually “The Future of the Force,” or are they just sad symbols of the inevitability of the Jedi’s destruction? Odds are, we won’t find out for some time. But once again, Star Wars Rebels gave us something fascinating to think about.
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