Review: Star Wars Forces of Destiny “Volume 1”

Get ready for a lot of Star Wars this month.

Overview (Spoilers Below)

For those who aren’t aware, Forces of Destiny is an ongoing series of Star Wars shorts (about 3 minutes a piece) that began airing earlier this summer. Despite being geared toward a younger audience than the usual Star Wars content, the events of the episodes are considered to be ‘canon’ by the masterminds in the Lucasfilm Story Group. Dave Filoni (creator of The Clone Wars and Rebels TV shows) is credited with creating Forces of Destiny.

Disney is billing this special as ‘Volume 1’, but it’s a mixture of episodes previously released online and new premieres.

Maz welcomes us with a fireside monologue to open the special and appears again after each commercial break. While there’s no real reason given for her to address the audience directly while out camping, it fits with her established character as someone who knows a lot of history and serves as a way to tie the episodes together (and illustrate their moral lessons more clearly for the younger audience members!).

The first episode, Sands of Jakku, serves as a quick re-introduction to Rey (voiced by Daisy Ridley here) and her capabilities. Taking place in the time soon after Rey met BB-8 on the desert planet of Jakku, monsters hungry for droids roam the barren wasteland. Rey performs a daring rescue after BB-8 is caught by one of them. The rescue concludes with Rey catching BB-8 in mid-air. My immediate reaction was disbelief, but according to Wookiepedia, BB-8 weighs in at an impressively slim 38lbs. Who knew?

Next, comes Newest Recruit, starring Sabine and her former-bounty hunter friend Ketsu Onyo. Seeing Ketsu team up with Sabine again was a real treat, as she has only been featured in a couple Star Wars Rebels episodes so far. Though Ketsu thinks smuggling food isn’t the most exciting mission, Sabine reminds her that it is an important task necessary for the survival of innocent civilians. The duo winds up on a rescue mission saving what is perhaps the strangest combination of creepy and cute ever put to screen. The episode ends on a significant note – Sabine repaints Ketsu’s armor with the symbol of the rebellion, signifying the former Black Sun member joining the fight for good.

The third episode, The Stranger, gives us an exciting chase scene when Jyn Ersa comes to the aid of a child and her pet Loth-cat being bullied by Stormtroopers with too much time on their hands. Jyn leads the troopers away, firing over her shoulder and hitting a pipe. (No, Jyn! The steam being released only makes them look more ominous!) The stormtroopers fun is done when Jyn shoots a grate they’re standing on, sending them tumbling into the sewers. (I have questions regarding how shooting the grate once would cause it to immediately fall.)

The Starfighter Stunt jumps us back to The Clone Wars era, where Ahsoka is giving Padme flight lessons. After being spotted by a droid ship, the two are in trouble. In true Hollywood style, Ahsoka takes a laser intended for Padme and is thrown out of commission. Padme has to do the unexpected to throw the droid ship off her trail. Shorts like these are a great opportunity to spend time with characters from the finished Clone Wars series. Honestly, an actual Clone Wars episode with Ahsoka and Padme’s adventures in space would’ve been amazing.

Bounty Of Trouble comes next. Sabine pretends to kidnap Leia in order to receive a classified data-tape from the Princess. The stormtroopers reaction to Sabine’s weapon of choice was fun: “Is this…paint?” IG-88 makes a brief appearance, which will excite longtime Star Wars fans. This short explores how Leia used her position to aid the rebels before the events of A New Hope. Hearing echoes of Sabine’s theme music from the Rebels episode Trials of the Darksaber always sends a thrill down my spine!

Hearing Han Solo referring to BB-8 as ‘ball’ was the highlight of the sixth episode, Tracker Trouble. The events take place while Rey and Finn are flying aboard the Millennium Falcon with Han and Chewie. Rey and Finn’s fun dynamic never gets old, and seeing their interactions with Han was one of my favorite parts of The Force Awakens. My only issue with this episode was the timer on the tracker bomb. The sole reason seems to be so there’s just enough time for the heroes to throw it off the ship. (To be fair, the bomb-on-a-timer is a standard action movie cliche.)

Leia teaming up with an Ewok named Wicket group of Ewoks is the subject of Ewok Escape. When teddy bear-hating stormtroopers start picking on a couple of the little critters, Wicket leaps into action. Leia doesn’t try to take the lead here, but steps in when it’s clear the ewok needs a little help. (But are Leia and Ewok really heavier than two stormtroopers?) Thankful for her assistance, the Ewoks gift Leia the dress she wears in Return Of The Jedi! (“Does it come with a spear?”)

Volume 1 finishes off with Teach You, I Will. Master Yoda drops in on a training session, where Anakin is teaching Ahsoka to fight with two lightsabers. (During season three of The Clone Wars, Ahsoka began to use two sabers, but it was never officially addressed onscreen until now, which is cool.) After easily besting her, Yoda tells Ahsoka to fight like herself. This leads to her assuming her famed upside-down lightsaber grip. All in all, this episode filled in some missing information about Ahsoka and her fighting style. (We won’t talk about Anakin’s much-maligned character design.)

The special closes with Maz finally brewing the perfect cup of tea. (And giving us some wisdom about what it takes to become a hero!)

Our Take

Questionable physics aside, I had a lot of fun seeing the many different Star Wars era’s all represented in the space of a single television episode. These shorts are a great way to fill us in on the smaller moments of the universe. While Leia’s Ewok escape doesn’t contain quite enough plot for a movie or full TV episode, it provides an explanation for how Leia obtained her jungle garb. And showing us Ahsoka’s first moments with her second lightsaber lets us in on key information they didn’t have time to show in the Clone Wars series. (Plus, revisiting TCW characters is always a treat!) The fact that most of the character’s original actors return to voice them here (Daisy Ridley as Rey, Ashley Eckstein as Ahsoka, and Felicity Jones as Jyn, to name a few) makes the episodes that much more engaging.

Maz asks us to consider what makes our protagonists ‘heroes’. Whether it’s Rey being there to catch her new friend when he falls (literally!), or Yoda passing on some ancient wisdom to Ahsoka, what makes us root for them is the fact that they step forward to help out, even when the odds are against them.

May we all be so brave! (And remember to bow.)