Star Wars: The Bad Batch S2, Ep 6 Review
Anytime we learn that a Jedi survived the initial Great Jedi Purge, my heart does a little dance. For all their flaws, the Jedi are still a force of good, and any Jedi that survives the Empire’s wrath, even if only temporarily, is a win. This week on The Bad Batch, the list of Jedi survivors gets expanded as a character from The Clone Wars returns: Gungi the Wookie.
The Jedi Still Live
The episode starts with the Bad Batch on a normal mission: delivering fake chain codes to a group of Droid smugglers. However, when Omega gets this strange feeling and starts looking around their station, she finds them beating and torturing a young Wookie. Omega steps in with her parental figures following suit, and it’s then that we learn the truth: the Wookie child is a Jedi.
Meet Gungi the Wookie. For those who don’t know, Gungi was introduced as a Jedi youngling in Season 5 of The Clone Wars, which saw him and several other younglings perform this ritual to get the crystals needed for their lightsabers. I haven’t seen it myself, but I’m told pirates, and General Grievous got involved, so it was crazy.
Now, we already knew from the Season 2 trailer that Gungi would make an appearance, but I didn’t expect it to be so soon. Despite their flaws, I’ve always been a fan of the Jedi, and whenever I see one ignite their lightsaber, I still get a chill. Any Jedi still alive after the Clone Wars is another win for good and another chance to stick it to the Empire. However, Gungi’s main focus right now is getting to his homeworld of Kashyyyk so he can lie low. If he’s going to hide, what better place than amongst his people?
From here, this episode serves as a callback to an unfinished story arc from The Clone Wars. Before the series was canceled the first time, they planned to have an arc revolving around the Bad Batch going to Kashyyyk to help fight against the Separatists and slavers. This episode calls back to this by mentioning how the squad’s been to Kashyyyk. However, instead of Separatists, they’re dealing with something worse: the Empire.
Nowhere is Safe to Hide from The Empire
Kashyyyk is one of my favorite planets in all of Star Wars, and it’s not hard to see why. The lush jungles, the exotic and strange creatures, the trees that grow to the size of mountains! Most importantly of all, it’s home to the Wookies. If seeing Chewbacca has taught us anything, it’s that once a Wookie calls you a friend, they will move planets and stars for you. In other words, they’re homies for life.
So when the Bad Batch brings Gungi home, the Wookies happily take him in. However, they soon have to face the encroaching threat of the Empire and their Trandoshan allies. The resulting skirmish, while small, is satisfying to watch. Seeing the Wookies, Bad Batch, and Jedi fight to protect this beautiful planet is a small example of how, even this early, people are fighting back against the Empire. However, can they end up winning?
While Gungi might be safer amongst his own people, as Hunter points out, no place in the Galaxy is truly safe for a Jedi now. They’ll have to spend the rest of their lives looking over their shoulders for bounty hunters, Imperial soldiers, and assassins trying to kill them. In addition, Gungi is a Wookie, a people that the Empire will exploit and abuse for decades before they’re finally overthrown. So will a Wookie Jedi be safe on Kashyyyk?
I still want to say yes.
Sustaining the Light in the Dark
Despite the incredibly dark future that I know Kashyyyk’s heading for, I still want to believe that Gungi can survive. Firstly, even though the Empire eventually conquers Kashyyyk and enslaves countless Wookies, they prove hard to keep down, with many continuing to fight up to the day their planet is liberated. They’re strong enough to tear the arms off an average human and intelligent enough to survive in a jungle world that can kill them. In addition, they treat skills like carving as essential survival skills, making them very resourceful. Now combine those abilities and skills with the ability to wield the Force.
In other words, Gungi’s a potentially OP character.
While his ultimate fate remains uncertain, I’m willing to bet on Gungi’s survival so long as he knows when to keep his head down. Moreover, given how Wookies live for up to 400 years, Gungi could outlive the Empire. Whether he does so, or even if he will remain a Jedi during that time, remains to be seen. For now, though, I’m content knowing that another Jedi survived Order 66.
