Have the kids finally found a competent adult, or someone very good at pretending to be one? Let’s find out.
Recap
The parents of all the vanished kids have all gathered and are approached by one of the Security Droids. It has been sent by “the Supervisor,” who has instructed the parents that their children have exited the Barrier and that there is nothing more that can be done. The parents are furious, but they are warned that they may not exit the Barrier. Back in the brig, the kids begin their escape with their new companion who introduces himself as Jod Na Nawood. They sneak out of the port and head back to their ship, arguing the whole way over whether or not he’s a Jedi. Jod wants to head to an old friend of his, but the kids insist on retrieving SM-33 before they go. When he balks, they say they’ll go without him. He agrees to retrieve the droid.
Jod finds SM-33 in a room full of deactivated droids. A member of his old crew, Benjar Pranic (Alfred Molina), recognizes him. He is happy to see “Silvo,” but wonders why Brutus would have let him out right before his trial. Jod tells Pranic that he let himself out; Pranic suggests that he should probably report this to Brutus. Back on the ship, the kids are arguing over whether Jod is really a Jedi who can use the Force. Jod makes it back to the ship with SM-33, but he’s being followed; they have to jump to hyperspace in a hurry. Brutus tells his people to put a bounty on Jod’s head.
Jod makes a meal and questions SM-33 about whether the kids are truly from At Attin. 33 has no answers for him, but is suspicious. Jod tells the kids to get some sleep, but KB can’t sleep—she’s calculated the odds and knows it’s unlikely Jod is a Jedi. He tells her that not everything can be calculated by odds and that they’ll be at his friend’s moon in a few hours. They arrive and walk to the base on the moon—Fern realizes that Jod is trying to hide the ship. He admits that he’s not 100% sure he can trust this friend, and that she might betray them.
There are two women on the station who discuss calling for reinforcements at the sight of Jod. When the group approaches approaches, they meet Kh’ymm (Alia Shawkat), who calls Jod “Crimson Jack,” and has maps to everywhere in the galaxy. When she hears that the kids are from At Attin, she tells them that there are no maps to At Attin; it was one of the worlds known as the “Jewels of the Old Republic,” planets holding incredible treasures. All of them are destroyed, or so they thought. Kh’ymm uses the knowledge the children have of their homeworld to try and narrow down a location. They figure out that the barrier is probably nebulous gasses, which narrows their search to 10,000 planets. Then Kh’ymm notices the “head of the class” badge Fern has, which are Palmarish numerals—something she’s never seen in proto-Republic artifacts.
Kh’ymm keeps narrowing down the planet range; Jod expects she’s stalling. He turns on her radio and finds out that New Republic has sent X-Wings at her request to help; she tells the kids that he’s a scoundrel and they shouldn’t trust him. Jod and Kh’ymm fight; he steals the possible coordinates and destroys her computers. Kh’ymm tells KB not to listen to her gut, but use her head to find the truth, and that they can call on her if they ever need help. As they make it back to the ship, KB and Fern insist that Jod tells them the truth. He admits that he’s just like them, lost and alone… and that he’s not really a Jedi. X-Wings show up and they have to leave, but KB says Jod can only come along if he works for them. He agrees.
There’s a short battle where Jod has the kids man the gun turrets and help pilot the ship in order to escape. They manage to get into hyperspace. One of the X-Wings lands and Kh’ymm berates him for letting them get away. The pilot (Andy Powers) points out that fighting was too risky with the kids on the ship, and asks where they’re headed. Kh’ymm says he’d never believe her.
Commentary
I do appreciate that we get some small sense that Fern’s mom maybe used to be like her kid: She suggests that she and her friends tried to run away sometimes, but were always caught by the Safety Droids. So this place really does wring all the interest out of its populace by blocking all attempts at non-conformity and exploration. The parents don’t seem to have any idea that they’re being controlled either, which is horrifying in the extreme.
And the Supervisor definitely isn’t some Wizard-of-Oz computer matrix that runs the planet. Certainly not.
The thing I’m most pleased about is that we’ve dispensed with the Jedi stuff quickly. Now we can find out what Jod’s actual deal is, which I’m far more interested in. Also, I appreciate that half the kids were canny enough to question him from go. Fern and KB have nice healthy amounts of suspicion, which is likely uncommon on their planet, given… everything.
Another thing I appreciate: We stopped to eat again! It so rarely happens, and it always bugs me when it’s absent. It’s even more egregious when your main characters are kids because kids need to eat more often. I get that we can’t spend all our time on the minutiae of living, but show food. For my suspension of disbelief and also because it’s fun! Show food.
They do a great job with Jod’s dialogue giving him away in terms of being a fraud. All that “the Force provides” and answering “practice” when asked how he distracted guards during their escape. And Law has always been particularly adept at finding that perfect intersection between charming and smarmy. (Wonder what happened to poor Pranic?) As a fun sidenote, Crimson Jack was a character in Star Wars comics who stole Han’s reward money from the Rebel Alliance? So giving that name to Jod as one of his aliases is incredibly funny.
Kh’ymm is fun and also a new species for Star Wars, although she has a bit in common with the gozzos, which we saw on Star Wars Resistance. Most of the lore she’s delivering in terms of “Lost Jewels” and “Palmarish numerals” are new pieces, as far as I can tell. The question now becomes what these lost jewel planets were in charge of in terms of production and/or resources. It seems likely that At Attin is where they made Republic credits? Question being, is this a mint/banking situation, or were Old Republic credits made of a rare material only found on this world?
Spanners and Sabers
- KB’s moms say they’ve lost the signal to her “life monitor,” which is likely meant to invoke those sadistic bracelets that Cindel and her family had in the Ewok Adventures. No joke, these bracelets have lights on them that indicate the status of family members, and when they go out… that means they’re dead. A great thing to have your child keep on their person!
- Wonder what KB’s “urgent medical needs” are? And if they tie to her cybernetics…
- Fern’s point that you could make things look like they were floating with the Force by using string could be called a very deep cut inside joke: Anthony Daniels (C-3PO) helped production on the first film when they got stuck on the issue of getting R2 to jack into Imperial computers because they couldn’t get the mechanism to align correctly in order to plug in. Daniels suggested they use string, an idea that was initially laughed off… and later used.
- You can see Hondo Onaka’s ship at the port. Which… gosh, he must be ancient by now. I’d love to see him, but just knowing he’s around brings me some measure of comfort.
- Why does the moon get theremin music? More theremin is never a bad thing, I just feel like it’s intending to create an atmosphere here that it isn’t quite achieving.
Next week we’ll see where the hyperspace jump takes us…
