The Bad Batch: Bounty Lost Thoughts
We get more answers to the mystery surrounding Omega and a battle between bounty hunters.
Episode nine picks up where “Reunion” left off last week with the Bad Batch trying to search Bracca for Omega while avoiding Crosshair’s ire and fire. But this episode isn’t about Crosshair, so the Bad Batch makes the jump to hyperspace, and it’s goodbye for now. And things only get more interesting as we get another reunion this episode. Let’s discuss “Bounty Lost”:
In Loco Parentis
Hunter continues to make reckless decisions for the team, and Echo continues to counter them with reason. Hunter wants to stay on Bracca to keep looking for Omega, but they are vulnerable. The ship’s defensive shields are failing and they are being pursued by Crosshair. Echo manages to talk some sense into him through a lesson from The Clone Wars: live to fight another day. I thought the episode might focus more on their search for Omega, but the guys are sidelined for most of this episode, leaving Omega to have to take matters into her own hands.
Hunter seems to always be on the losing side of battles when it comes to Omega, and they have been hitting that point hard throughout the season. At what point does he reevaluate his priorities and help prepare Omega to fight off potential dangers? Every other Bad Batch member has shared their skillsets with Omega: Echo teaching her how to use the crossbow, Wrecker with disarming the tripwire, and Tech with all things tech. Hunter has been the only holdout, although teaching her tracking skills still won’t solve their problem: he cannot protect Omega as long as the Kaminoans continue to hire bounty hunters to pursue her. Omega realizes this even if Hunter is in denial.
Also, Hunter is not even the first parental figure in her life. Nala Se certainly has a connection with Omega and does not just view her as property and has gone through great lengths to protect her from Lama Su. She is putting her faith in the Bad Batch to take care of Omega, and it would be nice to see her and Omega reunite. We don’t know the fate of any of the main characters, and someone could make the ultimate sacrifice to protect Omega. It could be Hunter, Nala Se, other members of the Bad Batch, or all of the above. All possibilities should be on the table because there have to be some stakes when clones, bounty hunters, and the Empire are involved.
The Alpha and the Omega
Star Wars is continuing the tradition of franchises revealing secret siblings as we finally get an answer to what makes Omega so valuable to the Kaminoans: she’s a Fett! Yes, add the Fetts as another legacy family, along with the Skywalkers and Palpatines. I know that all the clones are technically related to the infamous bounty hunter, but we only recognize two with the surname Fett: Jango and Boba. But Omega makes three as Tech informs the team that she is a pure genetic clone of Jango and, therefore, the closest thing to his daughter and Boba’s sister. And we learned that Boba is codename Alpha. Omega, true to her namesake, is the end of a set, but it is of the Fett family, not the clones. I expected either a force-sensitive clone or an intuitive clone that can pick up skills quickly. The possibility of a first-generation clone was an out-of-left-field option. I am not sure how the math works out with her age, but I loved being surprised.
What didn’t surprise me is the legacy part and expanding the Jango Fett family. And it especially wouldn’t surprise me if this was just a gateway to having another character connected to Boba Fett show up in his series, or a gateway to have Boba Fett show up in The Bad Batch. Is everything a little too connected? Perhaps, but since we are dealing with clones that come from Jango Fett and it is a big part of Boba’s past, it makes sense and, by making Omega a Fett, the likelihood of her appearing in live-action increases significantly.
Now let’s bring Fennec into this conversation because she is currently the only connection between The Bad Batch and the upcoming The Book of Boba Fett. She is also, possibly, the last living person that knows that Boba Fett has a sister, and we still don’t know if Boba and Fennec met before the events of The Mandalorian. Did Fennec ever tell Boba that he had a sister out there? Or maybe this is how they met in canon. There is probably an overarching story that Lucasfilm wants to tell, and it seems like we will watch it play out at least over the next year.
New Location, New Questions
One of the best things about The Bad Batch is the locations and seeing the galaxy in beautiful animation and cinematography. This episode adds a new planet to canon in the Lido system, Bora Vio, the home of an abandoned Kamino cloning facility. The complete opposite of Kamino, the facilities on Bora are in the sky, similar to Bespin. It is the perfect setting for a child raised on Kamino who is familiar with Kaminoan medical technology to escape one of the most capable bounty hunters. It is convenient but makes sense in the plot as the Kaminoans would choose an abandoned facility to do business away from the eyes of the Empire. While Shand is busy fighting Bane, Omega finds a medical room where she sends out a signal of her location to the team. While there, she stumbles across failed experiments of various specious, including a Kaminoan. It brings up some interesting questions about the Kaminoan’s early involvement with cloning experiments before working with the Republic. The long, abandoned hallways are perfect for a shoot-out between bounty hunters, and it was nice that Bane and Shand (and occasionally Bane’s droid, Todo) get the fight scenes to themselves without the Bad Batch interfering. We also get a moment with Shand and Omega where the bounty hunter tells her that she’s the best option (and we later get confirmation that Nala Se hired Shand to protect Omega and keep her away from Kamino).
While Omega’s fate is still a mystery, though she will probably end up back on Kamino at some point, we know the Kaminoans are not successful in saving their contract with the Empire. We already expect to see the phasing out of clone troopers in this series, but we could also see the end of the Kaminoans.
Taun We, We Hardly Knew Ye
Taun We, back from her absence in all seven seasons of The Clone Wars, returned this week as the Kamino delivery service to pick up Omega from Cad Bane. And, in typical fashion, someone shot the messenger. Taun We was only in this episode to get killed by Fennec Shand and, while it is hard to feel sorry for a group that doesn’t seem to have a moral compass, it’s still a rough end for the Kaminoan. And now, Nala Se is not in the best situation because Lama Su is aware of her connection to Omega and could find out about her hiring Shand. He is also in self-preservation mode after his conversation with Admiral Rampart and, when backed into a corner, the knives are sure to come out.
Omega continues to prove her resourcefulness as she uses Bane’s poor treatment of Todo to her advantage. She also fights her way into an escape pod, allowing the guys to pick her up, all while handcuffed. If she does make it out of this series alive, she could be another formidable ally or adversary wherever she ends up in the galaxy. Also, Cad Bane has hopefully learned to be nicer to his droid because the next time he runs into the Bad Batch, it will be more of a fight, and the bounty hunter will need all the help he can get.
Originally published at http://creditsandcanon.com on June 26, 2021.
