Is Ahsoka Training Sabine To 'End' The Jedi Order?
Ahsoka Tano (Rosario Dawson) is a lone wolf, an outcast from her pack. Originally assigned as Anakin Skywalker's Padawan, she eventually left the Jedi Order during the final days of the Clone Wars to pursue her own path. Now, on "Ahsoka," the Togruta warrior is doing things on her own terms once again. In taking Sabine Wren (Natasha Liu Bordizzo) back on as her Padawan despite there being no evidence that Sabine is Force-sensitive, and with Huyang (David Tennant) exposing Sabine as the worst Jedi in "Star Wars" history, it seems Ahsoka wants to end the Jedi as we know them. But is this truly the end of the Jedi, or is it the beginning of something better? As Obi-Wan Kenobi (Alec Guinness) once alluded to, everything is a matter of perspective.
Of course, Ahsoka's experience in the Jedi Order was fraught even before she left the Order in disillusionment on account of being framed for the bombing of the Jedi Temple hangar. Her relationship with Anakin was originally tenuous — the brash and arrogant Skywalker who would eventually become Darth Vader never wanted an apprentice to begin with. But her history, along with the history of the Jedi and even the Sith, can explain how she might end the Jedi as we know them.
Ahsoka is in conversation with The Last Jedi
Few "Star Wars" projects have caused quite the stir that Rian Johnson's entry to the franchise managed to create. Central to the controversy surrounding "Star Wars: The Last Jedi" was Johnson's attempt to blur the lines between good and evil that had permeated the franchise since its inception. The light and dark sides of the Force, the Empire, and the Rebellion — all of it flattened attempts to play within the gray area, and "The Last Jedi" attacked that philosophy with zeal.
What angered many fans was the way "The Last Jedi" played with the legacy of its titular Order. When Rey Skywalker (Daisy Ridley) finds Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill), he is a hermit, driven to solitude by his failure to rebuild the Jedi Order. In trying to do things by the book, he built a new Jedi Temple and trained a generation of apprentices. But just as the strictures of the original Jedi led to the creation of Darth Vader, his efforts only led to the creation of Kylo Ren (Adam Driver). Ultimately, Yoda appears as a Force ghost and destroys the ancient Jedi texts, telling Luke to "look past a pile of old books."
Ahsoka saw firsthand the dark path toward which Anakin strode, and while she still believes in Jedi as individuals, she is understandably suspicious of the Order's old ways. This manifests in frequent disagreements with Huyang, a droid who, for millennia, was an instructor in the Jedi Temple, in "Ahsoka" Episode 3. While Huyang believes that Sabine is not fit to be a Jedi since she would not have met the criteria for training, Ahsoka tells him those criteria eventually failed. "I don't need Sabine to be a Jedi," she says. "I need her to be herself."
Will Ahsoka make the Jedi more like the Sith?
Though he disagrees with Ahsoka's methods, Huyang ultimately acquiesces that she and Sabine come from "a long line of non-traditional Jedi." In the New Republic and beyond, we have seen several Jedi who could be classified as "non-traditional." That is, Jedi who are open to new ways of understanding the Force. But in their quest to reform the Jedi, will they end up like the Sith?
While characters like Ahsoka, Rey Skywalker, and perhaps eventually Grogu are undoubtedly forces for good (pun intended), their emulation of the Sith comes in a structural form. During the Old Republic era, there were once many Sith, much like there were Jedi. They ruled over the planet Korriban, but their endless greed for power led them first to war against the Jedi and finally against each other. When the dust settled, only Darth Bane survived. He declared the Rule of Two, which stated that only two Sith could exist at once.
Ahsoka's seeming vision for the Jedi would not lead to a universe where only two Jedi exist, but they would become similarly decentralized. With only a few Jedi scattered across the galaxy and each taking their own approach to training the next generation, there will now be a scattered assortment of distinct dynasties rather than a centralized organization like the Jedi Order.
However, in so doing, the Jedi might become something greater than what they once were. As we saw in George Lucas' prequels, the Order was a bureaucratic institution that ultimately proved unable to spot the threat posed by Darth Sidious. They had become something like glorified police officers. Ultimately, Ahsoka's methods might bring the Jedi back to their simplistic, enlightened roots, and Sabine may be the first step on that path.