What Ashley Eckstein Really Thinks About Ahsoka On The Mandalorian Season 2

One of most exciting things for Star Wars fans about the second season of The Mandalorian is the prospect of seeing beloved characters make their live-action debuts.

With all due respect to Timothy Olyphant's Cobb Vanth, the biggest of those names is the reported casting of Rosario Dawson as the Togruta former Jedi Ahsoka Tano, whose story defined much of the seven-season run of the animated series Star Wars: The Clone Wars and was picked up again during Star Wars Rebels. 

Ahsoka has been voiced by Ashley Eckstein since the character's introduction in 2008's Star Wars: The Clone Wars movie, and Eckstein has followed the character through those multiple television series, appearances in video games, and even a voice cameo in Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker. That long history with the character led ComicBook.com to ask Eckstein how she feels about the possibility of Ahsoka making the jump to live-action with another actor portraying her. Eckstein admitted she's excited for any Ahsoka appearance, but that she's a little disheartened by the common framing of the notion of a jump to live action, which she feels short-changes voice actors and the animated works they help produce.

"Some people say, 'Oh well, she's just a voice actress,'" Eckstein said. But a voice actor isn't just keeping the seat warm for a live-action appearance. "Voice acting is acting and some of the most brilliant actors I've ever met are voice actors. I mean, Corey Burton, who is the voice of Count Dooku and Cad Bane, is probably one of the most brilliant actors I've ever witnessed in my life."

Voice actors imbue characters with all the warmth and humor and fun, or all the menace and meanness, that makes a beloved character that in the first place. Eckstein's performance has taken Ahsoka from 14-year-old Padawan to a fierce Clone Wars combatant, through the character's disillusionment with the Jedi Order, the breaking of the Siege of Mandalore, and her role in the burgeoning Rebel Alliance. She survived Order 66. She dueled Grievous, Darth Maul, and Darth Vader and survived them all. It would be a shame to treat that journey as somehow minor league compared to whatever role she might end up playing in The Mandalorian.

But ultimately Eckstein's such a fan of the character that she's glad to see Ahsoka appear in anything and continue her journey in Star Wars. That's because she believes the character is a force for good — not just in her universe, but in our world too. Ahsoka serves as an inspiration and a role model for people seeking the right thing to do, even if that means breaking with traditional structures. "I support anything that Ahsoka's in because it can only bring people goodness and light and hope," Eckstein told Looper during our interview. "So if it's true I'm excited we get more Ahsoka."

One big name from the past has already been glimpsed in season 2's first episode. Fans will have to wait to see if or when Ahsoka appears when the seven remaining episodes of The Mandalorian are released each Friday between now and the season finale on December 18.