Star Wars Rebels: An Inside Man
December 5, 2016 8:21 AM - Season 3, Episode 10 - Subscribe

Kanan and Ezra return to Lothal to infiltrate an Imperial arms factory, unaware that Grand Admiral Thrawn has decided to take a special interest in the factory's quality control. In the midst of the espionage, the identity of the new Fulcrum is revealed.

For more info on "An Inside Man," check out the episode guide!
posted by Atreides (5 comments total)
 
Atreides, I'm starting to think we should just figure out some way to watch these together :)

I liked this. I like menacing Thrawn, I like that in particular he is portrayed as incredibly competent. Which I always felt was the prime take away from the timothy zahn novels. That Thrawn was tremendously good at his job.

It's a very "Rebels" touch that he's going to a factory on Lothal, it feels a little small, but that might be because I'm coming from the background of the books and know that as a grand admiral he commands millions of people. Makes it odd that he is pulling the speeder bike stunt personally. And that plant happened to be on Lothal.

But, on the other hand Star Wars is a layer cake made of coincidences and family and magic. So I can't really harp on that too much.

Also I think Thrawn's theme is the best new piece of music the show has produced.
posted by French Fry at 8:41 AM on December 5, 2016 [3 favorites]


What an amazing, incredible episode! Top 3, easily. Suspenseful, action-packed, great character moments, important movements of the plot: so much to like, I don't know where to begin.

I did briefly channel Geoffrey Rush in Les Miserables during Kallus's reveal: "I knew it!!!" Sure, it had been telegraphed for some time, but it was thrilling to see that story thread come to fruition. The cat & mouse game between Kallus and Thrawn the rest of the season is going to be intense.

And now we have a good idea what the Rebels will be doing with all those Chekhov proton bombs.
posted by The Nutmeg of Consolation at 9:40 AM on December 5, 2016


Also I think Thrawn's theme is the best new piece of music the show has produced.

Amen, I have the soundtracks for the first two seasons (the second is the superior, in my opinion), but Thrawn's theme is the first where I really can't wait for the release of the third season's score. Kevin Kiner is the man behind them and incidentally, thanks to his work on The Clone Wars, has probably scored the most hours of Star Wars out of anyone, including John Williams.

It's a very "Rebels" touch that he's going to a factory on Lothal, it feels a little small, but that might be because I'm coming from the background of the books and know that as a grand admiral he commands millions of people. Makes it odd that he is pulling the speeder bike stunt personally. And that plant happened to be on Lothal.

There's a little bit of suspension of disbelief, but I can rationalize it with the fact that Thrawn needs somewhere to build his top secret fighters. The Empire has an arms factory on an Outer Rim planet (middle of no where) which has that capacity and it's controlled by the somewhat competent Governor Pryce. Arguably, Thrawn personally stepped in less to teach the rebels a lesson, and maybe to subtly nudge Pryce into understanding how he expects such problems to be dealt with in the future. It could be seen as a sign that Thrawn respects Pryce at least more than Admiral Konstantine, whom Thrawn basically humiliated to put the admiral in his place.

The cat & mouse game between Kallus and Thrawn the rest of the season is going to be intense.

This could be my favorite episode(s) of the season. I'm pretty stoked over it!

Atreides, I'm starting to think we should just figure out some way to watch these together :)

Be at my gym approximately at 8ish in the morning on Saturday with the DisneyXD app downloaded and it's a deal! (I can't wait for the broadcast on television, so I end up watching the app when I go to the gym first thing in the morning.) A lot of people do "live" tweet the show when it airs at 8:30 EST and 8:30 PST, something I've been meaning to do at some point, too.
posted by Atreides at 7:26 AM on December 6, 2016


Oh, and....

TRIVIA!
  • The broadcast order of this episode, which is production number 311, was swapped with "Visions and Voices," production number 310, because the latter had thematic connections to episode 312.
  • Mr. Sumar, the ill-fated saboteur, almost appeared in the Season Two premiere as an angry anti-rebel, upset over the actions of the rebels which resulted in the death of Minister Tua and the heightened security measures taken by the Empire due to their activities.
  • Among the artwork in Thrawn's office is a Bardottan statue, holograms of ancient Lothal glyphs, the Syndulla kaikori, Kanan's old battle mask, and holographic examples of Mandalorian art from ancient crusades.
  • The TIE Defender design came from the classic 1994 TIE Fighter simulator game from LucasArts, where it was the top-of-the-line Imperial fighter model in the game. It seemed a philosophical departure for the Empire, pouring such resources into a small fighter craft - but now that a rather unconventional Imperial like Thrawn is backing the project, the origin gained new focus.
(My own personally aside: TIE Fighter totally flipped the balance of power between the Empire and the Rebels...and the TIE Defender was nigh unstoppable. Ooof!)
posted by Atreides at 7:33 AM on December 6, 2016


"Although this craft was initially left out of the multiplayer Star Wars: X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter (1997) for the sake of balance, the game data files still have an entry for the TIE Defender in the craft library, with the description field reading "Advanced space superiority fighter. This craft is too powerful to be put in this simulation. Dream on, fanboy!""
posted by Just this guy, y'know at 10:20 AM on December 13, 2016 [1 favorite]


« Older Deadwood: Deadwood...   |  Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: St... Newer »

You are not logged in, either login or create an account to post comments