Star Wars: Young Jedi Adventures: Season 3: Story 1: The New Droid Friends
What is it ? : Lys, Nubs and Kai are learning to repair droids at Dotti's Droid Workshop on Tenoo, and there is a particular droid which needs a new vocabulator, but while Dotti explains how they will install it, Two Spider Droids sneak in and steal the part.
Lys spots them and the Young Jedi pursue the droids across Kublop Springs, leading to Haps Sap Shack, where the droids cover the place in juice before escaping once again. But a customer points out the sticky footprints the droids have left behind from the juice.
The Young Jedi follow the footprints, which lead them to a large starship landed in the forest outside the town, but outside it two Astromechs are refusing to work, and a guard droid is bullying them, so the Young Jedi step in a defend the Astromechs by disabling the guard droid.
The Astromechs introduce themselves as Dozer and Gigi, Dozer has been upgraded by adding a ram which can produce powerful blows, and Gigi has a modification which allows her head to fly around. When asked about the missing part, they tell the Young Jedi that it was stolen to upgrade their friend, Beepers, but droids should not be upgraded with stolen parts, so they offer to help.
The group sneaks into the starship and spots the stolen part, but are detected by the spider droids and Rek Minuu, who says all he was trying to do was upgrade droids and make them better.
But when his argument isn't successful, he activates some more guard droids, and a fight breaks out, the Young Jedi are helped by Beepers who has a rocket booster, and they manage to deactivate the guard droids. Rek tells the droids that if they ever want to come back they are always welcome, he was only trying to help them, and the Young Jedi and their new droid friends leave.
Rek decides that the guard droids need more upgrades, and begins work along with his spider droids.
Back at Dotti's Workshop, the Young Jedi return the part and Dotti finishes her work, before turning to Beepers, she notices that he is very old, and fixes his existing Vocabulator. She recognises the three droids as special, so assigns them as companions to the three young jedi, and asks the young jedi to start work maintaining them using the skills they learned earlier. . . .
High Points : With a new title sequence, this feels like a bit of a reboot of the series, the new droids are assigned to the Young Jedi, with the strong one assigned to Nubs, the scout one assigned to Lys, and the rocket booster action one assigned to Kai.
And in the titles we see them waving in a friendly fashion to Taborr, even though they hadn't quite become friends at the end of the last season.
Low Points : One of the strengths of YJA has been that it grows and evolves with it's stories, characters learn things and become friends and allies. But this just seems a bit abrupt, season 3 feels like they've changed things rather than allowed the series to evolve as it has in the past.
Also I'm not convinced that Rek is the bad guy. His guard droids do treat other droids badly, but he himself does seem to want to help the droids he has, and the Young Jedi basically steal some property from it's legitimate owner. But at this point it could all just be words.
So what do you really think ? : The story flows well enough, and Rek seems to be the new bad guy for this season, now the Ganguls have been dealt with and Taborr is a friend, I'm guessing we'll get a bunch of droid related stories throughout.
Final Words : I'm wondering if the addition of the droids is to allow the Young Jedi themselves to become teachers of a kind to the droids, the series has always had to treat adults as incapable fools which need 3 kids to help them out. But it just makes the universe seem a bit incompetent. Now with some droids constantly needing guidance and advice, the kids can pass on what they've learnt.
Score : 7/10
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