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Star Wars Rebels: Season 2 Episode 17: The Honorable Ones

What is it ? : The Rebels have received information that there is a massive Imperial construction project underway around Geonosis, so they jump into the system and begin scanning. They discover that the planet is now lifeless, and that whatever was being constructed has now moved elsewhere, although there is a massive construction yard still remaining.
They land at one of the many construction yards, hoping to be able to download records, but are ambushed by Agent Kallus and Imperial Stormtroopers. They are forced to flee back to the Ghost, but Zeb is separated from the rest of the team, and flees to an escape pod instead, but remains locked in combat with Agent Kallus.
The Ghost fights it's away from the station, engaging with AT-DP's on the outside of the platform, and by the time they are finished the Escape Pod is out of range, so they head towards the surface of Geonosis to search for Zeb. Unknown to them, as Kallus and Zeb struggled aboard the escape pod, the controls were damaged, firing the pod towards a frozen moon of Geonosis instead of the planet itself.
Crashing through the icy surface of the moon, the pod lands in a cavern, and although Zeb is unhurt, Agent Kallus is wounded, and although he threatens Zeb with his Bo-Rifle, Zeb easily disarms him and they leave the pod. Zeb refuses to kill the weakened man, his honor demanding that any fight be fair. The escape pods beacon is damaged, and Zeb repairs it, but it won't work from inside the cavern, so the two work together to reach the surface, fighting a massive beast and forcing it away. As they spend time together, they talk, with Kallus telling Zeb of his actions during the fall of Lasan, Zeb's homeworld, and how he obtained the Bo-Rifle.
Once they finally reach the surface, it's now a matter of whether it's the Ghost or the Imperials that pick up the beacon first, and they have built up a certain amount of trust by the time that the Ghost arrives to rescue Zeb. Kallus remains behind to be rescued by the Empire,. but when he returns to his quarters on the Star Destroyer, no one seems to have noticed the life or death struggle he's been through, and he sits alone in his quarters.

High Points : Wow, this episode is amazing, not only do we get Kallus emerging as an empathetic character, and even though he remains loyal to the Empire (for the moment), we get to pity him and see how devoid of friendship and compassion his life is, and the yearning he has for those things.

The Death Star project is also introduced into Rebels, where we get to see the remnants of the construction project in orbit around Geonosis, and the destruction of the Geonosian people that the Empire performed as they moved on. This is perhaps the first time the plot of Rogue One impacts on the series, but certainly not the last, and the fact that this episode came out a full 10 months before the movie does show how well the writers are tying the universe together.

The time that Kallus spends with Zeb changes him, and not only do we begin to feel for this character as he becomes more well rounded, but we get to find out his history, that he never took his Bo-Rifle from a dead Lasat, but instead was given it by one in honorable defeat. And that he first encountered a Lasat, when he was stationed on Onderon fighting Saw Gerrera's rebel cell (another hook into Rogue One, but also one into The Clone Wars series). The world and character building is amazing, and rewarding, and it is this that makes this episode so outstanding, the interplay between the two characters.

I've always been slightly annoyed at the childish way that character of Zeb behaves, as I've felt he was a brave and honourable warrior, and this episode put this on display like no other in the series has. Zeb risks his life for an enemy, and it is this courage and display of compassion which will turn this enemy into an ally.

Finally, the creatures the two face off against on the icy moon are amazing, massive sharklike monsters, it's totally absurd that creatures this large and dangerous would develop on a moon which is so lacking in life to support them, but they are dangerous and amazing looking opponents for the pair, and so who cares about any logic, they're great.

Low Points : My one criticism of this episode is something that Rebels doesn't seem to be able to sort out in any episode.

How sensitive are sensors?

In this episode alone, they can scan the entire surface of Geonosis and detect that there is no life left there. But don't detect the Imperials awaiting them on the station. They need to travel down to the surface of Geonosis to search for Zeb, and don't detect the two stranded on the moon! Are the sensors sensitive enough to scan the entire planet and find it lifeless or not, if they are, shouldn't they easily be able to scan and discover that the two aren't on Geonosis, but are on the moon?
Often in Rebels, the Ghost avoids detection by powering down, when it is only a few hundred meters from an Imperial Vessel, shouldn't sensors detect the lifeforms aboard?
If they could just decide what the limitations of sensors are, and work within that please, it'd be nice.

So what do you really think ? : An amazingly good episode, not because of any flashy battles or action, but because of the characterisation and interplay between Zeb and Kallus. The two characters are wonderfully rounded, and you can honestly believe that these two would work together in this situation. Both, as the title suggests, have codes of honour, and there are many similarities between the two which forge a bond which will change both characters to different degree's.
And a certain amount of crowd pleasing continuity both backwards to The Clone Wars series, and forwards to the unreleased at the time Rogue One, doesn't hurt the episode either.

Final Words : We're really getting close to the end of the series now, and the tempo is building, 4 episodes to go, and from memory 3 of them are amazing, it'll be nice to see whether they all hold up to what I remember.

Score : 9.5/10

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