Star Wars: The Bad Batch: Season 3 Episode 4: A Different Approach
What is it ? : After fleeing Tantiss aboard a damaged shuttle, Omega and Crosshair are attempting to keep the ship flying, it emerges from Hyperspace and plunges towards the world of Lau. They crash and Omega tries to extract the coordinates of Tantiss as she wants to return to free the other prisoners, but Crosshair convinces her that the Empire is going to be looking for the shuttle so they need to find a way off world.
In Tantiss, Hemlock visits Nala Se in her cell, pondering why Omega's tests had always been negative until someone else conducted them, and Nala Se suggests that the recent test might be an abnormal one. Hemlock comments that he never understood Nala Se's attachment to Omega before leaving.
They find a settlement under control of the Empire, and head to the spaceport to try to leave, but discover that they will need chaincodes. However Omega convinces the person behind the desk to accept a bribe to let them leave, but they demand 30,000 credits, a vast sum even if they hadn't just escaped from a prison and didn't have any money at all.
Crosshair suggests she just let him loose as he's sure he could take out all the Stormtroopers at the Spaceport, but Omega doesn't want to kill anyone, and has a plan. They head into a nearby tavern and Omega begins gambling and winning loads of money. Just as she's finishing up, an Imperial Officer enters with his guards, and challenges Omega to a game.
As the game is coming to a conclusion the Officer gets annoyed by the presence of Omega's Lurca Hound, so Crosshair takes it outside, and the officer seems sure he's going to win, telling her she is good, but she underestimated her opponent. However, Omega reveals some cards, winning the game.
As they prepare to leave, the Officer tells them there's just one more thing, gambling is illegal, so they'll need to pay a fine, which takes them down to just over what they need for the tickets, so Omega reluctantly pays up. The officer is informed about the crashed vessel, and heads off to investigate, where he is told it has escaped from Tantiss.
Outside they find the hound is missing, and a local demands money to tell them where it is, taking them down to exactly the money they need, but they are told the Empire took the hound to the cargo docks.
The sneak in to the cargo docks even though Crosshair wants to abandon the hound, and locate it, but it's an ambush as the officer realised that the strangers in the bar were obviously from the crashed ship, he demands the rest of the money, telling them that he's informed Hemlock of their location and he's on the way.
Omega finally agrees that they should do it Crosshairs way, and he opens fire, allowing Omega to open the cages, freeing their hound plus all the other animals which cause chaos.
Omega boards a ship, and Crosshair grabs their money back, before they blast off into space. They get in contact with Hunter and arrange a rendezvous.
Hemlock arrives on Lau, and hearing what has happened, orders the transport tracked by it's beacon and their operatives informed.
Later, the transport is landed on a planet, when the Havok Marauder arrives, Wrecker and Omega happily reunite and hug, and Hunter is glad to see Omega, asking how she escaped. She tells him she had help, and Crosshair emerges from the transport, and Wrecker and Hunter stare in shock . . .
High Points : An absolutely brilliant episode, Crosshair is rapidly becoming my favourite current character in the series (since Tech isn't in these episodes), his dry wit and practicality are wonderful, and the interplay between him and Omega really works in a way that her relationships with the others doesn't. She's showing him a different approach, and even he has to accept that it works better sometimes.
The episode also works as the pair are really at their most vulnerable here, while it's amusing that Crosshair is carrying around a backpack of weapons, they're outnumbered and outgunned, so the tension is high. The authoritarian nature of the Empire is oppressive, and while they're still the heroes of the story, their options are limited and they mainly have to play by the enemies rules.
Finally the Imperial Officer in this episode is particularly odious, a character you really want to hate from the moment he enters, a brilliant piece of characterisation and much credit to the voice actor who brings his evil to life.
Low Points : The scenes with Hemlock are pretty pointless, as we don't see anything new, and they seem to just be there to remind us he's the bad guy. But otherwise I loved this episode so am willing to forgive anything else I noticed.
In the previous episode it introduced a tremor in Crosshairs hand, leading to him missing a shot for perhaps the first time ever in the series. But that's not mentioned at all in this one, is there something wrong with him, or is that now forgotten?
So what do you really think ? : A fantastic episode, and the gang is now back together (minus Tech), it's fast moving, has great action, great dialogue, and is perhaps the best episode Bad Batch has done so far. Everything just comes together without the episode being standout for it's story, it all just works to make it extremely watchable and fun.
Final Words : I keep finding myself wondering what has happened to Tech, I'm still not convinced he's dead, and the idea that Hemlock might have him and might use him as bait seems to make the most sense. And with the next three episodes being named "The Return", "Infiltration", and "Extraction", I just feel that these seem connected to Tech.
But I really hope there's going to be some moments to give the relationship between Crosshair, Hunter and Wrecker some time. Tech was always the one who understood Crosshair, not particularly agreeing with him, but understanding his decisions, but Wrecker and Hunter never really did, so it would be growth for them all to come to terms with their combined past.
Score : 9.5/10
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