WiC Watches: Season 7 of Star Wars: The Clone Wars
Photo: Star Wars: The Clone Wars Episode 703 “On the Wings Keeradaks” .. Image Courtesy Disney+
Episode 703: “On the Wings of Keeradaks”
We pick up right where Episode 2 left off. Anakin, Rex and the Bad Batch are on the planet of Skako Minor, retrieving Echo from Wat Tambor’s nightmare experiments. Echo is now half-clone/half-machine, and he’s connected throughout the Separatist computer network.
Tech is hurridly running through the program to unhook Echo from the machine when Wat Tambor and his droids show up outside the control room and begin using his new weapon, the Decimator, to penetrate the doors and get inside to kill everyone.
A little sidebar: in the unfinished Bad Batch story-arc from 2015 on Netflix, the Decimator was a little more gruesome. It was used on a native of Skako Minor and liquefied him into a puddle of disgusting goo. It’s easy to see why that kind of thing was cut now that the show is on the family-friendly Disney+. I imagine young children watching that happen might be a tad horrified.
Photo: Star Wars: The Clone Wars Episode 703 “On the Wings Keeradaks” .. Image Courtesy Disney+
Anyway, Echo uses his new computer network-connected brain to access the schematics of the Techno Union tower the team is in and they escape using a ventilation shaft right before the Decimator makes its way inside. They make their way outside to the top of the tower and are quickly surrounded by droids. Tech uses the native language to call on the Keeradaks — the huge bat-like creatures the planet’s natives use to travel around — and they escape. It’s kind of like when the eagles save Bilbo Baggins and the dwarves in The Hobbit and I am very here for it.
Tambor sends the droids and two huge walkers to the native village where Anakin and the clones have escaped with Echo, and they try to retrieve him. Apparently, Echo is now considered Techno Union property, and with all that information on the Separatist army in his head, I’ll bet he’s used to help defeat them before this season is through.
Photo: Star Wars: The Clone Wars Episode 703 “On the Wings Keeradaks” .. Image Courtesy Disney+
After an exciting battle, the heroes survive and leave the planet for the Republic base, Echo in tow.
This was an intense and action-heavy episode that I very much enjoyed. It didn’t have as much exposition as the previous two episodes, which was nice, although neither did it have much in the way of subtle emotional moments.
I like that Echo kind of looks like Anakin after Emperor Palpatine saves him in Revenge of the Sith. In fact, if you want to know what Darth Vader looks like underneath the black armor, then go no further than looking at Echo with his cybernetic enhancements, arms and legs.