Star Wars: The Bad Batch kicks off its final season with a bang
Star Wars: The Bad Batch review, Episode 302, "Paths Unknown"
Episode 2 focuses entirely on Hunter and Wrecker, who are desperately tracking down Omega's location in the wake of her capture. They get some info on an Imperial base that turns out to be outdated since it's destroyed when they arrive. But we learn that this was indeed a facility run by Hemlock at some point since they find a group of clone cadets who escaped.
The cadets are apprehensive about trusting Hunter and Wrecker after getting experimented on, betrayed, and forced to survive in a hostile forest for months. There were some cool science fiction references in this episode, as giant region-spanning tentacles attacked the crew from above while tiny pod-like crawlers did the same from the ground. These creatures seemed like an homage to the zombie-like Flood from Halo.
On a narrative level, The Bad Batch continues to amaze me in how many ways it can portray Clones being abused. This entire show is basically a case study on the subject of what happened to the Clones after the war and there hasn't been a decent severance package yet. The cadets are so distrustful that they contemplate stealing Hunter's ship and abandoning one of their own on the hostile planet just to reach safety. But they decide to rescue the others instead and Hunter promises to bring the cadets somewhere safe.
Presumably, this safe location is with Captain Rex and Echo, who we saw working to rescue as many Clones from the Empire as possible last season. I foresee this massive Clone group taking revenge on the Empire and getting involved in a final battle somehow, where most of them will likely die in a blaze of glory.
