Bad Batch just teased a huge detail from an upcoming Star Wars show
We could be seeing the origins of Ahsoka’s crew in the next big Star Wars TV series.
When Ahsoka eventually debuts on Disney+, the show will, presumably, not just be about Ahsoka wandering around in an empty galaxy. Just like The Mandalorian introduced a slew of characters to Star Wars fans, the upcoming live-action Ahsoka series will do the same.
The thing is, we may already have a small hint as to which characters might appear in Ahoska, and where they came from. In The Bad Batch Episode 6, “Decommissioned,” an interesting set of cameos could give us a better idea of who will populate the further adventures in a faraway galaxy, about a year from now.
Trace and Rafa Bad Batch cameos explained
Trace and Rafa with Ahsoka in The Clone Wars.
If you’re fuzzy as to who was competing with the Bad Batch for the head of a certain tactical droid in “Decommissioned,” that’s the Martez sisters, first introduced in The Clone Wars Season 7. After Ahsoka left the Jedi Order following the events of Clone Wars Season 5, Season 7 found her in the lower levels of Coruscant, where she eventually teamed up with Trace and Rafa and helped out with a few smuggling missions.
We haven’t seen Trace and Rafa since then, but their appearance in The Bad Batch makes total sense chronologically. Because The Bad Batch is happening right after Order 66 (roughly 19 BBY) Trace and Rafa running around the galaxy checks out.
But who are they working for?
Bad Batch sets up a Rebels connection
Ahsoka in Rebels.
At the start of Star Wars Rebels (5 BBY), some cells of the Rebel Alliance are getting info from a secret agent code-named “Fulcrum.” By the end of Rebels Season 1, we found out this person was Ahsoka. But how early did Ahsoka start working against the Empire? Could Trace and Raffa be working for Ahsoka at this point in the timeline?
In “Decommissioned,” the Martez sisters make it pretty clear that they’re working for some kind of proto-version of the Rebellion, which could connect to the Saw Gererra cameo we saw earlier in the season. If it’s not Ahsoka they’re talking to via hologram, then the next best bet is Saw.
But if it was Saw, then it feels like the show would have just revealed him. We’ve already seen him and the Batch has already met him! Because Trace and Rafa were introduced as a part of Ahsoka's storyline in Clone Wars Season 7, it seems to make the most sense that they’re working for her — right?
Live-action Bad Batch in Ahsoka?
Ahsoka and Mando in The Mandalorian.
If The Bad Batch is laying a framework that connects to Ahsoka’s backstory prior to Rebels, then it stands to reason anything that happens here could have lasting impacts beyond the end of Return of the Jedi and well into The Mandalorian-era. If Trace and Rafa connect the Bad Batch to Ahsoka, then we’re potentially seeing a soft-origin story for the Ahsoka series forming subtly in the background.
If Omega and the rest of the Batch become allies of Ahsoka Tano by the end of this 16-episode run, any and all of these characters (assuming they survive) could appear in the live-action Ahsoka. Tech, Wrecker, Hunter, and Echo might all be about two decades older, but this would also mean that Omega would be all grown-up in the Mandalorian timeline.
And even if the Bad Batch and Omega aren’t being set up for live-action, it’s possible Trace and Rafa are. We’ve already got Fennec Shand in three shows, The Bad Batch (animated), and two live-action shows, The Mandalorian and The Book of Boba Fett. Right now, the long game for a larger, interconnected Star Wars universe is kind of in its infancy.
This all makes The Bad Batch a confluence of various aspects of Star Wars canon that we’re just now beginning to understand. Sure, the Trace and Rafa cameos could just be a cool cameo (like the silly rancor shout-out in Episode 5.) But because of their connection to Ahsoka, this run-in with The Bad Batch seems like way more than just a happy accident.
The Bad Batch airs on Fridays on Disney+
