Star Wars: Tales of the Empire is the second anthology of animated shorts. Star Wars: Tales of the Jedi began streaming on Disney+ in 2022. The new series began with all six episodes streamed on May the Fourth Be With You. There was an anthology of stories in the novel, Star Wars: Tales of the Empire (1997) with a similar title that is now Legends. The first episode is directed by Nathaniel Villanueva. It is written by Amanda Rose Muñoz with a story by Dave Filoni. Yoda's words about the path to the Dark Side follow the titles of the first three episodes. Reddish clouds wrap a moon and below it, an explosion, where we see the battlefields of Dathomir! This was in Clone Wars, “Massacre” (2012), GL-CW4/19.
The fields are burning and Nightsisters loose energy bows and retreat from the droid army. One woman stands defiant loosing energy bolts against super battle droids. This is Selena voiced by Diana Lee Inosanto who played Morgan Elspeth in Ahsoka.Her daughter, Morgan (Cathy Ang) calls her name at her side. Ang, voiced the young girl lead, Fei Fei, in the Netflix animated film, Over the Moon (2020). She moves Morgan back and has several Hunters stay to hold off the droids. A Nightsister tries to get the attention of Selena when a green lightsaber blade is run through her! It is General Grievous (Matthew Wood), leader of the droid invaders! Woods recently voiced battle droids and other characters in the final season of Star Wars: The Bad Batch.
The Hunters draw their energy bows. BX-series droid commandos start to cut them down. Selena starts to chant words that activate symbols on her energy sickles. Grievous attacks and she uses her energy sickles, but he strikes down disabling them. Then, Grievous closes on her with his whirling lightsaber blades! Grievous catches hold of Selena with his cyborg foot and slams her down! The battle is also turning against the Hunters and Morgan runs from the fighting. She gets up and locks her energy sickles with Grievous’ lightsabers. Morgan watches as Selena gasps as a lightsaber runs through her! She cries out, “Mother!” as Grievous brings down his lightsabers.
Morgan escapes as Grievous laughs and tells her to run. He repeats Darth Sidious’ line from Phantom Menace. A dramatic death like Jango Fett with his son who watched it. Morgan finds cover on a large tree branch as commando droids pass. One pauses and then blaster bolts tear into the tree branch! Morgan falls and then kicks the droid! It takes out a blade and manages to grab Morgan’s neck. She runs a vibro blade into its head. The blasted Dathomir forest is burning from droid defoilator tanks and Grievous’ laughing is heard. Morgan then collapses unconscious. We see feet of three people walking past a battle droid in the ashen aftermath of the battle. They come to Morgan’s sleeping form.
Morgan wakens and is calmed by the Mountain Clan Matron (Lydia Look). They are in a hut lit by large blue crystals. The actress voiced Julie Chang in the cartoon, The Proud Family: Louder and Prouder. Morgan checks her face, her Nightsister tatoos are gone, the Matron explains that the Nightsisters are gone. She takes Morgan outside to the daylight. Morgan staggers out to see the Mountain Clan and their homes cut into the mountains. She is shown the smoldering remains of the Nightsisters. The Matron invites her to stay with them. Morgan shrugs away her hand and strikes the ground looking up with vengence. Later, at a campfire, Morgan hears the echo of Grievous’ laughter. A trio of young Mountain Clan people talk about fears that the droid army might head to their mountains.
STAR WARS: TALES OF THE EMPIRE -- “The Path of Fear” -- CATHY ANG -- © 2024 LUCASFILM LTD. & ™. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
The Matron tells them not to give into their fears. She is wise and compassionate. The Matron calls for Morgan to join the hunt with one of the trio, Nali (Daisy Lightfoot). Shuri in the animated show, Avengers Assemble, was voiced by Lightfoot. The other Mountain Clan girl, Nali, looks at her. They walk with bows until Morgan has them take cover when droid ships, HMP droid gunships soar past them. Morgan tells Nali that the droids are still hunting them. She offers to help Nali. At her hut, the Matron talks to a worried Nali, but tells her trust their way. Nali sees Morgan with the other two Mountain Clan youths. They say Morgan is taking them to weapons. Nali gives in to the peer pressure.
They walk to a door in a mountain, it slides back to reveal steps. Morgan picks up energy sickles and tests them. The others picks up spears and Nali takes an energy bow. At the village, The Matron discovers Nali is missing and sees droid ships scanning the former battlefield. The weapon storehouse begins to rumble and Morgan runs out with the others. She cuts though battle droids dropped from a droid gunship. Super battle droids unfold and attack! The gunship blasts the door and the explosion takes down Nali. Then, they turn to see the Matron bathed in white. Their blaster bolts are absorbed by the white field she is generating and then a blast knocks them down! This appears to be simliar to Ahsoka’s journey who lost everything leaving the Jedi Temple, but was still able to find her way. A great beginning for Tales of the Empire with Morgan Elspeth’s journey leading to where we found her in The Mandalorian!
Five Lightsabers out of Five!
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