Hero's Journey 2: Ezra Bridger - Star Wars rebels Season S01E01 to S03E05

In this series of articles, I would like to study the Hero's journey. It is known that Joseph Campbell was a mentor of George Lucas and the Hero's Journey is a base for the build of the characters and the plot.

My plan is to try to describe the hero's journey of the main characters of StarWars : Luke, Anakin, Ezra, Ashoka, Rey and also counter heroes like Darth Maul and Kylo Ren.

This way I will be able to check if the model is still applied in the newer cannon material and try to extrapolate the model in order to make some thought of what might come in the futures movies or shows.

The so far achieved hero's Journey of Ezra Bridger:

1. THE ORDINARY WORLD.	Ezra is an orphan child on Lothal. Parents killed by the Empire. Living on is own. Steeling to survive. Just believes in himself.
2. THE CALL TO ADVENTURE.	The main fact that shakes the ordinary is the meeting with the Ghost crew but there are 2 different calls to Ezra.  The first one is that Ezra starts to realize that I can us his abilities not help only himself but all others in order to avoid that others are facing the tragedy he faced.  The second is the knowledge that his abilities are special and that he should learn more of the Force.
3. REFUSAL OF THE CALL.	I first refuse to help others. I does not trust in other them himself. For him nobody helps others. This does not exist! So when Hera press him to go and help the crew, he first refuses. Why should he help someone? Nobody ever helped him !
4. MEETING WITH THE MENTOR.	The Mentors are 2 : Kannan and Hera The articfact is the Force (through the holocron)
5. CROSSING THE THRESHOLD.	At the End of episode 1, Ezra understands that he can use his abilities to help people, he can join this crew = strange family.  He passes the threshold when he run and save the life of a young Wookie (a mirror of the drama the Empire reserved toEzra). He can give a sense to his life!  He also realise that the Force is something that he has the opportunity to use to grow and help people. He choose to be trained by Kannan.
6. TESTS, ALLIES AND ENEMIES.	Allies : Kannan, Zeb, Hera, Sabine, Chopper, Hando, Rex, Ashoka, Leia, YODA.  Enemies : The Empire, Kallus, Tarkin, The inquisitors, Darth Vader, Maul, Thrawn…  Tests : The need of focus and discipline as a padawan, the thin path between trusting feelings without seeking revenge, the fear of loosing his new family, the quest to find informations on parent and the news that they are dead, The fight that constantly seems uneven... Tempetation. Becoming a pirate with Hondo and leave the fight. Trust Maul to seek knowledge in the Sith holocron: the easy path through the dark side.   During this period Ezra is growing in maturity and in abilities of padawan. He understands the cost of war and he has to constantly control is emotions that would tend to bring him to the dark side. Indeed, when he unleashes is emotions he can accomplish great actions through the force (both good and bad).
7. APPROACH.	The rebellion is endangered due to thte fact that the inquisiters are searching for Kannan, Ezra and Ashoka. The approach goes through the visit to the Jedi Temple: Ezra talks to Yoda, Kannan is made a Jedi Knight, Ashoka sees anakin and definitly knows that he his Vader. THen, Ezra and his Jedi friends, have to split to the rest of the allies and go to their major challenge: Seek knowledge to defeat the inquisitors.
8. THE ORDEAL.	The Ordeal takes place on Malachor (closure episodes of Season2). Ezra enters a Sith temple: the place that represents Evil. He also meet Maul that tricks him to activate the Sith temple. Ezra nearly dies by the end of Vador. Kannan is blinded, Ashoka is left for dead. Ezra feels himself responsible for all of it has he pushed to trust Maul and activate the Temple. At this point Ezra looses himself to passion, anger and hate...
9. THE REWARD.	The treasure is the Sith holocron. But off course this is very dangerous. Kannan is not present. Ezra opens the holocron and seek knowledge and power out of it. He reborns as a strong fighter with no mercy to his opponents. He his falling to the dark side but for him it is the only way to get revenge on the one that destroyed is family again (Kannan blinded, Ashoka dead... )
10. THE ROAD BACK.	The road back starts when Kannan (The mentor) returns and make him understand that Ezra is not responsible for what happened. Moreover Ezra starts to understand how dangerous the Sith holocron is for him. Slowly Ezra finds is way back to the light and start to act like before the ordeal. New test, Enemies, Allies are appearing but the Resurrection and the Return with Elixir is yet to come...
11. THE RESURRECTION.	open
12. RETURN WITH THE ELIXIR.	open

I am working on a way to visualize the Jouney on a time scale ploting also the feelings of Ezra. It will be ready in the next weeks. 

Now I am thinking of what could be the next steps of Ezra.
Based on this model, What do you think will happen in the rest of Season 3 and the future upcoming Season 4 ? 

Here my article about Luke Journey : http://beingstarwarsfan.blogspot.fr/2016/08/heros-journey-1-luke-skywalker-original.html

Rogue one Final trailer : Awesome !

Rogue One, A Star Wars Story has reached the final step before theatre release. The final trailer and the Final Poster

This Poster is beautiful. Look at Vader on the top right and the texture (plans?) on Jyn face. Very nice. 

Now concerning the Trailer: I did not expect so much new images and story background content about Jyn's father and the rest of this "dirty dozen" team. So as it is the contrary, I was really impressed.

We see also incredible images of planetary and space dog fight with rebel fleet in the background.

New images of Saw Gerrera: we discover that he had quite a hard life since we met him on Onderon during the Clone Wars.... He has lost both legs and he wears mechanical implants. He looks more machine than man now and he definitely has paid a very heavy tribute to his rebel actions. So much that he seems to have lost hope. The mission of Jyn seem to give him something to grab to...

As announced Bail Organa is involved (you see him on the right side of the round table). 

The Rebel X-wing pilot with the red coloured helmet (very similar to Jek Porkins..) is unknown to me. Did you recognize him?

The Death Star will fire! (on Jedha?) Probably not at full power tough.

Last but not least Darth Vader is there . We see him very briefly and I am glad because I did not want the trailer to spoil his actions!

I cannot wait for December. The movie will be great. We will feel 100% the Star Wars universe: A team (=a family), the drama father and daughter, the fight rebels - Empire, the internal conflict on what is the non return point of violence! Awesome.

Previous Rogue One related Post :

• Trailer
• Trailer 2
• Saw Gerrera
• First trailer Analysis

That is a great theory about Rey origin!

Just enjoy reading that. It is awesome and it is my favorite up to know.

Luke daughter is definitely too simple. I for sure agree on that.

http://epicstream.com/features/Mind-Blowing-Star-Wars-The-Force-Awakens-Theory-About-Reys-True-Identity

Star Wars Rebels Season 3: WHO is the new FULCRUM ?

Hello there  

Yes, this will be one of the major question of the Season 3: Who is Fulcrum? 

In previous seasons it was Ashoka Tano but we all know what happened to her in "twilight of the Apprentice" (do we really know?). It seems that, even if she is alive, she is gone for now...

So let us assume that the Season 3 FULCRUM is not Ashoka. Who is it ? 

Note that Hera explains that there may be several Fulcrum because we learn that it is generic name for spies providing intels to the rebels... so this can make things more complex and we could end up with various sources..

We got the first insight in the Trailer last summer and yesterday in the episode "The Wedge Extraction". Fulcrum informs (with a deformed male voice) that some cadets want to defect from the elite imperial flying academy. For my point of view, this intel must come from someone inside the Empire because cadets do not really have contacts outside the academy.

This article is just the beginning of a list of candidates that will probably increase every episode.... 

Option 1: Agent Kallus. We have been talking already in the past about him. 

First of all we know that he may have some doubts on the way the Empire use the violence to control the populations. He was put in charge of the massacre of the Lasat to make an example of what happened to his team on Onderon.  As a consequence Kallus sees why the Rebels are fighting and he respects them for there courage and loyalty to their cause. And most of it he knows the COST OF WAR. (see the episode "The honnorable Ones").

Secondly in the season 3 opening episode we see him being put in a secondary role due to the entrance of Grand Admiral Thrawn. He is also clearly not a fan of Thrawn brutal tactics to destroy the Rebellion with no matter of the civilians casualties. I made an hypothesis that Kallus could also act to help the Rebels in order to fool Thrawn : more details here 

Finally, in the episode "The Wedge Extraction", also Governor Price ridicules him in front of cadets. Moreover there is a clear scene in the Episode (I will not spoil that) that indicates some wish to help the rebels. 

So il looks like it could be him. But something is not ok .... : it is too easy to understand!. So I am not sure... let see. 

Option 2: Scaris (not sure I write is correctly)

He his officer/Instructor on the Skystrike Academy. He looks extremely convinced about the Imperial methods and pushes his cadets to follow orders without discussions (even if they have to shoot unarmed peoples....). But there is one extremely brief shot at the end of the Episode: after the successful extraction of Wedge, he actually SMILES. Why that ? Rebels have escaped, Why should he smiles? ... only if he provided the information as Fulcrum. 

He his also in constant contact with the cadets, so he could be able to understand that some wanted to defect from the Empire. 

Option 3: Thrawn

I read that on a comment of a video and I found it really good. What if Thrawn himself gives info to the Rebellion and the same to Governor Price and Kallus. This way it can build traps to try to catch the rebels. We should keep in mind this possibility for future episodes.

Well, no answer today! For sure you will have also some other theories. Let me know in the comments. !

May the Force be with you. 

Star Wars Rebels : Holocron of Fate : Obiwan Kenobi enters the show ?

Hello Rebels fans!

Episode 2 of Season 3 is already gone and we have a very interesting scenario in front of us !

I will not analyse the Episode in detail even if there is a lot to say about the renewed balance between Ezra and Kanan for example. But I want to focus on the last minute during which the 2 holocrons are fusing together and Maul and Ezra are having visions:

Maul says : I look for "Hope" and then "I see him", "he leaves"
Ezra says : "the twin suns" or "the twin sons" and then he speaks about various planets.

So question is Who leaves and give hope to Maul ?

Hope in the Sith way is to be able to get revenge or to get more power.
2 options :

1. Savage Oppress: Maul's brother (the "twin son"?).  From the Trailer we see a lot of Nighsister magic so Talzin, Savage Oppress... could be part of Season3. Savage was killed by Darth Sidious on Mandalor. Off course he could have survived like Maul did (perhaps thanks to the magic in his body). 
   
2. Obiwan Kenobi: Maul revenge over Kenobi who cut him half and made him become a crazy exiled mind on a junk yard planet for years...  Kenobi is on Tatooine : the planet with the "twin suns". Maul can get revenge over Kenobi by tracking him on Tatooine. The Light side Holocron even include a message from Obiwan Himself. 
3. Someone else?

It looks like the second option is more realistic. So unless you have other theories, there is a high probability that we will see Obiwan in Star wars rebels. Maul escaped in a beautiful Madalarian ship. Did he go directly to Tatooine ?

This is the planet of his very first fight with a Jedi, if it becomes the planet of his last fight the circle would be closed. 

Side Question: I ever thought that Maul wanted to use the Sith temple super weapon to kill Darth Sidious to have revenge on is brother and mother death. Was it that he wanted to kill Kenobi ?

Is that not a little bit limited ? Maul manage to take over Mandalor and several crime syndicates. He has the possibility to become very power full. He also claims to not be a Sith anymore but a new form of dark side force actor. So why this pursue of revenge on Kenobi instead of using his knowledge to lead part of the galaxy?

This characters seems to be doomed to fail over and over again in what ever he tries to accomplish...