#She looks white | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

writingforfun0714 · 2 years

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Hello readers,

Ever since The Mandalorian, I’ve been excited and passionate about all new Star Wars content (aside from the sequel movies of course). But in recent months, I’ve really gotten into the animated shows of Star Wars, specifically Clone Wars, Rebels and Bad Batch. (and I cannot wait for Tales of the Jedi!). I’ve just finished my 3rd re-watch of Star Wars The Bad Batch and feel that while I praise the show and it’s story, upon re-watching, I can’t help but notice the flaws that I’d like to discuss because no show is perfect. I’ll also be making comparisons to other animated shows that I feel The Bad Batch can benefit learning from.

Warning—Long post, Contains spoilers for The Bad Batch, Clone Wars, Book of Boba, Avatar the Last Airbender, and Arcane the following analysis (/review?) is purely opinion based and my own ideas/thoughts about the shows aren’t canon or confirmed by anyone. Contains talk of mental illness including depression, anxiety, abandonment and hallucinations, so anyone who might feel uncomfortable with such topics should stop reading. Any mention of mental illness is my own interpretation and based on my own experience being diagnosed with depression, anxiety, and OCD.

*I recognize and understand that both the Bad Batch and Arcane only have 1 season (with a 2nd season confirmed for both) out as of writing this post so I know my views and opinions will change as more content is created*

In short, the Bad Batch is about a group of genetically enhanced soldiers in the Grand Army of the Republic, which no longer exists, thanks to Order 66, called Clone Force 99. The enhanced soldiers find themselves divided when one member, Crosshair, still sides with the evil Empire. CF99’s Sergeant Hunter and the rest of the squad find themselves responsible for the young Omega, the only female clone of Jango Fett. After learning she is like Fett’s son, Boba—an unaltered clone, the remaining squad members vow to protect her from various bounty hunters, their fallen brother Crosshair and the rapidly changing galaxy thanks to the fall of the Republic.

The story of the Bad Batch comes to a head when Hunter is captured and the Empire destroys the cloning facility on Kamino, and finally, Crosshair deciding to stay with the Empire. The story is one of the things I cannot improve much, if anything at all upon, as I like it the way it is. I love the setting, starting with Order 66. The animation is stunning like The Clone Wars Season 7 quality and the music is beautiful (though the last CW S7 4-episode finale music is the best imo). Special clones and a young unaltered female clone is a nice take on the classic Star Wars trope of reluctant adoptive fathers meeting their space child.

Like many have pointed out, I agree that the Bad Batch have been severely whitewashed. The clone template, Jango Fett is played by Temuera Morrison, Brodie Taylor and Daniel Logan are all New Zealand actors and have dark tan skin, dark brown eyes and thick, wavy/almost curly hair and wide, rounded features. No one is white! Despite the age differences, all 3 actors share the skin tone, wavy dark hair and soft, rounded features.

Here are what animated clones looks like

While the clones don’t look too bad, these are considered regular clones, or ‘regs’. These are Echo (L) and Fives (R) (I believe from S3 of Clone Wars specifically) and while they have their tan complexion, the skin could use a bit of pink just to make the skin look fleshier. The lips are a bit too pointed, eyes a bit too angular and the jawline is clearly sharp and pronounced. Even the haircut is modeled after a buzz cut of straight hair. A curly buzz cut wouldn’t be flat on top and would have a bit of texture.

Now here is the Bad Batch.

None of these clones remotely resembles Temuera Morrison, who I’m using as my main actor for comparison. Starting with Hunter, you can easily see his straight jawline and his hair, while long, would be wavier and have more texture. His complexion is a lighter, orangier color, making him look white, especially while in a sterile, bright place like Tipoca City. His nose is thinner than Echo’s, who believe it or not, is the clone to Hunter’s left. Echo, what even is your skin complexion? Even through torture and complete lack of sunlight, Echo’s skin would still retain a natural hint of tan. This man looks pale as a ghost. Tech looks like he has a touch of jaundice or something, especially compared to Hunter or Wrecker and I don’t even know what his hairline is unless he cut it himself. Then there’s Crosshair, the thinnest, lankiest out of them. I understand it’s a design choice. Each member looks a certain way because of their genetic enhancement, but Cross doesn’t even resemble Temuera Morrison or a Māori man at all. Everything about his features are designed to be slim and thin, which could be achieved had he also not looked so angular. Round out the edges especially around his nose, jaw and change the skin tone (because his skin tone is a bit like Tech’s). And lastly, Wrecker, while still a bit on the lighter side, has skin that’s darker overall compared to the other members of the Bad Batch and has the wide, rounded features. But that’s where my next point comes in.

That was only their physical attributes. Next I’ll get into their characters, starting with Wrecker. While he may resemble Temuera Morrison the most out of everyone, he is assigned the role of the ‘dumb brute’ with the child-like personality, which isn’t a great message to send. Tech being the typical brilliant but socially inept character really would’ve been fine had his accent not been that of a British person’s. Echo’s PTSD from the trauma and torture he endured is completely sidelined by Hunter and Omega’s relationship and the group also have a hard time listening to his completely valid reasons for not wanting to help a Separatist. Echo is the ‘reg’ of the group and for him to be treated as lesser by the rest of CF99, plays right into Crosshair’s mentality of being being superior to the regs. Crosshair believes he and his brothers are superior to the regular clones due to their mutations and even outright says it! Even during my first watch, that line didn’t sit well with me. Lastly is Hunter and while he’s supposed to be the leader of his squad and protect everyone, he often puts his life, the lives of his brothers and even Omega’s life, in danger in order to please her. I’d also like to point out that the VA for all clones is Dee Bradley Baker, a talented, white man tasked with voicing all clones in the animated series. Omega sounds a lot different than CF99 because her VA is from New Zealand like the actors in the live action movies. She sounds a lot like Daniel Logan, which is nice, but her voice still sounded off to me. I googled her and saw the VA, Michelle Ang, is in her 30’s!

I deliberately have kept from talking about Omega to separate her from the Batch so I can talk about her as her own character. Here is Omega and a group of clone cadets for comparison. As you can see, her design isn’t too bad aside from the skin tone, and her nose is a bit too pointy at the tip. I don’t mind the blond of her hair too much, especially since one of the cadets below and Captain Rex have blond hair, but would’ve preferred it if she had dark brown hair like Daniel Logan (since they decided with the light skin tone).

Now Omega as a character I think could definitely be improved upon. Now to start, I’d like to say that my own headcanon is that Omega is 11. That’s important because a lot of shows write children as mini adults and, sometimes, it shows. I understand that children are annoying and can come off as unlikeable, but I think that’s the point, especially with Star Wars. Dave Filoni has a track record for creating unlikeable youngsters and having them grow over time, with Ahsoka being the most famous example and Ezra Bridger a close 2nd.

Filoni also worked on Avatar the Last Airbender, the best kids show there is. Both shows tackle mature themes of brainwashing/manipulation, genocide and war. I think one of the best developed characters is Sokka, who along with Zuko, has the most character growth. Sokka starts off as a sexist egotistical goofball that was comedic relief. But already by the 3rd and 4th episodes, Sokka is shown to be caring and apologetic when he realizes his wrongdoings. Omega doesn’t change much from the first episode aside from being less sheltered and more confident. The one lesson that she never seemed to learn was that you can’t always save everyone so, in the finale, saving AZ felt like a let down. It would’ve been great character growth for Omega to learn that not everyone can be saved, especially since she pressures Hunter into doing what she thinks is right. At this time, I’d like to point out that the VA in AtLA, during the time of recording, were children/young adults and able to pass as children. Michelle Ang being in her 30’s is quite obviously an adult. It makes the show much more believable and real with age-appropriate VA’s. I realize that Ashley Eckstein, Ahsoka Tano’s VA, is also an adult, but I feel she is better casted, because having an adult voice a child in animation isn’t uncommon and can be pulled off successfully (Bart Simpson, Ash Ketchum, Grey DeLisle roster of characters).

Omega is a young girl, who, deep down, is afraid of being abandoned and left behind as well as being part of the Kaminoan’s experiments. I’d like to bring up another young girl who’s afraid of being abandoned, left and replaced. Powder from Netflix’s Arcane. I’ll be using Powder as my main example of how a good child character can be a great child character.

I assume Powder to be around 4 or 5 at the very beginning of Arcane where we see her walking with Vi, her older sister, and see that their parents are dead, and about 9 or 10 during Act 1 and during the accidental explosion. Omega is 11, which isn’t far off from 9 and both girls are afraid of being abandoned and left behind by the ones they feel attached to. Now that’s definitely a theme within both shows, but Arcane does a better job of showing it, perhaps because it’s portrayed as a mental illness, especially in one of the youngest characters in the show.

Powder is shown, early on, to have a close and deep attachment to her older sister/protector, Vi. Omega is shown to have an attachment/relationship with the Kaminoan scientist, Nala Se and to CF99. Omega wears a gray headpiece that is identical to the one Nala Se wears, along with her clothes being similarly colored. While Nala Se appears protective over Omega by keeping Omega’s interactions with others brief to nonexistent, she actually helps the young clone escape with CF99 and even hires Fennec Shand to protect the girl from Lama Su, the Kaminoan Prime Minister. After reuniting with CF99 in the 1st episode, Omega is eager to prove her worth to the squad and join them, since it’s revealed in the finale that Omega knew the squad when they were being created (and is technically older than the squad-maybe not Echo though). Like Omega, Powder is eager to prove herself to Vi and their adopted brothers Mylo and Claggor, being the youngest, most inexperienced of the group.

Omega is shown to be afraid of being abandoned and gets upset when Hunter gets angry with her, as shown in episode 2 Cut and Run. Omega’s inexperience nearly gets the young girl killed by a Nexu (Nexxu?) Hunter yells at her briefly which causes her to cry once Cut takes her back to the ship. Omega is also shown crying when the Batch rescue her from Bane and Shand in episode 9 Bounty Lost, and upset right when Hunter missed his jump, getting captured in episode 14 War Mantel. Omega’s emotions are toned down and subtle with shiny wet eyes, and a wet sniffle being the main indicators of the young clone’s emotions. Because of her inexperience and her age, Omega would be terrified and show more emotion or have the emotions she does show be more intense. Which brings me to Powder, specifically in the heart wrenching episode 3 The Base Violence Necessary for Change. Powder is told to stay behind from Vi while their adopted brothers and Vi go rescue their adopted father. Powder, clearly upset, lets a single tear slip down her cheek in the presence of her older sister and the others, but after the siblings leave the young girl alone, she mentally spirals in their room. Powder’s crying is much different from Omega’s. Powder wails and lets her eyes and nose stream, not caring about the small bits of drool coming out of her mouth as she rips apart her monkey toy before launching it as hard as she can, screaming once before curling in on herself and hitting her own head. That is much more indicative of a mental breakdown than a tantrum a child would throw. Powder threw her arms back and screamed again before clawing at her face and hitting her head a bit more before finding the box she kept the hexgems in and slamming the box on the ground. The crystals tumbled out, creating blue sparks of energy, reminding Powder of the day she took them and the explosion that happened seemingly out of nowhere.

I know what most of you are going to say at this point. TBB is a kids show with a rating of TV-PG (which is for kids 7/8 and up) and Arcane is TV-14, which means the material/content in Arcane might not be suitable for kids under 14. I believe, however, that the older age rating in Arcane is mostly for the depiction of Shimmer (drug abuse), violence, the brothel scene, that one sex scene with Jayce and Mel while Viktor dies :/ (ep5?) and the bathroom scene with Mel’s mom (ep8 I think). I know Jinx’s hallucinations are extreme and severe, but I believe, as Powder, the emotional range would’ve been acceptable in a TV-PG show. I’ve experienced the kind of mental breakdowns Powder would have at 7-8, the first one being when my parents divorced. I clawed my face so hard I have a scar on my forehead that never went away, ripped out chunks of my hair and destroyed my room. But, like Powder, I was alone when it happened. No one ever knew. The only depiction of mental illness I saw at the time was Azula’s decline in Avatar the Last Airbender, and Star Wars’ Revenge of the Sith with Anakin turning to the Dark Side, and at the time, I was too young to really understand why Azula was acting the way she was. And I was definitely too young to watch my hero, Anakin get burned alive. So to see a young character like Powder go through such mental anguish, it brought up lots of feelings of my own trauma, while watching Omega, I couldn’t really relate to because my emotions have always been intense like Powder’s. Another fact I should point out is that Omega’s VA is in her 30’s while Powder’s VA, Mia Sinclair Jenness was 10-11 at the time of recording, which also makes the character more believable.

I’d also like to point out that both girls have skills that go unused (for a time at least), and both girls aren’t naturally good at what they like/prefer doing. Omega is great at strategy with the holochess game she used to pay Cid back, but she prefers to use her Zyggerian electrobow. While the first shot she took in ep1 hit Crosshair’s blaster, she is shown to not be a good shot, having only hit her target 3 out of 12 times. She works and trains over time to get better at it and her progress grows. Powder is actually a great shot, but because of her age (and location probably), she isn’t given a gun, despite being able to outshoot Mylo, the brother that often makes fun of her. However, Powder’s main interest is her explosives/inventions. She builds all sorts of homemade bombs for protection but none seem to work, until the accidental explosion she caused. It’s clear after the timeskip, Powder, now known as Jinx, has perfected her grenades and bombs, but because of her unhinged mental state, she isn’t subtle with them, which is where we get into the TV-14 area. I believe all depictions of Powder and her mental state would’ve been ok to show in a show like Bad Batch, given that we already know that it’s predecessor show, Clone Wars, definitely crossed the line a few times for a TV-PG show (much like AtLA and it’s successor the Legend of Korra).

I understand the creative team behind TBB and Dave Filoni are trying to take their time and build up the characters over time, so I’m sure my opinion on Omega will change, especially now that we’ve got an official Season 2 trailer. But there were some choices I believe that could’ve been made to make the first season much better. In short, the whitewashing should’ve been addressed properly (especially since the Batch, including Omega, has gotten new armor/clothes) and changed appropriately, and I think whoever’s in charge of casting should’ve chosen someone else, more age appropriate for Omega. Baker is ok but could’ve been cast better to begin with, and because he’s already established as the voice of the clones from CW, it makes sense to keep him on. And the animation/writers should’ve gone more intense with Omega’s emotions given her inexperience and age.

Hopes for S2, having seen the trailer…

I definitely see Cody and Crosshair meeting up again with Rex and the Batch and perhaps a showdown with Cody and Rex (please don’t let Cody die!). The boy Omega says ‘let’s go’ to appears to be an older Pietro (Pedro? don’t really remember the name) and we briefly see Gungi and another Wookie, which makes me believe we will see the group padawans from the Hondo/padawan arc and possibly Kashyyyk. I can’t even guess as to why Omega watches Palpatine on what appears to be Coruscant? But it definitely has to do with Nala Se and the scene we saw at the end of the finale. I hope we see Boba again. It would make his whole situation with Fennec in BoBF less awkward if he already knew of Omega’s existence, especially since we see Bane again. I don’t think he’d be thrilled at seeing Omega, another unaltered Jango clone, who looks nothing like his father. Kind of like a reverse Luke/Leia. While they seemed happy to find out they were twins/siblings, I’d like to see Boba hate the idea of a twin, since she’s as close to a twin as it gets, despite the age difference.

I’d like a flashback of Omega’s creation. I think we have a lot of unexplored potential with Jango and Boba’s early days on Kamino and how Jango actually felt about the war and his situation in particular. Does Jango know about Omega? If he did, did he consent to her creation? My own personal headcanon is that she was created after Jango was killed by Master Windu because the Kaminoans have realized that Jango’s DNA is deteriorating. Realizing they’ll need another source of pure genetic Fett DNA, the Kaminoans create Omega as a backup in case something should happen to Boba, aka ‘Alpha’ (which is lucky since the Kaminoans lose him at the start of the Clone War). So even with Boba seemingly gone or assumed dead by the Kaminoans, they still have access to pure Fett DNA through Omega. This is just my own headcanon and isn’t confirmed, just thought it was a cool idea.

I’d like to see actual consequences for Omega’s actions. I can’t get over how let down I was when she saved the droid. I mean I hope the route they choose is that AZ recovers memories of Fives and Echo properly grieves or something, but the save felt like a cop out. Even Ahsoka learns that lesson in season 1 of CW where she looses her whole squad by not following Anakin’s orders. After everything that the Clone Wars show set up, I felt a little let down by how…watered down things seemed with the Batch, so I hope season 2 will find its footing with an actual story instead of the typical Saturday morning cartoon plot of a job for Cid gone wrong. I have high hopes for s2 but based off everything in s1 and all the #unwhitewashthebadbatch content there is, I’m definitely conflicted about s2.

Anyways…those are just kind of my main points about The Bad Batch so far. Anyone still reading, thank you and I hope I gave you something to think about. I’ll be back with more fics real soon :)