A Recipe for Bad

The Bad Batch released two episodes for its finale on Wednesday, the first a bit better written than the second, though both fell short of their aims.

Once again, the influence of Andor is apparent. The Batch infiltrates an Imperial base to get intel on the Empire's secret cloning project. Unfortunately for them, young Saw Gerrera is there and ruins everything. The morally grey character who was part of one of the best scenes on Andor is here just an obstacle, spouting dialogue about how the ends justify the means. But the ends, it turns out, are that Gerrera doesn't assassinate his targets and the Batch don't get their intel--and Tech gets killed, too.

Tech was part of the focus of "Crossing", one of the two best episodes of the season (along with "Faster"), yet I still didn't feel a strong enough connexion with him for his death to have an impact. A lot of the problem may have stemmed from the awkward flirting scene between Tech and Phee.

She asks if he was just going to leave without saying goodbye and he says, yes, like he saw absolutely no reason why he should say goodbye to her. A couple episodes earlier, one of the other clones, I forget which, remarked on how Tech had "competition" when it seemed Phee had her eyes on the mayor of Pabu. That was the only time I can remember romance being hinted at between the two. "Crossing" made an attempt to explore how Tech doesn't express his emotions so I think we're meant to take his non-responsive reaction to Phee as a sign of that weak capacity for expression but it came off more like he simply had no particular interest in her. It made the scene unintentionally funny and slightly creepy. It kind of reminded me of Lara Flynn Boyle's character in Wayne's World except Wanda Sykes is still giving a slow, stilted performance.

I liked some of the business with the Batch infiltrating the base and writer Matt Michnovetz knows how to construct sequences like that. He gives some dialogue to Tarkin about "uniting" the galaxy under the Empire, a gesture towards some of the political, philosophical drama on Andor and in Anakin's story in the prequels. But it's only a moment before the Imperials go back to being cartoon villains. Tarkin orders an air strike on the Batch trapped on the rail car despite protests that Imperial troops might be caught "in the crossfire". For one thing, it's not crossfire when the firing is coming from only one direction, and for another, the Imperial troops are clearly a good distance from the Batch, so the line, obviously designed to show Tarkin being ruthless, just didn't make any sense.

Echo is back with the group because "Rex is on a separate mission." Why Echo didn't go with Rex is never explained.

Also not explained is why the Batch go to Cid to recuperate even though a couple episodes earlier we'd learned the Batch had turned against Cid, making her their enemy for no apparent reason. Possibly they couldn't trust medical care from any other source in range of Tarkin's base but it would've helped if there'd been one line in which the characters referenced this fact, maybe even a shot of Hunter and Echo discussing it. "Can we trust Cid?" "We have no other choice!" Then, when Cid betrays them, it wouldn't have seemed quite as stupid.

Ultimately, this two episode finale, though filled with moments clearly intended to have a deep emotional impact, was too sloppily conceived and written to succeed in its goals.

The Bad Batch is available on Disney+.