The Greatest Heroine of Star Wars: Ahsoka Tano

Feb 26, 2020

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Ahsoka Tano is one of the greatest Star Wars characters of all time and she’s featured in the most egalitarian Star Wars shows out there, The Clone Wars.

When it comes to the Star Wars universe, the role of heroic women is ever-shifting and in some ways a bit shaky. The original trilogy gave us Princess Leia; the prequels gave is Padme Amidala; the new trilogy put Rey out there, and Rogue One dropped in with Gyn Erso. While all four heroines are arguably iconic in their roles and some are popular, each one has some fair criticism. Princess Leia was never given a central role. Padme was given the dialogue of a cardboard cutout. Gyn gets lost in the crowd. And Rey will be forever haunted by the ghost of Mary Sue.

I say, “Enough negativity!” Let’s talk about the Star Wars heroine who works and, in my opinion, stands among the best of all the Star Wars characters.

You may not have heard of her, but I’m talking about Ahsoka Tano.

Ahsoka Tano hails from the Star Wars animated TV series, The Clone Wars, which has been a buried gem of the Star Wars franchise since 2008. Disguised as a children’s cartoon, the Clone Wars quietly built up a following through sheer force of excellence in writing, animation, voice acting, characters, and storytelling. On Rotten Tomatoes, the Clone Wars is up there with the only the Original Trilogy and at least for now, Disney’s hit series, The Mandalorian. Boasting a level of animation that may never be surpassed on television, The Clone Wars went on to become a multi-award award-winning series, collecting a treasure trove of animation and voice acting awards.

It’s time you discovered it too.

But the Clone Wars series is more than just Star Wars show that “adds” in a few female characters for good measure. Amazingly, they manage this powerful and positive balance without the intrusion of identity politics. Messaging gives way to story. Without a lot of fanfare, the Clone Wars achieves the most egalitarian balance of any Star Wars story. Period.

Women are everywhere in the Clone Wars. The galaxy is embroiled in an epic conflict and women are out in front, leading armies and commanding with confidence. They, themselves, are so comfortable in their leadership roles that you, the viewer, will barely notice or care much about gender and stay focused on what the characters are doing and saying. Women spearhead politics and moral debate. Several planets feature a woman as the leader and cultural figurehead. They inspire uprisings, lead from the front, and make mistakes.

We see plenty of female Jedi, but we also find them in the ranks of the Dark Side. Assaj Ventress in an absolute score for Star Wars villains, a Sith and assassin who hold her own in every episode she’s in. Women are mentors and pupils. They’re good and evil. They’re asserting their presence in the galaxy across the board, true allies and equals of their male counterparts. Without attempting to draw any attention to the incredible representation of women, the Clone Wars is effortless in its egalitarianism. The Clone Wars just lets their characters be themselves.

I’ve studied Ahsoka Tano in-depth and she holds up across every front. She’s heroic. She’s a woman of action. She’s compassionate. She fails time and time again, and I for one, have come to truly admire her as a full character, as rich and dynamic as Luke Skywalker.

I became a genuine fan by episode 19. In one of the Clone Wars’ best episodes, Storm Over Ryloth, Ahsoka Tano is given her first command of a fighter squadron. She’s to lead her clones in an attack on Separatist blockade that is under the command of a fully capable and even cunning Separatist admiral. The animation is up to the task and the action squarely within the Star Wars tradition.

Without her squadron around to defend the fleet, the Republic battleships crumble under a wave of vicious attacks. Ahsoka finally turns back, but not after losing a couple of the clones. And let me say, the clones are all personalized in this show. They have nicknames and personalities of their own. Ahsoka is horrified by the deaths her decision brought and her total failure. As a guy, I never once felt like I was watching a weak girl who didn’t belong on a battlefield meant for men. No, I saw a warrior who took her first loss and swallowed that bitter pill of real consequence. It’s summed up when Anakin, who’s an excellent and compassionate mentor, tells her that losing men is the “reality of command.”

Later in the episode, Ahsoka is again put in charge, but this time of the whole battleship. Her confidence is low. The clone officers openly doubt her, preferring the certitude and experience of Anakin. Ahsoka, herself, has doubts about her ability to lead, especially after such a devastating failure only hours ago. But Ahsoka makes a stand. She devises a brilliant but risky tactical plan and the clone army follows her lead. She carries out the plan herself. The maneuver is successful, and she ends up smashing the blockade and rescuing Anakin Skywalker. Ahsoka overcame her clear failure and endeared me to her character from then on.

Time and time again, we watched as Ahsoka faced real tests and hardships. As the new seasons came out, it became clear that Ahsoka Tano was fast becoming a Star Wars darling. She played her role as Anakin’s padawan to perfection, showing the proper respect to her mentor while daring to challenge him with regularity. She has a mind of her own, even within the military chain of command.

In what I regard as some of the greatest Star Wars there is…up there with the original trilogies—Clone Wars Season 5 concludes with a four-part series that does more to drive home the conflicts and themes of the prequels than even the movies, in my opinion. The democratic institutions are failing. The moral leadership is failing. The military presence is growing. In a bold plotline that foreshadows the events of Revenge of the Sith, Ahsoka Tano is framed for a crime she didn’t commit.

I’ve studied the recurrent themes of heroine-centric stories. And in the epic tradition of the heroine’s labyrinth story model, Ahsoka experiences what’s called ‘the broken truce,’ where the native culture itself turns against our heroine in dramatic fashion.  We get our first glimpse of a ubiquitous military that flexing some muscle on the Jedi and the whiff of military dictatorship on the horizon. Admiral Tarkin personally leads the attack on Ahsoka and a conflict arises between Jedi Knight Anakin Skywalker and the galactic military, who are bent on her capturing his fugitive padawan.

Incredible drama ensues with the highest quality visuals. Ahsoka is hunted down by a ruthless dragnet of clones and surveillance. The clones who pursue her are the same ones who Ahsoka had led into battle time and time again for five seasons. They don’t care that she was their former commander. They see only an enemy of the state. The writers and animators have full command over the entire palette of Star Wars sounds and images.

Eventually, she is captured, where she is expelled from the Jedi Order. This represents a total failure of leadership and the Jedi abandon one of their finest and turn Ahsoka over to military jurisdiction. Fans are treated to a courtroom drama of high crimes and treason against the Republic, spearheaded by the defending counsel, Padme Amidala and the military prosecutor, Admiral Tarkin, the future Grand Moff. This is a brilliant use of existing characters, who burst to life in a conflict we all care about.

After Ahsoka is finally exonerated, she does something that stands tall in the Star Wars Universe. The Jedi Order apologizes for doubting her and welcome her back into the Order. Anakin is sorry. They’re all sorry. But Ahsoka Tano turns them down flat. A woman with her own thoughts and moral compass, Ahsoka refuses. She walks away from the Jedi Order leaving the entire leadership of Jedi Masters standing wordless in the vacuum of her departure, the Jedi Order is silently judged as “guilty,” never to recover their moral ascendency again. Anakin Skywalker chases her down and pleads with her to reconsider. The dialogue is perfect, the cinematography is stunning, as fine as any movie.

Ahsoka Tano walks away leaving Anakin Skywalker on the steps of the Jedi Temple. It’s the last time these two see each other as friends. They take two very different paths in the wake of a collapsing galactic order.

What happens next?

No one knows because Disney bought LucasFilm and scrapped the Clone Wars under massive protests. Disney’s new TV show, ‘Rebels,’ came out instead. Yet, after a so-so reception for the new series, the writers of the Clone Wars came in and quickly reintroduced Ahsoka Tano. In an episode that features Darth Vader, voiced by James Earl Jones, himself, the dark lord and his former apprentice from the Clone Wars are thrown back in the mix together. Ahsoka senses the hate and anger and even passes out when she learns that the powerful darkness is her former master, Anakin Skywalker.

The two come face-to-face in a showdown that carries the kind of gravity we’ve only seen in the original trilogy. During the confrontation, Ahsoka strikes a blow to Darth Vader, and for a second, fans see the human eye of Anakin Skywalker through the shattered black mask. We even hear Anakin’s once compassionate voice when utters Ahsoka’s name. We see a glimpse of his humanity. The films never showed us Darth Vader like this until after he turned back to the good side. Ahsoka Tano brings this out of him.

Folks, she’s one of the greatest Star Wars characters of all time in my view. These are incredible storylines and character arcs.

All the criticisms that follow the Star Wars heroines of the big screen are absent here. And now, after all these years of silence, Season 7 of The Clone Wars has finally returned to conclude the saga. The newest episodes are available on Disney Plus and I wanted you to know what the hype was all about.

This is a story about the fall of the Republic, the emergence of the dark side, and the rise of a lone heroine who stands tall among the Pantheon of Star Wars greats. If you love heroic women in fiction and Star Wars like I do, then The Clone Wars is for you.

I highly recommend.