Star Wars Rebels Season Two Finale Q&A

by Sarah Woloski

So you’ve seen the Star Wars Rebels Season Two finale. You have LOTS of questions. More questions than answers, in fact. Well, here are *some* of your questions answered from Dave Filoni himself (executive producer), as well as Simon Kinberg (producer, writer), Ashley Eckstein (voice of Ahsoka Tano), and Taylor Gray (voice of Ezra Bridger). This video contains the entire Q&A we witnessed at Walt Disney Studios in Burbank, California, for the finale of Star Wars Rebels Season Two. Moderating the Q&A was Amy Ratcliffe, writer for The Nerdist, starwars.com, and podcaster on Full of Sith and Lattes with Leia. It was her first time moderating an event like this and we think she did a great job!

*SPOILERS AHEAD*

If you have not seen “Twilight of the Apprentice,” turn back now!

I love talking with the producer or director of a movie or TV show. They have so much over-arching knowledge about the entire thing. Dave Filoni, creator, writer and producer, is especially fun because he is known for being asked the hard questions and evading them. For nearly one hour, Dave Filoni evaded, sidestepped, and pirouetted over questions like a master. What questions he did answer, though, gave us terrific insight into the entire process of creating an animated TV Show about a much-beloved franchise. We are INVESTED in these characters. We all gasped when the Seventh Sister bit the dust. We all cringed when Maul revealed himself, we all gripped our seats as Ahsoka confronted Darth Vader. And what was with Ezra’s eyes at the end? Dave Filoni is a fan, too. He knows how we think, and what we’ll ask.

A few of my favorite quotes from this Q&A:

Simon Kinberg: We were all sitting around the table in a story meeting and Dave [Filoni] will draw images as we’re working on story. And you drew an image of Vader’s split mask, which I thought was one of the most compelling images I’ve ever seen in all of Star Wars. And it ended up in the show. You actually just doodled it during a meeting.

Dave Filoni: I’ve been up since 4AM, I’m on.

Ashley Eckstein: Whatever happens to Ahsoka, whether she lives or dies, I trust Dave. He’s always going to do the right thing for the overall Star Wars story. Dave once told me that if Ahsoka and Vader faced off it wouldn’t be a good thing for Ahsoka.

Taylor Gray: At the very end, Ezra’s holding a holocron and his eyes went… red? Yes? I asked Dave Filoni but I couldn’t get a straight answer.

Dave Filoni: I was obsessed with the light and dark and they are everywhere in this episode. Maul for all intents and purposes is dead. He’s in the underworld. So he’s the walking dead underneath the earth until he can be lifted up. And what lifts him up is youth and hope and opportunity and that carries him up the staircase. You see them going up and other stuff going down, which is a little bit of a clue of what happens at the end. Ezra is in a pillar of light when he meets Maul. To join Maul and help him he has to leave it. The explanation of everything is in the coding of the scene. Absolutely nothing we do is arbitrary.

So maybe that quote can help answer any questions you may have about Ahsoka descending down at the very end of this episode. Pretty fantastic.

Keep your ears open at the end of the panel. I got the last question of the night! I asked a music question, and much to my surprise when Dave Filoni answered, he gestured to Kevin Kiner who was sitting in the audience! I was so surprised, and even more amazed when I was able to speak with Kevin Kiner for a bit after the Q&A wrapped. For the complete audio of this and thoughts on the episode, listen to Episode 115 of Skywalking Through Neverland: STAR WARS REBELS Season 2 Finale Press Coverage Special.

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Sarah Woloski is a Star Wars / Disney fangirl. She is a graphic designer, entertainer, and co-host on two amazing podcasts, Skywalking Through Neverland and Fangirls Going Rogue. Sarah loves film music, runDisney, John Williams, and Julie Andrews. Find her @JediTink.