Series Discussion: Tales of the Empire
https://open.spotify.com/episode/2ezPCKbLMDekVPBnEvmAZB
Tales of the Jedi worked when it came out because it focused on characters and time periods that were (in the existing canon) not previously explored. The episodes about Count Dooku were the strongest as they outlined the slow desensitization of Dooku to the Jedi's teachings while the second Ahsoka episode about her learning to fight clones is easily the strongest episode in the run. Aside from the episode with Morgan Elsbeth meeting not-yet-Grand Admiral Thrawn for the first time, this anthology lacks that same intuition that the first season did.
Fundamentally the problem is that the stories being told and the era they're being told in feel a little stale. We've seen stories about the rise of the Empire, stories about the rise of the Rebellion, stories about the fall of the Republic, and stories about the rise of the New Republic so much in the last decade since Disney took over that they narratives in this era are starting to get boring. A former Jedi becomes an Inquisitor and grappling with that difficult decision? Seen it. The New Republic is ineffectual in its leadership leading to the rise of evil? Seen it. In a post-Andor world, a show called Tales of the Empire has lost all teeth because we've seen that done to what should be the new brand-standard of quality.
In a world where the series is apparently going to have each season telling a different story, something like Tales of the Confederacy or Tales of the Old Republic or Tales of the First Order or Tales of the Resistance would have been a much better use of the six episodes, especially when the one thing that was interesting in this show (setting up some of Thrawn's motivations for leaving the Ascendency and joining the Empire) will probably just serve to give him a more sympathetic motivation (not necessarily something we need about a guy who's basically like "a little fascism is ok as long as we can partake in a race war") in the impending Heir to the Empire film rather than setting the groundwork for the New Jedi Order film.
★★
