After seeing what the series has in store for us, thanks to a pretty incredible Star Wars Rebels Season 3 trailer that debuted at Star Wars Celebration Europe, I doubt there's a single fan out there who's not champing at the bit for more. However, we still have to wait a bit longer for the Star Wars Rebels Season 3 premiere. In the meantime, thankfully, co-creator, supervising director, and executive producer Dave Filoni delivered a few choice nuggets of intel during the series' Celebration press conference.
The biggest factor in Season 3 is obviously the addition of the expanded universe character Grand Admiral Thrawn, whose inclusion brings the character into the band of canonical Star Wars characters. The addition of Thrawn got a huge roar from the crowd at the series' panel and for good reason: Thrawn is a scary, menacing guy. And adding him to the series is going to change everything.
Filoni told reporters that he faced a similar problem with Thrawn as he did with Darth Vader: If they used these villains too often, it would start to get really unrealistic that this ragtag band of rebels somehow escapes these masterminds every single week. But considering Thrawn is being set up as the main protagonist of Season 3, something's going to have to give.
"He's too smart ... I don't have a lot I can supply to defend them against Thrawn," Feloni says. "It's going to get sticky."
And if the Season 2 finale is any indication, "sticky" is a mild term for what lies ahead for the Ghost crew.
But Thrawn's not the only threat that the writers have to worry about overusing. According to the voice of Darth Maul, Sam Witwer, "You can't use him too much." Like most of the villains in this higher stakes world the series has created, a little goes a long way.
"He's totally focused on the Ghost crew and converting Ezra ... he does have a different perspective than he had on things before and he's become a little more individual," Witwer added. "He's still as damaged and misguided as he ever was."
Considering how much care Filoni and crew put into this show, I don't doubt that they found the right ration of Maul & Thrawn to action.
Image: Disney XD
