Spoilers Ahead
The series has great animation and is one of Disney Channel's best. The show has great characters along with amazing character development and forcing the characters to make difficult choices. The main characters other than Kaz are: Tam, who feels betrayed by her friends and is on the edge of joining the First Order until she actually does it in the finale, Neeku a funny and very literal alien man, he mostly serves as comic relief and as Kaz's best friend, Yeager, a former Rebel soldier who fought at Jakku and has a dead wife and child, he isn't really a Resistance spy, but he always knew that Kaz is one, he helped Kaz and employed him in his own workshop. Lastly, Commander Doza and his daughter, Torra, the captain of the Colossus and his daughter, they eventually team up with the Resistance even though Captain Doza is a former Imperial and basically lets the First Order onto the platform.
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| Commander Pyre |
Before the series was released I was confused on the difference between Team Fireball and Ace Squadron. The Aces are the group of pilots employed by Commander Doza to protect the platform, the only two members the series really focuses on is Torra Doza and Hype Fazon. Although Kaz and Yeager sort of unofficially join by the end of the season. Team Fireball is the group of Yeager, Kaz, Neeku, and Tam that work on Yeager's ship the Fireball. They are the main characters. The last few episodes of Resistance take place during The Force Awakens and showcase Starkiller Base's destruction of Hosnian Prime (Kaz's home planet.) And I have to say that his reaction was more emotionally impactful than Starkiller's effect in The Force Awakens, because there wasn't any attachment to those planets, then. I liked the returning movie characters, Poe Dameron, voiced again by Oscar Isaac and from the episodes he was in, I thought he was pretty great. Gwendolyn Christie also reprises her role as Phasma in a few episodes. But there is a brand new villain for Resistance's first season, Commander Pyre. Along with Agent Tierny, aptly sounding like tyranny, it even sounds like that when Tam says it once. She appears only at the end of this season, I expect that she will appear again in season 2. Another few characters I appreciated were the pirates, especially one named Synarra. She had a lot of focus in a few episodes. She encouraged the pirates come back at the end to help against the First Order, so now the pirates will be on the platform with the people they were against at the beginning of the series. Should be interesting.
When Resistance was announced, I made a blog-post where I detailed the news, discussed what I thought of it and said what I wanted in the series. I guessed correctly that General Leia would appear. But I also speculated that Han Solo might show up, which is impossible now that he's dead in this point on the timeline, although he was going to appear this season, but Yeager's brother replaced his role. Given the same logic of their being occupied and soon dead around this time, I doubt Snoke will appear, but Kylo Ren still could. I speculated that Ransolm Casterfo from the book Star Wars Bloodline could show up, I'll be honest with you all here, Resistance doesn't take place at the right time for him to appear. I've come to accept that the only person who would address his whereabouts would be Claudia Gray if she writes another book in that time period. I don't think that the characters left on a cliffhanger in Rebels will appear (Ezra, Thrawn, Sabine, and Ashoka.) I believe now that they will be getting an animated Disney Plus series addressing whatever is happening with them after The Clone Wars wraps up. But that doesn't really stop Hera Syndulla and her son, Jacen from appearing at some point. This season does end in a similar way to the series finale of Rebels, with the characters going to an unknown place through hyperspace but it's different because this is ending a season not the entire series and we will see the aftermath of the finale in the next season of the same series.
Now let's get into what I liked and didn't like about the series. Resistance has some great dogfights, races, and battles. Some of the best in all of Star Wars. The races are the best since the pod-race in The Phantom Menace. The only big problem is that the show can sometimes be childish and have filler, both things can slow the series from moving forward in a serious way. Although some characters act too goofy and silly as well as some comedy being really childish, there is some great comedy here, especially with a good running gag about a janitor that has a very bad time being in the middle of all the fighting on the platform. Another gag, seemingly mocking Rebels' Phoenix squadron and other code names is when Neeku called Kaz Blowfish 1 and himself Blowfish 2 during an underwater mission. Going back to that Janitor guy, I love the moments in the series when when we can see some effects of all the conflict in the show on regular people and connect with the characters. The first order harmed and placed many restrictions on the people on the colossus. We get to see the results of this and it's a pretty neat thing.
This is pretty unrelated but I really appreciated how good the trailers and ads for this show were cut and edited. They really built up the suspense and hype for me. I loved the episode which featured the Kowakian Monkey Lizards, because I love Salicious Crumb and it had some great Poe and Kaz action. It also introduced scary Kowakian Ape lizards. If there is only one thing I would like in Season 2, it would be pod-racing. I have been craving an awesome new pod-race on screen for years and this would be the perfect show for it, story and animation-wise. Especially now that they are airborne and can be grounded for a race.
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| Ace Squadron |
Every real loose point in the series has been addressed, and I have no clue where the series will go next except that Season 2 will take place during and after The Last Jedi, also possibly the end of The Force Awakens. We know the first order will be chasing the Colossus and I am curious if the series will move farther away from connection to the movies and do its own thing or will move closer staying more connected to their events and characters. All we know is that they have used the hyperdrive on the Colossus to blast off to somewhere they don't know the location of, because Neeku made an error when typing in the coordinates. And that they will be back in season 2.
I wouldn't say that Resistance is better than The Clone Wars or Rebels just yet, but it is still a great program that I thoroughly enjoyed and watched week to week. It is the exemplar of how to do Star Wars media without always leaning on The Force and Jedi to carry it. Star Wars Resistance was epic and I can't wait for season 2. Thank you for sticking around, I'll come back soon with a new blog and video about Star Wars Celebration, Disney Plus and all the news we've been getting. Including a Resistance season two panel tomorrow. I will also be doing video adaptations of my blogs about once a month starting with two this month, this blog and the Disney+/Celebration one. To see all of that and much more, why don't you stay connected.
My Youtube video review: https://youtu.be/4e_N4oAY5jc
