Screenshot: Lucasfilm
Well, aside from being another legacy character for whom death is a revolving door or something to frequently lie about for the drama of it all, Ventress’ return in the final season of The Bad Batch raises a lot of interesting questions about how she’ll fit into events, and more broadly into this era of Star Wars. After all, we thought she didn’t survive to see Sidious’ rise and his ultimate plan to form the Empire actually come to fruition—but now she has, so what will her place in all that be? Is she helping the Batch to rescue Omega from the clutches of Mount Tantiss, or do they encounter on some other mission?
Where they might find her is interesting, too. The trailer also includes what appears to be a return to the planet Teth—which was first introduced in the original 2008 Clone Wars movie, and the place Obi-Wan and Ventress first crossed blades. Bringing Ventress back and having it associated with the first battle we saw her in would be an interesting parallel, and also perhaps Bad Batch coming full circle on an animated style and story that began 16 years ago.
There’s also another important question: if Ventress survives this second chance at life and comes out of Bad Batch in once piece, where does she go from here? Suddenly, there could be a lot more stories to tell with Ventress, instead of having her, as we’d seemingly thought for nearly a decade, perish before the next chapter of her post-Sith life could really begin, to have saved and redeemed Quinlan Vos. Could Ventress survive the rise and fall of the Empire? What would she be doing in that time?
And, perhaps, given just how vital Dathomir and the Nightsisters have become to the events surrounding the return of Grand Admiral Thrawn in the events of Ashoka, the timing of Ventress’ survival is very interesting indeed. Perhaps we might be setting the stage in Bad Batch for her eventual arrival in live-action Star Wars? An Ahsoka team-up after everything they’ve both gone through would be very intriguing (and honestly very funny, given their histories).
We likely won’t get an answer to all of these questions immediately, but we should start getting answers to at least a few of them when The Bad Batch’s third and final season begins streaming on Disney+ February 21.