There’s no denying that the fall of the Jedi Order at the end of Episode III – Revenge of the Sith is one of the most horrifyingly tragic moments in Star Wars history. But now, The Bad Batch has revealed that Order 66 was even more appalling than we originally thought.
As you’ll already know, Chancellor Palpatine’s evil plan to subjugate the galaxy and destroy the Jedi Order came into fruition at the end of the Prequel Trilogy, where he turned the Grand Army of the Republic against these warriors of peace and justice, decimating them at large throughout the galaxy.
Over the years, Dave Filoni’s The Clone Wars has further explained why these sworn soldiers suddenly went against their commanders. You see, it was all part of Darth Sidious’ master plan. When commissioning Kamino to create the Grand Army, the Emperor secretly placed an inhibitor chip in their brains, which upon activation would compel them to kill the Jedi on sight. While we always thought that the clones themselves were only a vessel and didn’t realize what they were doing, the latest episode of The Bad Batch has actually proven the opposite.
When Wrecker’s chip activates in “Battle Scars,” he turns on his teammates and even tries to kill Echo. Of course, the group quickly acts and knocks him unconscious. After removing the chip, though, Wrecker admits that even as he was trying to kill his friend, his consciousness fought against it but his body was unable to obey his commands.
A terrible realization, indeed, this essentially indicates that Palpatine turned every clone into a slave against their own wishes. It also draws an interesting irony for Anakin, who committed most of the genocide when he attacked the Jedi Temple with members of the 501st, even killing the younglings. As a boy, the Chosen One was a slave who spent every day dreaming of freedom and eventually freeing all the slaves in the galaxy. But through the actions of the Empire, not only did he make a slave of the entire galaxy, but also his close friends in the Clone Army.
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