Every so often a piece of media has a line of dialogue that inadvertently summarizes the shortcomings of the very plot it sits within. The video game Destiny had the infamous "
I don't even have time to explain why I don't have time to explain" line, regarding its hot mess of a plot (that was rewritten and smashed back together shortly before release). In a similar vein, the Mandalorian season had Bo Katan's line regarding Mandalorians "killing each other for reasons too confusing to explain" - which perfectly summarized how much of a jumbled mess the lore surrounding the various Mandalorian factions is. And we have another example in this most recent episode of Ahsoka - when Senator Xiao says "This reads like a Children's Fairy Tale."
Let me be clear - I'm not saying Ahsoka is bad. It's leaps and bounds better than Book of Boba Fett or Obi Wan or (especially) The Mandalorian season 3.
But folks also need to be honest, plot-wise, it's pretty darn underwhelming. It starts with a macguffin fetch quest and turned into a rescue mission involving riding in the mouth of space whales and on alien doggies. This is indeed writing down to the level of "Young Adult fiction" present in much of the animated Star Wars universe. There's nothing wrong with YA Fiction, but it tends to lack a fair bit of nuance and many get bored by it. Star Wars has always been family friendly, but that don't necessarily mean childish.
Any depth of character is dependent on the viewer having watched Rebels or The Clone Wars, and largely isn't actually present in the Ahsoka series itself. A good activity for assessing a character is to describe them without using their physical appearance or profession as part of that description. Based on the Ahsoka series itself (and not the predating materials from TCW/Rebels), almost all of these characters would have pretty underwhelming descriptions in that exercise.
Ahsoka, the very titular character who even had a whole backstory episode - Stoic, Troubled...... skilled with a lightsaber? Not really much there to describe her.
Sabine - Inferiority complex, in love with Ezra, and ????
Thrawn - Imposing, supposedly manipulative, and ????
The show is supposing we feel certain ways about characters, but not really doing much to develop them as characters or make people feel attached. For instance with Thrawn, he's supposedly this cunning strategic mastermind - but his actions in the most recent episode essentially boil down to "have some of a limited supply of troopers die, get surprised when a mercenary bails, don't capture or kill anyone at all, and retreat" and then him claiming victory. As if his 20 minute fight in the middle of nowhere meaningfully slowed down any of the heroes from getting to the Chimaera. (Note - this was also an occasional problem with his depiction in Rebels, where it's essentially just "let them escape" over and over again being a supposed master plan). And let's not get started on the fact he's been working with three Night Sisters who apparently can triangulate the exact position of people in space but he just let Ezra Bridger run around within a days ride for 10 years.
And we have needlessly tacked on Hera scenes that are pretty much just there to justify that she's still a character on this show, and to set up their coming Avengers-style team-up movie that Filoni wants to do.
There's plenty to like in Ahsoka. Chopper is still hilarious. The character and setting design in the unknown regions/new galaxy have been striking. The soundtrack has been really excellent at times. There's much more "adventure" than we've gotten out of any Star Wars content since the first two seasons of The Mandalorian. The Noti are adorable. But claiming the show is on the same level as Andor is just kinda silly. Even if you prefer one "genre" of Star Wars content or another, there's plenty you can evaluate in a fairly objective manner. And the dialogue, acting, costumes, directing, cinematography, character arcs, plot, and overall writing quality in Andor is leaps and bounds better than Ahsoka.
