Star Wars has long been about masters and apprentices, and Ahsoka is definitely no different. The tradition established way back in 1977 with Ben Kenobi and Luke Skywalker continues today in the Disney+ series — so much so that the series premiere was literally titled “Masters and Apprentices”! You’ll note the plural there, as the series has traced the storylines of a pair of dark Jedi — Baylan Skoll and Shin Hati — and, obviously, Ahsoka and her estranged padawan Sabine Wren.
All that got shaken up big time in Ahsoka Episode 4, “Fallen Jedi,” an episode that added another master and apprentice pairing to the series. SPOILERS ahead!
In the final battle of “Fallen Jedi,” Ahsoka appears to be defeated by Skoll in a lightsaber duel. Our hero gets flung off the side of a cliff, and then the rest of the episode plays out with nary a surprise return. We finally see Ahsoka again in the very last scene of the episode, and she does not look to be in a good way. The camera pans over the cliff that tripped her up and then over her unconscious body, completely out of scale with said cliff. It’s then revealed that Ahsoka isn’t in the water, but rather a kind of celestial walkway. From elsewhere, Ahsoka hears a familiar voice say, “Hello, Snips.” It’s exactly who you think it is.
Ahsoka turns around to see Anakin Skywalker standing before her, in the… well, not flesh per se. Anakin says, “I didn’t expect to see you so soon,” and then we see Ahsoka’s response to seeing her master again. In an outstanding bit of acting from Rosario Dawson, you can see wonder, joy, confusion, awe, and maybe even terror in Ahsoka’s eyes upon seeing Anakin Skywalker, the Jedi formerly known as Darth Vader.
So… clearly we have to unpack this.
Is Ahsoka dead?
Considering that the series is titled Ahsoka, I’m going to go with “no” — even though she is indeed standing face to face with a very dead character. Remember, Anakin has been dead for five years at this point.
Where is Ahsoka Tano? Ahsoka Episode 4 ending explained
That remains to be seen. It’s clear she is not literally standing on a walkway in the middle of space staring at the reanimated and refreshed corpse of Anakin Skywalker. Ahsoka is definitely in some sort of Jedi afterlife, or maybe a kind of limbo between life and death. There’s actually a lot we don’t know about the Jedi afterlife and how certain Jedi mastered the art of returning as a Force ghost. Anakin was one such Jedi who mastered that trick, as seen at the end of Return of the Jedi. Add that to the fact that Ahsoka showrunner Dave Filoni has never shied away from the mystical and inexplicable side of Star Wars and it looks like we’re in for a trippy reunion next week. Hey — at least we finally get to see Anakin Skywalker and Ahsoka Tano, master and padawan, in live-action for the first time!
New episodes of Ahsoka premiere on Tuesdays at 9 p.m. ET on Disney+.
