“ Thrawn ’s return … as Heir to the Empire . ” In just seven words , Ahsoka ’s first trailermade empty the desire fans have yearned for sincea gloomy - skinned manin a white admiral ’s uniform first stepped out of the shadowssix years prior : Thrawn is here , and Heir to the Empire , the novel that commence it all decades before , is coming with him in some manner .
It ’s impossible for a million reasons for the current loop of Star Wars canon to refashion Timothy Zahn’sclassic trilogy of books — Heir , Dark Force Rising , and The Last Command — wholesale . Too many factor have already been plundered and shifted about in Star Wars ’ present continuity , Thrawn himself included , and just as many are as out of the question to re - work for the direction the dealership has now taken thepost - Return of the Jedi story . Although we know little at this point , it ’s likely that whatever Ahsoka and the Dave Filoni - helmedNew Republic vs. Imperial Remnant movieset to come after it will have little in unwashed with Heir to the Empire ’s narrative — beyond that teasing name pearl , and the macro - scale fact that it will deal with Thrawn commanding a sea of remnant forces in a military campaign against the New Republic .
But that does n’t really matter , because in a means , that ’s really all you need to take to do a new version of this narrative . Because in the end , Thrawn himself does n’t really matter beyond that specific tale being told . Why ? spoiler for a novel thatturned 30at the start of this calendar month : Thrawn dies at the climax of The Last Command . He is a major scourge for those three Holy Writ , and then he is gone .
Screenshot: Lucasfilm
This is not a knock on the character of Thrawn , or the legions of fan that have come to be fascinated by the character in the decades since his rapid rising and fall over the hardly two geezerhood it took the Thrawn trilogy to unblock . He isbeloved for a reasonableness , and Zahn make such an impactful and challenging scoundrel that his reach has stretched far beyond the character ’s short , active lifetime in Star Wars fabrication . That reach has now expanded into the current persistence as well , not just in Rebels and before long Ahsoka , but Zahn ’s further geographic expedition of the Grand Admiral ’s lifetime in thenew Thrawn trilogyand its prequel follow up , theThrawn : Ascendancy novels . But for as entrancing and endure a character and piece of iconography that Thrawn is , and for as rightly beloved as those first novels with him are , what was always the compelling matter about the Heir to the Empire saga was not needfully the saga itself , but the state of the Star Wars galaxy it set up for decades thereafter , especially when it came to the vestiges of the Galactic Empire .
Thrawn ’s frustration at Bilbringi — assassinated by his once - loyal safety , his clutches of the Emperor ’s cloning technology thwarted , his forces routed , and , now under the command of his still - faithful comrade Captain Gilad Pellaeon , rejoin to the lallygag control of the a la mode contour of the Empire ’s ruling council — brings to an abrupt end the life history of a Star Wars villain that has since become much gravid in the minds of fan that it ever really was in the fabrication itself . Zahn ’s trilogy book were n’t Thrawn ’s only appearances , of course . The later Hand of Thrawn duology have-to doe with on the Grand Admiral ’s seeming resurrection , and the novel Outbound Flight fleshed out Thrawn ’s relationship with theJedi Jorus C’baoth , in a prequel mise en scene . But Thrawn himself , albeit an incredibly compelling character , was never the most interesting thing that his trilogy set up . It could n’t be ; he was deadened and gone by its net Sir Frederick Handley Page . What was genuinely fascinating , and what ca n’t really get the picture into the current timeline of Star Wars , is what come after .
That largely get through in another element current Star Wars canyon is borrowing for this newfangled version of the tarradiddle : Captain Pellaeon . Thrawn ’s most trusted consultant and the de facto commander of his force after his death , Pellaeon ’s post - Thrawn arcis the arc of the Imperial Remnant itself for decades . The timeline of the post - ROTJ state of the coltsfoot in the old Expanded Universe is much more draw out than it is in the current persistence , and Pellaeon is there for much of it . The astronomical civic warfare take almost two decades to terminate in the EU compared to the five eld it finishes in at the battle of Jakku in the current canon , giving clip for the Imperial Remnant to be flesh out in a much deeper and more compelling mode . Pellaeon , in various roles , helps transform the Remnant into the astronomical equivalent of a neighboring country . Although elements of the antagonism and avaritia that sparked the revolt against Palpatine in the first lieu still linger , the Remnant of the onetime EU was draw to become introspective , to see just what vile history Palapatine made and what office of that history needed to be reckoned with for this new political entity to survive beyond it . In clip , the Imperial Remnant became an occasionally wary ally of the New Republic , aiding in the battle against theYuuzhan Vong , and in more time , eventually conflate back into it with the decline of both entity and the cosmos of the Galactic Alliance .
Image: Dark Horse Comics/Lucasfilm
This lavishness of time and emergence is not something current persistence has . There ’s 30 years between Return of the Jedi and The Force Awakens , yes . But in the bulk of that fourth dimension theremnant we ’ve seen growingin The Mandalorian , and whatever is to descend with Thrawn ’s campaigns in Ahsoka and beyond , has to be smashed aside for the creation of the First Order — which , in stark contrast , is just the Empire again . And even that then has to be demolish away for the Final Order in The Rise of Skywalker , which is even more just the Empire again , literally right down to the quondam Star Destroyersand older Palpatineat its helm . In current persistence , there is no actual blank space for the self-contemplation and evolution of the Imperial Remnant as discover in the old EU , and no blank to examine that whatever military strike Thrawn will fulfill — and see inevitably subjugate — in this New Republic vs Remnant conflict to come was not the path to the Empire ’s selection . And it does n’t need to , because we know the Empire survives without that introspection in the shadows of the Unknown Regions anyway , only to be just as easily quashed in generations to get along .
That ’s not to say there ca n’t be something like this in current Star Wars canyon , just removed much farther away from the Empire and the events of the original trilogy . If Lucasfilm really manages to give to finishing an announced picture show project — which has been astonishingly hard as of late — we’re on the cusp of getting a law of continuation of The Rise of Skywalker in the form of aNew Jedi Order motion-picture show , which will no doubt have to deal with at least some of the side effect of the First and Final Order ’s remnants in the wake of the sequel trilogy . But that ’s only really similar in spirit , and comport a much more awkward free weight of grappling with those movies ’ nefarious faction compared to the lineal test of the original Galactic Empire .
It is that bequest that is perhaps more important from Heir to the Empire and its follow - ups that was far more authoritative to the seniority of the old thrive Universe than Thrawn himself ever now was . And no matter what Ahsoka and its follow ups will adopt from it , it ’s something that the current Star Wars galaxy can never really re - capture .
Screenshot: Lucasfilm
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Screenshot: Lucasfilm
