We know that both Jon Favreau and Dave Filoni, serving as producers on The Mandalorian, have extensive and possibly unrivalled knowledge of the Star Wars lore. They’ve even proven this over the course of the Disney+ series time and again, which is probably why Ahsoka Tano raised a lot of eyebrows when she failed to mention Jedi Master Yaddle during the latest episode while talking about Baby Yoda’s race.
After more than a year, we finally learned about The Child’s backstory. Much to everyone’s surprise, Din Djarin’s traveling companion, whose real name was also revealed in the same installment, was a youngling in the Jedi Temple on Coruscant. Ahsoka even briefly mentions Grand Master Yoda, the “only other” person of his kind that she’s seen. Canonically speaking, though, that’s a questionable statement.
Remember Yaddle, the female counterpart of Yoda that Episode I – The Phantom Menace introduced to fans? Well, according to the Star Wars Character Encyclopedia, the Master was almost 500 years old at the time. Of course, we also know that Yaddle gave up her seat on the Jedi Council after the events of the first movie and was replaced by Master Shaak Ti. But how did Ahsoka forget about her?
While it’s fair to surmise that this may have been a simple continuity blunder, I’d bring up the first point again. Dave Filoni, who wrote and directed “Chapter 13: The Jedi,” knows his Star Wars. So, if that’s not the case, then what is it?
Well, we could make the point that when Yaddle retired from the Council, Ahsoka would’ve only been 4 and it wasn’t until a decade later that the Order promoted her to the rank of Padawan, under the tutelage of Anakin Skywalker. Perhaps that’s why she doesn’t remember Yaddle. It’s also plausible that she never saw her in the first place before starting her training as a youngling, given the ambiguous, if not downright contradicting, timelines of the two characters.
Recently, fans of The Mandalorian kickstarted a campaign on social media demanding #JusticeForYaddle, but the idea that the producers simply forgot about her is ludicrous, to say the least. Besides, in the new Star Wars canon by Disney, we don’t know what happened to Yaddle after retiring, so it’s entirely possible that she was the one who took over Baby Yoda’s training and even hid him when the Jedi Purge began.
Published: Dec 1, 2020 11:34 am