This are getting very interesting on the Colossus platform as the First Order finally makes a true appearance. No more skulking around in the shadows for the boys in incredibly shiny plastoid armour. But can Kaz keep up with the First Order long enough to find out what they’re up to?
We find out as we take a look at Star Wars: Resistance‘s “The High Tower” in Five Thoughts. Spoilers below.
1. Power Rations
This episode hinges on an interesting notion, and one that continues my train of thought about the day-to-day life on the Colossus from a few episodes prior. As a transport comes to dock with the Colossus, Captain Doza announces to the platform that power will be rationed for the next 100 hours. That’s the better part of a work week in which mechanics cannot make money because they don’t have the available power to access their tools. Instead, the workers of the platform are left to linger in Aunt Z’s waiting for a return to relative normality.
At first, I thought this was an interesting spotlight on the realities of living on a floating docking platform in the middle of an ocean planet out in the outer reaches of the galaxy, until the episode followed it up with an even more interesting nugget: Doza’s central tower doesn’t ration power.
All of a sudden there’s a power dynamic at play. All of a sudden, those mechanics out of work have somewhere to target all their frustrations. All of a sudden, there’s a base conflict to this setting. It’s a simple thing, but goddamn, does it make this episode.
2. Enter The First Order
Well, it’s been a few episodes coming, but the First Order do in fact make their presence on the Colossus known in this episode. In fact, Major Vonreg himself makes the journey to meet face-to-helmet with Captain Doza to propose that, in light of the recent pirate attacks, the First Order offers its “protection.” Now, you don’t need to be well verse in Italian gangster films to know just what kind of protection is on offer and I think it shines a light on something interesting about Resistance‘s portrayal of the First Order.
The FO in the Sequel Trilogy have no real ideology other than “We’re mad at the New Republic because we’re the script designated bad guys” and it’s part of why the overarching, ideological conflict of those films fall flat. This isn’t the oppressed underclass striking back at the evil empire. Instead, this is isolated radicals who cling to the remnants of said evil empire trying to get a foothold and establish dominance. The Colossus is clearly to key to this, but I don’t feel like I quite know just why yet. It’ll be interesting to see where that goes from here.
3. The Aces Of The Platform
Underneath the dealings with the First Order, this episode finally shines some light on the aces pilots of the platform. Sure, we got an introduction of each of them in the first episode and we saw Torra in action, but here we get to meet Hype Faizon himself and see how the aces live away from the cockpit. Sadly, we really only spend time with Hype in order to illustrate Kaz’s hero worship of the aces and Tam’s rocky history with Hype before getting a brief cameo from Torra during Kaz’s escape from the First Order.
I hope we get to see more of Freya, Griff and Bo Keevil in the coming episode because Ace Squadron is an aspect of the show that really fascinates me and so far the majority of the pilots have been background characters. As cool as it was to see Hype in the spotlight for most of the episode (largely because of Donald Faison’s performance), I would like the show to flesh out the other pilots as well.
4. Getting To Know Tam
Tam has the unfortunate role of being the stick-in-the-mud, traditionalist foil to Kaz’s wackier antics and it’s meant that, so far, she’s really only been highlighted in being done with Kaz’s shit. I say unfortunate because a young black woman in Star Wars being a mechanic making her own living in the fringes of galactic civilisation is a fantastic silhouette of a character and giving her all the personality of the Mother from an 80s sitcom sucks.
Continued belowThankfully, we get some backstory for Tam in this episode, at least a notion of her life before Kaz disrupted everything. We get to see that one of the reasons Tam feels so closed off is because one of her closest friends went off to become an ace pilot and live in the central tower and left her to fend for herself. I hope this episode is a catalyst for allowing Tam to open up a bit more and maybe even take centre stage in some episode because I think she could easily becomes Resistance‘s answer to Ahsoka and Sabine (in the sense of a female character from an animated series becoming popular enough with fans that they become a staple of Star Wars lore).
5. The Intrigue Builds
And so Star Wars: Resistance concludes it’s fourth (or fifth, if you count “The Recruit” as two episodes) episode and things are starting to pick up. The First Order have gone from a background influence that Kaz is trying to investigate to a prominent force affecting the Colossus. We’ve been given a look at the inner circle of Ace Squadron and Kaz maybe even has an in with them now that he’s made friends with Hype Faizon and Torra Doza. And Captain Doza himself has now taken an interest in Kaz after he was chased around the tower by trigger happy stormtroopers. This was a big episode that is setting up a lot of dominos, maybe even more than the show’s premiere, and I really hope the show keeps up this momentum.
