The hard working folks of The Wolfpack Podcast have posted a report on a rumor circulating the Star Wars online community that The Clone Wars actress Ashley Eckstein may be returning as fan favorite Ahsoka Tano in the new animated series Star Wars Rebels.
In fact, we may have already heard from Eckstein in the most recent Rebels episode, “Out of Darkness”.
During last week’s episode, we learned that Hera Syndulla had been receiving intel from a mysterious source known only as “Fulcrum”. While on a mission to recover valuable supplies, Hera makes contact with Fulcrum via a com channel aboard the Phantom.
Whoever Fulcrum is, their voice is properly masked by the static of the com channel… but if you listen carefully, you might notice that Fulcrum‘s speech is fairly similar to that of Ahsoka Tano.
Could Ashley Eckstein be returning as Ahsoka Tano in Star Wars Rebels?
The great team over at Rebels Report noticed this and decided to take their research a step further. They’ve taken an audio sample of Fulcrum’s transmission and shifted the pitch upwards. The results pretty much speak for themselves.
Check out this recording of Fulcrum’s voice, carefully pitched upwards until the tone resembles a female voice:
It’s admittedly a far cry, but diehard fans of The Clone Wars have been clamoring for more callbacks to the popular series and this could be the ultimate tie-in.
For the sake of comparison, we’ve included a clip of Ahsoka Tano speaking to the Jedi council during an episode of The Clone Wars. Check the video below:
It’s also worth noting that the character of “Fulcrum” was not given a voice credit during the end of the episode.
Interestingly enough, Hera seems to be playing the pronoun game while discussing Fulcrum with Sabine, never referring to her intel source as either a “he” or a “she”.
Will fans see an appearance by an adult Ahsoka Tano in Rebels?
What do you think, Dork Siders? Could this “Fulcrum” actually be Ahsoka Tano? Has Ashley Eckstein quietly returned to Star Wars already?
Leave us a comment below and let us know what you think!