In The Bad Batch Season 2, Clone Force 99 will unlearn everything they’ve learned

The thesis for The Bad Batch Season 2 has been stated loud and clear just two episodes into the latest installment of the series.

As Clone Force 99 embarks on a dangerous mission to steal valuable resources from the Empire, things go wrong — and important lessons are learned.

Tech learns a lesson the rest of his squad likely hasn’t considered much before either — that the galaxy hasn’t always found itself plunged deep into an unwinnable war. Civilizations existed and even thrived long before the Clone Wars, and such galaxy-wide battles threatened to destroy so much of what made all those worlds good.

Omega also learns something in these two episodes — not just about ships, but also about living. Holding a toy in her hands, she’s told for the first time in her life that not everything has to be about winning, succeeding, or moving closer to a goal. Having grown up on Kamino under the watchful eye of cloners, she’s never known anything other than metrics, work, and war.

Now she’s being told that not everything has to have a purpose beyond spreading happiness. Pretty sound advice given to someone actively searching for her purpose after the end of a war that has lasted a significant portion of her life.

Two episodes in, we have a pretty good idea of what we’re in for thematically this season.

This series may be animated, and it may cater to younger Star Wars viewers from time to time. But like other animated Star Wars series, the show’s messaging is valuable for all ages. Even as the world (or the galaxy) changes around us, adapting to such shifts often means discovering not just who we are, but why we’re here at all.

New episodes of Star Wars: The Bad Batch drop Wednesday mornings exclusively on Disney+.

Follow Dork Side of the Force for all your Star Wars news, reviews, and more!