Tales of The Empire episode 5 "Realization" ending explained

Tales of the Empire episode 5, “Realization,” follows up with Barriss Offee, showing the convicted Jedi killer as a novice Inquisitor. It's hard to tell how much time has elapsed since she donned a helmet and committed herself to the Empire. We left her at the end of basic training, but she is now a soldier on an unnamed battlefield with only a fellow Inquisitor, the Fourth Sister, as her unit leader.

The problem with Barriss at the beginning of her career is something that she shares with Anakin Skywalker at the end of his: She is conflicted. Seeing Fourth Sister terrorize villagers who are hiding a Jedi, she approaches a child with an understanding of how she can use that girl’s fear to draw out a simple confession. She is the more successful hunter and the only one who sheds no blood. On the trip out of the village, Barriss begins to question her leader's methods.

When they find the Jedi hiding in the mountains, the Fourth Sister is quickly knocked out. Barriss then tries a more peaceful route, trying to talk the Jedi down into surrendering. Just as she begins to get through to them, the Fourth Sister wakes and strikes them down. This angers Barriss, who, like in the village, had found a different path to resolution. The Fourth Sister's actions have successfully broken any positive illusion about the Empire that Barriss had.

By the end of the episode, Barriss has reasserted herself as a Jedi. She shoves the Fourth Sister off the side of the mountain to her presumed death. This one action declares Barriss a target of the comrades she knelt with at the end of episode 4. On the surface, this is a candidate for the source of the title, "Realization." It may tie back to a central part of her Jedi character. 

In the short story collection Star Wars:  Tales of Jedi and Sith, Karen Strong’s story “A Jedi’s Duty” depicts Barriss finding that she is well-suited to helping Jedi who are suffering emotionally in the Clone Wars. Barriss’ approach to the child informant in the village and compassion for the hidden Jedi in the mountains who admit that they are tired of being hunted are nods to this soft heart.

For all her anger towards the Jedi and the malice of her attack on the Temple, Barriss realizes in episode 5 that she isn’t as divorced from her service to the light as she thought. Her attack on Fourth Sister is a matter of darkness used in defense. It’s a great turning point for her to turn her attention to her prey and refuse to let them die.