By now most of you have seen Episode 4.15 of The Clone Wars: “Deception” and hopefully have read both reviews on EUCantina. Wondering where the events of this episode fit in with current Star Wars Expanded Universe lore? We will explore different elements of the episode and see how they fit with current continuity.
Jedi Undercover
Just less than a decade prior to the events of this episode, Obi-Wan’s close friend, Siri Tachi, was dismissed from the Jedi Order when she joined the slave trader Krayn’s operations in Jedi Quest: Path to Truth. Obi-Wan, like Anakin in ”Deception”, believed she was a traitor and lashed out at her in hostility only to discover that Siri’s betrayal was part of an intricate plan hatched by the Jedi High Council to get Siri close to the evil Krayn and bring down his operation from the inside. Unfortunately Anakin blew her cover and they had to improvise by initiating a slave riot to complete the mission.
During the Clone Wars when the Jedi High Council learned that the captured bounty hunter Moralo Eval has set his plan to kidnap Chancellor Palpatine into motion, it wouldn’t be a long shot to assume Masters Yoda and Mace Windu chose the negotiator Obi-Wan to go deep undercover because he knew first hand the risks involved after such missions as the Siri Tachi/Krayn mission.
Emotional Anakin
The "death" of Obi-Wan brings Anakin close to the Dark Side
Anakin has had to suffer through his Master’s “death” before. In Clone Wars Volume 3: Last Stand on Jabiim, Obi-Wan is believed to be killed-in-action while trying to save wounded clones from a burning AT-AT. Anakin, who was still a Padawan, was assigned to Ki-Adi-Mundi to complete his training.
Did Mace and Yoda really think it wise putting the emotional Anakin through the torment of believing his master was dead a second time? Are they testing Anakin to see if he can let go of attachment? Deceiving Anakin and not including him in the plan will probably be a severe blow to his trust of the Jedi Council.
Codename: Ben
When Obi-Wan gets his hands on a comlink planted in the prison and contacts Yoda and Mace, he uses the codename Ben. This is the first time I have heard Obi-Wan use that name prior to his exile on Tatooine. Why did he choose that codename for this mission and why would he choose that name when he settles down on Tatooine a few years in the future? Was it nostalgia to the days when he and his former apprentice were still cunning warriors and good friends?
Boba Fett
Boba Fett returns in this episode and is obviously older and much more battle hardened, considering the Republic Judiciary Central Detention Center is probably not the best place for a pre-teen to grow up in. You would think juvenile detention centers would exist in a galaxy far far away, but if someone like Kyp Durron was thrown into the Spice Mines of Kessel when he was nine, Boba Fett’s imprisonment is nothing out of the ordinary.
Until we get an official The Clone Wars timeline we won’t know where this falls in continuity, but it is safe to presume Fett’s time in Republic prison occurs after the events of the young reader novel Boba Fett: Hunted, when he goes on his first mission for Jabba and before Boba Fett: A New Threat when he has worked for Jabba for a few years and hunts Wat Tambor.
Bossk stands up for Boba during a confrontation in the prison and it is interesting to note that in The Clone Wars these two seem to be good friends. Years later Bossk and Boba continuously compete and double-cross each other since the hunt was more important to them than any alliance or friendship.
I hope that in Season Five we will get another three or four part episode series starring a young Boba Fett that sees him fall in with the Death Watch. Expanded Universe headaches aside, that is something I would love to see since we saw the Death Watch in Episode 4.14 “A Friend in Need” are in fact becoming more like the Death Watch they are based off from Jango Fett: Open Seasons; skilled, ruthless, nomadic warriors.
Kidnapping Plot
What are the details of Moralo Eval's plot?
Moralo Eval has a plot to kidnap Chancellor Palpatine and if we assume that this is the same kidnapping plot we see come to fruition at the start of Revenge of the Sith, who is he working for and what role does he play? Is he working for Darth Sidious, Count Dooku, General Grievous, or somebody else entirely? Since we have yet to see the completion of this episode arc we can only guess at this point.
So far in current Expanded Universe lore it was General Grievous who launched and coordinated the faux kidnapping of the Chancellor. In Labyrinth of Evil, Darth Sidious was the one who commanded General Grievous to use the secret Deep Core hyperspace lanes, launch an assault on Coruscant, and kidnap his alter-ego Palpatine.
Is Eval’s plan part of the same kidnapping plot or a completely different one? Perhaps he is ordered by Sidious to uncover the secret Deep Core hyperspace routes and present them to Grievous, or maybe he along with other bounty hunters are hired to weaken Coruscant’s and 500 Republica’s security defenses.
Other Stuff
We got to see Republic Officers wearing the distinctive caps of the Imperial Officers we see aboard Star Destroyers in the Imperial Era.
The DC-15S Cad Bane fires during their prison escape is incredibly inaccurate and goes to show that it’s the blaster rifle that can’t hit a target. Future stormtroopers are off the hook because of their terrible shots with an E-11. BlasTech just can’t make a decent blaster.
Sources
Jedi Quest: Path to Truth, Clone Wars Vol. 3: Last Stand on Jabiim, Jedi Academy Trilogy: Jedi Search, Boba Fett: Hunted, Boba Fett: A New Threat, The Bounty Hunter Wars, Jango Fett: Open Seasons, Labyrinth of Evil.
Next Week: We explore the EU and The Clone Wars in the second episode of this four part arc, ”Friends and Enemies.”
Written by Andy Ury
All staff members can be contacted at staff@eucantina.net
Andy Ury joined EUCantina in 2012 as a columnist of the weekly Expanding The Clone Wars column, exploring the current Expanded Universe and fitting it in with the new continuity brought about with The Clone Wars TV series.
Andy has been a huge Star Wars fan since first viewing the VHS Special Edition of the Original Trilogy in 2002, and since then he has poured over every detail of the SWEU. Andy believes every aspect of the Star Wars Expanded Universe can somehow be retconned into one cohesive continuity, including Lil’ Maul and Skippy the Jedi Droid. 
Just a quick point about Boba Fett: I think that all six of the young reader Boba Fett books will end up taking place before the events of The Clone Wars. At the end of Book 6, Mace never knew that Jango Fett had a son, but in Lethal Trackdown, he was the only person who knew about Boba.
Otherwise, I love the article.
Yea it’s hard to place TCW with those Boba Fett books. It’s easier to say that the Battle of Xagobah and Boba’s attack on Windu on Coruscant as detailed in Boba Fett: Pursuit and stuff takes place after these episodes because Tarkin is Governor, a couple years have passed since Boba Fett: Hunted, and it’s very close to the end of the war.
Main continuity issue is with Asajj’s ship showing up at the Battle of Xagobah. She was supposed to have already been betrayed by Dooku on Boz Pity at this time and deep in the Unknown regions…and that raises the question when does Boz Pity occur in TCW timeline?
So many questions…I need to reread those Boba Fett books its been WAY too long and I loved them.
Great article. In the off season, you might consider looking at prior episodes as well as the Clone Wars digest size comics (based on the new series) and their palcement within the series.
Emotional Anakin – They acknowledged in the second ep that the charade of keeping it from Anakin was too long in revealing the truth to him. I think it’s the Council constantly testing Anakin in order to make him face his fears of others close to him dying and to again force him to learn how to detach. Also it was vital that Anakin be convincing publicly in making others think that Obi-Wan bit the dust and so far Hayden…err…Anakin is a crap actor – primarily *because* of his emotional attachments. It also displays the weak point of the Jedi, that they are so hard-nosed about not having emotional attachments that they both alienate themselves from the rest of the galaxy (which helps Order 66 happen successfully – the Darth Plagueis book touches on this) and that they fail at finding an effective way to “cure” Anakin of his attachments because of his late in coming to the Jedi.
Codename Ben – I’m wondering if that might be his birth name? However I doubt they’ll go into the origin of the name choice itself. I assume it’s merely his Undercover Brother name and it would make sense that if Anakin is never told or finds out what it is, that he would use it on Tatooine since Yoda/Mace/other Council Jedi would know it but others wouldn’t. So if any other “important” Jedi survived the purge (because how would Yoda and Obi-Wan necessarily know who did and did not get killed in Order 66?), then if they happened to be on Tatooine, they would know that “Ben” is Obi-Wan.