History Recap / StarWarsRebelsS3E12Warhead

* WorthyOpponent: For once, Thrawn is impressed that the Rebels attempted to outsmart him by reprogramming the droid to detonate while allowing it to return to its Star Destroyer.

* SpannerInTheWorks: The giant spiders attack the Infiltrator Droid before it can even relay knowledge of the base, ultimately allowing the Rebels to postpone the eventual discovery of their base.

* AmbiguousSituation: This being the first episode shown of them after "An Inside Man", neither Kallus or Thrawn show any hostility or awareness to each other of the former's possibly compromised status as Fulcrum. Either Thrawn is just hiding it because there's not much reason to bring it up at the time, or Thrawn doesn't actually know Kallus is Fulcrum in spite of what he implied in the ending of "An Inside Man".

* ProperlyParanoid: Chopper wants to destroy the damaged Infiltrator Droid, even though it just looks like a busted protocol droid. Zeb ignores him. Chopper gives him an "I told you so" through AP-5 when it reveals its true nature. Had Chopper gotten his way, however, the Rebel base would have been compromised immediately.

* SpannerInTheWorks: The giant spiders attack the Infiltrator Droid before it can relay knowledge of the base, ultimately allowing the Rebels to postpone the eventual discovery of their base.

* WorthyOpponent: For once, Thrawn is impressed that the Rebels' attempt to outsmart him by reprogramming the droid to detonate while allowing it to return to its Star Destroyer.
* XanatosGambit: By Thrawn, naturally. If the droid returns safely to base, he gets the Rebels' location. If the droid never returns, he knows to investigate that world as a likely target. Even when Zeb gets the idea to send the droid back rigged to blow, thus destroying a large portion of the droids without revealing which one was compromised, Thrawn still narrows his search considerably because all those droids had specific targets.

* HorribleJudgeOfCharacter: AP-5 and Zeb immediately trusts a stoic, quiet droid that has virtually no personality. Droids of that type are usually bad news.

* KillerRobot: The seemingly harmless protocol droid Zeb found is a heavily-armed Imperial Infiltrator Droid that will destroy any rebel it sees.

* OddFriendship: AP-5 (and apparently Chopper as well) is happy to have another protocol droid on base, rather than making any snarks about the new guy. EXD-9 is apparently a quiet and/or mindless droid undercover (so it wasn't like he could reciprocate it anyway if he wanted to), probably also due to being damaged. Of course, it doesn't last when EXD remembers his mission.
* RealityEnsues: While it was the only option that didn't lead the Empire ''directly'' to Chopper Base, by sending the droid back to blow up it does narrow the search of systems the rebels could be on, from thousands to less then a hundred, any system the droids had been randomly sent to, even if it did not give any coordinates about it's last known location. On the plus side, it will still take the Empire time and resources to do another search, let alone act on this speculation.
* RelocatingTheExplosion: From the base to the Imperial ship EXD came from. This way, the Empire can't be sure which droid detonated, buying the rebels some time as they figure it out.

* SpannerInTheWorks: The giant spiders attacked the the droid, preventing it from transmitting it's last known location.

* TrojanHorse: The mysterious damaged droid is actually an Imperial probe droid disguised as a protocol droid sent to spy on and destroy the rebels at their base.
* WorthyOpponent: For once, Thrawn is impressed that the rebels' attempt to outsmart him by reprogramming the droid to detonate while allowing it to return to its star destroyer.
* XanatosGambit: By Thrawn, naturally. If the droid returns safely to base, he gets the rebels' location. If the droid never returns, he can easily guess the rebels' location, or it will blow up the rebel base, ridding him of one rebel cell. If (as happens in the episode) the rebels sabotage the droid so that it self-destructs upon its return to base, he doesn't get the exact location and loses a lot of infiltrator droids, but still significantly narrows his search, freeing up his resources for more thorough searching.

** Kallus being Fulcrum is alluded to, after TheReveal in "[[Recap/StarWarsRebelsS3E08AnInsideMan An Inside Man]]".

* XanatosGambit: By Thrawn, naturally. If the droid returns safely to base, he gets the rebels' location. If the droid never returns, he gets the rebels' location. If (as happens in the episode) the rebels sabotage the droid so that it self-destructs upon its return to base, he doesn't get the exact location, but still significantly narrows his search, freeing up his resources for more thorough searching.

** Wedge and Hobbie return after last being seen in their debut episode, "[[Recap/StarWarsRebelsS2E02TheAntillesExtraction The Antilles Extraction]]".
** Kallus being Fulcrum is alluded to, after TheReveal in "[[Recap/StarWarsRebelsS2E08AnInsideMan An Inside Man]]".

* ADayintheLimelight: AP-5, Zeb and Chopper.

* RealityEnsues: While it was the only option that didn't lead the Empire ''directly'' to Chopper Base, by sending the droid back to blow up it does narrow the search of systems the rebels could be on, from thousands to less then a hundred, any system the droids had been randomly sent to. On the plus side, it will still take the Empire time and resources to do another search, let alone act on this speculation.

* ADayintheLimelight: AP-5, Zeb and Chopper

* WorthyOpponent: For once, Thrawn is impressed that the rebels' attempt to outsmart him by reprogramming the droid to detonate while allowing it to return to it's star destroyer.

* RealityEnsues: While it was the only option that didn't lead the Empire ''directly'' to Chopper Base, by sending the droid back to blow up it does narrow the search of planets the rebels could be on, from thousands to less then a hundred, any planet the droids had been sent to.

* RealityEnsues: While it was the only option that didn't lead the Empire ''directly'' to Chopper Base, by sending the droid back to blow up it does narrow the search of planets the rebels could be from thousands to less then a hundred, any planet the droids had been sent to.

* ADayintheLimelight: AP-5

* TrojanHorse: The mysterious damaged droid is actually an Imperial probe droid sent to spy on and destroy the rebels at their base.

** A robot built to harm and destroy gets bonked on the head when it lands on a new and unfamiliar world, causing it to forget its mission, then befriends two of the locals before turning back into a superweapon when something reminds it of its mission? [[WesternAnimation/TheIronGiant Sounds familiar...]] 'cept here, there was never any good in EX, nor will there ever be.

** A robot built to harm and destroy gets bonked on the head when it lands on a new and unfamiliar world, causing it to forget its mission, then befriends two of the locals before turning back into a superweapon when something reminds it of its mission? [[WesternAnimation/TheIronGiant Sounds familiar...]]

* InnocentlyInnocuousEpisode: While it can be considered a BreatherEpisode compared to the three that immediately preceded it, that an Imperial droid was able to find the base is definitely not something to be taken lightly. Given that the Imperials finding the new base was already teased as being a major part of the last few episodes of the season, it's pretty safe to presume that the events of the episode will have an impact on what follows.

* TrojanHorse: The mysterious damaged droid is actually an Imperial probe droid sent to spy on and destroy the rebels at their base.

* StrangeFriendship: AP-5 (and apparently Chopper as well) is happy to have another protocol droid on base, rather than making any snarks about the new guy. EXD-9 is apparently a quiet and/or mindless droid undercover (so it wasn't like he could reciprocate it anyway if he wanted to), probably also due to being damaged. Of course, it doesn't last when EXD remembers his mission.

Zeb and Chopper bring a damaged droid found in the Atollon wilderness back to base, only to discover that the droid is a new Imperial probe programmed to spy on and destroy rebels.

%%* BreatherEpisode: Though the risk of Chopper Base being exposed is still serious, Zeb and Chopper getting into shenanigans gives us a cooldown after all [[TheReveal the reveals]] and series of [[WhamEpisode wham episodes]] of recent.

* MythologyGag: The Imperial droid is based on Ralph [=McQuarrie's=] famous design for Threepio, the same painting that Chopper's design was pulled from. It's painted black with red highlights, but the design is otherwise identical.

* MythologyGag: The Imperial droid is based on Ralph McQuarrie's famous design for Threepio, the same painting that Chopper's design was pulled from. It's painted black with red highlights, but the design is otherwise identical.

* BreatherEpisode: Though the risk of Chopper Base being exposed is still serious, Zeb and Chopper getting into shenanigans gives us a cooldown after all [[TheReveal the reveals]] and series of [[WhamEpisode wham episodes]] of recent.