Nightmare Fuel / Star Wars: The Bad Batch

All spoilers are unmarked. You Have Been Warned!

Most animated Star Wars series directed or produced by Dave Filoni start off relatively lighthearted before getting hit with Cerebus Syndrome at some point. However, due to being a direct spin-off of The Clone Wars taking place in the aftermath of Order 66, The Bad Batch is as dark as (if not darker than) those previous shows' later episodes from the beginning.

---

Season 1

Episode 1: Aftermath

• On Onderon, when you realize that Tarkin had sent the Bad Batch to go kill civilians, including children and the elderly. You can already feel the Empire's more insidious actions coming to life. Since the Separatists are so remembered for their cruelty, the Empire doesn't make any distinction between them and other rebels. It's little wonder the Rebel Alliance were heroes with bad publicity.
• Crosshair’s ‘good soldiers follow orders’ at the start of the episode and him clutching the side of his head at the end, when we finally know that his chip is responsible.
• Order 66 once again serves as much as this as a tearjerker, most notably Depa Billaba's horrible screams of mingled terror and agony as she implores her Padawan to run even as she's shot repeatedly to death by her formerly loyal men, the clones' mindless insistence on Caleb's death despite him being only a young teen at best and the covered body of a Jedi highly implied to have been on Kamino when the order came about, which would have meant they were probably surrounded by clones who in seconds switched from being loyal and trustworthy to hostile and with murderous intentions. That poor Jedi likely did not have any advance warning or ability to defend themselves.
• Grey's immediate shift from being jokey, snarky, and even somewhat chipper to coldly looking at Billaba the second he is told to execute Order 66, as if he's thinking about the best way to kill her.
• There's something unnerving about the Bad Batch being surrounded by hundreds of cheering regs as Palpatine announces the birth of the Empire. You really feel as if they're very small cogs in a system that has just gone horribly wrong.
• Omega and AZI go snooping around Clone Force 99's barracks. AZI tries to warn Omega that they have a duty to Nala Se, but Omega tells him it's a research assignment. When AZI comes across a dead Battle Droid, Omega decides it's time for them to leave, but the Coruscant Shock Trooper Quartermaster catches them and despite Omega assuring him it won't happen again, he orders a few of the Clones in his command to take Omega to the brig and Clone Force 99's stuff to the hanger, even shooting AZI when he tries to tell him and his men they're Kaminoian medical personnel.

Episode 3: Replacements

• The entire execution scene. Following through with the order to eliminate Saw Gererra's rebels on Onderon, Crosshair orders his Elite Squad to execute a group of four remaining and unarmed civilians. Refusing to comply, ES-01 attempts to take control of the squad and have them detained, only for him to be personally shot through the chest by Crosshair. Only then do the other three members excluding Crosshair comply.
  • What's worse is the method of execution. This isn't just a normal firing squad. Not only do the troops fire at the civilians, one of them burns them alive.
  • The “Good soldiers follow orders,” that Crosshair calmly growls after he shoots ES-01 is blood-chilling.
  • There is also the part just before the civilians. After killing most of the rebel soldiers, the last surviving soldier surrenders. Crosshair asks her where Gerrera is, and she states that she doesn't know and wouldn't tell him ever if she knew. Crosshair unexpectedly shoots her dead before the sentence is even finished, before calmly stating "I believe you".
• Shortly after crash landing on the moon, Wrecker begins complaining of a severe pain in his head, which he claims is due to banging his head in the crash. While this could be interpreted as him trying to find an excuse to stay on the ship and build Omega's room, one can only wonder if it's the activated inhibitor chip beginning to create a strain on his brain.

Episode 4: Cornered

• Imagine being Omega — lost in an unfamiliar city, being chased by a bounty hunter, and nearly getting killed several times over in various high-speed, high-altitude shenanigans. Now imagine being Hunter or any of the other Bad Batchers, seeing all this happening to their little sister.

Episode 6: Decommissioned

• The bulk of this episode actually counts as one for Wrecker:
  • Carrying over from the squad's appearance in season 7 of The Clone Wars, Wrecker has a fear of heights—be it the simple going-up risky rail ladders, or jumping across a chasm to a mechanical arm. And then, with one bad landing on the other side...
  • Blunt-force trauma knocks Wrecker out for a moment, and the dreaded phrase "Good soldiers" begins coming out of his mouth. (He even hears Crosshair saying it in his head—which he struggles to shake off.) This confirms that his inhibitor chip is still latent. We can only begin dreading for the moment the Bad Batch encounters a Jedi—especially one they've worked with. (Or worse, someone who is purely innocent yet coincidentally Force-sensitive.)
    • The chip has already started to affect Wrecker, given that he's no longer afraid of heights when he jumps down from the control tower to take out the police droids on the factory floor.
• While Omega is slowly but surely becoming a competent member of the Batch, she is still a child—and when she loses her laser-bow and gets trapped in a conveyor belt (which will end up on a scrap metal incinerator), she can only scream for Hunter's rescue.
• Downplayed, but take this from the perspective of the newly-reactivated battle droids Trace and Tech signals. One of them were actually asking if they won the Clone Wars—which was immediately superseded by them simply firing against their own kind. What Measure Is a Mook? is definitely at play here.
  • One of the droids doesn't even have hands, yet leaps into battle anyway shouting "Orders are orders!" Good soldiers follow orders indeed...

Episode 7: Battle Scars

• Rex going for his blaster the moment he finds out the Bad Batch hasn't removed their chips, claiming they make them a danger to anyone around them. And as the episode later shows, he's right.
• Wrecker’s chip fully activates in this episode as Tech tries to sedate him to get the thing out of his head. While he does open fire on the other clones with his blaster, more terrifying is when he wraps his massive hands around his squad mates necks. Fortunately he’s interrupted before he can cause any permanent damage to Tech and Hunter.
• The entire sequence with Wrecker played out like a classic Sci-Fi Horror with the team being hunted down the corridors of an abandoned starship by a ruthless Wrecker, and Omega desperately running and hiding before she's found and almost killed. The eerie soundtrack only enhanced the atmosphere of terror. And the way Wrecker conducts himself? He’s become just as cold as Crosshair.
• Wrecker apologizing for his actions while brainwashed by the inhibitor chip after it gets removed. He states that he tried to fight it as hard as he could in his mind but was unable to resist his programming. This implies that all the regular Clones and Crosshair included, are horrified by their actions thanks to the inhibitor chip but can do nothing to stop it. It makes the clone troopers all the more tragic characters.
  • This was first seen with Rex in the Finale of the Clone Wars, in which he similarly apologized to Ahsoka after almost killing her while Order 66 was active after his chip was removed. This episode all but confirmed that the Clones are internally horrified at having to kill their Jedi commanders and serving the Empire.

Episode 8: Reunion

• Crosshair ordering his troopers to shoot and kill Omega, a little girl, just because she tried to be a good person and snap him out of the inhibitor chip's brainwashing. Even for a Brainwashed and Crazy Clone trooper, that is an especially low thing to do.
• After the Batch manage to escape the ion engine ignition, Crosshair and the Elite Squad get hit by the blast instead. Crosshair's helmet gets blown off and the viewer gets treated to a shot of his face slowly getting scorched by the full force of a Star Destroyer's ion thrusters, which has been animated in great detail. The last time he's seen in the episode, he's being carried away on a stretcher with bandages wrapped all around his head and breathing through a respirator.

Episode 9: Bounty Lost

• The Abandoned Laboratory gets progressively darker and creepier as Omega wanders its halls while escaping Fennec and Cad Bane, before she comes across a room emitting an ominous green glow. Besides the controls to the station, the room contains vats full of various grotesque and malformed creatures, one of which looks like a cross between Snoke and a Kaminoan. Concept art◊ shows us more details, showing that some of them are just blobs of flesh with eyes and other random body parts. Given the nature of the Kaminoans' work, one wonders what other genetically modified horrors lie in the depths of the lab...
  • Legends actually give a hint, in that, once in the past, the Kaminoans actually produced a biologically immortal Force sensitive. And while the Force sensitivity was a completely unexpected fluke, they still made an unaging being... And the creatures there could be unaging just as well.
• Omega releases a vat from its supports, causing it to fall on Fennec Shand and shatter. This in turn causes a non-living Kaminoan subject to flop out of the vat on top of her and pin her to the floor. She's only trapped under the body for a few seconds, but seeing the giant, dead humanoid with elongated limbs splayed out on top of the much smaller human is quite a disturbing sight.

Episode 15: Return to Kamino

• As it turns out, Crosshair had his chip removed. That means he's been following the Empire of his own free will for who knows how long.
• Rampart destroying the Kaminoan cities via orbital bombardment with the Bad Batch and Crosshair still inside. Even worse is that it's all but stated that this was on purpose so that he could kill off Crosshair.
  • When giving Rampart the order to do so, Tarkin says a line that will send chills up any long time fan's neck.
  You may fire when ready

Episode 16: Kamino Lost

• The city slowly turning into a Drowning Pit.
• That...thing that attacks the group in the tubes, officially known as a Kamoradon. Fittingly enough, one of its other names is saberjowl. In Legends, it was genetically engineered by the Kaminoans, and one tried to attack Obi-Wan during a battle on the planet.
• Except for the last minutes, the all episode is pure nightmare fuel for people suffering from thalassophobia and/or claustrophobia and/or nyctophobia.

Season 2

Episode 3: The Solitary Clone

• Crosshair's execution of Governor Ames, who's body we are told will be put on display for all to see what happens to rebel against The Empire. Grotton was a whiny brat, but this is outright inhumane. Thankfully we don't get to see it.
  • Crosshair doing so is also what gets Cody to decide that he is beyond redemption.

Episode 4: Faster

• Riot Racing is basically what happens when you take away the few rules that Pod Racing had. Not only are weapons allowed, racers are in fact encouraged to shoot down their opponents, causing them to crash or blow up. Even the audience isn't safe; a crashing racer has a weapons malfunction that sprays blaster-fire into the crowds, killing one person, and the PA chimes in to remind spectators that the venue is not liable for their deaths because they knew the risks when they came to watch.

Episode 5: Entombed

• The destroyer. It's a giant mech that is the size of a mountain and towers over everything, letting it rain down massive lasers with ease. Even worse? It's clearly designed to target items meant to house people, as shown by it taking aim at the Marauder, meaning that it's more than likely this thing was designed to hunt people, explaining why there are no signs of life on the planet.

Episode 6: Tribe

• The Trandoshan commander Venomor is even a little more unnerving than the rest of his kind. Like so many Trandoshans in the Star Wars universe, he is a slaver and an unrepentant killer. But this particular commander adds the following: working with the Empire to take the Wookie slavery one step further, being so enthusiastic about this that one of the clones seems a little stunned by the fact that he is so happy with the idea of killing a Jedi, having killed so many Wookiees (himself or on his order) that he is able to promise 100 Wookiee furs as recompense, and having modified Separatist Armored Assault Tanks^note Known as Imperial Armored Assault Tanks to fit in with their use by the Empire. especially to destroy the environment and archaeological sites. And for the last point, he doesn't hesitate to set a part of the jungle on fire to fight just one target, and as for the destruction of a site, the reason for this is only to keep in the schedule.
• And yet, Venomor himself manages to end up at the receiving end of the Nightmare fuel. Yes, he was an evil jerk, for all the reasons listed above. However, to see him beat up by the Netcasters, and then wrapped up in web and slowly dragged away in direction of their nest while he is screaming in terror, is nonetheless very creepy. Especially if you are a viewer with arachnophobia.

Episode 7: The Clone Conspiracy

• We come back to the destruction of Tipoca City, and learn that it was far worse than we thought. Tipoca was not the only target, and Rampart not only didn't bother evacuating the other cities on the planet first, he covered up the destruction and Genocide of the Kaminoans.
• The unnamed clone assassin in this episode dies to an electric equivalent of a Cyanide Pill, horrifically twitching as he does so. Not only is the scene very unnerving to watch, it also reminds you of the terrifying Blind Obedience of the regs in a very visceral way.

Episode 8: Truth and Consequences

• Palpatine's first (physical) appearance on the show reminds you why he's the Greater-Scope Villain of Star Wars. An ear-splitting alarm sounds as he slowly rises out of the hole in the center of the senate. As we see Palpatine's scarred face, possibly the creepiest version of his theme ever plays softly, with it being made clear that everyone in the Senate is intimidated by him. We get a Hope Spot as he's seen agreeing to punish Rampart and thanking Cuchi — but then it turns out he's been playing Xanatos Speed Chess with everyone and that the heroes have played into his hands. The scene really hammers in how much Palpatine outclasses almost everyone else in the galaxy both physically and mentally.

Episode 11: Metamorphosis

• This episode gives several Alien vibes with a creature attacking a lone clone commando on a damaged ship floating through space. The creature isn't seen throughout the entire scene and kills the clone by attacking it from above.
• It's later revealed what the creature is: the Zillo Beast. And it was successfully cloned by the Empire. This is the reason why the Empire kept Nala Se alive.
• It's also revealed that Lama Su is also alive. He suggests that Omega be captured due to Nala Se's fondness for her.
• The Empire saw the Marauder leaving the scene as they captured the Zillo beast, and while it wasn’t immediately recognized as the Bad Batch’s ship, Scorch, one of the Republic’s most elite commandos, now a loyal soldier of the Empire, has been ordered to find out who it belongs to and bring them in.

Episode 12: The Outpost

• The planet the titular outpost is located on gives some major Death World vibes, being covered in snow and ice, and Mayday even tells Crosshair that there is some pretty nasty wildlife out there that’ll get him if the cold doesn’t. The terrain calls to mind media like The Thing (1982) and Dead Space 3.
• In the end, Doctor Hemlock has Crosshair transferred to Mount Tantiss. What is going to become of Crosshair in a place that we know contains horrors such as the Zillo Beast?
• And, in the vein of the Disney canon that increasingly realistically represents the Empire as a machine to grind individuals, here the treatment of clones. On Coruscant, where the Senate and some public opinion are concerned about what will become of the veteran clones, the Empire maintains appearances and sends them gradually to retirement. Rampart, who was incidentally an active public figure in the Senate, somewhat restrained his racism towards Clones so as not to publicly compromise his and Empire's plans. Nolan is not a public figure, and on an isolated and sparsely populated planet like Baron-4, he doesn’t need to pretend. The Empire only cares about individuals according to their value or potential in its plans. And as the clones are about to be forcibly retired, their value and potential are very low, less than the armor they wear. Under these conditions, it is not surprising that Imperial officers are no longer even concerned about the physiological needs of clones, and do not hesitate to send them on suicide missions simply to keep or recover some boxes of material that can easily be produced en masse, while refusing to give them the means to accomplish these missions, and to designate them as "used equipment" looking them in the eye. Letting them die so as not to waste medical equipment is only the logical continuation of the Empire’s reasoning. The only difference between Nolan and the other Imperial officers is that his Fantastic Racism is so extreme that it borders on the Too Dumb to Live trope, and so he has absolutely no filter. However, with the Jedi gone and with the Clone officers also retired, no doubt about the fact that the other Imperial officers keep only the minimum of facade respect to avoid ending up like Nolan.
  • Having said that, coming from the same Empire that, in the previous episode, kidnapped an entire village and is implied to have executed a part if not the totality of its population, there was little else to expect but contempt for its old soldiers.

Episode 13: Pabu

• The Tsunami, it appears and the only signs beforehand are the local animals getting nervous and running away to higher ground. The Galactic Empire may not have any interest in Pabu, but despite its peaceful and almost paradise like state, it still has dangers. Truth in Television for anyone who lives near the coast or on islands at the destruction it can bring.
  • Even more terrifying is that Omega and Lyana are out on the waters when the tremors start and they find themselves unable to get to shore and having to run on foot. Hunter just manages to get there in the nick of time on the Havoc Marauder to save them.

Episode 14: Tipping Point

• Hemlock poisons Crosshair with a gas that he himself has built an immunity to, just like the Joker with his Joker Venom. No wonder the Republic expelled him from their Science Corps for his unethical science experiments, only for Palpatine to welcome him back in with open arms when he formed the Empire.
• Crosshair, upon refusing to give up any information about the Bad Batch, gets tortured with a IT-0 Interrogation Unit. While he manages to hold out for a while, the episode ends with him writhing in pain and screaming.
  • Notably, this is the first time in the history of the franchise to feature an IT-0 without cutting away. It's surprisingly graphic for a kids' show.

Episode 16: Plan 99

• By the end of the episode, Omega is in the clutches of Dr. Hemlock, who now has a bargaining chip to get Nala Se to do his bidding. He also makes it clear that Omega will suffer if Nala Se still refuses or doesn't succeed. On top of that, courtesy of Saw Gerrera's actions in the previous episode, Dr. Hemlock's original shuttle and the tracker placed on it were destroyed, so now the Bad Batch has absolutely no idea where Hemlock's compound (and by extension, Omega and Crosshair) is, and no idea where to start looking for it.

Season 3

Episode 1: Confined

• Season 3 opens up with an Imperial Nu-class attack/transport shuttle being struck by lightning and crash landing in the wilds of Mount Tantiss. The crew of TK Stormtroopers gets attacked by some beast that we cannot see as they frantically shoot at it and try to call for backup but to no avail. When Hemlock is asked to answer the request to send backup, he ignores it and leaves the crew to die.
• The presence of Clone Commandos in the Tantiss facility is chilling. Enhancements and training aside, they are clones no different to the ones being dragged around and treated like animals, and yet they do absolutely nothing to stop the horrific abuse of their brothers. Either their inhibitor chips are still in effect… or their mental conditioning is just that thorough.
• There's something deeply unsettling about how mundane Omega's routine is, if one were to ignore the blatant suffering around them, then it can be viewed as just everyday life, not unlike someone going to work. It shows scarily well why so many decided to ignore the Empire before the Death Star, they were good at putting a veneer like everything would be the same as it was with the Republic, only the Empire took destroying corruption and crime more seriously without greedy Senators who profited off both holding back change. Of course it's just that, a facade and the slightest breeze would show the horrible nature of The Empire underneath.

Episode 2: Paths Unknown

• The Slither Vines. Basically the botanical equivalent of a Sarlaac that Hemlock and the Advanced Science Division created before abandoning it once it got out of their control, but instead of staying put and waiting for prey to get close and fall in, the vines actively hunt. Oh, and if the vines get cut off, they morph into mini-sarlaacs.
  • For those familiar with the High Republic, the Slither Vines are shockingly similar to the Drengir, such as being hard to kill, having severed appendages grow into another specimen and the relentless need to spread itself and consume non-botanical life. Given how much damage they did during that era (and no one could control them, whether it be the Nihil or the ancient Sith), just imagine how bad it would be for the galaxy if this abandoned experiment found a way to get off Setron, or the Advanced Science Division was able to control it. The only silver-lining is that unlike the Drengir, there's nothing indicating that the Slither Vines are sapient or have mind-controlling toxins.

Episode 3: Shadows of Tantiss

• Emperor Palpatine himself pays Hemlock's facility a visit in order to personally evaluate the good doctor's progress, and just like when he showed up in the previous season, his appearance here is nothing short of unnerving. Not only is the way he descends his shuttle's boarding ramp reminiscent of his foreboding arrival on Mandalore, there's an eerily wraithlike quality to the Sith Lord as Hemlock gives him a tour of the laboratory. What's more, it turns out the primary reason he came all the way to Tantiss is because he's very interested in seeing how much progress Project Necromancer has made. If there's two things Palpatine values, it's results and character. Dr. Hemlock has both.

Episode 5: The Return

• The Ice Wyrm is just rather terrifying and ugly with their gaping mouths, rows of teeth and they're incredibly gigantic. As blizzards have slowly buried the depot in 6 feet of snow, these creatures just roam the area and prey on unsuspecting souls. Hunter was scared shitless just looking at one.

Episode 6: Infiltration

• The fact that the previously near emotionless Clone Assassin, CX-1, becomes much more emotive once he spots Crosshair is deeply disturbing. Addressing him specifically in an almost patronizing way as "brother" certainly doesn't help. Not to mention outright suggesting to his interrogators that Crosshair likely has all the answers they are looking for. For his part, Crosshair is clearly alarmed upon meeting the X Trooper.

Episode 7: Extraction

• CX-2, the latest Clone Assassin, is nearly unstoppable as nothing seems to be able to put him down as he keeps getting back up in pursuit of the others. Whether it's being hit with debris, shot at, exploded or thrown he still gets back up. When he faces Crosshair, he gets him in a chokehold and nearly drowns him. If not for Howzer saving him, Crosshair would've died.
  • And at the end despite plummeting off a waterfall, CX-2 is shown to have survived it.

Episode 10: Identity Crisis

• The kidnapping of the Force-sensitive Bayrn. Too young to know what it was doing, the baby used the Force in front of others and a greedy Aqualish villager reported them to a Class One bounty hunter within the hour to get some credits. It's implied the baby's mother, Ailish, didn't even realize her child's true nature, so she has absolutely no idea of the terrible danger they're in, or why when she wakes up, her baby will be gone without a trace.
• Cad Bane is back, and he's here for more Force-sensitive children. Bane does have some cocky taunts, but for most of the job he's a No-Nonsense Nemesis, calling forward to his quieter, angrier portrayal in The Book of Boba Fett when he largely functioned as an angel of death. And what's worse is that he boasts about how good he is at his job, with Bayrn only being the latest of many innocent children he's stolen for the Empire. And he keeps getting away with it.
• Tarkin calls Hemlock to gripe about the extra funding that he's been getting for Project Necromancer. When Hemlock reasonably refrains from elaborating on the project Palpatine is personally invested in, Tarkin retaliates by threatening him that if the project fails, he will pay for it with his life. Even if Hemlock would certainly deserve such a fate, this is Tarkin we're talking about, and we know that as petty and bloodthirsty as he is, he doesn't make idle threats.
• Hemlock agrees to promote Karr to chief science officer of Project Necromancer and finally brings her to the vault where, to her horror, there are several Force-sensitive children being held in captivity far stricter than what Omega endured. Hemlock simply says there aren't that many Force-sensitive adults to pull from the galaxy and that children are easier to get to cooperate. Nala Se later admits she figured these children were as good as dead.

Episode 11: Point of No Return

• The Empire finally arrives on Pabu and they are done playing with the Batch. The Havoc Marauder is destroyed, as are any and all ships on the island to cut off any way for the Batch to escape with Omega. Civilians are beaten and swatted aside, the island's livelihoods are being destroyed, and even when Omega surrenders, Clone X-2 implies he's not going to stop as punishment for Pabu harboring the fugitives. Even if he does them alone afterwards, as seen in the next episode, he's left a clear reminder that the next time Pabu crosses the Empire, they should not expect any mercy.

Episode 15: The Cavalry Has Arrived

• Hemlock reveals that he has one more trick up his sleeve at the time the Bad Batch entered his facility: 4 X Troopers. They aren't a joke, either. For a good portion of the episode, they dominate the Batch and the freed clones at every turn. Granted, our heroes do get pretty banged up as the episode goes on, so they are not exactly fighting at full strength, but even without that, those operatives are not messing around.
• The galaxy was lucky that the Bad Batch managed to kill Hemlock and destroy his cloning operation when they did. Otherwise, Hemlock may have actually given Palpatine a perfected cloning process for his own use before suffering any major setbacks, which could have caused a lot more problems for the rebels and the future New Republic later down the road. His death at Endor may have even become irrelevant a lot sooner with Hemlock's cloning in hand.
• And to say nothing about the Zillo Beast, attacking everyone in the facility with extreme prejudice. It appears to have gotten even bigger than last time since its release, and it has escaped into the wild. Tantiss may be destroyed, but the Zillo Beast is still out there, and the only boon is that it can't get any bigger because there's no more electricity to feed on. Anyone left behind will have likely been eaten by the creature. Weyland is officially a condemned planet.