So I was rewatching that scene in Rise of the Old Masters where the Inquisitor, after knocking Kanan across the corridor, taunts Ezra by saying, âYour master cannot save you, boy. He is unfocused and undisciplined.â And Ezra retorts, âThen weâre perfect for each other!â
But when I looked closer, I noticed Ezraâs lips didnât sync up with his dialogue.
I slowed down the frame rate and studied it a bit more, and it looks like he was originally saying this:
This was a last-minute change made right there in the recording booth, after the animation had already been completed. And what a change it was.
The old dialogue acknowledges that Ezra believed the Force was right in placing Kanan and him together as master and apprentice. Itâs a very neutral statement, no indication of Ezraâs feelings.
âThen weâre perfect for each other!â is a much more emotional statement, I think better fitting for this emotionally-charged scene where Ezra, probably terrified but equally determined, is courageously protecting his fallen master with nothing but his flimsy little energy slingshot. His words are defiant, defensive of Kanan and his shortcomings as a teacher, but absolutely assured. We are perfect for each other. Ezra feels that he and Kanan are meant to be together and that their similarities--and mutual deficiencies--are what will make them work so well as a team. And heâs ready to go down with these words on his lips, because surely he realizes how outmatched he is against the Inquisitor.
Rabbit trail: The shift from past tense in the original line (the Force was right) to present tense in the new line (we [are] perfect for each other) is also interesting. Ezra is looking forward now, not backward. He wants Kanan to be his master, no one else. He finally has a strong male role model (father figure) in his life again after seven years of being alone, and the guy is a Jedi (very cool, maybe a little bit of hero worship going on here), and Ezra likes him and is already attached to him. How awful it must have been for him to hear Kanan talk about how Luminara would be a better master than him, which would also imply that a) he doesnât care about Ezra the way Ezra cares about him and wouldnât miss him if he left, and that b) Ezra will be forced to leave the Ghost (his new family and home) and go train with Luminara somewhere else. No wonder he was so depressed. Heâs spent half of his life alone and abandoned, and it was about to happen to him all over again.
Itâs a little ironic how Ezra, the inexperienced padawan, is the first one to realize that, yes, the Force wasnât wrong in bringing him and Kanan together. However, Ezra also realized that it didnât matter how much he believed Kanan was meant to be his master; if Kanan didnât believe it himself, then this apprenticeship would never work, which is why he was still sad/angry toward the end of the episode. He thought Kanan still didnât want to teach him, and with Master Unduli being truly dead and gone, there was no other option left. Ezra was fully prepared to call it quits.
âIâm letting you off the hook. [...] I know you wanted to dump me on Luminara. Just 'cause sheâs gone doesnât mean youâre stuck with me.â
Kananâs realization wouldnât come until the very end of the episode, when he vows to stop trying to teach Ezra and actually will teach him (âdo or do not, there is no tryâ). Kanan had to learn to believe in himself, which is exactly what he had been trying to teach Ezra earlier in this episode. Self-confidence.
He also realized that he didnât need to be perfect, he just needed to be there for Ezra--one of the basic and most important tenets of parenthood and mentorship. Because thereâs no such thing in the galaxy as a perfect master... or a perfect father.
And nothing bad ever happened to either of them again, the end.
