Thrawn Demonstrates His Ruthlessness in Star Wars Rebels: Inside Man Preview

In the penultimate episode of Fall 2016 for Star Wars Rebels, it looks like we'll see Thrawn's plan advance further as he continues to study the Rebel Alliance to figure out how to, in his words, "pick them apart piece by piece." But first, a little reminder that while he's charismatic, Grand Admiral Thrawn is a bad, bad man and the Empire is ruthless to the core.

That's what's demonstrated in the clip, which ends before what sure looks to be an explosive finale.

"Seeking information on a new Imperial weapon, Ezra and Kanan infiltrate the Imperial factory on Lothal, but they must trust an unlikely ally to escape a lockdown of the building.

Catch an all-new episode of "Star Wars Rebels" this SATURDAY, DECEMBER 3 (8:30 p.m., ET/PT) on Disney XD," the official description reads. The "unlikely ally" is most likely Agent Kallus, who most fans assume to be the new Fulcrum following Ahsoka Tano's apparent demise at the end of last season.

As for that new Imperial weapon? It looks, from the image in the gallery below that features Hera and some schematics, like it's a new model of TIE fighter. The spread array shown on the bottom half of the image looks similar to that of the TIE D Defender that first appeared in the TIE Fighter video game, and hasn't been brought into official canon before, but without seeing three wing arrays, it's impossible to tell for sure.

Hopefully we'll find out the answer to that question, as well as our questions about Thrawn (how much does he really know about the Rebels? What is his end game?) when "An Inside Man" airs on Saturday night. Only one episode remains after it, with a winter hiatus before things pick back up early 2017.

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Star Wars Rebels follows the adventures of Hera (Vanessa Marshall), Sabine (Tiya Sircar), Zeb (Steve Blum), and the Jedi Kanan (Freddie Prinze, Jr.) and Ezra (Taylor Gray), a small crew that's finding their way in the nascent Rebel Alliance a few years before the events of Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope. Executive produced by Simon Kinberg and Dave Filoni, the in-canon series helps to connect the worlds of the films and the previous animated series, Star Wars: The Clone Wars, with guest appearances so far by characters like Lando Calrissian, Ahsoka Tano, Darth Vader, Darth Maul, Leia Organa, Wedge Antilles, and more.