Star Wars: Ahsoka Tano Actress Ashley Eckstein Teases a Future for the Character

When Star Wars Rebels premiered, a major question lingered in fans of Star Wars: The Clone Wars’ […]

September 5, 2017, 9:55pm

When Star Wars Rebels premiered, a major question lingered in fans of Star Wars: The Clone Wars‘ minds: what about Ahsoka? When Anakin Skywalker’s padawan first debuted in Star Wars: The Clone Wars, the majority of fans were unimpressed – or even annoyed by the character. But over the course of five seasons, Ahsoka Tano grew up with an audience that quickly embraced her. The nuance of the writing, the directing, and the performance by actress Ashley Eckstein were the perfect storm to create a fan-favorite that tops many a list.

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Then, she ran afowl of the Jedi Council, and left the Order for good. The series ended before the rest of her story could be told, and as far as anyone knew, the Jedi (or light side Force users in general) were wiped out in the “Dark Times” era, aside from Obi-Wan Kenobi and Yoda. The #AhsokaLives hashtag began, as fans rallied behind the character. Then Star Wars Rebels came around, and suddenly we met the voice of “Fulcrum,” a hidden-identity Rebel agent. Fans quickly figured out that the voice, despite its digital manipulation, belonged to Eckstein.

Fast forward and Ahsoka appeared throughout season 2 of the series, leading to the inevitable confrontation with Darth Vader, who she confirmed was her former master Anakin Skywalker. The two fought, and Vader won, but hidden in shadow and without a word, Ahsoka was seen walking into the Sith Temple underneath which they fought. So the question (and hashtag) returned: did Ahsoka live? Is there more of her story to tell?

Eckstein is the special guest on a new Disney Cruise doing “Star Wars Days” today, and while she couldn’t say much, she did confirm that Ahsoka “has a future.”

“@HerUniverse [Eckstein’s twitter handle] asked [showrunner Dave] Filoni what she could say about Ahsoka’s future on #starwarsrebels on this #Disneycruise,” wrote Bryan Young, a journalist, podcaster, and writer with credits at StarWars.com and many more. “She has a future,” however, was literally all she could say.

At Star Wars Celebration Europe in July 2016, Filoni and Eckstein talked about Ahsoka’s past more than future, but Filoni did tease at the time that while he initially thought Ahsoka’s story ended with Star Wars Rebels season 2, he was reconsidering, and hoped to find a way to tell more stories with her in them. Eckstein echoed this a few months later.

“In my opinion, and I don’t know the truth, but I think she’s alive,” Eckstein told Comicbook.com in August. “There’s so much we don’t know. Seeing her walk into that temple, I’m really hopeful that we’ll get more of her someday in the future, and also get more from her past.”

With all of that said, we probably won’t be hearing anything about Ahsoka Tano in Star Wars Rebels season 3, which will instead focus on Darth Maul tracking down Obi-Wan Kenobi and the continued threat of Grand Admiral Thrawn; there’s just not really room for Ahsoka’s story to continue just yet. The nature of animation, however, means a season four (not yet confirmed) has been in the works for several months at this point. Hopefully we’ll find out something more concrete at Star Wars Celebration Orlando in April.

Star Wars Rebels airs Saturdays at 8:30 pm ET/PT on Disney XD.