Speaking of Descents into hell, it is appropriate that this series opens with the Massacre of the Night-Sisters during the Clone Wars era, as that would truly be hell for the coven of the night sisters
So quick catch up, the night sisters are a coven of force users(and yes coven is very intentional) who stay on Dathomir and use the Dark side of the force, but they use it in a way that doesn't affect them.
And yes they are witches. There is a novel that underlines their way of using the dark side, I forget what it was called but it is about Assajj Ventress and Quinlin Vas(if you didn't know those two dated even though one is a Jedi and the other is a nightsister/with assassin) where it's explained all about using the dark side and not letting it consume you in the process.
I haven't read it but I've heard it's a good bit of writing.
Anyways, unnecessary digression aside, the first three episodes are very much so based on Yoda's description of how one is lead to the dark side.
Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to suffering.
And so we see as a young Morgan Elsbeth is consumed by fear and anger towards the Droids that killed her entire Coven, as she should be, given that she is a child and her mother was killed right in front of her.
She is initially saved by the mountain clan, who it seems, unlike the nightsisters use the light side of the force to do their magic, I say that because like the night sisters, they have appeared in star wars media before and also because they seem to give of similar pacifist vibes like the Jedi.
Also her face markings disappear, and the Mountain Clan people say this is because the end of the Nightsisters meant the end of their magic, but Merrin didn't loose her face markings, I guess this was because she kept practicing her Magic, or because she didn't go to the Mountain Clan, but then, I believe the real reason is because Morgan didn't have Tattoos in the Mandalorian and they needed a way to explain that.
And why is that? Oh that's because she wasn't written as a Nightsiste... oh No, I remember, that is because the Darkside of the force is a pathway to many abilities some consider to be unnatural.(that is how somehow Palpatine returned.)
Morgan uses the younger ones' fear to take them to the destroyed nightsister colonies to get weapons and in the process gets them killed, as they are not experienced in using weapons.
The leader of the mountain clan, then teleports in and defeats all the droids, so that seems to be a power that they share with the Nightsisters as Merin(a nightsister) teleports all the time in Jedi fallen order and Jedi survivor.
We are then given the first lesson that Morgan chooses to ignore and that is, Just because someone chooses not to fight, doesn't mean that they are incapable.
We then go to the next stage of the fall to the dark side, the path of anger, as we see Morgan has taken over a small outer rim planet called corvus and plans to give the people work by using their planet's resources and people as labour with her plan for the new tie defender.
Which I will just say, is much superior to the tie fighter because look at this shit, and also, they have shields.
We see then, one of the first reasons for the downfall/hatred of the empire, which was also shown in the show andor, and that is their greed and complacency, as they reject Morgan's plans and simply wanted to use her to gain information to further themselves.
There is however one hope for the empire in general Pallaeon, who, like in the Mandalorian, is working for Grand Admiral thrawn, who actually right now is still an Admiral.
Morgan returns to Corvus and the people immediately turn on her due to their greed, which I why they appointed her magistrate in the first place, and the irony is, she might not have gone down as much of a dark path as she did, or at least might not have treated them as poorly, if they hadn't been so prejudiced against her being a 'witch'.
Just like the irony of her joining the Empire, the same people who ordered the destruction of her people all those years back(Darth Sidious.) but then again, it seems that most night sisters (especially the younger ones) believed the assailants to be Jedi because of General Grievous' lightsabers.
At least that is what we can gather from what Merrin tells Cal in the Jedi Fallen Order game.
So it seems appropriate that Morgan would align herself with an organization that hates Jedi, also it just seems she is in it for the power of it all but that's always there.
We then skip forwards to after the New republic is already formed to begin the final stage of the fall to the dark side, the path of hate.
As we see that the entire town she is a magistrate over has turned into a police state and Elsbeth uses the same beskar spear to kill the Republic Envoy who is actually a former resident of the planet called Nadura and then her troopers torch the entire forest, which is probably why it was a wreck when we see it in the Mandalorian Season 2 in the episode where we see Ahsoka.
Come to think of it, she probably came there because of Bo Katan picking up the distress signal that Nadura releases at the end of this episode, with a Glowing light to signal the light of hope, because Star Wars is many things, it aint subtle
And for those who don't know, the person who gets the beacon, Wing, is the one who takes over after Magistrate Elsbeth.
On the other side of the Galaxy, Bariss Offee, the by the books Clone Wars Character who was Ahsoka's Friend and was a contrast to the more, just throw the book out and wing it approach that Ahsoka had. Also in Contrast to Ahsoka, she got disillusioned by the Jedi order and then Bombed the Jedi Temple.
She then proceeded to blame it on Ahsoka and get her expelled. However due to Anakin's heroism, Ahsoka was exonerated and Barriss was exposed, but Ahsoka, left the Jedi Order as a result.
We begin this episode by showing Barriss in a Prison Cell and guarded by two shock troopers as is visible by their Red markings.
She is then interviewed by the fourth sister, or Lyn, for being in the Inquisitors, which is a sect of Fallen/Rejected Jedi or non Jedi Force Users, that have been trained in the Dark Side, to hunt and Kill Jedi.
Darth Vader controls them, but has a very Uneasy Relationship with them, because he is Well aware that the Emperor could at any moment replace him with a (in the emperor's eyes) more worthy Force user. And she is here because, Barriss called the Jedi corrupt and dangerous.
We are lead to believe that the episode's title, Devotion, is her being Devoted to the Dark side, but in a twist it is actually, to show that she was always devoted to the Light side.
So we move on to the next episode, where we see Barriss and Lyn are sent to hunt a Rogue Jedi, and we see the first hint of Barriss still being towards the light side, in spite of that terrifying force Choke, and that is that she gets information out of a little Kid, by making him trust her by removing her mask to connect with him on an emotional level.
However, the fourth sister is in a full on inquisitor Mode, and kills the villagers for lying to her, they always have to kill villagers, these villains.
And this is when Barriss starts to think that maybe the Darkside is not for her.
She climbs up the hill to get to the Rogue Jedi, and during the climb, she asks Lyn, why she did that, if as inquisitors are supposed to bring order to the Galaxy, and they just killed villagers.
Lyn Answers:
Which goes to show, that the Inquisitors really had a similar kind of mindset to the Clones post order 66, which shows the extent of their brainwashing.
however, after a truly amazingly animated Lightsaber fight, Barriss manages to convince the Rogue Jedi to surrender willingly, and come with them, Lyn however, just straight up executes her.
And this is where Barriss decides to not go down this path, and finally throws Lyn off a cliff, completing her journey back to the light-side. That's a weird sentence.
However, the show then again jumps forwards and shows that a couple is carrying their child to meet a supposed 'healer' because they believe their child is ill, given that the Empire freaks out around it, but in reality, the child is force sensitive, as Barriss tells the parents.
And it goes to show, as it does from the Bad Batch and the Mandalorian, force sensitive children are being snatched from their parents to either be killed because Jedi or be used to Clone a new body for Palpatine, again, that is bad, until you realize that the Jedi were the same, they just trained child soldiers.
This episode follows Bariss's confrontation of Lyn as she chases down the force sensitive Child and Barriss tries to send the family away to presumably, Ahsoka, as she says she is sending the family to an old friend.
Lyn is then trapped in a cave full of Mirrors, which seems to be like the Darkside cave from the Last Jedi, as it seems to be in tune with the force and can only be traversed by the use of the force in a proper manner, I say so because Lyn is trapped there when she uses the Dark Side and tried to brute force it, and she is able to come out just fine once she calms down.
The family are easily able to cross because of two 'followers' that Barriss had, and Barriss who tried to help Lyn get out safely, got stabbed on accident by Lyn, which by the way, why did Barriss go so close to Lyn anyways? Especially when she is Raging around like no ones business.
But Lyn is shocked by the stabbing even though she has killed many Jedi in cold blood, which once again goes to show that she really was Brainwashed and wasn't thinking straight, and despite appearances had a close relationship with Barriss.
This also fills in the gap between Obi Wan and Rebels, because the Fourth sister is in Obi Wan but not in Rebels.
And so just like Tales of the Jedi, Tales of the Empire goes after two stories of particular characters, one going just towards the dark(Morgan) and one going from dark towards light(Barriss) Just like Tale of the Jedi was one just for the light(Ahsoka) and one from light to Dark(Dooku).
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