hera syndulla

Women of the Galaxy by Amy Ratcliffe / Art by Jennifer Aberin Johnson & Christina Chung

[Vanessa] Marshall jokes that she sometimes asks herself in her own life, “What would Hera do?” And indeed, to the galaxy’s great benefit, while on a mission to gather intelligence on Imperial activities on the planet Gorse, Hera meets Jedi Kanan Jarrus and persuades him to assist her. They end up forming the core of the Spectres.

This Hera-Kanan scene is really the first of several scenes where the mother figure checks in on how the father figure is doing. And she is, again, a bit more wise because she’s looking at the bigger picture as to what Sabine actually needs, and how Kanan might be limiting her based on his own fears. Fear of, you know, allegedly that she could hurt herself. But I think there’s also with Kanan a fear that he’s not as good a master. He might not be able to teach her well enough. He could barely, in some ways, teach Ezra in the long run, and now teaching Sabine. The truth is, it’s probably more difficult for Kanan to do than it is for her to learn because she’s such a skilled warrior.

Dave Filoni, Trials of the Darksaber audio commentary, on Kanan’s first check in with Hera and Kanan as a teacher

I was very careful about how Hera would react in this scene. You see a lot of this scene is not Hera talking at all, but Hera observing. Watch her observe. She doesn’t like what Ezra is saying there. She’s waiting, she’s picking her spot because Hera’s the most aware of what Sabine’s past is and what’s causing Sabine to react the way she is. It’s also all very like these characters, all these men in the foreground, to be explaining this situation to Sabine and why she should be doing these things. And frankly, not really listening to what Sabine has to say or what she’s actually feeling. And I felt like Hera needs to be the counterpoint to that, this almost inquisition, you know. They want her to do something, but they’re not really thinking about what she needs emotionally. And Hera is now supporting that, but she’s also cutting through to the bare facts of the thing. She empathizes with Sabine, but she also knows that this needs to happen for a greater good. She’s trying to appeal to Sabine on that level. For me, I always thought that Sabine would assume that Hera would be supportive of her and her reluctance to do this. So she’s a bit surprised when Hera actually supports the training of her with the saber. But it’s ‘cause Hera’s playing a bigger game here. She understands the bigger picture.

Dave Filoni, Trials of the Darksaber audio commentary, on Hera in Sabine’s Darksaber “Intervention”