Ahsoka Season 1 was packed with familiar Star Wars faces, ranging from various Rebels characters being depicted in live-action to the first time, to Hayden Christensen reprising Anakin Skywalker following his return to the franchise in 2022 for Obi-Wan Kenobi. And then there was Anthony Daniels, who cameoed as C-3PO in the episode “Dreams and Madness” to help bail Hera Syndulla out of a jam. Half a year after that appearance, the actor has shared that he snuck in a clever homage to original Obi-Wan Kenobi actor Alec Guinness, and I wish it hadn’t been cut from the episode.
During a spotlight panel at MegaCon 2024 (via Popverse), Daniels talked about how he was approached to appear in Ahsoka Season 1’s penultimate episode. He agreed, flew out to Southern California and had the “most wonderful time,” and even cheekily described “Dreams and Madness” as “the best episode of Ahsoka ever, just saying.” He then talked about doing something “rather clever” for this courtroom scene that can be viewed with your Disney+ subscription, explaining:
Dave Filoni and I had a script conference on Zoom. Basically, the scene was Threepio walks in, says something, and then walks out. If you ever watch that scene again, Threepio comes in at the back of the set, and there were two guards. I came up with a line, which I totally stole from Episode IV with Sir Alec Guinness. I tell the guards, ‘You don’t need to see my identification.’ That was a straight steal.
That’s a fun callback to the scene in A New Hope, the first of the Star Wars movies in order (in terms of release) when Obi-Wan Kenobi used the Jedi Mind Trick on some stormtroopers when he, Luke Skywalker, C-3PO and R2-D2 were entering Mod Eisley. While C-3PO is obviously not gifted in the ways of The Force, and thus not truly capable of such mind manipulation, Anthony Daniels amusingly recycled the identification line for his Ahsoka appearance. Alas, the line ultimately didn’t make into the episode’s final cut, so unless an extended version of the courtroom scene is included on the Ahsoka Season 1 Blu-ray or even thrown onto Disney+, we’ll just have to imagine how this sounded.
For those who need a refresher, C-3PO stopped during Hera Syndulla’s disciplinary hearing, as she’d disobeyed orders from her New Republic superiors not to follow Ahsoka Tano and Sabine Wren to Seatos, where Morgan Elsbeth was located at the time. However, C-3PO came to the hearing on behalf of Leia Organa and provided a data transcript showing that the senator had personally sanctioned Hera’s mission to Seatos, and had been unaware that a vote against the mission had been spearheaded by Senator Xiono without her being present.
Because Leia was head of the Defense Council, she decided to overlook this misstep on the condition that future concerns like this were brought to her directly. After Hera was let off the hook, she thanked C-3PO, then informed Chancellor Mon Mothma had indeed approved her mission, but the timing of when she did so was a bit fudged. Anthony Daniels’ cameo followed a year after his brief appearance in Obi-Wan Kenobi’s first episode, with that series seeing Ewan McGregor reprising his younger version of the Jedi Master for the first time since Revenge of the Sith.
You can revisit Ahsoka, A New Hope and plenty of other Star Wars content over at Disney+. Remember to also keep visiting CinemaBlend for news on upcoming Star Wars movies and TV shows, including Ahsoka Season 2, which is officially moving forward.