Star Wars: Tales of the Empire will finally hit Disney+ this Saturday. The new animated series will tell the untold stories of Barriss Offee and Morgan Elsbeth. In Elsbeth’s case, it’s about to reveal her backstory before her appearance in Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Star Wars: Ahsoka. So, to prepare for Tales of the Empire, get to know more about one of the franchise’s most mysterious villains.
Elsbeth sealed her role as one of the intriguing Star Wars villains when she first appeared in The Mandalorian Season 2 Episode 5. At the time, he was looking for Grand Admiral Thrawn, proving she was an ally of the Empire.
As a member of the Nightsister, she was one of the few who had survived the massacre of her people in Star Wars: The Clone Wars after Count Dooku sent General Grevious to the planet of Dathomir. The tragic event pushed Elsbeth to seek revenge and grow her power and influence by building a business empire.
She started building ships for the Imperial Starfleet while destroying worlds for their resources. While doing so, she finally got the chance to meet Thrawn. From there, she became his loyal follower and promised to return him to the Galaxy after being exiled by Ezra Bridger.
Morgan Elsbeth’s Appearance in Star Wars: Ahsoka
After pledging her loyalty to Thrawn, Elsbeth became the Magistrate of planet Corvus and established herself in Calodan. She has her own HK-87 droids and a hired gun named Lang guarding her. Despite the fall of the Empire, Elsbeth managed to grow her forces in secret as she prepared to travel to distant worlds to find Thrawn.
However, Ahsoka Tano managed to track her and defeated her in combat. She was then taken into New Republic custody, but Baylan Skoll and his apprentice Shin Hati helped free her from imprisonment. She then continued her position onboard the Eye of Sion and used her magic and a lost star map to track Thrawn.
Elsbeth found the planet of Peridea, where the Grand Admiral was, along with the ancient Dathmiri witches known as the Great Mothers, who gave her the gift of shadows and the mystical blade of Talzin. This officially made her a Nightsister.
However, her triumph was only short-lived as she stayed behind to slow down the Jedi while Thrawn made his way back to the Galaxy. Ahsoka then arrived and a rematch happened. Though she destroyed one of her lightsabers, Ahsoka defeated her again, resulting in her death.
Diana Lee Inosanto Returns as Morgan Elsbeth in Star Wars: Tales of the Empire
Diane Lee Inosanto returns to reprise her role as Elsbeth in the upcoming Tales of the Empire. So, to learn more about her character, he studied Elsbeth’s backstory on Timothy Zahn’s books about Thrawn. And though she’s known as a villain, the voice actress starts to be sympathetic to the warrior after learning her story.
“When you see the kind of pain and suffering that she witnessed and yet still had the fortitude of trying to just stand tall…I mean, who could not relate to that?” she told Star Wars. “She's resilient, defiant, strong. She is a survivor. She created this armor of anger that she felt would protect her and I think people are going to understand now why Morgan is wired the way she is wired.”
Tales of the Empire is set to be released on Saturday, May 4, on Disney+. Its six episodes will be equally divided between Offee and Elsbeth, with the first three being about Elsbeth and the last about Offee.
After seeing her journey end in Ahsoka, fans will finally see how it all began in Tales of the Empire. Who knows, just like Inosanto, they may also sympathize with Elsbeth after learning her story.
