Spoilers for Star Wars Jedi: Survivor AheadThe story of Star Wars Jedi: Survivor picks up five years after Jedi: Fallen Order, and a lot has changed in that time. While players can read about some of these events in the tie-in novel Star Wars Jedi: Battle Scars, most of it occurs behind the scenes. In that time, the Mantis got an entirely new crew, and Cal Kestis seems to have become a core part of Saw Gerrera's rebellion. Instead of exploring this new cast of characters, Star WarsJedi: Survivor quickly moves onto something else entirely.
Respawn created an entirely new cast of characters for Cal Kestis to interact with, but they are quickly dispatched during Jedi Survivor's opening sequence. These characters and their backstory could have led to an interesting narrative, and they deserve their time to shine. While it may be too late to go back and expand upon them, the studio should have utilized them a lot better.
The Mantis' New Crew Deserved Better
The opening of Star Wars Jedi: Survivor sees Cal Kestis arrive on Coruscant in handcuffs. It seemed like he had finally been captured by the Empire and was being escorted to Senator Sejan by masked soldiers. Once players reach Sejan, they quickly learn that this is all just part of an elaborate plan to retrieve some secret military Intel from his yacht. Cal Kestis disables the yacht, the masked soldiers reveal themselves as the Mantis' new crew, and Star Wars Jedi: Survivor's high-stakes action begins.
These masked soldiers are not the same Mantis crew from Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order. Instead, they are an entirely new cast of characters that Cal Kestis teamed up with in-between games. This crew includes three humans named Bode, Bravo, and Gabs along with Klatooinian twins Koob and Lizz. Each character seems ready to take on the Empire, and almost all of them perish within the first hour of the game.
Koob, Lizz, and Gabs all die once an Inquisitor shows up to take out Cal Kestis, and Bravo gets blown out of the sky as they try to escape Coruscant. The only survivors of this crew are Bode and Cal Kestis, with Bode reuniting with Kestis a bit later in the story. The rest of them are gone before they can even become interesting characters, and they deserved so much more.
This new Mantis crew could have given Respawn a ton of new story potential to work with. They all seemed like they were integral parts of Saw Gerrera's rebellion, and they all had strong working relationships with Cal Kestis. These relationships were forged offscreen, and players will probably never get to see any of that. These characters do not even play a major role in the tie-in novel, and thus feel wasted.
Respawn cannot go back now and redo how it decided to tell Star Wars Jedi: Survivor's story. The death of these characters helps really drive home the fact that this battle against Star Wars' Empire feels pointless. No matter how many people die for the cause, the Empire continues to grow in power and expand across the galaxy. It is a lesson that Cal Kestis learns again in the opening hours of the game, and their deaths are one of the big catalysts for that. They served their purpose, but they could have been more than plot devices.
Hopefully, Respawn goes back to explore these characters in more depth sometime. A simple prequel DLC could give these characters more time in the spotlight, or even another tie-in novel could do the trick. While they may have helped kickstart the plot in explosive fashion, there are also more stories that the studio could have told with them.
Star Wars Jedi: Survivor is available now on PS5, PC, and Xbox Series X/S
