Ahsoka chronicles the titular character's journey after the fall of the Empire. But the more we learn, the stranger her absence from key Star Wars events becomes. Where was Ahsoka Tano during the original trilogy?
How might her own show fill in her missing years?
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That Practical Reason Why Ahsoka Isn't in the Original Trilogy
There's a practical reason why Ahsoka was absent from the original trilogy; her character hadn't been created yet.
It was only decades later that the Star Wars franchise expanded enough to have several adjacent stories, with many characters hopping from one to the other.
Ahsoka was introduced in the Clone Wars (2008) movie as Anakin's padawan and became one of the main characters in the Clone Wars TV series.
Initially, fans assumed that Ahsoka had probably not survived long enough to be in the original trilogy.
Star Wars Rebels reinforces that at first, with her fateful and famously inconclusive battle against her former master.
But Rebels' ending confirms Ahsoka's survival.
The character went on to appear in the New Republic stories The Mandalorian and The Book of Boba Fett before getting her own show in the same era.
Boba Fett even confirms that Ahsoka and Luke know each other.
Now that her contributions aren't confined to the pre-Battle of Yavin era, more explanations about Ahsoka's whereabouts during the original trilogy are necessary.
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Ahsoka's Whereabouts in the Original Trilogy; What We Know So Far
So far, Ahsoka's own show hasn't fully explained where she was during the original trilogy but Rebels and Ahsoka provide a few hints.
During the rebellion, Ahsoka acted as an informant and was one of the several people to use the codename Fulcrum.
After Ezra saved her, she likely continued her rebel activities until the Galaxy was liberated.
In her own mini-series, Ahsoka is hard at work trying to prevent Grand Admiral Thrawn's return as heir to the Empire.
Her show starts by stating that Ahsoka has captured one of Thrawn's subordinates, Morgan Elsbeth.
Moreover, she is now in possession of a map that might reveal Ezra and Thrawn's location.
It's implied that this search took several years.
Given that Ezra's removal of Thrawn into another Galaxy happened before the Battle of Yavin, it's possible that Ahsoka and Sabine have looked for a way to reach Ezra on and off since then.
Moreover, we now know that Ahsoka spent some of the 'missing years' in her timeline mentoring Sabine Wren although she walked away from her apprentice some years before Ahsoka's events.
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Why Didn't Ahsoka Help Luke?
Other than the practical reason discussed above -- namely that the character didn't exist yet -- Star Wars might justify Ahsoka's independent path by giving her a backstory that shows she was needed elsewhere.
Since Ahsoka is such an important character, fans question why she wasn't by Luke's side.
After all, the quest to bring Anakin back to the light would surely have resonated with her.
First of all, depending on what Ahsoka was doing at the time, she might not have known the truth about Luke's parentage until later.
Although Tales of the Jedi reveals that it was Senator Organa, Leia's adoptive father, who recruited Ahsoka into the rebellion, this doesn't automatically mean that he revealed information about Anakin's children.
Other than him and Obi-Wan, very few people were aware of Luke and Leia's real parentage at the time.
If Ahsoka didn't know, she likely didn't have a personal motivation to join Luke instead of continuing her own anti-Empire activities.
But even if she did know, perhaps she was aware that saving Anakin from himself was not her own mission.
Ever since she left the Jedi order, her path was a solitary one.
Toward the end of Rebels, she reaches the conclusion that she's unable to save her former master.
Perhaps the disillusionment that came from this realization prevented her from acting as a mentor for Luke.
Alternatively, she might have known that Luke would do alright with the help he did have and felt that she would be more useful elsewhere.
Hopefully, Ahsoka will reveal more about the titular character's path during her missing years.
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