After seven seasons of Star Wars: The Clone Wars and four seasons of Star Wars: Rebels, Ahsoka Tano finally made her live-action debut in The Mandalorian. As she fought alongside the Mandalorian, Ahsoka rekindled the biggest unsolved mystery of Rebels and the New Republic era. Ahsoka interrogated Elsbeth for the whereabouts of Grand Admiral Thrawn, marking the first live-action mention of the antagonist. Years prior, Thrawn vanished alongside Jedi Ezra Bridger during the Battle of Lothal. The two were transported to an unknown location via Purrgil hyperspace travel, thus leaving no hints or evidence about their location. Both of them, an Empire militant and a Jedi padawan, seemingly vanished into thin air.

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Nevertheless, the Rebels epilogue showed Ahsoka and Mandalorian Sabine Wren reuniting to continue their search. The scene doesn’t provide many details, but it does confirm that the former Ghost crew reconvenes to find Ezra. A popular fan theory suggests that Ahsoka’s new outfit — namely her staff — will be the key to finding the lost Jedi in season one of Ahsoka.

Ahsoka Tano and Gandalf The Grey

     Lucasfilm Animation

Dave Filoni, Star Wars writer, director, producer, and showrunner, famously draws inspiration from J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings. When Star Wars: Rebels and Star Wars: The Clone Wars, Filoni often shared fan-created or conceptual art that tied the shows to Tolkien’s stories. Additionally, he connects the characters of Star Wars and The Lord of the Rings not to each other but to their literary “archetype.” His frequent allusion to the series suggests that core elements of Tolkien’s storytelling technique and character development greatly influenced Star Wars.

Using this information, Ahsoka’s transformation in the Rebels epilogue scene takes on a whole new meaning. In Ahsoka’s first cinematic appearance, she is dressed in warm red hues. The clothing style evolved as she grew older, but it stayed within the initial color palette. As the series (and Ahsoka’s character) grew darker, her wardrobe took on colder tones. From season seven of Clone Wars to The Book of Boba Fett, Ahsoka is adorned in blue, gray, and black hues. This makes her appearance in bright white all the more striking.

This transition mirrors Gandalf’s transformation from “Gandalf The Grey” to “Gandalf The White.” Filoni even admitted that Ahsoka is following a similar storyline in a Vanity Fair Interview.

Ahsoka’s cloak has a deeper meaning. It suggests that like Gandalf, Ahsoka went on a personal journey, and when she returned, she was a changed person. In her transformation, she gained something — knowledge, power, experience, or notably, a mysterious new staff.

“I’ve always made comparisons to her heading toward the Gandalf stage, where she is the one that has the knowledge of the world and can help others through it. I think she’s reached that point.”

Zeb Orrelios and The Lasat Mythology

This wouldn’t be the first time that a staff guided or protected someone in Star Wars. Zeb Orrelios, a member of the Ghost crew, was led by his bo-rifle-turned-staff in season two, episode fourteen of Star Wars: Rebels (“Legends of The Lasat”). After finding two Lasat elders by pure chance, Zeb and his newfound kin attempted to fulfill an ancient prophecy. It allegedly revealed an intergalactic path to the mythic planet Lira San, a rumored safe haven for surviving Lasat. The prophecy required a chosen one, several key figures, and importantly: Zeb’s bo-rifle. When Zeb’s rifle was reassembled in the ancient way of the Lasat High Guard, it served as a makeshift torch that illuminated a hyperspace path for Chopper to follow.

This proves that many cultures and people imbued ordinary objects with great purpose. Where Zeb’s bo-rifle was initially a useful weapon, it later served as the saving grace for the Lasat species. Their entire livelihood rested on Zeb’s shoulders as the prophetic guide. This mirrors Ahsoka at the conclusion of Rebels. Ezra’s fate (and by extension, the fate of the Jedi culture) rests on Ahsoka’s shoulders. As she reunites with the Ghost crew, she is the most likely member to guide them on their search. She could wield the force by herself to locate Ezra, or she could channel it through her staff.

Luke Skywalker’s Compass

     Lucasfilm

Zeb’s bo-rifle demonstrates the potential greater purpose of ordinary objects. While the staff could mirror Zeb’s rifle in that sense, its unique shape points to other possible storylines. The circular shape attached to the top of the staff could mimic Jedi runes, it could be a nod to the “World Between Worlds,” or in the case of this theory, it could house Luke Skywalker’s compass.

Luke Skywalker’s compass was seen briefly in Star Wars: The Last Jedi and the Star Wars: Battlefront II video game. There isn’t much in the canon to explain where the compass came from outside of Pablo Hidalgo’s Star Wars: The Last Jedi Visual Dictionary. It says the “antiquated star compass was among the Jedi relics hoarded by the Emperor during his rule.” The compass contains a supraluminite lodestone, thus attuning the mechanism to hyperspace vectors. The shape, size, and relationship to the Jedi point to this being used in conjunction with the staff.

Everything Comes Together in Season One

     Lucasfilm / Disney

Season one will clarify when the series is set, and in doing so, it will explain when, how, and why Ahsoka’s transformation occurred. Like The Mandalorian, Ahsoka will be set in between Return of The Jedi and The Force Awakens. However, there is still ambiguity about when the series and Rebels epilogue take place with respect to Ahsoka’s other cinematic appearances. Dave Filoni teased this possible use of nonchronological storytelling in the same Vanity Fair interview.

Does this mean that Ahsoka reunited with Sabine before joining Luke at his new Jedi Temple? Did Ahsoka gain information on Thrawn in The Mandalorian and pass it along, opting to search for Ezra later? In The Book of Boba Fett, did Ahsoka only have the compass and not the staff? Even prior to the release of Ahsoka, the story of the padawan-turned-rebel-hero remains one of the most perplexing in Star Wars canon.

“That’s not necessarily chronological. I think the thing that people will most not understand is they want to go in a linear fashion, but as I learned as a kid, nothing in Star Wars really works in a linear fashion. You do [Episodes] Four, Five, and Six, and then One, Two, and Three. So in the vein of that history, when you look at the epilogue of Rebels, you don’t really know how much time has passed. So, it’s possible that the story I’m telling in The Mandalorian actually takes place prior to that. Possible. I’m saying it’s possible.”