A Brilliant Oscar-Winning Actress Has Joined The Star Wars Universe With The Bad Batch
There will be spoilers ahead for "Star Wars: The Bad Batch" season 3, episode 2, "Paths Unknown."
"Star Wars: The Bad Batch," the animated series that followed the popular show "Star Wars: The Clone Wars," enters its third and final season today. Throughout the show, we've been treated to incredible cameos and recurring characters familiar to fans of movies and television. One of the biggest came in the form of Rhea Perlman of "Cheers" fame, who took on the role of the Trandoshan Cid during the first two seasons. Wanda Sykes has appeared repeatedly as a treasure hunting scoundrel named Phee Genoa. Héctor Elizondo voiced a one-off character in the first season named Romar Adell. Ernie Hudson made an appearance, as did Taran Killam and Ben Schwartz. There has been no shortage of star power coming to the world of "Star Wars," but in the three-episode premiere of the third season of "The Bad Batch," an Oscar-winning actress joins the "Bad Batch" family.
Anjelica Huston is Lady Isa Durand
Best known for her icy or eccentric roles in films like "The Royal Tenenbaums" and "The Witches" or as Morticia Addams in the 1990s iterations of "The Addams Family," Anjelica Huston won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress in 1985 for her role in "Prizzi's Honor." Directed by her father, the legendary John Huston, and starring her then-boyfriend Jack Nicholson, "Prizzi's Honor" tells the tale of a pair of assassins who fall in love and are assigned to kill each other. Huston won her Oscar for playing the mob princess and daughter of the titular Prizzi.
She has made a name for herself across six decades of roles and now spends plenty of time doing voice-over work for shows ranging from "BoJack Horseman" and "American Dad" to "Trollhunters." In "The Bad Batch", she plays Lady Isa Durand, an alien character (a Devaronian) who commands a great amount of respect and power and makes a deal with the Bad Batch themselves, loath as she is to do so.
Huston has visited the (non-canonical) Star Wars galaxy before
Though Anjelica Huston has now come to "The Bad Batch" and the world of canon "Star Wars," this isn't entirely her first brush with the "Star Wars" universe. That happened last year, when she played the Sith Mother in the award-winning "Star Wars: Visions" short "Screecher's Reach" from Irish studio Cartoon Saloon. She lent her voice to the haunting short and helped create the atmosphere that made it work so well.
Though she's only recently stepped into a galaxy far, far away, Huston is no stranger to the work of George Lucas. Disney and Lucasfilm fans might remember that she played the part of Supreme Leader in "Captain EO," the Michael Jackson-led theme park attraction that was a mainstay at Disneyland and Walt Disney World for over a decade.
Whether or not Huston's character, Lady Isa Durand, will show up in future episodes of the final season of "The Bad Batch" remains to be seen, but her work on this part of the premiere was good, giving the character an icy edge that seems perfectly suited for Huston's capabilities.
New episodes in the final season of "Star Wars: The Bad Batch" premiere Wednesdays on Disney+.