Star Wars: The Clone Wars Season 7 Episode 5 Easter Eggs Explained

Ahsoka returns! Once a Jedi and now a runaway, she has to make her own way in the dangerous lower levels of Coruscant’s planet-sized city. This episode kicks off an arc that will last most of the season, leading to the Siege of Mandalore, one of the last conflicts in The Clone Wars (and one mentioned in The Mandalorian.) Down in the lower levels, Ahsoka hides her Jedi powers and meets up with struggling mechanic Trace Martez. 

Here are all the references and easter eggs we found in “Gone With a Trace”:

Level 1313

Coruscant’s seediest level was originally the setting of two Star Wars projects that never saw the light of day. George Lucas originally invented this location for what was intended to be the first Star Wars live-action TV series, Underworld. The idea was canned in 2010 due to budget concerns, although two seasons of the show had already been scripted.

Level 1313 was also supposed to be the setting of the video game Star Wars: 1313, an action-adventure game that would have starred Boba Fett making his way through the criminal underworld of Coruscant. The game was canceled when LucasArts was shuttered as a game studio and exclusive game rights were given to Electronic Arts.

1313 survived thanks to The Clone Wars season two episode “Lethal Trackdown,” which mentioned the location.

Ahsoka’s Story

The current Clone Wars arc, known as “Ahsoka’s Walkabout,” features some similarities to the YA novel Ahsoka by E.K. Johnston, which was published in 2016. The novel references the Siege of Mandalore but takes place after The Clone Wars.

Like in “Gone With A Trace,” Ahsoka goes to a place where she needs to lay low and meets two girls. In the book, she poses as a mechanic and befriends Kaeden Larte, a girl with Rebel sympathies from a farming family, and Kaeden’s sister. 

Nebula-class Freighter 

Trace mentions she’s transforming a Nebula-class freighter into her new home in the stars. This designation is probably familiar to Star Wars fans interested in minutia, but in a different context. The Nebula-class Star Destroyer type occasionally cropped up in the Legends continuity, but even in that timeline, some inconsistencies made it hard to say what was a Nebula and what wasn’t. 

For example, the Legends New Republic incorporated a Nebula-class Star Destroyer (also known as a Defender-class Star Destroyer) into its fleet during the Black Fleet Crisis trilogy of novels by Michael P. Kube-McDowell.

Lando’s Laundromat

Ok, it isn’t technically Lando’s. But Rafa Martez’s laundromat features a few signs in the Star Wars in-universe alphabet, Aurebesh, that reference the legendary baron administrator. One reads “Landomat,” another “Calrissian.” These references are also a bit reminiscent of the tongue-in-cheek branding for the Javva the Hutt coffeeshop in the Lucasfilm corporate building.

Lando probably doesn’t have anything to do with this show since he would have been a teenager during the Clone Wars. But it’s fun to think he’s out there causing juvenile levels of trouble.

Graffiti throughout the episode is also written in Aurebesh. 

Binary Loadlifters

The droids Ahsoka and Trace repair call back to a one-off concept first mentioned in A New Hope. In the first act of the movie, C-3PO mentions his “first job was programming binary loadlifters,” making him suitable to work on the moisture vaporators the Lars family use on in their farm on Tatooine. (What C-3PO meant by his first job when he was in fact built by Anakin Skywalker is unclear since he’d had his mind wiped between Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope.) The specific type of loadlifters Ahsoka works on are brand new for the show.

Loth-Cats 

Running around on Coruscant’s streets are some familiar and beloved little critters from Lothal. The Loth-cats, the big-eyed, big-eared, skinny-legged animals you see in a pack in one of the episode’s crowd shots, first appeared on Star Wars Rebels. They were important to the plot of that show in that they helped Jedi apprentice Ezra Bridger learn he could connect to animals using the Force. More importantly, they also became fan favorites because of their cute design.

While Loth-cats are native to Lothal, they also seem to have spread throughout the galaxy, winding up on the planets Batuu, the setting of Galaxy’s Edge at the Disney parks, and Sorgan in The Mandalorian.