Star Wars: The Clone Wars' Asajj Ventress may have been killed off in a book, but here's how she can still return onscreen. The deadly Sith assassin made her debut appearance in Genndy Tartakovsky's cell-animated Clone Wars series in 2003, but proved to be so popular that she was brought back for the show's CGI follow-up several years later. And despite having met her end in a canon novel, there's still a chance that Asajj could make a welcome return in a future Star Wars film or TV project.

Taken on as an apprentice by Count Dooku during the Clone Wars, Asajj Ventress was notoriously deadly in battle. Armed with powerful Force abilities, capable of incredible acrobatics, and proficient in lightsaber combat, the former Night Sister of Dathomir caused a great deal of trouble for the Jedi and their clone army during the early days of the war. However, Darth Sidious began to fear her power, and coerced Dooku into assassinating her as a sign of loyalty. The attempt failed, and Asajj would survive and reunite with her fellow Night Sisters until they were wiped out in a brutal massacre led by General Grievous.

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In the years following her escape, Asajj became a bounty hunter, briefly aided Obi-Wan Kenobi, and began to repent from her evil ways. Ultimately, her story would come to an end in the canon Star Wars novel Dark Disciple, in which she falls in love with Jedi Quinlan Vos and sacrifices her life to save him from the murderous Count Dooku. This story was originally intended to be an entire story arc in The Clone Wars, but was converted into a novel following the show's cancelation by Disney. Ever since the book's publication, many Star Wars fans have rallied behind the idea of Asajj's return, and even Asajj's voice actress, Grey Griffin, has expressed a desire to return to the role. Thankfully, there are plenty of ways to bring the character back, even if a few of them involve breaking the established canon.

The simplest solution for returning Asajj Ventress to the screen is to move back in time and tell new stories prior to her Dark Disciple death. Star Wars is no stranger to telling stories spread out across the timeline of the series, and there are plenty of blank spaces in Asajj's story that could be filled in with TV episodes or even a feature film. Another viable option is for The Clone Wars' director Dave Filoni and his team to do for Asajj what they did for the Bad Batch characters in their recent animated show, and give her a Disney+ series all her own. It could even adapt the events of Dark Disciple and tell the story of Asajj's redemption, Quinlan Vos' fall to the Dark Side, and the love the two shared before her ultimate sacrifice.

Of course, both of these options would mean working around the fixed canonical point of Asajj's death. However, Disney and Lucasfilm have defied the canon of published material before, with one notable example being the big differences between Ahsoka Tano's Order 66 survival in the 2016 Ahsoka book and how it was handled in The Clone Wars season 7. There's even proof that Lucasfilm has already considered this approach for Asajj; it was recently confirmed that an episode of the animated series Star Wars: Resistance was originally intended to feature an older Asajj, but the idea was dropped to avoid distracting the audience. Since Resistance is set decades after Asajj's death, this cameo would've effectively de-canonized her Dark Disciple fate. If Disney is willing to follow through on the idea of ignoring the book, then Asajj could finally be free to return to Star Wars and forge a brand new destiny within the franchise.

Next: How Star Wars: The Clone Wars Retconned Episode II's Clone Troopers

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