One of Star Wars’ Best TV Series Is Being Uploaded To YouTube For Free

Star Wars fans now have the opportunity to experience one of the franchise's best shows, Star Wars: Rebels, at no cost, as full episodes have begun being uploaded onto YouTube.

After starting as primarily a film franchise (with a couple of outliers sprinkled in), Star Wars now has well over a dozen TV shows in its library, with more being released all the time.

For example, new episodes of Andor are currently being released on Tuesdays on Disney+, and a brand new animated installment of the Tales series (called Tales of the Underworld) is set to premiere on May 4.

Star Wars Rebels Episodes Are Being Uploaded to YouTube for Free

Disney recently uploaded the very first episode of Star Wars Rebels, "Spark of Rebellion: Part 1," to the Star Wars Kids YouTube channel. The episode was released on the channel on April 18 entirely for free, and includes no ads before or during the video.

This is a bit surprising considering Star Wars Rebels is widely considered one of the best shows in the entire franchise, and many would likely have no problem subscribing to Disney+ so that they could watch the series.

At the time of its release and in the days following, the first episode was all that was released from Rebels. However, exactly one week later, on April 25, Disney then released Episode 2, "Spark of Rebellion: Part 2," on the same YouTube channel.

Once again, Episode 2 didn't feature any ads before or during the video, meaning that fans can watch it without paying any money at all, as long as they have access to YouTube.

Now that two full episodes of Rebels have been released on YouTube, many may be wondering whether new episodes will continue to be added.

Under the playlists tab of the Star Wars Kids YouTube channel (and on the homepage), there is a playlist titled "Star Wars Rebels | Full Episodes Every Friday."

So, it seems as though fans can expect new Rebels episodes to be released weekly until the entire series has been added (ad-free) to the Star Wars Kids channel.

Why Is Disney Uploading Star Wars Rebels for Free?

As mentioned, it is a bit surprising that Disney would choose to upload full episodes of one of the most popular Star Wars shows ever created for free. The entire series is behind a paywall on Disney+, or can be purchased digitally and physically, so by making the episodes free, Disney is ultimately losing money on the front end.

Rebels is not only one of the best Star Wars shows, but also one of the most important. It may even be the most important, but that claim could be disputed.

If someone were to list out every single Star Wars project that has ever been released and then draw a line between the projects that directly connect, Rebels may have more lines than any other movie or show.

Without Rebels, the storyline for Ahsoka and the larger MandoVerse wouldn't be what it is today. Darth Vader's story wouldn't be as fleshed out as it is because of that show. Even Hayden Christensen would not have been able to return to the galaxy far, far away as Anakin Skywalker in the World Between Worlds without Rebels.

Ultimately, Star Wars is likely releasing the episodes for free on the Star Wars Kids YouTube channel for a couple of reasons. One of those reasons is to expose that channel's subscribers to Rebels for no cost in hopes that they want to watch the rest of the series without waiting for episodes to release each week.

If a YouTube subscriber wasn't subscribed to Disney+, they (or their parent, since it is the kids channel) may actually pay for Disney+ just so they will have access to the full show.

Another reason is simply to continue to build out the subscriber base of the YouTube channel and get more viewership. More viewership is never a bad thing, even if those viewers aren't directly generating revenue from watching those particular episodes.

If someone were to begin watching the episodes for free and still never subscribed to Disney+ or anything like that, who is to say they wouldn't want to buy a Rebels action figure, a Chopper t-shirt, or even a replica lightsaber?

Ultimately, Rebels being added to YouTube for free is a long-term business plan that Disney sees as profitable. Luckily, all parties have the chance to benefit since fans (particularly the young ones) are being exposed to the upper tier of what Star Wars has to offer.