Claudia Black will not return as Great Mother Klothow in the second season of Star Wars: Ahsoka after a pay dispute with Disney and Lucasfilm, a change that highlights the pressure on working actors inside big-franchise television. The Australian performer confirmed her exit while promoting the Starz series Spartacus: House of Ashur.
Black said she had been lined up for Ahsoka’s new season, then stepped away once she saw the financial terms attached to a shoot based in London while she maintains her home and family in Los Angeles. She explained that Disney “could not pay me what I needed to be paid as a single mother,” so she “had to bow out” of season two, calling the decision “very sad for me.”
In the same interview, Black described the process as professional rather than hostile, stressing that she understands the “show business” side of the industry and the current climate for expensive genre series. She said everyone involved “had to do our sums and move on,” yet she still emailed showrunner Dave Filoni to thank him for the opportunity and praised the virtual-production “Volume” stage as a rare technical experience for an actor with deep sci-fi credits.
Black appeared in three episodes of Ahsoka’s first season as Klothow, one of the Nightsister Great Mothers who ally with Grand Admiral Thrawn on Peridea and later reach Dathomir, setting up their continued importance to the story. Trade coverage and fan sites expect the character to return in some form, likely with a new performer, although no replacement has been announced.
Her departure lands as Ahsoka reshapes parts of its ensemble. Following Ray Stevenson’s death in 2023, Rory McCann has already been cast as Baylan Skoll for the new season, which began filming in the U.K. in April 2025 and is slated to debut on Disney+ in 2026.
Disney executives have repeatedly stressed “cost discipline” and tighter content spending in recent earnings calls, a shift that filters down to individual contracts on franchise shows. Black’s comments give a rare public look at how those corporate priorities intersect with relocation demands, family responsibilities and the economics of a character role inside a global streaming hit.
