I've never seen Rebels and am only halfway through the first season of Clone Wars (yeah, took me long enough, I know) so I was worried I would be lost here, but fortunately, nothing could be further from the truth. I really enjoyed this and had no issue figuring out who was who and what was what. There are a bunch of allusions to Rebels, of course, but they're done kind of like the allusions in the Original Trilogy: like backstory that might be nice to know but they mostly just add a lived-in texture to the world. Plus, bonus, I already like all the characters here so I'm even more keen to go back and finish the animated shows.
And yet, oddly, I did read all the Star Wars novels I could get my hands on when I was a kid so the likes of the Witches of Dothamir and Thrawn are hardly new to me.
Small quibbles aside (like, would it really kill these shows to use at least a couple of John Williams cues every once in a while - especially for a show that's this purely Star Warsy? and the pacing is ever so slightly off) but these couple of episodes were a very good start to what looks like a really fun Star Wars show. And after the very non-Star Warsy Andor and the just plain messy Mandalorian Season 3, it's good to feel like we're on solid ground again.