Elisabeth Moss, Bryce Dallas Howard love Baby Yoda, and Laura Dern may have seen him at a basketball game?
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The collective love of Baby Yoda is so pure and powerful that, were it possible to distill and reproduce, that love could thwart global warming, solve the energy crisis, and turn everyone’s poop into confetti cake. Baby Yoda could very well usher the world into a new age, one that future generations might look back upon with reverence and dub “The Great Affectioning.” And while your love for Baby Yoda is nice and all, you are not a famous person, therefore your opinion is not nearly as consequential (if at all)—if a tree falls in the woods, etc. But the opinions of Elisabeth Moss and Bryce Dallas Howard (who actually directed an episode of The Baby Yoda Show, featuring special guest Helmet Guy) do matter very much, so it’s a good thing they also love that little bug-eyed green puppet baby.
Moss, a Scientologist, believes that Baby Yoda has “united the country in a way that is very necessary”—possibly because it has distracted us from the Dark Lord furiously and indiscriminately mashing buttons in the Oval Office, or maybe because it has given us something in common with Elisabeth Moss, a Scientologist:
Bryce Dallas Howard, who directed the most recent episode, told Vulture that when she first laid eyes upon the magnificently cute Baby Yoda, she had a rather visceral reaction:
I think I screamed. [Laughs.] It was a physical reaction — I’m holding my face right now, I’m squeezing it, because the baby is so cute.
This is a perfectly normal response, but—as illustrated by what Howard says next—it’s worth noting that prolonged exposure to Baby Yoda may trigger psychosis in some patients. Please speak with your doctor about the side effects of Baby Yoda to determine what’s best for you.
Something that might really be not true, but I heard recently and I was like, “Oh, I feel this is true,” is that someone told me that when you see something cute, it fires a part of your brain that’s very close to the violence part of your brain. And that’s why you say, “I just want to smush it. I just want to squeeze.” It’s that kind of visceral reaction — you get that burst [of feeling] when you see those eyes and those ears and those cute little hands.
It seems that Baby Yoda is enjoying his new celebrity status as much as the rest of us because, according to Laura Dern, she spotted him at a recent basketball game. Just don’t ask her for more details because Laura Dern is most definitely not about to narc on her space friends:
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Laura Dern: “That’s all I’m going to say, thank you”Interviewer: “But Ms Dern, are you sure -”Laura Dern: “I SAID THANKYOOOOOU!!!!!”
I like how Laura Dern is always pleasant and collected, but her inner life seems like the life of a character Laura Dern might play.
And that is 100% her role in the first Jurassic Park lol
Yes.Celebrities.They’re. Just. Like. Us.Okay, the baby is cute. I’ve watched two episodes twice, just to watch the baby interact with Mando. And equally as important, Mando’s reaction to this cute little green orphan, who is making a fuss and a muss of his plans, seemingly just for fun (the flipping of switches just to be a dick was pretty funny).
Annnnnnnnnnnnnnd calm the fuck down. I’m all for a moment of cultural alignment, and most of us can agree that this little fake person is super adorable, but Jesus. I’m sure I’ll buy a plushy when they don’t have a 7-month pre-order window, but the amount of time dedicated and absurd tonnage of interest is incredible.
Okay, the baby is cute
RIP Happy Endings.
Side note: Just watched Happy Endings all over again on Hulu and it’s 1000000000 times better than Friends or How I Met Your Mother. It’s the spiritual predecessor to New Girl.
I’ve watched every single episode of all 4 sitcoms you mentioned.Friends & How I met your Mother have laugh tracks. They are like a different animal to New Girl & Happy Endings.In keeping with your “spiritual predecessor” analogy : Friends, How I met your Mother are like two cute little capuchin monkeys named Marcel and Barney; New Girl is a Neanderthal and Happy Endings is Einstein.
Laugh tracked shows are terrible. I can safely make it through multiple episodes of the two latters, and while you are technically right, I believe they’re all considered Sitcoms and ensembles so I think it’s apt to hold them up to one another. I also disagree with New Girl being described as a Neanderthal, but that’s because I’m in love with Cici
Yeah, but the analogy is they are all considered sitcoms the way monkeys and humans are all considered primates, just cos you can group doesn’t mean easy to. I love CeCe too, and Lamorne Morris, and Nasim Pedrad was the perfect addition. Well, *you* made the spiritual predecessor analogy about the New Girl/Happy Endings, and Einstein’s predecessor was a Neanderthal, so … well, Neanderthals had their moments!I was a fan of all 4 shows – I actually enjoy Friends reruns when I catch them on (which is all the time on UK TV). In contrast, I have to change the channel if I stumble on How I met Your Mother which I know I enjoyed back in the day but find unwatchable now. New Girl eps are very hit and miss on rewatch – more misses than hits. Happy Endings still seems fresh and like comedy genius whenever I see it. It will just never NOT be a joy to watch! (Don’t trust the B is another that’s still fresh!)
You spent more time writing about it than 99.9999999999999999999999% of people have spent thinking about it.
Just FYI.
Counterpoint: One of the celebrities directed an episode of The Mandalorian which heavily featured Baby Yoda. So it makes sense to ask her opinion. And another is national treasure Laura fucking Dern.
So, do you think Laura Dern misunderstood the question and gave a generic answer that sounds completely off the wall in context, that she was teasing the interviewer, or that she actually saw Baby Yoda at a basketball game?I think it’s the last one. And the “basketball game” was at a YMCA where she, David Lynch, Kyle McLachlan, and Michael Horse were playing Horse (yeah, he does think it’s funny).
old man shakes fist at cloud
I probably saw “awwwwww” out loud like six times during the last episode I watched. The EARS oh lawd those little ears and the little fuzzy hairs and the way he toddles
His little wobbly walk gets me everytime.
same, also laughed my ass off at his I’m just gonna look straight at you and push this button anyway move
I’m a fan of the little extend-the-hand-and-squint move myself.
Would it kill the whole thing if one time he just farted?
Yoda is dead. This is not Baby Yoda, unless it’s a clone, but even then, it’s not YODA, but a clone of Yoda. Most likely, it’s a young one of his species.
Everyone knows that. Why do you “Well, actually it’s not Yoda” people feel compelled to make that comment? No one thinks the baby is Yoda, it’s just that saying/typing “Baby Yoda” is a lot less time consuming than saying/typing “Baby who is the same species as Yoda”.
They’re salty 🙂
The problem is that we don’t know what Yoda’s species is called. So referring to the child as a baby version of Yoda makes sense. And it’s sorter than saying “the baby of the unknown species that Yoda is a member of.”Hopefully we – or the Mandalorian – find out more about this species before this season is over. Like what they are called? Why are they so rare? Are they all force-sensitive?We shouldn’t make sweeping generalizations based on 1 or 2 examples, but the only two members of this species we have seen so far (Yoda & Yaddle) have been Jedi masters. Now this baby is clearly force sensitive. We haven’t seen a single other member of the race. And Lucas always refused to give any background on them, including the name of their race.
“At no point in your rambling, incoherent response were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this room is now dumber for having listened to it. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul.”
Have you considered this thoughit’s baby yoda
It’s Baby Yoda. Sorry you don’t like it.
Yoda was the scientist. This is Yoda’s Monster.
It’s Yoda, baby.
You’re both right and wrong. You see. Yodas are not a species. They are aborted force fetuses. So they come from all races.
I thought there was some sort of an accident with a time machine and a contraceptive…
Kudos to BD Howard on episode 4 of The Mandalorian btw.
She nailed it. “Magnificent Two.”
FTW
I’ve been watching The Mandalorian and it has grown on me. And, of course, everybody loves the baby. But there is one thing about it that bothers me and I couldn’t quite put my finger one what it is. Then I read a review that nailed it. She wrote that it’s hard to develop an emotional attachment to a hero who rarely speaks and you never see his face. I can see him not showing his face to the others. But why can’t we, the audience, see his face?
They keep pushing the “Mandalorians never take their helmets off” thing so hard, that it’s obvious that he’s going to at some time and they’re probably hoping that it’ll have more overall emotional heft than if we’d seen his face all along.I’m calling it now: Mando is actually Samus.
“And then I take off the helmet and you see I’m a lizard person too. Cut to black. End of episode.”
Sorry I’m not up on all of the Star Wars trivia so I have no idea who Samus is. It does amaze me, though, that the Star Wars geeks know the name of every character who ever appeared in a movie, no matter how small his role was. They know the name of the character who appeared for 3 seconds just to left of Darth Vader in the first movie. Who knew these guys even had names?!
Samus is from the game Metroid, about a inter galactic bounty hunter in a power suit, who at the end of the game is revealed to actually be female. Fans have been theorizing that the Mandalorian is a female using a male voice changer.
I feel like he either has to be a lot more talkative or a lot more expressive with his physicality to engage me as a character.
Agreed. Right now he’s kind of a nothing character who fights a lot.
I kind of like not seeing his face. He has to make his voice and gestures do all the acting because we don’t see his expressions.
I just want to see Moss have one of her trademark awkward Peggy Olson conversations with Baby Yoda now.