Parents, this is why you never leave your adopted magic baby unattended while he’s channeling the Force, even for a moment. The Mandalorian is firing up its jetpack and zooming its way towards a finale, and Mando’s got a whole crew of legendary Star Wars fighters (plus Bill Burr) backing him as he goes to confront the series’ Big Bad, Moff Gideon (Giancarlo Esposito), and save baby Grogu from the newly revitalized Empire. The most grizzled bounty hunters in the galaxy cannot resist the lil’ guy’s squinty charms—not even the legendary Boba Fett (Temuera Morrison), who interrupts Mando and Grogu’s mystical quest on the Jedi’s home planet, Tython, early on.
As has become routine on the series, this week Mando was offered a quid pro quo by Fett and the newly cybernetic Fennec Shand (Ming-Na Wen), who Fett rebuilt with a brand-new mechanical stomach after Mando left her for dead on the sands of Tatooine last season. Fett wants his armor back, and Mando’s got it stowed away on the Razor Crest after collecting it as his payment for another quid pro quo arrangement with Cobb Vanth (Timothy Olyphant) on the season two premiere. However, unlike last week, this week the negotiations/standoff went spectacularly wrong, as the tracking device the Empire put on the Razor Crest a couple of episodes back led Gideon’s troops straight to them.
Luckily, Fett runs down to the ship to grab his armor before the Razor Crest goes to gunship heaven. That’s amid the melee that takes up a good portion of “The Tragedy,” an episode that’s light on plot but heavy on weaponry—heaven to a certain sect of Star Wars fans. There are lots of blasters, of course, including a cannon and rocket launchers. But the coolest weapon of the week is one that Fett presumably took off of a fallen enemy back on Tatooine: A gaderffii stick, the traditional weapon of Tusken Raiders, which Fett uses to smash in a Stormtrooper’s helmet (among other badass moves). Although their deal is technically done, Fett and Shand offer to stick around and help Mando get Grogu back after he’s plucked from the seeing rock at the center of the ancient Jedi temple by Dark Troopers. (Fett did say, “I guarantee the safety of the child as well as your own,” which is pretty open ended.) And that’s good, because Mando’s gonna be bumming rides for a while.
This season, we’ve seen Grogu (a.k.a The Child, a.k.a. Baby Yoda, a.k.a. Yodito) develop a personality beyond just being adorable. He’s a growing boy who’s hungry all the time, for one, and shocked some, let’s say, more sensitive viewers when he ate Frog Lady’s unfertilized eggs, even though they’re her last ones and she can’t make any more. (Everything turned out all right in the end, though.) That incident suggested an underlying recklessness, one that could be dangerous if Grogu doesn’t learn discipline as his Force powers grow. Ahsoka Tano warned Mando that Grogu’s powers could be corrupted by his emotions, and we saw a glimpse of that at the end of this week’s episode, when he threw Stormtroopers around like rag dolls aboard Gideon’s ship. Anger, as we know, is the gateway to the Dark Side, and with Grogu in the Empire’s clutches, Mando better act fast before they have a new Anakin Skywalker on their hands.
Before “The Tragedy” descends into chaos and one hell of a cliffhanger, we see a vulnerable moment between Mando and Grogu on the Razor Crest (RIP), as Mando tests his adopted son’s abilities. Mando seems to be on a rollercoaster of emotions right now, first chuckling when Grogu responds to his name (I think it’s pretty funny too, Mando), then choking back tears under his helmet in anticipation of having to say goodbye. Later on in the episode, he tries to act like he doesn’t really care, telling Fett and Shand that “The Child is gone” with the implication that there’s no use going after him now. But he does care, and although he’s not a perfect father—not to backseat parent, but he knows Grogu gets tired easily and that force field (heh) wasn’t going to last for too long—he’s trying. And he’ll keep trying, up to the one-on-one confrontation with Gideon we all know is coming. Can Darksabers cut through beskar? Asking for a mercenary friend.
Stray observations
- This week’s episode was directed by the Robert Rodriguez of Sin City and Planet Terror fame (or Spy Kids and Alita: Battle Angel, if you’re a bit younger than I am). But aside from his signature “character looking at the camera while an explosion rages in the background” shot, I didn’t see a lot of his visual signatures here. Rodriguez is known for extensive use of green screen backgrounds in his films—he was a pioneer in the field, in fact—so it’s interesting that the majority of “The Tragedy” seems to have been shot on location.
- Speaking of, I’m honestly not sure if I liked the setting (obviously inland California somewhere) of this week’s main firefight. On the one hand, it lacked the visual interest of the series’ more fantastical locations. On the other, stormtroopers clambering over boulders has a “kids playing Star Wars” kind of vibe that I enjoyed.
- Temuera Morrison also played Boba Fett’s father Jango Fett in the movie prequels, which is fine because Boba is a clone anyway.
- The depiction of the ancient Jedi temple as a Stonehenge-type structure, blended with Grogu sitting in a classic meditation posture, is the kind of lore I like to geek out on. The Jedi blend a number of ancient religious concepts and traditions, and Druids and ancient Indian yogis are good ones to crib from.
- Following last week’s introduction of Ahsoka Tano to the Star Wars live-action universe, Vanity Fair interviewed the actor who plays her, Rosario Dawson, about a number of things—including the lawsuit filed last year by a trans man who once worked for Dawson’s family alleging that they assaulted, harassed, and belittled him based on his gender. The suit is ongoing, with two claims surrounding an alleged assault by Dawson’s mother still outstanding. (The other 18 claims were withdrawn over the summer, which could be seen as the influence of Dawson’s money on the case.) For her part, Dawson says the charges are untrue, adding, “this is coming from someone I’ve known since I was a teenager … it really just makes me sad. But I still have a great empathy for him.” The plaintiff in the case, Dedrek Finley, said in 2019 that “I always hoped there would be some reconciliation, but when it goes physical, that’s it. You have to take a stand for yourself … not only for myself but for the community.”
- Dawson doesn’t appear in this episode, but Gina Carano, who comes with her own transphobic baggage, does. I’m fine with her staying behind a desk for the remainder of the season.
- In an interview with SFX magazine back in May, Rodriguez revealed that he was not Jon Favreau’s initial choice to direct “The Tragedy,” but he did jump in when his buddy—Rodriguez has appeared on Favreau’s The Chef Show, and Rodriguez in turn interviewed Favreau on his show The Director’s Chair—needed a last-minute replacement. “I mean, it was so fun, you can’t imagine what it’s like to walk on a set that has the classic look of The Empire Strikes Back,” he said. “You really feel like you just walked into your childhood. “
462 Comments
I like how Gideon just let Grogu toss those troopers around just to see what the kid could do. Worst. Boss. Ever.
Moff Gideon doesn’t get out the teeny tiny baby handcuffs unless he knows he needs them.
Right? Do they have like,an entire locker of progressively larger handcuffs???
Let’s take a look at that, shall we? Hmm… baby Yoda can move things with his mind. Perhaps he needs a little assistance from some hand-waving. But mostly it’s with his mind. So to incapacitate him, we’ll put handcuffs on him which A) don’t do anything to inhibit his Force powers and B) don’t immobilize his hands, just force them together which, for all they know, could make his telekinetic abilities even STRONGER!!!Sorry, I’m a lifelong SW geek, I promise, but the threadbare story choices here are REALLY pissing me off…To wit:2 troop transports land. Our heroes kill, what? maybe 50 baddies by the time all is done? 60? When initially, like 10 troopers were in the first transport? Were the rest of them throwing up from fear inside the transport? How the fuck did they all fit? And all the troopers were felled by only one shot each … and stormtrooper cross-eyed aim is in full effect here too, as well as the “I have a rifle but I’m going to take several steps toward an armed and obviously capable opponent with my weapon held across my abdomen, pointing to my right instead of straight ahead” school of combat.But my favorite is the E-Web cannon being set up in what looks like the center of a fucking FOOTBALL field-sized area of flat, open ground, while at least 2 armed opponents are clearly mowing down everything that moves all around them. The absolute lack of basic self-preservation, let alone STRATEGY, was ALMOST enough to make me abort the end of the episode. (I mean, I AM a SW geek… of course I’m gonna watch…)At this point, though, I’m about ready to say screw it and wait for the series to finish entirely, then just look for a guide that suggests episodes that don’t totally suck.The fan-service is definitely cool, but the combat has absolutely no imagination, no tension, no uncertainty. Last week’s episode I was shouting at the screen, “Run away you faceless snorkel-monsters! Run, Reese! Go save Sarah Connor! Yeah, you’ll die in that story too but at least it’s entertaining!” Watching red-shirts get owned by a Jedi was never so predictable or yawn-worthy.
i wonder how many of those baby handcuffs they have sitting around, and WHY?
He’s the anti-Gus, who was the best boss ever (at least to his fast food employees).
Just don’t let him near a box cutter.Also, Esposito is scarier when he smiles.
Esposito’s smile always makes me think of his detective in The Usual Suspects when he gets kind of a creepy smile on his face when the burned guy starts yelling about Kaiser Soze.
Except for that time he slit his loyal minion’s throat in front of Walter and Jesse to make a point.
Hence the parenthetical “(at least to his fast food employees).”
His minion was wrong, and it was business. He wanted walt under control and knew walt was better.
To be fair, that loyal minion, Victor, was kind of an asshole.
Kind of hilarious that even a child can wreck Storm Troopers. Boba Fett doing it by himself didn’t seem so impressive after that, lol. They’re so worthless.
You’d think the Empire would figure out something better than Napoleonic era run-straight-at-them-with-no-cover battle tactics. Or that guys holding long range weapons wouldn’t run straight up to the guy who can only hurt you if you get within fighting stick range. No wonder Finn wanted out. He appears to have been the smartest Stormtrooper of all time.
Best part of a not good trilogy.
On the flipside, he’s surprisingly good with kids! (When not having them shackled and probed, of course. But who among us AMIRITE?)
Even better, I think he did it, so that Yodito would tired himself out so that he could talk shit to him before knocking him out. Peak villain, im going to talk shit to a lil baby
I also saw it as a “I’m going to let this kid tire himself out so he can’t choke me to death” kinda plan.
The man was introduced killing a bunch of his own soldiers to make some kind of point (I’m still a bit unclear about what it was). But this guy does seem to be a wannabe Darth Vader, so killing the underlings seems par for that course.
You know, if Gideon was smart, he would realize he can’t deploy Stormtroopers like an endless supply of disposable weapons. This is post-Empire. There’s no recruitment and training academy anymore. He’s got maybe a couple thousand loyalists working with him? Wanna-Be-Vader should realize he needs to budget his resources.
Was just telling a friend it’d be cool to break with tradition and have Mando lose his signature ship and have to get a new one. I’m now wondering if Boba will die and Mando will inherit Slave I. Seems a bit too Star Wars-y to keep things so insular.
I am betting myself that they just somehow remake the Razor Crest. I still don’t understand how Slave 1 works. Is there a rotating pod in the middle of it?
The Lego set showed me how it works. Yeah, the two side pods rotate to direct its thrust. It’s goofy but it makes sense.
Yep! You can actually see how it works in Attack of the Clones.
After the polar planet episode, I figured Mando would look at the smoking rubble and say, “Give me ten minutes to get it flying again.”I’m enjoying the show for its style and acting, but its plotting is dumber than dirt.
*extremely Oscar Isaac voice*
“Somehow, … the Empire returned.”
I gotta admit I was extremely iffy about bringing back Fett. But god damn it worked. Morrison being too old for the role was nicely sidestepped by his sarlacc digestion scars, and there were some real neat tricks up his sleeves (watch those knee rockets!). Those incredibly brutal armour smashing blows from his (sand people?) staff were crunchy and satisfying in a way the show/star wars in general hasn’t really managed yet, really great work from Rodriguez. Seeing the Slave One touch down and him don that armour again just worked so well, even as someone skeptical as to the idea of making him a prominent or even alive character in the new continuity. Still hope he gets to play Rex at some point though. Also retconning Jango’s story a second time was a great idea. He makes sense as a foundling, I always hated that they made him a fake mandalorian that stole his armour, so having Mando and Boba find common ground like that really brings it together.
It was nice that they finally let Boba Fett do something useful and cool in a Star Wars story. He’s been skating on his reputation for 40 years now.
That was my hesitation. His reputation was entirely based on looking cool over like ten minutes of screen time total, 1 of which had him dying in an extremely goofy bit of slapstick (eu notwithstanding). Now here we are with a badass Fett who immediately earned the reputation he had.
Sadly, I doubt Captain Phasma will ever get such a reprieve.
Hey, you never know, a young Phasma could show up on this show!
I’d be down for that.
Oooh, maybe she’s wearing Beskar!
Was just thinking about her once I was reminded about how little screen time Fett had as such a fan favorite. Man, they really botched Finn and Phasma’s arc.
AgreedFinn was my favorite breakout character in TFA and when they announced that GoT’s Gwendoline Christie would be playing a villain in cool-looking Stormtrooper armor, I was psyched. Way to fuck both those characters up.
Finn was great in The Last Jedi too. But after the way Rise of Skywalker unfolder, I kind of think it would have been better if they’d just let Finn sacrifice himself on the salt planet near the end of The Last Jedi.
My issue with Finn in TLJ is they basically reset his character. His arc didn’t progress. Here, again, we see him trying to sneak off to find Rey and leave the Resistance behind until Rose stuns and kidnaps him for no reason. And yeah, as much as I like Finn, his character would’ve been better served sacrificing himself to stop the battering canon than what we got instead.So many things would’ve worked better if Leia had sacrificed herself instead of Holdo. This would’ve given Luke the push he needed to train Rey in TRoS and then Luke should’ve sacrificed himself to give Rey the power of all the Jedi to stop Palpatine.Then again, I dunno if anything could’ve saved TRoS. The Palpatine angle was just terrible, to say nothing of the fact that they gave it away in the opeing crawl of the movie.
Agree. And I thought
Temuera Morrison was fantastic. And how great was it that he has a bit of a gut and didn’t fit perfectly in his old armor. Just fantastic. And they finally let him kick ass. Guys my age remember the missile on the action figure before Empire Strikes Back came out. We loved him before he was even in a film. And that missile was a chocking hazard and the figure was changed. NOW IT’S BACK!
The deep cuts with the old toy designs are so great. Mando and Rebels have both made use of this 40 year old Imperial Transport, which allows 48 year old me to tell my 53 year old brother, see, it is so a real vehicle that the Storm Troopers use!
Ten minutes is probably a bit generous.
The Mandalorian will have justified its own existence for this alone.
Yep, I said to the wife exactly that: “So much for Boba Fett not being a bad-ass…”
I told my husband: “Well, he’s definitely earned the armor now.”
Mine said the same!
He really redeemed himself for getting embarassed in the OG movies. He made mando look like a rookie by comparison. Mando eats lasers with his beskar but Mando just fucked everyone up without taking a hit.
Yes! I turn 40 next month & have been a Star Wars fan that whole time & this is the first time he’s done anything bad-ass besides glower in a helmet. It was great to see.
I felt this way about Vader in the ending scene in Rogue One, I know Rebels has shown him as fearsome and menacing, and he was unstoppably terrifying in Fallen Order, but to see him actually earn his reputation as an absolute unstoppable force in that 30 or so seconds of screen time made me giddy with childlike joy.This was the same feeling.
Lol right? I remember seeing him in ESB and thought how cool he looked. Then thinking in RTJ he was going to showoff his badass skills and gets shafted with a lame “kill”. I would like to see an “origin” story of what he did and how he became the badass bounty hunter we know now.
I remember as a kid in the Seventies, wondering why all the boys at school were so obsessed with Boba Fett when he was such a small part of the film. Watching this I got it for the first time. He really was impressive.
it’s almost like that was the entire point, that he was some intimidating looking guy who would just get accidentally killed by mr. magoo, but the fanfic crowd could never allow anything be anything more than surface-level action figures bumping into each other
Yeah, I prefer my childhood version of Fett. Badass-looking guy who got what he deserved.Also, what’s with this bounty-hunter-with-a-heart-of-gold thing they’re doing with him? I know there’s a guild, and there are guild rules, etc but for a series that supposedly owes so much to westerns they seem to have no concept of the existing characterization of the “bounty hunter” type.
He out played Han Solo.
To be fair, he also had an extremely cool ship.
On paper, I hated the idea of bringing back Boba Fett, but this was super fun and it was nice to see the most overblown, overrated character in the franchise’s history actually get to be cool.
This episode was tremendous fun.
Also nice to see Temeura Morrison, who may have been the only actor to escape Attack of the Clones with a tiny bit of his dignity intact, getting to rejoin the star wars universe in a vehicle that isn’t, you know, completely awful.
Oh, hell no. Whilst the Prequels may well be a graveyard of reputations, several people came out unscathed. Liam Neeson, Ewan McGgreggor and Jimmy Smits all did just fine.
Neeson had the good sense to take a part that had him getting written out before even TPM ended! :)Fair point on MacGregor, who did about as good a job as possible under the circumstances and who was such an inspired bit of casting that one can get sad imagining what the prequels might have been like if they’d been written and directed by literally anyone else.(Smits honestly didn’t make much of an impression on me, which I guess may count as a victory in a context where poor Sam Jackson had to attempt to say “the party’s over, Dooku” with a straight face.)
I loved Morrison as Jango Fett and his fight with Obi Wan was one of the few highlights of the PT.
“Tusken” is the word you’re looking for. “Sand people” is what racist old Obi-wan called them.
*adopts nerd stance*
They were called Tusken Raiders because they raided the Fort Tusken. “Sand people” is the more polite term for them.
*denerds*
“Native Tatooiners”, thank you very much.
“Indigenous Tatooinians” works just fine, thankyouverymuch.
I think People of Sand is okay though. Don’t quote me on that.
See I hesitated cause its always ‘tusken raiders’ also sounds kinda racist.
“Tusken” is the word you’re looking for. “Sand people” is what racist old Obi-wan called them.
No.
Yeah, but then they ruin it by bringing back Bill Burr and his retarded Boston accent. Every time he speaks, it takes me out of the SW universe.
See I saw the jango when they said jango was a thief* and I thought it was semi-clear the guy was lying to make his people look better. Could be me projecting because I wouldnt expect them to claim him. I think a failure of the writing was that they didnt prove or disprove his words which makes it absolutely right to take it at face value. Wouldnt expect a writer to introduce a lie and not clear it up.*assuming you talking about clone wars season 2
Te stickfighting was badass. Nice to see one of those things used for more than hassling farmboys.
The shards of Stormtrooper armor flying around like dust was a beautiful touch.
It was good!
I’ll admit that when Boba appeared at the end of the season premiere, I groaned. I have always found the obsession with him (based solely on the movies – I know there’s more development of him in the EU, but I also know that his presence in the EU happened because of existing obsession with him) to be incomprehensible. I even asked some of my friends about it in a casual poll, and none of them could give me an answer that made sense beyond “they just think he looks cool.” (As to minor supporting players from the original trilogy, I’ve always been partial to Wedge Antilles myself. He’s the one fighter pilot who isn’t Luke who gets to survive through the whole trilogy! And he fires one of the shots that blows up the second Death Star!!!) I suspect The Mandalorian knew it had to justify bringing Boba on the series, which I think they have done. As much as I was irritated with the idea that he survived the Sarlacc and all that, they presented a Boba Fett who finally lives up to the reputation fans have (unearnedly) given him for the past 40 years.I sort of like to imagine that his having to survive on Tatooine for the past few years without his armor may have actually contributed to his badassery. As Katie notes, it’s Boba’s handling of the gaderffii stick that makes for the most impressive fight moments this week. That would almost certainly be stuff he learned since we presumed him dead in Return of the Jedi. The Boba Fett we’re seeing now is far more impressive than the Boba Fett we would have known without the Sarlacc incident.
Well it’s very unlikely that there would be a star wars show called “The Mandalorian” that wouldn’t feature Boba Fett in some way or another. That character is the only reason that fans know that the Mandalorian race/culture/whatever exists in the sw canon at all. In fact, as a somewhat casual fan that doesn’t follow every announcement I initially assumed that the show would be ABOUT Boba Fett, though I’m glad it isn’t
Yeah I was quickly corrected by nerds when I mentioned the show being a Boba Fett spinoff. “The timeline is all wrong, and Fett is presumed dead anyway!”
Boba Fett legit earned his reputation in a couple of ways:1) He was the only bounty hunter smart enough to anticipate the Millennium Falcon’s escape.2) He was able to successfully hold off Luke and the gang’s attempted rescue of Han Solo.The only reason people are shitting on him is because of the lame and lucky/accidental Sarlacc death. Which, finally, has been redeemed.
Everyone complains about how Boba Fett died in RotJ, but his death isn’t about him, it’s about Han. Killing your badass bounty hunter arch-nemesis by accident while blind is an extremely Han Solo thing to do.
I totally got those things. But those things are not actually THAT impressive. Like he’s a good bounty hunter. (Apparently, not a great one since Vader has to warn him not to disintegrate anyone.) Got it. But the fan wankage surrounding him went WAY beyond that. Besides, he only held them off at the end of Empire WITH help FROM the Empire. It’s not like he did it single handed. He was a clever opportunist at best. I think it’s like 75% that he looks cool and is mysterious. That’s it.
Like he’s a good bounty hunter. (Apparently, not a great one since Vader has to warn him not to disintegrate anyone.) Got it.
Not every bounty calls for the bounty to be brought it alive.
He was a clever opportunist at best
Clever opportunists are some of the most successful people on the planet.
As to minor supporting players from the original trilogy, I’ve always
been partial to Wedge Antilles myself. He’s the one fighter pilot who
isn’t Luke who gets to survive through the whole trilogy! And he fires one of the shots that blows up the second Death Star!!!
Wedge is awesome. He’s the only pilot in the entire New Republic that’s entitled to paint two Death Stars on his fighter.
Interesting tidbit; Temuera Morrison inputted his wielding of the gaffi stick with elements of his own Maori heritage in using clubs for those sequences.
I think I remember back in the day of the prequels there were Jango Fett comics that supported the ide that he was a foundling – I don’t know if they used that word but I vaguely recall the other characters saying he was not a true Mandolorian.
I was a bit worried about including too many side characters in such a short time, but it still worked really well with Boba Fett. I just hope they save Thrawn/Ezra for another time. They were doing so well in not over-including the Jedi and characters that make the galaxy smaller. While this season is fun, I hope they continue to make their own characters without leaning too much into the established lore.
I agree, tho I think for better or worse there’s no getting the toothpaste back in the tube now, and with rumours that some of the cast weren’t given the last several pages of next week’s finale, we’re likely in for something bigger than any of the previous reveals. Still if my totally unfounded hope for Kyle katarn comes to fruition ill never complain about anything again.
Yeah I enjoyed it, even though I don’t love seeing him without the helmet. The whole reason we have the idea that a Mandalorian doesn’t take off his helmet is because we never saw him without his. But it worked (even if his armour doesn’t seem to really fit him that well lol). I do wish they’d made the Storm Troopers a little more threatening, they’re really starting to lose their punch.
I fear any chance of seeing Rex died when he was nowhere to be seen in Ahsoka’s debut.As you said, Morrison is too old (by over 2 decades!) to be playing Boba, who, if he was 12 during AotC, would be 41 here. Hard living and a Sarlacc are the in universe explanations I’m sure.
The other clones of the Grand Army variety age twice as fast as Boba, which would make Rex 82 during the Mandalorian, at LEAST. I would say that Rex was probably full grown when Boba was 12, so that would make him even older. No doubt I wanted to see a dying Rex in the company of Ahsoka talking about the clones and their place in history, but it’s not to be I think.
Could someone explain why the storm troopers wear that shitty armor?Single blaster shot, anywhere? Down.Part-digested guy whacks you with a stick? Dead.
Gladly! So obviously originally it had no real explanation beyond them being goons for the heroes to easily overcome, but as people added to the worldbuilding it became a parallel to how our own militaries tend to work: ie soldiers are often pretty badly equipped because military contracts are handed out to the lowest bidder. Stormtroopers are general infantry, they’re expendable and their armour and weaponry is substandard. It also explains why they can’t shoot for shit, their weapons are badly made and their helmets have terrible vision. It’s like soldiers in my country having poor quality boots and guns that jam /break, because its more cost effective and threatening to have a big army than a well trained/equipped one.
Ugh.So then the troops continue to wear it, even though it’s clearly restrictive to their movement and provides no protection? And the Empire continues to waste its resources churning out brand new armor despite it doing no good?Presumably the troops in your army who rely on those guns are doing everything they can on their own to improve their function.
Oh, is this how it’s going to be. People giving out grades based on who’s in the episode? rather then the merits of the episode itself? I hope not.
He doesn’t act like he doesn’t care. He’s depressed because he doesn’t think he’ll ever see the child again. I don’t know how you got that in your head, unless you were trying to find something to complain about. Like all of your complaints are half hearted. what’s up with that. Have you not eaten today?
This is not the WAY to review. You can’t judge the merits of an episode based on shit that has nothing to do with said Episode. Gina Carrano is just an Idiot. Oh well. I don’t understand how people can call someone a Bigot for not understanding Trans. People generally keep their sexuality to themselves. Don’t worry, it will be fine. But people are expecting too much, too quickly. And jump to attack. Gina Carrano is an MMA fighter. She’s been hit in the head… ALOT. Hello, she probably has brain problems. Still she shouldn’t have blown it up. And then the election shit… She’s just not all there. Get over it.
They already shot everything, before any of that went down. Did you except them to go back shot NEW material, not only this late in the game, but with COVID and lockdowns?
I’m sure either she’ll be gone before next season, or they’ll address it with some sort of big ass public apology publicity stunt. Probably the later. I’m sorry to say.
My only complaint of the direction is they left in lens edges on certain shots. At first watch I thought maybe it was suppose to be in helmet. But that doesn’t work.
I’d give the episode an A, it was almost perfect. Fans will be pleased.
I dunno…a year of targeted harassment and threats should have forced her to see the light, rather than retrenching and, legitimately, gravitating to a safe space where people support her!
Targeted harassment and threats usually do the very opposite of forcing someone to see “the light”.
Thank you. If you’re expecting someone coming from the MMA world to have all the Twitterwoke bona fides then I’m sorry but you are going to be disappointed 100% of the time.
if i were writing the reviews i would have given it a D just for having boba fett in it
What was up with the aspect ratio randomly changing? Every once in a while during some of the action shots there were small blurred bars that appeared on the edge of the screen. At first I thought it was a directorial flourish but then it kept happening. Really sloppy from a show that’s usually pretty slick.
The number of time Mando stopped short of saying “my child” instead of “the child” was a nice touch.
I hope all future Grogu figures comes with baby handcuffs included
I’m sorry, why did it feel necessary to drag in the information about Rosario Dawson’s lawsuit? Granted, if it is found in a court of law that she or her mother were definitely liable based on any presented evidence, then fuck them both, and they should bear the consequences. Also, given her penchant for Trumper MAGAts and ignorance of trans issues, fuck Gina Carano. But I just don’t understand the relevance of bringing up both issues when it’s unrelated to the episode that you’re reviewing. Care to explain why?
The AV(oke) Club
Glad to see that the show’s uptick in quality is directly related to them crafting more sophisticated, serialized storytelling and actually having real stakes and setbacks for the character.It’s almost as if it’s what I’ve been saying all along! Oh, wait, it’s EXACTLY what I’ve been saying they should do all along.
Yes, I’m sure they were listening to Rando on the AVClub and didn’t have this as the overall plan from the start. Have you seen Filoni’s previous work?
Because many people on this forum have decided to paint me as some kind of contrarian jackass just for daring to respectfully critique this show in the past, now I’m just leaning into it!
“People called me an asshole just because I was acting like an asshole, but now that they’re saying I am, no reason to stop pretending that’s what I am!”Yawn.
Ah, no. Way to miss the point, but have fun!
no, Jhelter has you pegged.
I was never acting like an asshole. People treated me like an asshole because they got bent out of shape that I dared critique the show. Because, I guess, they’re all secretly Jon Favreau? Otherwise, their attitude towards me was totally unjustified.
You’ve been a snug condescending ass in every single review thread of this show. And now you’re projecting your own shittiness. So 🤷🤦Selfaware, thy name is not lawrenceq
No, I wasn’t snug and condescending. I was critical of the SHOW. Certain people acted as if I’d insulted them and then became dicks to ME. And when that happened, I responded in the shitty way that THEY initiated.
K🤷
Okay, cool.
That sure will teach me how kind you actually are. How dare I think that someone who talks to people like this all the time might just be an asshole?
Really? Me saying “have fun” was too mean for you? Okay, have fun!
lol, holy shit dude
Have fun!
It’s sincerely like talking to a middle schooler. What is your life, kiddo?As a children’s librarian I’m straight-up fascinated by this shit.
That sounds like a great job. Good for you.
Because you are such an edgelord, Larry. A legend in your own mind.
No, I’m not. Where are you even getting this from??
Your long comment history, genius.
There’s literally nothing in my “comment history” that is remotely, slightly, accidentally “edgelord.” Zip. Do better next time.
You’re right – but not for lack of trying. You do succeed at being an asshole. Just saying, edgelord /s.
Sure thing, friend. Have a good one.
Your critiques were never valid and were always paper thin.Again, you couldn’t see what the show was building up to but others could.You’ve arrived late to the party but are saying that you arrived first, actually.
Larry is so full of himself.
This is the same progression that Filoni’s animated shows had. Some of the season 1 filler episodes felt very much like episodes in the other shows that feel stand-alone but set up characters to recur down the line.
is it really serializing if you just take the plot of a decent 3 hour movie and split it into half hour chunks.
Heh.
I’m enjoying these more heavily serialized episodes but I also enjoyed some of the more standalone/mission of the week episodes as well
This episode is tied with The Jedi as my favorite. And Morrison is killing it. I got a real Manu Bennett vibe from when he was Deathstroke.
Yes! That’s what it was!Kiwi-Power, haha.
I wouldn’t mind if we saw him on the show in some capacity.
The watchability of Arrow has a 1:1 correlation with Bennett’s presence.
But aside from his signature “character looking at the camera while an explosion rages in the background” shot, I didn’t see a lot of his visual signatures here.I don’t know if Robert Rodriguez has many recognizable visual trademarks besides that one (maybe dual-wielding pistols, but that’s more John Woo’s influence?) but he does know how to stage a good shoot out, and good fights, and it worked well here, with this episode having some of the season’s better-looking action.
His Spy Kids movies were like a bad acid trip.
But he accurately predicted thumb-headed goons.
Rodriguez’s biggest visual trademark, by far, is guns popping out of things that shouldn’t have guns in them. Today it was knees.
I think you mean ‘should, but usually don’t, because life is boring.’
heh, you’re totally right, but i didn’t catch it because new The Mandolorian LOVES to utilize old weapons / hardware / tech that was only ever mentioned on the back a trading card or action figure packaging (including knee-rockets)
This is extremely accurate.
And it’s even the first time knee-gun he’s done
Those kneepad rockets have been canon since Star Wars started doing visual guides, though. In fact, I was rather elated to see what it looked like when they were actually used.
I wish there was an outtake of Boba using that crotch gun from Desperado & From Dusk ‘til Dawn
Yeah, how do you NOT get El Mariachi/Desperado vibes from one or a few people having a massive shootout in the desert against multiple enemies?
I said something of the sort in another comment. This was VERY 90s Robert Rodriguez
Came here to say this. How does one not mention El Mariachi/Desperado when discussing Robert Rodriquez?
I like how the reviewer mentioned people younger than her not knowing Sin City…I was like, listen here young’un, there was this movie called Desperado, which introduced the world to Antonio Banderas and Salma Hayek, ya may have heard of them…And they call themselves a pop culture site!
I guess they’re teasing out a half-mystery, but I do wish this show gave us just a little more world-building about the Imperial remnant.It totally made sense in the first few episodes that the Client was just one guy hunkering down in a random building with only half-dozen (dirty!) stormtroopers at his disposal.But Moff Gideon seems insanely powerful. He had that base on Nevarro, he has a capital ship (not an SD, but still), tons and tons of troopers, that ship on the Mon Cal planet, those new Dark Troopers, TIE fighters, etc. etc.It’s quite a lot. Sure, it’s certainly plausible that pockets of the Empire still exist in remote areas of the galaxy, but we’ve only see 3 New republic personnel and at this point seemingly countless imperials.
I see Gideon as a small-time warlord at best, unless they’re building up to a live-action Thrawn reveal or something. The one old ship he has was basically the stormtrooper of warships on Clone Wars and Rebels—they got knocked around all the time just to prove how strong the good/bad guys were.
Please leave Thrawn out of this! Yeah, Gideon I guess seems super powerful to just one guy in a suit, but probably wouldn’t last very long if the Republic actually brought the hammer down.
Eh, given the absolutely massive number of ships a galactic-scale Empire would need to maintain, it’s not hard to believe that once said empire fell, a bunch of smaller-scale warlords would pop up and gain control of a few abandoned ships and bases. There are probably hundreds of thousands of them out there. Gideon is an impressive threat to Mando because he’s just one guy with a jetpack, with, at best, four or five pals backing him up. But in the grand scheme of things, Gideon’s small time. If the Rebel Alliance (a galactic-scale army, albeit a smaller one than the Empire in its prime) were still around, they’d make short work of him.If anything, Gideon’s big plan seems to be to graduate from being a small-scale warlord by using Baby Yoda blood to make supersoldiers.
(So why doesn’t the New Republic do something about him? I guess because both the New and Old Republics are basically useless in any Star Wars media, since their stated goal is to prevent wars in the stars.)
This is entirely what happened in the old EU
I’d imagine the New Republic isn’t doing much because Gideon’s Imperial faction is all hanging out in the Outer Rim, i.e., sparsely populated frontier territory that’s a bitch to police. Unless they’re building a new Death Star or something, they’re not enough of a threat to the New Republic to be worth tracking them down in hostile territory.
Exactly. Think Afghanistan on a galactic scale.
Or because the New Republic is a fledgling organization that isn’t very solid and Gideon hasn’t actually done much to invest resources in so they have to choose their battles.
I mean, the Empire was basically destroyed when the Emperor and his second hand man died during the destruction of the Death Star. However, that still had to be a miniscule portion of the entire fleet. We know Admiral Thrawn is out there and that Moff Gideon is currently working on a way to harvest Force-sensitive blood cells for some purpose (most likely, for attempts to clone the emperor). There is still likely a ton of Imperial leaders still out there even after the battles that occurred after Endor, like the Battle of Jakku. Ultimately, we can talk about how easy the Imperial remnants would be destroyed, but we don’t really know that. Plus, it’s the outer rim, and it’s not like ruling a galaxy is easy. You can’t keep tabs on everyone. I like where the show is going. The best Star Wars seem to take a lot of cues from the Dune Saga, and the First Order rising up from the outskirts of the galaxy reminds me a lot of the Scattering. And Old Man Luke was very similar to the blind hermit version of Paul Atreides from Children of Dune.
nah, i don’t give a shit. I’m here for Mando.
“It’s quite a lot. Sure, it’s certainly plausible that pockets of the Empire still exist in remote areas of the galaxy, but we’ve only see 3 New republic personnel and at this point seemingly countless imperials.”I’m not surprised you are confused. The Empire has always been a bottomless pit of money, resources and personnel mostly because the simple plot demands it. Or did you think the First Order managed to build up their hilariously large and powerful force from scratch over the course of only 30 years?
Well, if there’s one thing that’s pretty consistent across every iteration of this general time period of Star Wars, it’s that Palpatine was kind of a geek, and he had a lot of plates spinning in a lot of places. It makes sense to me that there’d be remnants of the imperial fleet all over the place, many of them linked to bizarre Force-related research projects.It’s like if you finally brought down a fantastically rich drug kingpin and seized his main stronghold, only to discover the dude had like sixteen other vacation homes full of man-eating tigers and weird booby traps and shit, all fully staffed, all with at least a few guys thinking that maybe they can be the next big swinging dick.
I have a feeling that Thrawn is behind Gideon somewhere.
I hope not, but we’ll see.
I honestly hope so because it’s a very Star Wars! thing to do and, after 35 years of being a Star Wars fan, that’s fine with me.
To each their own though!
No, it’s a very “Mandalorian” thing to do – resurrecting characters from across the lore as shameless fan service instead of focusing on developing their own characters.Alas.
“you’ll put your eye out”Classic Favreau referencing his friend Peter Billingsley’s movie.
“Grogu, drop those Stormtroopers!”“I CAN’T PUT MY ARMS DOWN!
Little Oprhan Palpatines secret code was really feed your anger! What a rip off!
Little Orphan Palpy, a 5 minute sketch.
I’d be fine with the Lilo and Stitch live-action remake if Disney took a page from Grogu’s design, or the designs from the Detective Pikachu film. I feel like Uncanny Valley actually works to the advantage of a design for a monster or an alien— especially one that treads the line between ‘a goblin that makes you mildly uncomfortable’ and ‘marketably adorable’.
God I really hope Gina Carano isn’t a right wing nut job. She’s hot and I love Haywire. But alas … if confirmed, she will be dead to me.
Uh, have you not seen her Twitter? Saying Democrats are blind with a picture of masks over their eyes. Inviting her followers to got to Parler instead where there’s real free speech. Last year she made a joke about trans people but walked at back as people misunderstanding her. Her recent Twitter shows nobody was misunderstanding her. This has been confirmed for a while.
Let’s just say you can take the girl out of Texas…
Get out the pitchforks everyone Gina is done. I wonder if the SJW pitchforks are going to come out when Ellen Page continues her female role on Umbrella Academy?
…and what did she say that was incorrect, exactly?
It does seem like one of those things where legions of straight white male “allies” spending a year harassing her and screaming that she should be raped to death and die in a ditch may not, in fact, have convinced her that she should be more sensitive to other people’s feelings.
Folks advocating for someone to be raped to death in a ditch over someone’s opinion aren’t likely the ones who have any problem with Carano’s views. Most, if not all, of the “allies” you’re talking about simply want her to sincerely apologise for her comments and/or for Disney to drop her from The Mandalorian.
Believe it or not, crazies use targeted online harassment campaigns as cover to be crazy, then blame the person they’re targeting.Have you ever seen a targeted online harassment campaign change someone’s mind? Genuine question.
So you’re saying she’s stupid? You think left wing liberal folks are the ones with the rape and murder threats? Every female celebrity and politician gets them. It’s gross that it happens, but it always happens. If that “convinces” anyone of anything they’re an idiot.
I mean…no fucking shit she’s stupid, haha.Was that ever in question?She said something dumb, because she’s an idiot. Then she tried to walk it back, but the harassment and threats continued for months.While “the good guys” were engaging in this targeted harassment campaign, transphobic assholes were telling her that she was cool and smart and strong and brave.wHo CoUlD eVeR hAvE fOrSeEn that a person famous for getting punched in the head might align herself with the people that were nice to her, as opposed to the people calling her a c*** who deserved to be raped and shot, without doing a deep dive into the ramifications of the nice people’s political ideology???But hey – I’m sure the NEW targeted harassment campaign by Very Online White Guys will change her mind!!!!
By the way, you avoided the question:Can you name an online harassment campaign that HAS changed a public figure’s mind on a hot-button issue?You can come up with all sorts of justifications about why someone “deserves” to be harassed online, but it’ll never make it anything other than cyberbullying.
I never said “deserved” don’t put words in my mouth. You think left wing liberal folks are the ones with the rape and murder threats? I think people lashed out at her controversial and stupid opinions because she is an online celebrity. Her opinions are incredibly wrong. I wasn’t one of them, I don’t care enough to tell online celebrities why and how they are wrong. She is and she supports fascists and racists. Do I think anyone celebrity or not changes their views from Twitter or FB or any social media? Nope or very infrequently. I can think of one campaign where Melissa Mccarthy honestly apologized because one charity they were supporting kinda sucked and they got rid of it after being given more information and looking into it. That’s probably because she actually cares to do the right thing.
Mate…this exchange began with you jumping down my throat because of my (clearly controversial!) “Cyberbullying is bad” take.I think she’s a fucking moron.I also think that months of cyberbullying and threats (aLtHoUgH sHiTtY wHiTe DuDeS hAvE nEvEr ClOaKeD tHeIr DeSiRe To HaRaSs WoMeN iN “pRoGgReSsIvIsM”!!!!) legitimately played a role radicalizing her, as she sought out circles where she *wouldn’t* be called a c*** who deserved to die…which happened to be filled with Nazis.
But, again, I’m just using that whole “empathy” thing, even though I disagree with her on literally everything, and saying that cyberbullying is bad.I know both of those things are against the rules on the Internet.
If one is to put incredibly offensive controversial legitimately incorrect racist things out into the there’s gonna be a response. She should be well aware of this.Brie Larson said film critics should be more diverse, a very reasonable opinion and probably got 20x worse in response. I feel bad for that.However this lady is not blameless, she was not being reasonable. Do you have proof left wing people sent her rape and death threats? That is terrible regardless.People calling her out for being a pandemic denialist, racist and supporter of fascists is not bullying though. But I’m sure she claims to be a victim just like every right wing asshat does. She also doesn’t seem to care about anyone in her beliefs, paradox of intolerance.
Read up on yer one’s descent into nuttery, man.It started out with a shitty joke about pronouns, which was then followed with a decent attempt at an apology.The harassment didn’t stop, though, and only (Breitbart-y shitbirds) were being nice to her…so she started burrowing into that nonsense.Harassing someone doesn’t become okay when they have a public platform…and it pretty much always does more harm than good (as can be seen here, where Carano has gone from being a meathead who means well to a Trumpist anti-masker, because the people cyberbullying her did so in the name of “Social Justice”)
You’re just defending her and bullshit now. You have a crush?
Going full schoolyard, haha!Impressed with your lack of pride/self-respect.I’ve honestly never understood why people find yer one attractive…I’m just anti-harassment, and try to empathize with everyone, including assholes.
I don’t care to ever continue this conversation. It’s weird and annoying. Goodbye.
Yes, hon…empathizing with people you disagree with IS weird and annoying!At least you’re honest about not viewing that work as worth doing! Run along back to Glenn Greenwald Twitter feed – he’ll tell you all the opinions you should have, and you’ll never be bothered by that whole “empathy” bugaboo again!!!
I don’t care to continue this conversation goodbye. Thank you.
No worries at all – this is the Internet!I’m sure you’ll be able to find a collective of fellow straight white guys who agree that cyberbullying is good and only people who agree with you are worthy of empathy!
But remember! When you find that group of straight white guys who tell you that you’re strong and smart and special and brave for standing up to wrongthink on the interwebs…don’t believe everything they say!That’s how you end up like Gina Carano.
So how come him defending her is wrong and must be a sign of him having a crush or something (eyeroll), while you bashing her is somehow fair game and totally okay? It’s almost like you tribalists operate under some kind of double standard (both sides apply the double standard – frankly I don’t find you that much different in your rigidity of thought from some MAGA type).
Racist? Now you’re just making stuff up. At least stick with what’s factual if you want to make your point.
It is incredibly naïve to think people are incapable of being extremely shitty because they are left wing. During the BLM protests I saw more than one video of white people screaming in black cops’ faces calling them Uncle Tom and such (not to mention the black police officers who reported repeatedly getting called n***** by the same kind of people). It’s tribalism at its absolute worst to dismiss a comment because surely no one from your tribe is capable of bad behavior.
If one wants to work they must kiss the ring and show fealty to our views.
I obviously haven’t, no.
Yeah, she’s been spewing transphobic Trumper trash for a while now.
All MMA fighters etc. have extreme politics. They’re either leftists or MAGA chuds (or too dumb to be anything). No normies or centrists lol
She’s one of the biggest people on Parler now. That alone is confirmation enough. She does not care at all that shes possibly tanking her acting career to own the libs.
Those darn evil free speech people, standing up for ummn, free speech and rights and all. The BASTARDS!
Man, it would be an absolute tragedy if they killed off her character & slotted Sasha Banks’s character into her place. /s
And you know what’s going to happen if/when she gets let go from this show? She’s going to talk all kinds of shit of how Disney got pressured by the fans or the media to kick her off the show. She’s totally going to bite the hand that fed her.
Yeah doesn’t she know she should shut up and conform to our opinions in order to be allowed to work?
Or maybe she says, ‘Fuck your cancel culture.’
Prediction–Cara Dune either dies in the finale of this season or early in Season 3, and then we get Gina Carano complaining about it for years.
Um, she totally is, man.
She’s dead to you.
Shes Persona Non Grata far as I’m concerned. We still have Carla Gugino though. For some reason I always mix the two up.
HOW?!
It would be much more alliterative for sure – Gina Gugino and Carla Carano? Maybe they could go on a double date with Dermot McDermott and Dylan Mulroney
Literally every MMA fighter seems to be dumb as fuck.
Surprisingly modeling your life around violence and taking a bunch of blows to the head without any protection has an effect on you
They do get punched in the head. A lot.Being punched in the head is bad for what’s inside.
I really just think she looks like a slightly more buff Mariska Hargitay.
Hate to break it to you, but she’s waaaay over in that group of people who hate anyone that isn’t like them
“…in that group of people who hate anyone that isn’t like them” This comment is a little ironic in a thread of people saying she’s dead to them and persona non grata. Oh right, but it’s different when we do it (which is, funny enough, exactly what they say).
So I guess we are all right with taking employment from people we disagree with politically eh? I hope you all will be just as all right with it when the time comes those with a more liberal bent are treated the same way.I don’t like her views but I will defend to the death her right to say speak them, that’s what our constitution is all about. First amendment, freedom of speech. If you don’t support opposing views then you are supporting censorship and are opening the door for oppressive government.
Ironic coming from a bunch of nerds obsessed with a fairytale about a dark oppressive regime seeking control in the universe.
It’s a shame because she seemed pretty likeable and I was always a fan of here when she was in Strikeforce but she wants to ruin her career to own the libs
I came to love her even more after watching the behind the scenes series about the first season of The Mandalorian. She seemed so charming and likeable and I loved her friendship with Carl Weathers. But then I saw her Twitter 🙁
It’s alright to like someone who has different views than you.
Oh no, someone has a different opinion to you. How difficult this must be for you. She can spout right wing comments all she wants while crushing me with her thighs.
I didn’t say I wouldn’t bone the shit out of her.
She has some stupid opinions about the voter fraud issue but she’s not talking about rounding people up in box cards. Why not just accept some people think differently than you without killing them off in your mind? We’re a country of fucking children now.
Yeah, dickhead. And the Republican party are the fucking children. They have completely given up on democracy and adopt fascism. If you are one of them you ain’t my friend either.
All I can picture of you is a whiny, ineffectual little college student.
No, sadly, I’m just a very partisan middle aged man who probably needs a life.
She’s cuckoo for cocoa puffs.
Because you know, an actor with political beliefs different than yours simply CAN’T be a good person, or actor, and shouldn’t be allowed to act.Cancel culture is the fucking worst. Purity police at work.
The depiction of the ancient Jedi temple as a Stonehenge-type structure, blended with Grogu sitting in a classic meditation posture, is the kind of lore I like to geek out on.
Luckily, the Jedi design team had a better sense of scale:
Tython!Where the Jedi dwell! Where the Boba’s laugh and they do laugh well!
Tython!Where Mando is a Man, and the Grogus dance to the pipes of pan!
And you, my love, won’t you take my hand
“I think that the problem may have been that there was a Jedi monument on the hill that was in danger of being crushed by Grogu. That tended to understate the hugeness of the object.” – Mando St. Hubbins
TAKE YOUR UPVOTE!
Nice to see Ming-Na Wen back but it seems like a stretch that Boba would’ve been able to get her anywhere in time for someone to save her with a mechanical stomach implant. Speaking of which, that seems to impact so many bodily functions and I have so many questions, but it’s not like the show will ever need to dive into that.I read this in another forum but why wouldn’t Boba just grab the armour from Cobb Vanth, who was in all likelihood a much less dangerous adversary and also open to quid pro quo? It would’ve saved him the offworld trek. Having Temuera Morrison really makes it feel like we’re getting to know Boba Fett for the first time in some ways after numerous revisions and adjustments to his origin.
Chapter 19: The Digestive Tract will cover both Ming’s recuperation and Fett’s time in the Sarlacc Pit.
This is good Kinja.
Speaking of which, that seems to impact so many bodily functions and I have so many questions, but it’s not like the show will ever need to dive into that.Spoiler: She now shits literal bricks.
He may have just tracked it down and that’s how he knows Mando has it…
Booba Fett was more cool and badass during the five minutes he was smacking Stormtroopers around with his murder stick here than he was in every prior filmed appearance he’s made combined. Congrats to him on finally doing something besides standing around and falling into a hole.
I found the actual cracking, shatter, and exploding of Stormtrooper armor more visceral than virtually all previous Star Wars violence. Holy shit. Bloodless but VICIOUS.
Boba Fett didn’t even have 5 minutes of screen time combined in the OT.
You’re right, but at least once on TV (not film) he was pretty cool and badass to those of us of a certain age…
Is it just me, or does Boba Fett’s armour look extreme goofy on whoever’s wearing it this season? Felt the same way during the premiere, too.
It’s really only half the armor, which makes sense considering everything it’s been through, but does kind of make it look like they didn’t finish up the CGI on the stuntman.
Yeah, they really should have sized the armor up while keeping the proportions the same. And Fett now needs to break off some of that Beskar spear and complete the armor.
It slowly shrank in the wash over a thousand years.
Just like all my clothes as I got older.
More so that I think it was the bottom half. Tight jeans on the first guy (essentially), and a desert skirt on Fett himself. Who knows if they change it up but I’d like to see more proper pants for Boba next two episodes.
I’m the exact opposite – the robes under the armour looked great to me. Helped that they weren’t just cresting entirely on nostalgia and doing something new with the character.
He quickly don his armors over the cloak that he’s wearing, which adds some bit of bulks to his appearance.I am sure his looks would be bit more streamlined like the Original Trilogy in next couple of episodes.
Honestly, even Mando or even Bo Katan are that form fitting in their armors and I can’t believe I’m saying this, but it makes me feel better about body positively in fantastical sci fi shit. Mando can just woddle his way awkwardly through blaster fire, and Boba Fett can have a gut on him and still wreck a legion of stormtroopers.
it looked goofy until it didn’t.
It makes him look really out of shape. But I suppose he didn’t get much time to work out inside a sarlacc.
The dishwasher hoses connecting the gauntlets to the breastplate certainly don’t help…
It shrunk in the Sarlaac
Yes. That’s the point? It’s not really armor any more. It’s a few armor pieces pulled out of a Saarlac and tied together with string.
I notices that the armor didn’t fit Morrison and his dad bod but also Olyphant. Maybe Olyphant was tall for the armor or something. I also never realized how much of Fett’s armor is actually not armor but cloth. Are those cargo pants and sleeves denim?
Yeah turns out anyone over 5’8″ not covered in pouches would probably look funny.
The location brought to mind a number of Budd Boetticher westerns which relied on shoot outs amongst boulder-filled hillsides.Also, if you remember Rodriguez’s early action films you can see some of the flourishes esp. in the slow-mo shots of Fett as he beat the life out of the Stormtroopers and you’ll also recall he did plenty of non-green screen filmmaking back then.This was the best thing Rodriguez has done since probably Desperado or Spy Kids 2 and a high-watermark for the series. He’s working in a sweet spot here where it’s small scale enough for him to actually elevate the action setpieces and is constrained by it being a Disney/Star Wars joint so he can’t give in to his lesser ‘shoot it in my guest bathroom’ DIY impulses.
I’ve got plenty of issues with the show but this season has been an improvement over season 1 and the last two episodes have both been really engaging. This might be my favorite episode of the season and I’m actually excited to revisit these last two episodes.
Some of the most low stakes fighting ever. Just some terrible staging and choreography. I know this is a kid’s show, but maybe make the Stormtroopers at least land a single fricking blow to show they have at least one tooth. As to the opening of this recap: Had Mando been looking directly at the little gecko while he sat on that rock, nothing would have changed. He brought the kid there to do something magic on that rock. He wanted that to happen. Had Slave-1 not landed right then, and Mando was just looking at the vista, he would have been perfectly happy with what the froglet got up to.Mando is just an incredibly shit tactician. He proved, himself, 3 TIMES that nobody could get to the kid right then. Just stick with tadpole while he went through his *whatever* and scoop the squirt up when he’s done.The contrivance that make Mando take off his jetpack, so he can’t get to the kid quickly for plot reasons was ridiculous. “I’ll drop my rifle and you drop your….jetpack?” What the hell is that? He wasn’t wearing it at the end either. I thought this one was dumb. The writing was junior high level.
I wouldn’t disagree that him taking off his jet pack was contrived, but a good tactician wouldn’t stand at the top of the hill, while two really good fighters eventually get killed, just so he could he face the force that killed them alone. Before the Dark Troopers, the threat was only coming from one direction, and directly helping with defense makes the most sense. I do find it a bit ridiculous that anyone who shoots at Din always hits his armor, when large portions of his body aren’t covered by his relatively small plates of armor.
Hard disagree on the tactics. The one and only reason he remains to fight the odds he’s fighting is Newt Boy. If the little tyke wasn’t inside a force field, Mando would be dusting off in the Razor Crest (RIP). He’s got high ground, and he’s got two capable fighters keeping them at bay. Their goal is ALSO to protect the kid. The Stormtroopers are clearly there to get the kid. The force is coming from the sky, so could conceivably drop right in on top. It’s irrelevant how the other two are handling the situation, his entire goal is in that henge. I agree on the hits only happening on his armor. He needs to at least get winged or something….but the show doesn’t seem to be about scuffed up good guys.
Hey give the Stormtroopers some credit. They have been missing their shots for 40 years and when they finally hit someone you are ragging them for only hitting them in the protected parts?Baby steps.
Oh, looky here. I found the contrarian. I love the fact they do not Mary Sue Mando. He regularly gets his ass handed to him by Jawas, Mud horns and Squid pirates. Rey would have been using her SJW Mary Sue powers to fling people left and right and bring herself back from the dead. LOL! SW was best when the Force was nothing more than believing in your own abilities and occasionally tilted the deck in your favor. I will agree with the StormTroppers being way too ineffective. We all know that is the running joke, but it was just ridiculous with the Bo-Kanta assault on the weapons ship. They had machine gun lasers and tight choke points and at no time did you feel anyone in their party was in danger. They should have brought a few other Mandalorians along in the raid just them to get kill to increase the stakes.
Yeah, the jetpack thing really bugged me too—I can sorta see how Boba would ask that of him given that he’d know first-hand how being able to eject out of any situation would be a tactical advantage, but at that moment, Din’s whistling birds were more of a threat and it would have made more sense to ask him to stand those down.
I agree.But it’s also Star Wars.The franchise that brought you Han Solo tapping a Stormtrooper on the shoulder and running around a base so he could lead them to his friends.Or Teddy bears defeating Stormtroopers with rope, rocks and sticks.
Seriously, Star Wars was never really deep or well thought out. And it’s always relied on cartoon-logic when it comes to battles. It’s modeled after cheesy serials from the 40’s and Westerns where the main character doesn’t get shot but shoots everyone with almost perfect accuracy
I think it’s because a lot of people grew up with cheesy Star Wars and now that they are adults, they want a more.. serious and mature take on it.Which as you mention, that’s not really what Star Wars is about.I mean personally, I would like a Star Wars story that is more mature and has less eye rolling moments and more in depth character development with more realistic stakes.But that’s a wish list thing for me, because Star Wars is all about the cheese so it’s silly to rip it for what it has always been.
Scrolled through until I found a comment I agreed with—yours. Really irritating episode, this one. I was glad I had dishes to do while the firefight was going on, it was boring as heck. Every time you have a bunch of storm troopers you know you’re going to see them all get hacked/shot/whatever until the serious bad guy shows up. It’s a casual thumbs up for death (as long as the life is concealed within white plastic) that is one of my least favorite things about Star Wars.
Fighting stormtroopers is like fighting Forky.
The writing was horrible, laughably bad. If Favreau is intent on this being all it can be he needs to do what the duo on Game Of Thrones could not, hand the reigns over to brilliant young writers and work WITH them to make the best story possible.Mando came across as a complete fucking idiot.
The thing is that Favreau is a good writer. His writing has nuance. So my belief is that he’s actually writing FOR Junior High. He’s purposely making this dumb for kids who just wanna see heroes kicking faceless white plastic butt. Giancarlo Esposito is a good, nuanced actor. Here he’s one step away from doing a Maniacal Evil Laugh all the time. This is the show Disney wants to make. It’s just that the show they want to make is dumb. Looks pretty, though.
But… it’s possible to write at a junior high level and have the storytelling still make sense. This show routinely has characters do things that don’t even make sense on the surface, or say things that are just awkward and weird, or have characters act in totally inconsistent ways. The Clone Wars definitely wasn’t aimed at an adult audience (my kids loved it, I enjoyed it but thought to myself “this must be how my parents felt when I was watching cartoons as a kid”) but at least I wasn’t constantly finding myself baffled by the storytelling and dialogue choices. On this show, every couple of minutes, I go “wait what? why?” and then just sigh as it moves on to the next thing.
Oh man, I agree that there is very spurious logic going on on this show. The story beats take precedence over the story. This ep, for instance, wanted Baby Yoda to be taken. It also needed Mando not to have to fight the Dark Troopers yet. So it made up dumb reasons for him to leave. It didn’t try for clever, it just went for mindless cool (“Like, Mando has to run down to save Camille with his sweet ass Whistling Birds! Then the super cool Dark Troopers snatch the kid! Yeah, that’s the ticket!”) I think an eleven year old me would just see the cool, and not notice the dumb. I think an eleven year old me wouldn’t even notice that the Stormtroopers are so inept that I sort of feel bad for them. I have to accept that I’m nowhere near the demographic the show cares about. Still…..frustrating.
It is written for a very young audience. It’s an all-ages show on Disney+ and it’s rated TV-PG, not even TV-14. It’s never going to be sophisticated. I would love a show that was attempting to do more in the Star Wars universe (something closer to Battlestar Galactica from 2004), but I don’t think we will ever get that. At least the well done nostalgia is winning me over most episodes.
Well said. After this ep I have to tailor my expectations to the level they are shooting for. (which is one step up from Saturday Morning Cartoons) I agree that they are doing very well keeping the sensibilities of the earlier movies. And the show’s visuals are just gorgeous. Thanks for commenting.
I wanted more stormtrooper gore when Boba smashed them with a Gaffi stick, but I also didn’t really expect it.
For what it’s worth, a number of the episodes (including this one) have been TV-14.
This episode is an exquisite example of the “Idiot Ball” trope. So many contrivances and stupidass behavior from Mando had to come together in order for the abduction to be successful.Also, the abduction itself might have landed harder if Mando had shown ANY emotional reaction whatsoever.
Yeah, he seemed way too resigned to Gogurt’s kidnapping. Then again, we also wouldn’t want him to pull a Finn and scream at the sky.
Thinking about it more, it may be that Boba knew the jetpack could let Din escape with the armor (his goal). The threat Din poses is more about whether he can get away with Boba’s armor than whether he can take Boba and Fennec in a fight on his own, whistling birds or no.
“I know this is a kid’s show”. GTFO. lulz
Deus ex jetpackina?
I knew this was the Rodriguez directed episode before it ended because it had a fairly pedestrian, workman-like quality to it. He did a fine job, but last week’s episode was shot with real artistry. This episode worked best in the action moments, of which there was a lot. Temura was great as unmasked Boba. I kind of hope at some point Mando loses his armor and has to function without it for a while, just so we can see Pedro really do his stuff.
Not gonna lie, I was a little bored during this one. It had great moments, and on the whole I enjoyed it, but I found wave after wave of Stormtroopers kinda dull. It was fine!
Apparently, he was a replacement director…
Surprised by the B grade. I was engrossed the entire episode and whimpering over what might happen to Grogu. Tip: If you don’t want viewers to worry the entire time about the fate of major characters, don’t title your episode “The Tragedy.”
I think the title meant the destruction of Mando’s sweet-ass ship.
Surely the reference is per the capture of Grogu..?!
Why not both? They occur about 30 seconds apart.
I wish that the show had come up with a more organic way of having The Mandalorian not have his jetpack throughout the fight rather than it being a somewhat random request from Boba Fett. Like maybe have them do a bit of a fistfight at first or something and have Boba disable one of the rockets like The Mandalorian did to Boba’s Jetpack way back.
Disagree with Boba’s request for Mando to remove his jetpack being “somewhat random”. He has tracked down Mando to get his armor back. As someone who used to have a jetpack, he knows that Mando can use his own jetpack to leave this situation immediately. The last thing he wants is for Mando to fly away as he’s trying to convince/force him to give him back his armor.
(The other 18 claims were withdrawn over the summer, which could be seen as the influence of Dawson’s money on the case.)Wait, what? That’s the opposite of how that works. If Finley had any case at all he’d go for a settlement, not drop 18 claims. He claims he had extensive video evidence of Dawson and her family being transphobic for months on his phone but Dawson stole it when they kicked him out. Please. Dawson, who has been vocal about LGTBQ rights, is secretly a transphobe, who somehow allowed herself to be videotaped being transphobic for months, while never considering that Finley could upload any of those video at any time and completely destroy her career? Nobody is that stupid. By Finley’s own court filings, Dawson’s mother was trying to help him out, as a long time family friend who has been a struggling most of his life. They flew him out to California, paid him for renovation work, while letting him live for free in a fantastic apartment they owned. There’s no doubt things went badly. They told him he had to leave and he tried to invoke a California law that, though he wasn’t paying rent, because they allowed him to live there he is now a tenant and couldn’t be evicted without eviction proceedings. He basically said, fuck you, I’m going to live here for free now. He then claims that Dawson’s elderly mother somehow dragged him out a window and proceeded to beat his ass. Then Dawson “sat on him” to make it easier for this old lady to beat on him. Oh, and Dawson stole his phone at that point too. His description of the events read like a bad movie scene, down to Dawson standing over him and stepping on his wrist so his hand would slowly drop his phone like it was a gun. It’s all a bit farcical. I’m not saying things couldn’t have gotten a physical when the Dawson’s tried to get him off their property but Finley’s description of that event isn’t credulous. Yet here is AVclub still throwing shade, without apparently looking at the case filing at all, and painting Dawson as transphobic, and implying that Dawson’s money is the reason that Finley couldn’t sustain charges of Dawson’s family being transphobic towards them. I get always trying to support trans people in a world that consistently denies their reality and actively endangers them. Everyone should. That doesn’t change the reality that anyone can be a gold digger looking for an easy out. I mean, Carano has made public spectacle of her views. There’s no question there. A large paragraph would probably be better spent there.
It seems odd to me to think that they settled 18 claims but left two intact. That’s not usually how settlements work. “I’ll give you a bunch of money to drop all of your claims.” “Uhh, I really still want to stick with two of them, but I’ll take the money to drop 18.” [Dawson writes check]
They didn’t settle 18 claims. Finley dropped them from the lawsuit. There has been no settlement. They remaining two claims regard the physical altercation Finley claims had happened.
Right. That’s what I was saying, I don’t think there was a settlement because it doesn’t make sense.
The io9 article that mentions the same interview explicitly says the charges were withdrawn without a settlement.
Yeah I kind of did a double-take when I saw that line. Our default approach should be to take claims of abuse very seriously but at the same time when an accusation is pretty clearly money-grubbing bullshit it’s not just okay but necessary to say so, because false accusations take up such outsize importance in the rhetoric of people who wants to minimize sexual violence, transphobia, homophobia, misogyny, etc.
Yeah, if Dawson had settled I’d be giving this a lot more side-eye, but the fact that the charges were dropped without a settlement says a lot about how well they could be substantiated.
“Unable to be substantiated” != untrue, though.
She isn’t making “sorry you were offended” statements. She’s using proper pronouns & offering support to him in his transition publicly. Maybe she’s an high-level sociopath who knows how to play the game but all we can judge is what’s in front of us. Dismissals without settlement, unequivocal denials that nonetheless validate his gender.
Having met Isobel, that’s Dawson’s mother’s name, she’s no tiny old lady. Having said that, I don’t believe the grifter trans man at all, from my experience that’s not the kind of people Rosario and her mother are. I’m not sure why anyone would give that story serious consideration.
Entitlement is epidemic among us, even more epidemic than COVID. So it’s more likely, as someone mentioned above, that after getting treated well and seeing how good Rosario lives, that guy got pissed about having to give it up.People these days really do make it difficult on those who want to be generous. Too many willing to take more and more and more.
Being a critic isn’t the same as reporting news and A.V. Club writers are much better at the former than at the latter. Once things get passed the usual “who dated who” gossips and enter more serious territory (which has happened a lot in showbiz the last few years), they’re out of their depth. You can’t just say “it’s because of Dawson’s money” without any evidence to back it up. That’s what Donald Trump would do!They need to learn that some situations require a neutral tone.
Yeah, I’m not buying it. If he was attacked so viciously, why not call the police? A report would bolster the claims a bit more.
I mean, LGBT folks have almost as bad of a time with cops as POC do.
I know Rosario’s mom personally from way back before her daughter got famous and was still squatting in a building in NYC all of what Finley said is entirely possible.
Yeah, being trans and being an opportunistic, manipulative scammer are not mutually exclusive.
The way the easily-offended work is that all accusations are credible and true until proven otherwise, and even then they are still true.
I’m sure there’s something fucked up happening. But I don’t know if any of transphobic things happened, but maybe there were domestic altercations since he seems very much part of the family.
I’m of the theory that both Dawson’s mom and Derek did some fucked up, shitty things. No one is ever 100% innocent or 100% the bad guy. Don’t dismiss Dawson’s mom as too feeble to kick someone’s ass, in 2020 she is 57 so presumably she wasn’t an old doddering grandma type when this happened. And people from that age group are more likely to have transphobic ideas. I know it’s ageist but if someone called a middle-aged woman was a transphobe I think we’d all agree that’s likely.At the same time Derek might also be a shithead who is out for money now that Rosario has some of that sweet SW money.
Gawker makes calls purely off political views and purely off hearsay.They’re basically the whinier, less successful gestapo, or KGB.
No wonder Anakin and Luke both hated Tatooine. The planet really ages people. Boba Fett is like 15 years younger than Bo Katan but he looks 30 years older than her.
And I thought an acid peel was supposed to make you look younger!
A Sarlacc doesn’t help.
Sand blasting winds and sarlacc digestive juices will do that to you.
in fairness, Katee Sackhoff literally doesn’t seem to age in real life, so a character based on her not aging seems pretty accurate
I mean… we all saw what it did to Obi-Wan.
It’s those damn twin suns! It’s like they don’t use any SPF!
Luke didn’t hate Tatooine! He had the normal teenage boy “I gotta get outta here” pout-fests but he was raised by a loving aunt & uncle and had a circle of actual friends.One of the recent Star Wars comics has a line where Luke says how much he loves sand, which is obviously an Attack of the Clones gag, but also says a lot about the fundamental differences between him and Anakin/Vader and how they were raised.
Well, Anakin was raised as a slave who had to watch his mother work on her knees to the bone before having to leave her behind forever. Not exactly a happy environment.
Mandalore is galaxy famous for its skincare regimens.
Luke was actually 9 years old, he just looked 20.
it is like northerners that move to the SW deserts when they retire and in a few years look like old leather.
I was not nearly as bothered by his appearance as Bo Katan, who just looks WAY younger than she should. I know Katee Sackhoff is only a little younger than Bo Katan would be, but that’s not how it looks onscreen.
Go watch ROTJ.
If there’s supposed to be 19 years between Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope, nobody felt the Tattooine rapid-aging worse than Aunt Beru.
Aunt Beru looked like she spent every day since Luke arrived drinking and smoking heavily
Boba has 99 problems and the Sarlacc was like 9 of them.
the desert is a harsh place to live. look at what the sun did to Robert Redford.
Rodriguez may have directed a thing or two before Sin City ffs
Yeah, that line made me feel like I’m pushing 90. Kids…
I’m not sure why Boba Fett wouldn’t just get the armor back from Cobb. Seems much easier than getting it from an actual Mandalorian.
I imagine it was a matter of actually locating it. Cobb got it off some Jawas, so either they took it off Boba while he was unconscious/recovering from the Sarlacc/whatever, or Boba traded it to them at a point when he maybe had nothing else to offer for food/water/transport. Based on his wanting it back, I’d imagine it was stolen by the Jawas, and he had to go through the tough task of tracking down the specific bunch, and then trying to track down who they gave it to. I kind of had the impression Cobb didn’t have it all that long, since back in Mos Eisley they still figured that town was overrun with bandits.
This week’s episode was directed by the Robert Rodriguez of Sin City and Planet Terror fame (or Spy Kids and Alita: Battle Angel, if you’re a bit younger than I am).
Or El Mariachi and Desperado if you’re a bit older.
Please excuse what I completely agree is a dumb newbie question, but can someone explain to me when this series takes place in comparison to the Star Wars movies? I didn’t like the prequel movies or the ones that were set after the original trilogy enough to want to go back and watch them to figure shit out…so the Republic/New Republic/Old Republic references don’t really tell me anything as far as when anything happened.
A different, but related question I have is this—are the Republic (whether old or new) and the Rebels from the original trilogy all on the same side against the Empire? And are the separatists like the Rebels, except in reverse (in that they are fighting for the Empire)? I really don’t want to sit through those movies again (especially the prequels), but I guess I will if I have to.
This series takes place about five years after Return Of The Jedi. The rebels of the original trilogy became the New Republic. The Empire from the original trilogy is still around, but as individual factions rather than a single organized force.
So after the original 3, but before the Disney movies?
Yup!
Thank you–very helpful.
Yes.
Thank you!
Yes, The Force Awakens happens about 30 years after Return of the Jedi.
Well, this is one of the worst AV Club headlines of all time.
I loved everything except the plot-stupid act of Mando putting his jetpack down on the ground and then never remembering to retrieve it, even though we’ve established that he can call it remotely, when he needed it most.
Plot stupid is most stupid.
DAMN! I thought the jetpack thing was stupid before, but I totally forgot he could remote pilot it. That makes that plot contrivance WAAAYYY stupid.
Presumably, the jetpack would have to be completely disabled for the bargain Boba made with Din to make sense.So, not so stupid.
considering all of this is make believe, it would make more sense for him to hit the off button if that were the case, and the film makers show us that directly (even though it would be even more obvious foreshadowing than it already was.) This show is so full of plot holes and poorly thought out narrative that it’s hardly worth calling out anymore. I do enjoy it though, but just don’t put it on a super high pedestal that many here seem to
They didn’t make that clear in any way. A line of dialogue could have done it. Or some other mishap. But what they did was sorta forget about it, or at least hope that we would do so.
They do a lot of stuff that annoys me. I’ll put down my gun when you put down your backpack! The stormtroopers retreat into transport ships with giant turrets on the side. Why not stop at that point, and shoot Mando and his friends with the ship’s guns? And why are we lugging around big cannons with tripods? If you can make a little hovering motorcycle, why not make the tripod weapons float too? None of the blasters ever show any recoil, and you can obviously brake and brace the hovertech, even if recoil was a thing.It was nice to see Slave I again, though. Still my favorite ship design in the Star Wars universe. Boba Fett smashing everyone with a gaffi stick was also fun. It’s too bad he’s going to have to die to 1) bequeath his ship to the Mando, and 2) not steal all focus from the title character, who owes his whole existence to being a Boba Fett substitute.
It’s too bad he’s going to have to die to 1) bequeath his ship to the Mando, and 2) not steal all focus from the title character, who owes his whole existence to being a Boba Fett substitute.This will be an interesting test, because even though story-wise it sortof makes sense to kill Boba Fett, I wonder if Disney would be willing to write-off IP like that. The Boba Fett movie that they’d planned is long dead, but 5 years from now they might want to give it another shot. If it happens they could do it as a prequel, but a giant media conglomerate probably wants to leave every single option open.As an aside though, I think that bringing Fett in now actually makes Mando feel like less of a knockoff. We all knew it was going to happen eventually, and now that the band-aid has been pulled off Mando is a little more free to just be his own thing.
I feel like the whole second season has been more-or-less about that. First, we are told as an audience by the existence of the marshal that the armor isn’t the special bit. Then we’re told by Bo-Katan that the creed isn’t the special bit. Then we’re told by Boba that being a foundling isn’t the special bit. None of the “background character notes” are actually what the character is, since they get regularly reflected and diffracted through other characters. The project of this season is making Mando his own guy, rather than generic knockoff bounty hunter guy.
I’m a little surprised we didn’t get even the slightest bit of a hint that another Jedi heard Grogu’s call, force sync, whatever you want to call it. I wasn’t expecting anything overt that would clue in to anyone specific, say Ezra, but just something that indicated it worked
A B? Are you kidding? Midway through the episode my 11-year-old proclaimed “This is everything I ever dreamed of!”
that’s frankly pathetic. i would rather kill myself than experience media that way
This is the weirdest take I’ve ever seen about someone saying “my child really enjoyed this”.
hmm interesting, I kept watching until the 3rd episode. Tough tough call. you be the decider for yourself, mate. let’s hear more of the bigM story.
Boba coming out in his armour gave me total“I wonder if I can still fit in my highschool prom suit” vibes.
My two or three cents:Back on May the 4th, I thought it would be fun to track down the old NPR radio productions of the Original Trilogy. Perry King played Han Solo, John Lithgow was Yoda, etc. Great stuff. Relistening to Return of the Jedi, (and assuming that the radio production staff had access to the Lucas/Kasdan et al original screenplays) there were some fascinating scenes that didn’t make the film. There is indeed – in there – from 1986 – dialogue by Han, upon realizing Boba Fett went into the Sarlac Pit, words to the effect of, “Gee, digested for a thousand years. ‘Wonder if he can escape? Wonder if he’s really dead?” It was real obvious that they were sowing the seeds for a future Boba Fett return. This was in 1986 or so (each radio production came out about a year after the films were released). So, even if Lucas is on record for claiming he killed off Boba Fett with a shrug – couldn’t figure out what the big deal was with this character, some couple of someones in the near-inner circle wanted an “out” for Boba. Way back then. So Boba’s resurrection here, to me, (after listening to the radio play) is no big deal. I mean it’s cool and all, but no big surprise. I’d like to have a scene where Morrison gets to recount how he escaped and how it felt to be in a semi cryogenic state with the awareness of being digested – even if for only seven years. Maybe we’ll get that. Sorry that went long.This episode for me was an A+ opening but the rest of the episode settled into B+ territory. The opening scene landed big because Mando finally said out loud that he wanted this “lost orphan to find his people” or words to that effect – and yes, it was blunt force emotion – but I guess I needed it, because I hadn’t put it together exactly that Mando is trying to help Grogu in a way that he wasn’t helped when he was young. It was an “Ohmygod, of course!” moment for me. I can be slow at making these connections sometimes. It was like the whole series’ mission statement was spelled out in a few short, emotionally resonant lines of dialogue.Rankings of Jedi who will hopefully come looking for Baby Grogu:Princess Leia – as played by Billie LourdeDe-aged Mark Hamill /Luke SkywalkerAhsoka (“Yeah I told him to call out to a Jedi and the stubborn little bastard called out to me, so I guess I have no choice.”)The Nightsisters of DathomirJocasta – she’d be really old but I’d prefer a woman to either wild-man Quinlan Vos or a crippled Mace Windu. Mando doesn’t need any fatherly competition.
Jocasta?
“Grogu, don’t touch that. That’s not polite.”
I don’t follow the cartoons or the EU, but some reading I did do led me to believe someone named Ezra might be the Jedi whocomes looking. Does that make sense?
Ezra would be okay, I guess. He ended Rebels with two interesting abilities: primarily that he has a Jedi’s sense of really being able to connect with animals – hopefully a live action Ezra would lean into that. Secondly, near the end of the series, both Ezra and Ahsoka discovered that through various Jedi Temple “power spots” across the galaxy – that they could, if they so chose, to travel between them and even (ulp!) Time Travel. Recently Rahul Kohli (Owen from “the Haunting of Bly Manor”) threw his name into the mix as someone to play Ezra Bridger and he would be a fine choice. At this point in the story, Ezra would be about 9 years older than Luke. If The Mandalorian takes place 5 years post RotJ, that puts Luke & Leia at or about 31, Ezra at 40, and Ahsoka at 48.Here’s one no one is talking about yet: Kanan and Hera from Rebels had a kid who probably could be force sensitive (as Kanan was a Jedi) who would be about 10 at this point. Lately I’ve been thinking, so that Mando doesn’t become a background character in his own series, that the Jedi to show up for Grogu might be another youngling. Now he’s got two kids to look after!
Mando gets a few more kids; Ahsoka gets a few more kids; they get married —- and that’s how they all became the Star Wars Bunch!
The Nightsisters? I thought Palpatine had them killed, or something (I know, Star Wars, even Boba Fett is alive, so why not?).How about Asaj Ventress?
It’s Star Wars, so the whole “maybe not quite so dead” thing may be in play, but Ventress died in 19 ABY saving Jedi Quinlan Vos from Count Dooku in the novel Dark Disciple.
Well I believe this series is c. 8 ABY, so she’s still out there. Wait, Dooku in ABY? I know he’s dead — he doesn’t have a head.
Oops, typo. Ventress died in 19 BBY, the same year Dooku died.
Ok, that makes sense
You’re right, they got purged… but yeah, *Star Wars* so they’re still around in some form. Thumbs up on Asaj.
Per the RotJ radio drama, when you say 1986 I think you actually mean 1996.
Hey. You’re right. Thanks.
I’m thinking Ahsoka. Bringing in Luke or Leia seems unlikely unless the plan is to kill off Grogu after his training begins because if Grogu is left with the Jedi, then we know something must have happened to him to not show up at all in Episodes VII-IX. Plus, Ahsoka seems likely to be brought back this season to help with rescuing Grogu, given that last season’s structure involved pulling in the various friends that Mando met along the way to help. Seems like Bo-Katan and Ahsoka will be recruited to help (assuming Mando can find them, though Ahsoka possibly could seek Mando out if she realizes what happened to Grogu through their Force connection). I could see Ahsoka softening her stance a bit if the alternative to her training Grogu is to have Dark Side users/sympathizers controlling his training and powers. Would make sense if she changes her mind and takes Grogu in, though I am not sure how that would complicate any Ahsoka-centric spinoff.
“This week’s episode was directed by the Robert Rodriguez of Sin City and Planet Terror fame (or Spy Kids and Alita: Battle Angel, if you’re a bit younger than I am).”I’m probably a bit older, so he’s the El Mariachi and From Dusk til Dawn guy to me.
Big same. RR’s major contribution to my life is seeing Antonio Banderas & Salma Hayek being too sexy for words.
“Robert Rodriguez of Sin City and Planet Terror fame (or Spy Kids and Alita: Battle Angel”Really? You’re going to say his claim to fame is those movies?
Robert Rodriguez of RED 11 and MACHETE 2 fame!
To all those who are wondering why Boba didn’t take the armor from Vanth:They never said how long he’d been out of the Sarlaac. The armor could have been spit up or kicked out long before he was. Or he had amnesia for a while. Or he was doing other stuff – like lying low for awhile. They can explain it a lot of ways.
Or it was hanging around in that Jawa land crawler for a while and it took him time to find where it ended up. Or he didn’t want to take on a gunslinger dude wearing it when all he had was a robe and a gaffi stick
I dunno, he seems awfully handy with a robe and a gaffi stick. Ask those troopers.
Pshaw. Troopers and their plastic armor are made for smashin’.
They suggested that the Krayt dragon could eat Sarlaacs. So clearly, Fett was slowly digesting for 25 years or so, then the Krayt ate the Sarlaac, so then Fett was inside that. Then they blew up the Krayt, and he was free!
Canonically The Mandalorian only takes place about nine years after the Sarlacc swallowed Boba Fett.
Yeah, makes more sense. I thought a twenty-five got thrown in there at some point in the episode though.
“My chain code has been encoded in this armor for 25 years”.
That was it. It registered before I knew where he was going with it and probably munged it together with the timeline of the sequels.
I’m not gonna say I called it but I’m glad The Mandalorian is on roughly the same wavelength as me.
The notes about Dawson and Carrano ruined this review…
The unfussy, standalone approach to stakes and storytelling that this show employs is very enjoyable and refreshing. Nevertheless, it was good to see the ante being upped somewhat, not just with the Kid being in actual danger but also Mando displaying some naked, unfiltered emotion and Boba Fett dishing out some seriously crunchy violence – this ep really doubled down on the ragdoll Stormtrooper slaughter. ‘Twas great!
Fett and Shand were being AWFULLY generous in how they interpreted the deal they made with Mando, first defending Grogu from that imperial assault and now going on a rescue mission with Mando against an Imperial cruiser just because Mando agreed to give back Fett’s own old Armor? (which he didn’t really do, Fett just took it anyway)
Fett, though relatively honorable, is not as “morally ambiguous” as Mando, and mostly does stuff for his own benefit. (I wonder how the non-Star Wars fans side of the internet will react if they mention his ship’s name is the ‘Slave One’)Maybe Fett has gotten softer after getting chewed on for a few years by the Sarlacc. (heh)
Though I can kinda give them a pass if they keep giving us more cool action scenes with Fett. (seriously, is the Trooper armor made out of Styrofoam or something? )
He was…tenderized.
I figured that Fett saw how distressed Mando was at losing his “son”, remembered the pain of losing his own father at a young age and decided to help him.
Though technically true, I wouldn’t really call someone with just a cybernetic stomach a “Cyborg”.
THIS is a Cyborg. (Beilert Valance, which would be really cool if he eventually appears on this show)
I agree. Does an artificial heart make you a cyborg? Mechanical leg?
Technically having a pacemaker makes you a cyborg.
Yes.
I love the new title song.
Goddamn is Ming-Na sexy
Mando’s life is routine the same way the characters in The Office’s life are routine, Mando’s just involves more gunfighting. Routine isn’t inherently bad.
Oh, that was heartbreaking. Not Grogu being kidnapped (they’ll get him back), but the Razor Crest getting vaporized. I really loved that ship.
Grogu is somehow going to end up being Snoke or Snoke’s clone base, isn’t he?No matter! Seeing Dave Filoni, Jon Favreau, and Robert Rodriguez restore Boba Fett to being the Empire Strikes Back badass he was before Lucas got his jowls on him in Return of the Jedi is enough for me!
So who did Grogu contact?
People are betting on Luke, but my money’s on Ashoka, she was summoned by Grogu via The Force as her wake-up call that she can’t sit this one out any more than Anakin could sit out training her.
If it’s Ahsoka the whole journey to this henge was a waste of time. The Guppy could have made his case to her face to face. No way.
Disagree! It’s a nice continuation of Anakin’s reluctance to train her, only for even better reasons.
I almost wonder if this “contact a Jedi” notion is a red herring…when Mando was told to return Baby Yoda to “his people” maybe what was meant was for Mando to find the other remaining little green critters like Yoda, etc. And since Mando was a foundling…and now we know Jango Fett was too…maybe FOUNDLING Grogu is meant to stay with Mando. Mandalorians take in foundlings. It is the way. And Daddy Mando can teach Grogu to follow his initial healing/helpful instincts with the Force.
At the end of the day I think that’s the endgame. Din teaches Grogu “The Way.”
Grogu was the Mandalorian of the title the whole time!(I am only half joking.)
this was the first episode i really loved. best one yet, IMO. give me some fun character moments, some stakes, some forward momentum and some kick ass action.
I agree. This was the best of the series by far for me
The worst episode of the series.
I mean this “battle” was ridiculous..
Do Stormtroopers only exist to die/suffer for the pleasure of the “Empire” officers? Cause I do not see any other use for them. They are horrible in battle and basically incompetent in everything else. The biggest joke in SW universe is how the Empire managed to be.. an empire with those idiots as an army..
Why Gideon didn’t send the Black Cylons to do the job in the first place?
I like silly action but the whole thing was so dumb..
You’re just now asking about the uselessness of stormtroopers? At least they can hit a target now — too bad about the impenetrable armor.
I was expecting Boba to make a comment on how much better his “brothers” were at this. The one thing the prequels did right was show useful clone troopers. Hell, they did more to take out the Jedi than Anakin the kid-killer did
I thought it was interesting fight where we got to see a lot of tactics and weapons we’ve never seen before, such as mortars and some kind of laser equivalent of a 50 cal. Storm Troopers have always been cannon fodder basically
It’d have been nice if the stormtroopers had any tactical training to go along with the new equipment, though, instead of advancing widely separated in ones and twos so that they can keep getting picked off.People joke about how stormtroopers are disposable cannon fodder, but in the original trilogy they were treated as a significant threat: except during the Battle of Endor, our heroes always fled from stormtroopers in a fight, because they were always outnumbered. Of course the stormtroopers could never hit our heroes, but our heroes had to seek cover and flee. They didn’t just mow down the stormtroopers and complete their objective.
I think back to the first movie when Obi-Wan tells Luke that stormtroopers are precise shooters. Or in the opening scene when stormtroopers completely overpower a rebel capital ship. Or later when escaping the Death Star when Leia suspects they were allowed to escape and it is then confirmed by Vader/Tarkin.
This view of stormtroopers as a deadly threat has of course been entirely discarded at this point, but it’s still tiring to see them being used as useless and disposable mooks. And what is the purpose of their armor? A single blast from any weapon is enough to leave them dead. In Rogue One I believe there’s even a point when one of them gets punched and it’s enough to take him out.
Wasn’t that just (just!) an E-Web heavy repeating blaster?also, love your avatar – “People hate me!”
I always thought that storm troopers replaced clones as the main military body of the Empire because they were just cheap conscripts. The clones were used to create the Empire. Once it was created they just needed occupying forces. it’s the entire reason the Empire fell. A sense of complacency with an already conquered populace. Relying on weapon and armor superiority vs. actual skilled troops. The rebels capitalized on the ineptitude of the Empires forces while still struggling to overcome their materiel superiority. And they just succeeded through Luke and his friends.
If you think this was the worst episode of the series you should probably stop watching.
Are you 5y old? I read that this is a show for kids..so just wondering. I mean at the age of 5, usually people do not realize that not everyone likes everything the same.
Maybe I should ask your permission which episodes of Mandalorian to like or not?
It would have made a bit more sense if Gideon had sent the stormtroopers to fight Din et. al., and then while they were occupied the Dark Troopers come down to abduct Grogu. But he doesn’t even send the Dark Troopers until after Din et. al. have completely taken out all the stormtroopers and blown up their transports, and also after Gideon blows up the Razor Crest. It’s yet another writing decision that makes the characters look like idiots.
I can’t disagree on the troopers. It would be nice if they weren’t so comically terrible at combat in all things Star Wars. However, I think you can make an argument for the robot troopers. The Storm Troopers acted as a diversion. If they happen to succeed then, great! But if not then you send in the others just as the other engagement appears to be nearing a conclusion.
I like how the stormtroopers parked next to the razer crest and got out like it was a parking lot. Remember everyone, we’re parked in lot Goofy. Then they proceeded to try taking the HIGH GROUND like they didn’t have access to the air support they just parked. The stormtroopers might have just been a distraction for the dark troopers but I doubt they knew that because why bother trying to take the hill when you could just pin them down? And if they had goddamn rope in Star Wars they could have some troops rappel behind the enemy and they wouldn’t even need dark troopers. Not that they even needed to do any of that because Mando and crew were so far away from baby yoda the Empire could have turned them into a crater and still not harmed baby yoda.
This week’s episode was directed by the Robert Rodriguez of Sin City and Planet Terror fame (or Spy Kids and Alita: Battle Angel, if you’re a bit younger than I am). But aside from his signature “character looking at the camera while an explosion rages in the background” shot, I didn’t see a lot of his visual signatures here. Rodriguez is known for extensive use of green screen backgrounds in his films—he was a pioneer in the field, in fact—so it’s interesting that the majority of “The Tragedy” seems to have been shot on location.Remember his first film was the low budget film El Mariachi, which has a similar western feel to The Mandalorian, and has no green screen at all. I guess he went back to basics with this one, which is funny given the huge budget and visual effects available
FYI they don’t use CGI on this show. They film on a huge stage that has a giant wall of LED panels that create the environment.
They don’t use green screen. They sure as hell use Computer Generated Imagery.
lmao, would you like to take a moment and consider what CGI stands for, dipshit?
Clearly I meant green screen.
Why so hostile? You motherfucking asshole.
Darth Grogu has a real nice ring to it.
On the other hand, Sith Lords like to take new names to hide their activities (That silly Dark Side! It clouds everything!) or come across as more eeeevil.Recent Sith Lords have (intentionally or not) had names that were regular Basic words with the prefix removed (Invader, Insidious). On that model, I’d like to suggest that when Grogu goes full Sith, he take the nom de guerre Darth Dorable or possibly Darth Dorbz.
Didn’t they have those kid-harnesses in that galaxy?
Seriously, and Mando should have had a Bumbo for the little guy to sit in.
That ball baby Grogu sat on while he was meditating. I really felt like I’d seen it before.
YES. And the blue waves that were rising around him really made me think of the towers in Breath of the Wild when you unlock them.
While the eponymous tragedy may be the abduction of Baby G., to me the real tragedy was the destruction of the Razor Crest. Mando hasn’t just lost his transportation, but his home, his arsenal of weapons, his professional equipment (e.g. carbonite freezer), and all his clean underwear.He found the lever knob that Baby loves, but I’ve been wondering: why does it fascinate the Child so?
I wonder whether that knob now has the tracking device.
So is “The Tragedy” the kidnapping of Baby Yoda, or the destruction of the Razor Crest, which was a pretty sweet ride?Oh, well. Maybe Mando can pick up a surplus U-Wing.
Admiral Blue Jeans is back. He’s watching the re-enactment of The Good, The Bad and the Ugly from afar in his helicopter at about 10:48 in the episode.
Are the dark troopers all Droid, part Droid, Droid with humanoid bits and midichlorians? I am confused.
100% pure droid!Welcome to beep-boop country.
The ones in the videos games are fully droids.That said, we don’t yet know what Moff Gideon’s version are. Making them partially organic would tie in nicely with the cloning operation we know he has. The fans editing that Wookieepedia article may have jumped the gun in adding The Mandalorian’s version to the main article.
‘Tis a minor point, but the more I think about it, the weirder it seems. “Looks like we’re going to have to travel the last stretch with the windows down” is a strange joke for Star Wars. When have we seen a vehicle in Star Wars with windows that go up and down?Space vehicles have sealed cockpits, and the ones with canopies don’t fly with them open. Your X-wing doesn’t have a convertible mode. Repulsorlift vehicles for personal use tend to have open cockpits with small windscreens or are completely open (speeder bikes and swoops), while military vehicles are more likely fully enclosed with viewports. I don’t recall seeing any Star Wars vehicle with windows that go up and down to provide comfort.
The episode was okay, but there is still something about this show that rubs me the wrong way. The fan catering still just seems so relentless. The lead is a Fett lookalike. Running around with a baby Yoda. Old Fett fighting with a Tusken Raider staff. The list is endless. And Tatooine. Again. For a remote planet, it sure feels like grand central station. Stay tuned next week for another exciting episode of “Do you know your Star Wars brand?”.
I don’t give a shit what anyone says about this episode, it resolved a decades long mistake by Lucas and truly made Boba Fett be the badass he was supposed to be..The way he demolished those stormtroopers.. Jesus Christ.I love that Mando is usually not the toughest guy in the room in most of these episodes and is giving some really great character turns and reveals that has got me more pumped than any of the new films. There are some serious dudes in this place (and Bill Burr lol)
Temuera Morrison is clearly a great actor (his depiction of an abuser in Once Were Warriors is chilling), but I actually think they should have brought back Daniel Logan. Morrison is pushing sixty these days, and I don’t think the sarlacc pit has the ability to accelerate your age. Keep Morrison around for the return of Rex.
Gina Carano a transphobe? JFC.
“(The other 18 claims were withdrawn over the summer, which could be seen as the influence of Dawson’s money on the case.)“
(The omnipresence of this narrative on this website, even when reviewing an episode that doesn’t include Dawson and therefore does not justify the inclusion of this information, could be seen as the influence of try-hard wokeness rearing up in whatever writer happens to be assigned the job of reviewing an episode and those charges that don’t seem to have any more information about them. Dropping 18 out of 20 charges COULD be seen as having no ability to back those charges up in any meaningful way, but you went a different direction.)
(The existence of the charges from a childhood friend SHOULD indicate the existence of Dawson’s money in the first place, and SHOULD indicate that maybe this person is a gold-digging piece of shit. But uh oh, critical thoughts like that only apply when you might not get accused of transphobia?)
I’m just going to be honest, Star Wars isn’t my home fandom. That would be Star Trek. So a lot of these characters that people are squeeing over don’t really register for me. I never watched the animated series so I had no experience with Bo Katan or Ahsoka Tano and even Boba Fett basically got a “Oh okay. Welcome back, old man” from me. That said, this episode finally made me see what my Boba Fett loving friends have seen in the character.
This show really likes to kill off stormtroopers. I’m not complaining. I just kept watching it like “Damn!” The boulder rolling down the hill crushing stormtroopers along the way was a nice bit of work.As I watched this episode, I realized that sci-fi makes mask-wearing easy. Almost every character wore some version of a mask except for Cara Dune which…yeah. AFAIC, they can kill her off anytime they want.
This episode raises a ton of questions, but most importantly: Why was Boba Fett such a schmuck in ROTJ when he is clearly the baddest of the bad asses?
bad luck
Just one of those days I guess.
And if you’re a bit older, you think of Rodriguez as the director of El Mariachi, From Dusk ‘til Dawn, and Desperados. And that environment is way more in keeping with those films.One thing I’ve liked about Mandalorian is that whereas Mando is unquestionably a badass, he’s clearly not the most dangerous thing in the universe. That for a mandalorian, he’s not the most skilled. He doesn’t have the experience of his more badass brethren and sistren. And in this episode, you see the difference. You absolutely believe that Bobba Fett deserves his reputation.
Biggest shock to me was that they splashed the Razor Crest. My kid built the LEGO model just last month.
The Mandalorian being a showcase for different directors’ takes on Star Wars is smart. Keep at it, y’all. See who else you can get. Go wild. I mean, shit, would Herzog direct an ep?
This week’s episode was directed by the Robert Rodriguez of Sin City and Planet Terror fame (or Spy Kids and Alita: Battle Angel, if you’re a bit younger than I am)I find it odd you use Spy Kids (a nearly 20 year old movie) as an example for the younger crowd when that was one of his earlier movies and is older than Sin City and Planet Terror by several years at least. Also, I’m so down for a Boba Fett Mexico style Tatooine trilogy now lol.
Sh*t. This is reason sometimes wished had cable. Really want to watch ‘The Mandalorian’. Seems very good. Too bad am poor f*cker. Even the WHYY daytime programming (Philly PBS mainstay of 3 channels) is now geared for the ‘kiddies’ & unwatchable/boring. My Bar Bud Andy Capp thinks I should prolly drink less beers if tv that important. For once, He may be right.
I live in L.A. and while I don’t know the exact spot, it looks so much like Santa Clarita that I’m sure it has to be. It was the only thing that took me out of it a little bit. Same thing happened in Picard earlier this year. There was a big meeting of Romulans engaged in some mystical science shit on some hidden planet in the middle of nowhere and I took one look at it and realized it was probably the hills outside the studio.
I’m now waiting for Moff Gideon to go full Gus and warn Mando “I will kill your infant Yoda.”
Loved seeing Boba Fett, now let’s see some Wedge action.
Why does the lawsuit need inclusion here? what bearing does it have on the story, the production, or anything else? Are you directly covering the lawsuit and what relevance does it have to this weeks episode? Do you have an editor and is this a personal agenda for either you or them to bring up unrelated, unresolved salacious material? Why did I spend the time reading your article if this is the kind of crap I might find? Maybe I should go elsewhere. This whole group of sites is a pit.
This season has been stellar.
I take back what I said. I didn’t read any comments. She’s just the worst. I won’t be renewing my Disney Plus. Keep fighting the good fight Katie!