The Mandalorian becomes Law & Order in a galaxy where everyone is in love
Bo-Katan and celebrity guests fully claim the spotlight from Din Djarin and Grogu
TV Reviews Mandalorian
This week on The Mandalorian, lots of people are in love, the working class admits that work is okay when you know that your boss will die someday, and multiple famous people showed up. The episode was a somewhat weird and silly one, even by Star Wars standards, but I actually think it might’ve been better if it had gone even further in that direction. This is an installment where Din Djarin really could’ve shined with his more outsider-y perspective on the galaxy, but I feel the show is using his taciturn nature to make things a little too easy on Bo-Katan (the real star of the series).
The episode—“Guns For Hire,” one of only three times there wasn’t a “The” in the title and the second one of those directed by Bryce Dallas Howard—opens with Bo’s old crew of Mandalorians working as mercenaries, as teased earlier in the season. They’re riding an old Clone Wars-era Star Destroyer and bullying a ship of Quarrens (the squid-faced guys). As it turns out, they were hired by the Mon Calamari (the fish-faced guys) to recover the kid of some big-shot fish woman, because the kid is in love with the Quarren ship’s Captain Shuggoth. Sidebar: It seems vaguely insulting to give a squid-faced person a Lovecraft-sounding name, but that’s not my call to make.
Shuggoth says goodbye to her fish-love, stroking his face with her tentacles, and then the Mando mercs—led by Axe Woves, a front-runner for Worst Star Wars Name—take the Mon Calamari guy away. It’s kind of an odd intro, since it doesn’t really paint the mercs as especially bad guys, just motivated by money. Considering last week’s episode ended with the tease that Mandalorians (presumably these Mandalorians) broke Moff Gideon out of prison, I would’ve expected the show to build these people up as more ruthless jerks now that they don’t have Bo-Katan leading them.
Speaking of, Bo and Din are now on their quest to reunite the disparate Mandalorian tribes so they can all reclaim their planet, and Bo easily tracks her old comrades down to an Outer Rim world called Plazir-15 where something is clearly going on. Plazir is a very bright and clean world, which is pretty unique for this show, and it felt a lot like the opening of a Doctor Who episode to me, where our heroes show up on a world with no idea of what the story is, but there’s some kind of adventure just waiting for them.
Din and Bo are greeted by a pair of black Imperial droids, which puts Din on edge because he hates droids. (Way back in season one it was revealed that Seperatist droids killed his family.) They are then taken away to meet with the planet’s democratically elected king and queen, setting up one of the wildest things to ever happen in a Star Wars: The leaders of this world, a lovey-dovey married couple called the Duchess and Captain Bombardier (bom-bard-ee-yay), are played by Lizzo and Jack Black. And not only are they played by Lizzo and Jack Black, but they’re both dressed and acting like this is some kind of Disney fairy tale. Their costumes are comically over-designed and brightly colored, they’re both doing cute little voices, and everyone is constantly tossing around needlessly fancy honorifics.
It feels like something out of The Clone Wars, where the writers had to come up with some new, vaguely kid-friendly planet for Anakin and Ahsoka to visit every week, and while I didn’t love that show, I do kind of dig how completely silly this all is. Part of the reason for that is that there’s no secret malice beneath all of this; it’s just silly aesthetics for the sake of doing something new, and I think that’s kind of cute.
The Duchess and Bombardier explain that their planet’s economy is built on reprogrammed droids, mostly Seperatist Battle Droids (you know, from the prequel movies!), who do all of the manual labor. Everything has been perfect for years, but a concerning number of droids have started malfunctioning recently and harming citizens. They don’t have any armed police, and no soldiers are permitted to enter their city in order to maintain peace, but they do have a team of ineffectual constables let by a guy named Commissioner Helgait (spoiler alert: pronounced “hell-gate”) who is played by… Christopher Lloyd! Great Scott! Reader, my head was spinning from all of these famous people!
Helgait says he has a button that will shut down all of the droids, malfunctioning or otherwise, but he’s not legally allowed to hit it. See, the non-droids all love this society where they don’t have to work, so they voted to forbid anyone from ever shutting down the droids. (When will people learn that democracy doesn’t work?) Din and Bo speak with the Ugnaughts in charge of maintaining the droids and get a list of where they suspect the next malfunction will happen, and as Bo chats with the Battle Droid in charge of the worksite, Din just starts kicking droids to see if any of them will freak out and retaliate.
One does, and they chase it through a neon-filled cyberpunk-y city, ducking through storefronts and charging past panicking citizens. It’s very by-the-numbers as far as these foot chases go, but the magic of Star Wars is that it can get away with that kind of thing simply by putting it in a Star Wars setting. They kill the droid and find a “spark pad” on it that leads them to a droid bar called The Resistor that might be one of the best Star Wars locations I’ve seen in a long time. It’s full of old practical animatronics and people in costumes, just hanging and spinning their heads around as the drink robo-booze (called Nepenthé, an Odyssey reference), and it’s all very silly in the best way.
When Din leans on the bartender a little too hard, he reveals that the droids of Plazir-15 would never harm the organics—they actually really like them and are happy to do all of their manual labor. After all, humans built them, and human lives are relatively short compared to their own, so why not carry some boxes or pick up their garbage? It’ll only be so long before they all die. It’s another nice little subversion from the more obvious path, which would’ve been that there are some robot revolutionaries (or Imperial remnants) trying to undermine this society.
But it turns out that it’s not robots or Imperials that are making the robots malfunction; it’s a bad batch of Nepenthé that was ordered by…Commissioner Helgait! When Din and Bo confront him, he reveals that he’s actually an old Seperatist who is pissed that the Duchess and Bombardier have turned the planet into a decadent party world, and as he makes a speech about how Count Dooku was a visionary, Bo and Din beat him up and arrest him.
They take him back to the Duchess and Bombardier, and in case their earlier scene felt a little too serious, this one one is basically a cartoon. They’re playing a game where you bounce a ball off of a bug through a hoop, which Grogu is cheating at by using the Force, and the Duchess exiles Helgait to some other planet after he makes what is apparently a genuine apology for being a bad guy. Then, she presents Bo-Katan with the key to the city—a literal big key!—and names Grogu a knight of the Ancient Order Of Independent Regencies. What is any of this? Why is any of this happening? I don’t know, but I think I like it!
With the droid problem solved, Bo and Din are free to go meet up with the other Mandalorians, who aren’t particularly happy to see their old boss back. Axe Woves kind of likes being in charge, so Bo challenges him to a fight and easily wipes the floor with him—though the fight scene is at least pretty well done, with both of them pulling off various jetpack and grappling hook and flamethrower moves.
Bo convinces Axe to yield, but he says that she’ll never be the true leader of Mandalore because she needs the Darksaber to do that and she doesn’t have the guts to take it from Din. But then Din reveals that she doesn’t need to take it from him, because she rightfully earned it after killing the robot guy earlier this season who captured him and stole it. Ergo, the Darksaber has been hers ever since then. The Mandalorians somewhat begrudgingly agree, and she triumphantly ignites it and does a cool pose.
Stray observations
- Credit where credit is due: Toussaint Egan at Polygon pointed out weeks ago that Bo-Katan earned the Darksaber after killing the crab robot. I thought the show would’ve acknowledged that earlier if that were the case, but nope. Din was just keeping that fact to himself until it was narratively more exciting. And here we keep saying the show’s not about him anymore!
- The cop show tropes in this episode were fun, if a little heady-handed. The foot chase, the coroner scene, the good cop/bad cop routine. I would’ve liked it a little more without the Mandalorian stuff at the end, since that was a totally different vibe.
- Lizzo’s Duchess was the rightful ruler of Plazir-15, and Black’s Bombardier was an Imperial sent to conquer the world, but then they fell in love!
- Speaking of, both of their performances here were distracting, because it was impossible to not see them as Lizzo and Jack Black, but I liked the exaggerated little frown she gave Grogu when the two of them waved goodbye.
- Din doing the full Boston Dynamics kick on the droids to see if any of them fall down was a nice gag.
- I’m sure there were a lot of Easter eggs in the droid bar, but one that I clocked was the Star Tours pilot (who has shown up in other places before this).
- Bo and Din specifically shut Helgait up before he can mention that Dooku was assassinated by Anakin Skywalker, which was interesting. Maybe the show didn’t want to name-drop him after Din had already met his son? Does Bo-Katan know that he became Darth Vader?
- The corrupted Nepenthé made the droids malfunction because of nanomachines, son. I would’ve given the whole season an A if someone had actually said that line.
187 Comments
Feels like this is the experimenting season for them. I liked most of the admittedly very goofy Law & Order stuff, the celebrity cameos are getting a bit distracting though, especially when they aren’t known for acting. The challenge at the end was a cool fight and one of the first times any Mandalorian besides Din seemed badass and not just a flying power ranger
That fight scene was a lot of fun. Bryce Dallas Howard has some solid directing skills.
So true. I can’t believe they tried to get Christopher Lloyd and the guy from Tenacious D to act.
This felt like the full pendulum swing in the opposite direction of Andor, and I mean that in a good way. Star Wars contains room for multitudes, including goofy shit. And WOW was this episode some goofy shit!
Goofy is fine. But dumbasss goofy is not. Wow, this episode was dreadful.
Whatever Buzz Killington, I got half an evil Christoper Lloyd monologue before he got electrocuted & Jack Black & Lizzo as the sweetest space couple in the universe.
It was a waste of all three of them! But I’m glad you enjoyed the episode on the level it was intended. (that sounds condescending, but is not meant as such!) To me, I’d be thrilled to see any of those 3 in SW in a story that wasn’t awful.
Between those three guest stars, I’m surprised there was ANY scenery left to be chewed. I loved it.
This is a new thing I do with people crying about bud light. I don’t give them a chance to argue back bc there’s not really an argument to be had. I go waaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhh bc you sound like a little baby.
Nah, it ruled
Have you ever enjoyed any episode of this show?
Yes.
He spent the entire first season commenting on how the show was awful and it was going to bomb. Those comments are hilarious to read now knowing how the show was an immediate hit.
You seem to have a pretty miserable existence. Again: no one is forcing you to watch this show every week, then wax poetically about how terrible it is.
I have a lovely existence. Comically bitching about a TV show is a mildly amusing pasttime that has zero bearing on my overall mental state. Thanks for your concern.
Comically? That’s quite a stretch. Don’t let me interrupt your lovely existence of constantly belly-aching about a show you clearly hate, yet dutifully watch week in and week out though.
Talking about bad tv shows is fun. You needn’t be concerned for my mental health.
Shocking. LaurenceQ didn’t like this episode.
Shocking. The Mandalorian had (yet another) shitty episode.
He spent the entire first season saying every episode was awful, convince people that the show was going to fail, and once it was apparent that the show was a hit, he tried to tell everyone that they were wrong. Reading his season 1 comments are hilarious.
The writing, direction, and pacing met the goofiness of the visuals and guest performances by keeping things light and zippy. It was a really fun 40 minutes that felt like 20 (in a good way.) Fun action, a non-desert planet, and a self-contained adventure that set aside some time at the end for “big picture” plot stuff (which in turn kept the series’ larger narrative from bogging down the caper-of-the-week.) It reminded me of the better episodes of previous seasons. After a lackluster first few eps this year, the last two have given me some hope that the show still knows how to be fun.
Yes, every time we go to the Rim, I clench and mentally go “oh god, no, oh god, not again” until it’s proven not to be Tatooine… “If there’s a shining center to the galaxy, uh… apparently this is it.”
Andor was such turgid shit for people who think Star Wars is beneath them. This show gets Star Wars.
It’s kind of veering wildly between Saturday morning live action serial, and 70’s Glen A. Larson primetime, but with incredible production values. And you know, I’m having fun with it.
Immediately cheered seeing a Quarren that wasn’t some mustache(face tentacle)-twirling villain for a change.
I want a resolution for their aquatic forbidden love subplot!
Spinoff? Spinoff! Otherwise I’m sure the fanfic is already underway 🙂
On it!
Do you want a Zoidberg? ‘Cause that’s how you get a Zoidberg.
“I’LL TAKE EIGHT!”
Obviously!
Nobody wants a Zoidberg.
ESPECIALLY Zoidberg!
For the entire cold opening, I thought that it would cut to Baby Yoda watching it on a holo because it was some kind of star wars version of a Telemundo novelas.
“That stuff will rot your brain, kid.”
I thought the cheif Uag Naut looked a lot like Bobs horrible boss from the incredibles*, but I was just seeing constant cameos at that point.( or possibly Nixon)
It would have been kinda cool to hear Wallace Shawn’s voice saying, “I have thpoken!”
I was hoping for Nick Nolte.
Buddy of mine thought he looked like Christoph Waltz
That was Nixon?! Oh, what a McGovern I’ve been,not noticing that.
Also because I’ve been playing a lot of Skyrim again , this had a definite subquest vibe to it . Show up to a new area, have to solve a mystery to get a quest item, do it, get made a thane , sorry Knight, then get to do the thing you need to continue your main quest..
You kind of described the whole series.
He described what a TV show always was until relatively recently.
It’s weird how people think an episodic episode–which TV was full of before 15 years ago–are “side quests.”
They’re more “procedural quests”.
Lot’s of cameos in this season of The Mandalorian. Jack Black, Lizzo, Christopher Lloyd and Tim Meadows.
No one should really be complaining with some of the goofiness in this season of Mandalorian. It fits right in with Star Wars. The Cantina Bar. Return of the Jedi. That’s always been Star Wars. Andor was the serious side of Star Wars and even that had some goofy moments.
This episode felt like it belonged on something on the CW. Intro and outro advance the “arc” while the actual body of the episode is just another quest of the week. This show is starting to feel a little low budget to me, which is a shame.
Did… did you watch any of the previous seasons? Which fit that exact description perfectly?
The Mandalorian has usually just been A-plot 24/7 with folks wondering when Grogu will find a Jedi being the B-plot. Once in a while they swapped.
The Quarren captain was portrayed by Christine Adams. I would have been happy to have her be *the* guest star for the episode… but then to have Christopher Lloyd? As just… some guy?!!?! Incredible. The casting on this show is bonkers and I love it.Jack Black and Lizzo actually did well with their characters. Black especially, he wasn’t twirling his mustache or anything, they genuinely seemed like Star Wars characters who were in love. They would have been 100% in place for a Clone Wars/Rebels arc.
Finally, please give Bryce Dallas Howard one of the upcoming unnamed Star Wars movies! She knocks it out of the park every single time.
I don’t know for sure if the Mandalorians are the ones responsible for the attack on the ship, since it is based entirely around the presence of Besker steel there. Maybe, just maybe, Moff Gideon who used to rule Mandalor for the Empire has plenty of it floating around. Hell, his underling when trying to buy Grogu used Beskar as the reward for the quest.
“Moff Gideon who used to rule Mandalor for the Empire has plenty of it floating around.”He wouldn’t have had it in jail.
I think the idea is that his killer robots are made of beskar.
Also easter egg: the Death Troopers from Dark Forces were upgraded in stages, and it makes sense that Death Troopers version 2.0 are upgraded with beskar, given that a Jedi with a lightsaber just wiped the floor with a whole platoon of them.
No, but Moff Gideon wasn’t exactly working alone… now was he? Hell we see his former bridge officer wandering around freely in the New Republic, disrupting shit.
The beskar armor was likely left deliberately to blame Gideon’s escape on the Mandalorians.
This episode was a sandwich in which the two slices of plain white bread taste better and have more substance than the shit between them. Worse shit than Taika Waititi’s crap episode from the Boba Fett show. These ridiculous cringe cameos serve no purpose.Damn, I already miss the Bad Batch.
Waititi didn’t even direct an episode of TBOBF.
This season has been all over the place, thematically, and I don’t know how to feel about it. As someone else said, it seems like they’re experimenting a lot. I like that they’re trying new things, and for the most part I’m having fun, but narratively this has been all over the place. Maybe I’m just bitter because my favorite person in the whole world, Timothy Olyphant, hasn’t come back yet.
It’s a good reason to be bitter.
This episode was all over the place!But I did enjoy the Lizzo, Jack Black, and Christopher Lloyd cameos. And Grogu using the force to cheat at the Star Wars version of Wonderland croquet (or whatever that was).
Grogu wasn’t cheating – he was helping Lizzo win.
“Would this blade then not belong to her?”
The mercenaries stand there silently, racking their brains trying to remember their high school algebra knowledge on the Transitive Property.
heh.
Points taken off for Axe Wove not responding with “This is the Way.” Are we trying to preserve our cultural mumbo-jumbo here or not, people?
I think that’s more of a saying for the zealot branch.
I love how lawyerly the Mandalorians are, even the non-Orthodox ones who take their helmets off. Mando finds a legal technicality to hand over the darksaber, and they all gasp in unanimous agreement after rejecting Bo-Katan just three minutes earlier.
Well, it was the first night of Pesach.
I laughed my ass off at this because I have been asking the exact same question since that episode, and if you brought it up on Reddit or other Star Wars groups you were met with a chorus of iT dOeSn’T wOrK lIKe tHaT!
As was said, Nepenthé is an Odyssey reference. But I remember it from Poe’s The Raven. Anyway, it’s a drink that makes you forget your troubles.
It was v weird that Bo didn’t mention rightfully owning the Darksaber between the trip-to-Mandalore ep and this ep. Did she not think the fight was enough of a “battle”?
Dear god, this was the worst episode in the worst season of what is, on its best day, a middling series.What the hell is this season about anyway?
The friends we make along the way?
Pretty sure that was Season 2.
Everything always is about this. Even these comments boards, friend.
Dear god, this was the worst episode in the worst season of what is, on its best day, a middling series.
Nobody’s forcing you to watch something you clearly don’t like.
That’s what you think!Send help!
Chicken from Robot Chicken? Is that you???????
Close. I volunteered for the Ludovico Technique.
Clockwork Orange pull, nice. 🙂
People are allowed to critique things, holy shit.
Nobody is forcing you to comment on an opinion you don’t agree with either.
He seems to have great difficulty grasping this.
“Nobody’s forcing you to watch something you clearly don’t like.”Have you ever been in an adult relationship?
Did you watch an Andor episode by accident?
Pissing you off so you take up a quarter of the comments here, evidently.
I’ll stop when we get to 40%.
No you won’t.
It’s still a long way off. We’ll see what happens when we get there.
Already moving the goal posts.
Yes, because your comment was (I assumed) a joke. But I guess playing along with a silly comment was my mistake since you were, I guess, being serious….?!
I didn’t write “evidently” for nothing.
Go back and read his season 1 comments – they’re hilarious. He hates the show and is overly confident that the show will flop. Once he realizes it’s a hit he spends the entire season trying to convince everyone that they’re wrong.
What is truly shocking about this season (among its many other sins) is just how Grogu is barely in it. He’s literally just a piece of luggage Mando is carting around.Yes, it was a terrible decision to have Mando and Grogu reunited so quickly, which obliterated the point of their heartfelt farewell. Particularly when it happened in an entire different show!But now that decision seems even more baffling since, a few minor scenes here and there aside, there’s literally zero reason why Grogu even needed to be in the season so far at all. Every now and then, the show cuts to Grogu for a pointless “reaction” shot, as if to remind us that, “oh, yeah, the cute guy that everyone loves is still there!’But they would have been better served to have Mando working solo for the bulk of the season only for them to reunite in a more satisfying way after an absence, particularly since he’s not doing a damn thing and isn’t the focus of any of the stories. The entire reason the show is a hit is because people think the damn puppet is adorable. That’s 90% of the show’s success, at least.
definitely seems like *someone* made them reunite Din and Grogu in that other show that we shan’t speak of, whether it be the higher ups at Disney or LucasFilm or both OR just Favreau and co. not feeling completely confident in the direction of season 3 (which is 100% warranted, given what we’ve seen thus far) and thinking “eeehhhh let’s at least have the option to fall back on the unanimously beloved little guy.”but for the record, i loved this episode and still love this show. it’s just obviously becoming Clone Wars more than Mandalorian, which is fine to me ultimately!
I agree wholeheartedly… except for the last sentence. I don’ttmean to knock Clone Wars or any other Wars; I just really prefer the smaller scale Mandalorian show: bounty hunter and his sidekick having adventures across the galaxy every week, and sometimes there’s a tie-in to an umbrella narrative. This episode covered all those bases for me, and I hope that the increasingly prominent Mandalore/Darksaber/are-we-seriously-supposed-to-root-for-the-cultists-here? plot still leaves room for more of these eps.
The difference between a religion and a cult is marketing.
given the choice between a continuation of the Mando we know and love and Clone Wars Part Whatever, I’d absolutely prefer Mando – agree with you completely. Just saying I don’t necessarily mind going that route if that’s where we’re headed. but i agree with you entirely
Given that Favreau either wrote or co-wrote every episode in Season 3, it’d be weird if he mandated Grogu’s return only to have him do nothing.
Not sure what that means, but I’m here for all the Calculon content, so bring it on!
pointless “reaction” shotThat’s Calculon’s reaction shot
A regrettable number of people forgot about Calculon’s reaction shot after coming down with a case of explosive amnesia.
ah, thank you!
And all in one take! After all, he only does ONE take.
I’m perfectly fine getting Grogu in small doses. He’s exactly the kind of character where you don’t want to overdo it.
That’s a completely fair point since he’s still not actually a character. He’s a non-verbal prop that just coos and smiles and eats. That said, the character is at the heart of the show and they need to figure out what the hell they’re doing, because turning him into literal luggage is not the answer.
I love that people cannot accept grogu is just sitting back and learning from Din and Bo Katan.
“cannot accept?” You’re giving the show way, way too much credit.
They should ahve just left Grogu with Luke. That would have been a more interesting show.
Dude, they can only levitate so many frogs together…
Agreed with all this.To add, its easy to see how many times Grogu is offscreen with another character, including random ones Din has no reason to trust. Im convinced Din showed up on Boba Fett because of how bad that show was being received by a fair number of people. Episode 5 was a much better season opener than we got. Then episode 6 was one of the most Easter egg fan service pieces of Star wars ever. How is it possible for a show with 8 episodes and short episodes to have so much filler. I guess Filoni really is just doing live action cartoon episodes, which is his or there prerogative.
I don’t think you realize how long it takes to produce an episode of these shows. There’s no way that the decision to focus so heavily on Din Djarin & Grogu happened after episodes of TBOBF had already aired.
that’s impossible. they shot the entire show before they got any response. they didn’t pivot mid-season, seasons of tv aren’t long enough to do that anymore.which makes the decision ever weirder!
Well, the entirety of BOBF was in the can before it aired. Such is the nature of a show with such extensive FX. But, perhaps you meant internally? Like the powers that be behind the scenes realized the show needed some work and the easiest thing to do was not fix the actual story but just throw in bonus Mando content for 2 episodes? I could totally buy that explanation. As for “The Mandalorian”, the show has always been primarily “filler.” While we’re accustomed to more heavily serialized storytelling in today’s TV landscape, the show has always mostly ignored its larger story arcs in favor of standalone, mission-of-the-week episodes. It’s not my particular preference, but this episode certainly qualifies as that. And, in theory, there’s nothing wrong with that approach.But the show wants to have it both ways. Serialized arcs and standalone episodes. But, among its many other sins, it really handles the juggling act very, very poorly.
Reuniting the Mandolorians would have been the perfect time to get him back, too.
The volume technology is 100% funded by Grogu merch.
At this point, it seems like 92% of the entire Walt Disney Company is funded by Grogu merch.
The Mandos are in a Gozanti class, it’s a lot smaller than a Star Destroyer. Remember? There was a whole season 2 episode about stealing it.
That was the freighter – this is the Arquitens-class command cruiser (or Imperial Light Cruiser) that was taken from Moff Gideon at the end of season two.
i can personally verify it is indeed possible to not be distracted by Lizzomy pop culture knowhere may have depth with certain properties but it lacks a general breadthi honestly thought that was Nicole Byer and had to google who Lizzo was after this review
I was wishing it was Nicole Byer. I think she would have played off Jack Black better.
were i at any point in my life—including like fifty years from now—to meet a strange omnipotent entity that would grant me an answer to one question goldfish style, my mind would immediately turn toward av club ad 2023 and whether you people got paid to give this sort of machine generated slop good reviews or did it out of your own misguided volition. jesus fucking christ
Well you sound like you might be a certifiable moron so, ya know, glass houses.
I enjoy the seemingly respectful and positive relationship that Bo and Din share. They butt heads in their own way but also manage to focus on moving forward at the same time without trying to out do each other.
i’m seeing some people think the show is looking a little cheaper than it has, which i don’t agree with save a few VFX shots. I’ve been thinking the opposite, or at least feeling a little better about the direction of the VFX and overreliance on The Volume. Some of the fights have been a little power-rangers-y BUT they feel like real people in the same space, a space that’s larger than the space directly in front of the big LED screen. Where Boba Fett and Kenobi really seemed to show the limitations of The Volume, Mando S3 has seemingly taken some notes from those shows and expanded the scale.
It seems vaguely insulting to give a squid-faced person a Lovecraft-sounding name
Insulting to who?
To the memory of the brave men and women who lost their lives in the ill-fated antarctic expedition of 1936.
At least they weren’t naming a cat-faced person.
Purrbert West: Reanimeowter
Well, at least they weren’t named The Calamari.
Also Axe Woves is a front-runner for worst name in what race? Are they running a JV one while leaving Elan Sleazebaggano and Therm Scissorpunch and Savage Oppress and Darth Millenial (yes really) and Trioculus and Triclops to run the real race? Those last three are also three different evil mutant humans with a third eye.
To be fair, MST3K burned through like 80% of all the good remaining Star Wars names with Blast HardCheese / Dirk HardPec / Fridge LargeMeat / Bob Johnson in the Space Mutiny episode.
When I’m in Star Wars my name with be Yahmo Bethere.
Up and over.
From Planet Mondegreen.
You left out the best one!
I hear Dash Mihok is still available!
No discussion of “shittily-and-lazily-named-alien-creature-characters-with three-eyes” can exclude “Ree-Yees”.
There’s also Jedi Knight Ima Gun Di (guess what happens to him in his one and only episode)
Not to mention Den Tynegum, Spatch Diakok, Tirmeesu Decdent, and Bol Weevuns.
Look, if Grogu’s knight title somehow use in an story arch, I’ll riot. That shit just came out of nowhere
He is now Sir Grogu. The first of his name, Master of Cuteness and Pop Culture, and Lord of Lucasfilm Marketing.
Grogu is the true founder of the Knights of Ren.
The Knights of Ren Hoek
I got a real “Wizard of Oz just giving out random stuff to everybody” vibe. Scarecrow, you need a diploma! Just happen to have one right here! Tin Man, you could use a “testimonial,” I mean, heart shaped necklace-watch thingy! Why here’s one in this drawer! Mandalorians, a key to the planet! Why, what a coincidence, this closeby servant droid has one on a pillow or something!BTW, I love Lizzo as a person and a musical artist, but her acting was…not good.
Come on, am I the only one who enjoyed Starbuck chasing a toaster?
I thought the droids this episode had an unusually high quotient of scan-y eyes, toaster style:)
Damn, no Jack Black saying, “This is the hway.”
I’m gonna throw a guess out here;Some people really enjoyed this episode.Some people really hated this episode.But which group of people are right? What is the correct opinion? Should it matter? Oh my god what am I supposed to do once I’ve watched it? What if I’m wrong?
The most important thing is that you go on Rotten Tomatoes, declare the critics are bought and paid for, and then find a reddit thread to scream about something I think.
Boy Andor really has shown what a fucking total hack Jon Favreau really is.
“…the Duchess exiles Helgait to some other planet…”Fittingly, it was the planet “Paraquat”, named for the infamous chemical the government used to use to kill marijuana crops, that would stand for punishment in this cannabis-flavored silly poofy colorforms episode-world.
“Human paraquat” was used as an insult in The Big Lebowski. Took me a minute to figure out where I’d heard “paraquat” before; surprised I wasn’t already familiar with the definition of it that you provided.
I wish Din had followed up “Would this blade not belong to her?” with he stinger “Or are you just looking for an excuse to run away?”Also: “You had me at battle droids.”
In this week’s episode of the Mandalorian, we’re introduced to a royal couple played by… *checks notes* Lizzo and Jack Black.Is this episode written by Mad Libs or something? o.0
I’ve been enjoying this season fine, but this is by far the most fun episode, and I am here for it. I kind of wish the Bad Batch season finale had aired over two weeks just so I could have watched this right after the finale.
I really thought it was going to wind up being the Ugnaughts fiddling with the droids because they’re being portrayed as the SW version of the Morlocks while the clueless Eloi partied on the surface.
More Scooby Doo than Law and Order.
The “now THIS is pod racing” acting vibe is strong with this one but holy shit if it wasn’t entertaining!
Y’all really need to revisit the cast listing. Cara Dune is decidedly no longer a part of this show.
Really enjoyed the episode!!
Some good shots, but… painful.The direction in the chase scene was such a missed opporunity, and even for an amateur (which I still consider BDH to be), was not good.Story, utterly irrelevant. This whole episode could have been done in 5 minutes on top of any of the other irrelevant episodes this season.I just… what the heck happened? C+
She’s been doing it for 10 years, but sure, what she really needs is the respect of internet men.
People can just skip the entire domed city storyline which ultimately had nothing to do with the Mandalorian challenge at the end. What a waste this episode was. But, from some of the comments, turns out some people do like pointless cameos.
I find it baffleing that after 22 more or less self contained episodes that people are still going “Where’s the story!”If y’all aint figured out the cadence of the show by now – Adventure Town of the week has a problem, Mando rolls in, sorts out the bad guy’s shit, then moves on to next week’s Adventure Town (with the occasional light sprinkling of Bigger Picture) – I don’t know what to tell you.It’s the A-Team or Knight Rider, but with blasters.
It’s basically Doctor Who with a bigger budget and reskinned as a Star Wars tv show.“We don’t know why we’re here, but we’ll figure it out eventually.”
Or The Incredible Hulk with Lou Ferrigno and Bill Bixby. Also, long overdue RIP to Bill Bixby – that guy was great.
Feel like that’s more in the editing. Also, why not just jetpack your way above the crowd to catch the rogue droid?
“led by Axe Woves, a front-runner for Worst Star Wars Name”i was thinking the exact opposite.better than bo-katan which is nearly just two Japanese weapons smooshed together.
I love that meaninglessly harming a robot is now referred to as doing a “boston dynamics”.
Back in my day, we called that a “PC Load Letter”.
“What is any of this? Why is any of this happening? I don’t know, but I think I like it!”I agree with the review-this episode was very silly, but I enjoyed it. The Star Wars fans who think every story needs to be Andor now (and don’t get me wrong, I also love that show) are not going to like it. But Star Wars is a Saturday morning serial at its heart, and Guns for Hire captured that vibe well. “Credit where credit is due: Toussaint Egan at that Bo-Katan earned the Darksaber after killing the crab robot.”A number of us pointed that out in the comment section for that episode right here! I criticized the show at the time for not addressing it when it happened, but I am actually glad they saved it for the scene with the mercenaries. It is more dramatic this way than a conversation about it between Bo and Din in a cave!
“After all, humans built them” – I haven’t tuned in to this show, but weren’t battle droids canonically built by Geonosians?
well if half the audience loves what you’re doing and half the audience hates what you’re doing…you’re doing something!
The show’s original synopsis was ‘The travels of a lone bounty hunter in the outer reaches of the galaxy, far from the authority of the New Republic’I wish they stuck with that.
This episode was fun. And since I somehow avoided all spoilers b4 watching, those cameos really surprised me (pleasantly). The tone and also the fact that something actually happened not on a desert planet was great. I also think this whole series would’ve been more interesting if it was a Bo Katan series. Din and baby Yoda have basically just been set pieces throughout all these seasons.They once again waste Sasha Banks’ potential by relegating her to looking cool and pretty in the background in her Mandalorian armor.
B+?! Can I have some of your easilypleasedness? This boring dreck was the finishing point for me. Embarrassingly awful. Even my youngest daughter has decided Baby Yoda isn’t enough anymore.
“Considering last week’s episode ended with the tease that Mandalorians (presumably these Mandalorians) broke Moff Gideon out of prison”Does anyone *really* think that Mandalorians were the ones that broke Moff Gideon out of the shuttle? That piece of beskar armor found there seems like it was deliberately left there to put the blame on the Mandalorians.
On one hand, it’s impossible not to see Lizzo when watching her attempt to act through this episode, as she’s clearly not a great actress. On the other hand, the dialogue written for the Duchess/Plazir scenes was so trite, even Meryl Streep couldn’t save it.P.S. “Calamari”? Really???
Whenever a big star who’s a fan of Marvel or Star Wars gets cast in some goofball background role, I imagine them getting the call from their agent, getting all geeked up, and then being deflated at learning it’s not a well-known hero or awesome new Jedi.I’m sure Jack Black will be okay, but as a fan I can feel it.
And now I’m imagining Kumail Nanjiani and Martin Starr, in character as Dinesh and Gilfoyle, trying to convince each other they got the better Marvel deal.
The droid bartender was voiced by Seth Gable, whom I will always remember as Agent Lincoln Lee from Fringe. He is also married to this episode’s director, Bryce Dallas Howard.
Crazy to think that whatever the heck this episode was, it happened with two episodes left of an 8-episode season. They’ve had two and a half years to develop the third season, and we’re getting a bizarre amount of filler episodes this season.
A few days late to the party, but I’m guessing this was an intentionally light episode to set up some dark stuff coming up (no doubt with Giancarlo Esposito wrecking everyone’s shit again). Personally, I loved it, though it definitely felt like an episode of an entirely different show.
I consider myself a lifelong Star Wars fan. I saw SW in 1977 in the theater. I was just 5 years old. I had all the toys and supported the sequels. Star Wars is part of my childhood and today it is still a part of my life. It means so much to me and when it comes to SW for me there’s no love it or leave it. Just love it and bare with it. Just like you love a family member but put up with all there bad and good qualities.
Which brings me to my point in this example. Some of the socalled SW fans said that after last weeks episode of The Mandalorian with Lizzo and Jack Black that SW was finished and they’ll never watch it again. Now those same SW fans are praising the new Mandalorian episode and saying that SW is back. Fuck you! This isn’t fandom. You can’t come and go. True fans like me stick with Star Wars no matter what. If you can get pissed off about one or a few episodes of SW that you didn’t like and say you’re done with the franchise, you were never a true SW fan to begin with. SW fans are a family and family sticks together thru the bad and the good. This is the way.