As disappointing as Star Wars has been since Disney bought LucasFilm in 2012, it’s been hard to ignore the universal praise of The Mandalorian. The last Star Wars from Disney that I’ve watched was the Solo movie, which had its moments, but was mediocre at best, and fell far short of what I expect from the series. Not to mention that a Han Solo origin film wasn’t something fans were even asking for after how badly they butchered Solo’s character in The Force Awakens.
So with my expectations properly tempered with nothing more than hopeful but cautious optimism, I signed up for a month of Disney+ to see if the Favreau/Filoni creation was worthy of all the hype surrounding it.
ATTENTION: There are light spoilers in the rest of this article. If you haven’t seen The Mandalorian yet, you’ve been warned.
The show’s main character is a Mandalorian warrior/bounty hunter who belongs to the underground warrior guild of the same name. Much like the Jedi and the Sith, the Mandalorians are a group of warriors who live by their unique code, but who rely solely on their armor and weapons instead of the Force. The only other place we’ve seen Mandalorians prominently featured like this is in the Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords video game that came out in 2004, although there might be some Expanded Universe novels and comics that feature them as well. We don’t know a lot about the Mandalorians, and exploring who they are is an interesting idea for a Star Wars TV show.
Strangely enough, The Mandalorian has a lot of the same ‘Star Wars western’ aesthetic to it that the John Jackson Miller’s Kenobi novel has.
If you haven’t read Kenobi by John Jackson Miller, I would recommend it. It’s a different take on Star Wars that hadn’t been done before. It has a lot of the story beats of a western, but done in a very Star Wars way. It works, and I’m happy to say, it works in The Mandalorian as well to the point that I’m wondering if Miller’s Kenobi novel was an inspiration for the show.
The show’s score sounds significantly different from the John Williams scores we’ve heard in the Star Wars films. It doesn’t completely abandon the classic Star Wars sound, but there are definite tonal elements that we’ve never heard in Star Wars before. This bothered me at first, but then I realized that this is a Star Wars show about bounty hunters. This isn’t Jedi vs. Sith. Therefore, the subject matter is a little darker and a more sinister-sounding score is appropriate. It’s done well and I found myself humming the main theme a lot after I finished watching an episode.
But even in spite of the darker tone, the show still interjects small amounts of humor here and there that always seems to come off well. I found myself laughing out loud at a lot of it. The contrast of a dark, mysterious, tough Mandalorian bounty hunter taking care of a small child is endearing and provides a lot of moments of humor that are legitimately funny.
Speaking of the child, you pretty much have to have a heart of stone not to find Grogu, a.k.a. Baby Yoda, adorable. He’s easily the best idea Disney has had for a Star Wars story so far. He’s the centerpiece of the show and the catalyst for everything that happens. The Mandalorian wants to protect him, but a lot of others want him for their own mysterious ends that we suspect has something to do with his nascent Force abilities. Much like Yoda from the Star Wars films, Grogu can go from funny to serious in a flash, and he does it without saying a word. He’s brilliant and I can’t wait to see what he turns into in Season Three.
Although I have to say, I was disappointed at first that Baby Yoda isn’t actually Baby Yoda. The show takes place after the fall of the Empire, so Yoda is dead. I thought The Mandalorian took place hundreds of years before and he was actually a young version of Yoda.
Although The Mandalorian never went into full “girl power” mode, there were a couple times it came close. Cara Dune’s character, played by Gina Carano, is somewhat over the top in her masculinity to the point it becomes hard to take her seriously at times. This is supposed to be Star Wars, not Xena: Warrior Princess. In fact, the only female character who actually seemed feminine at any point during the show was Ahsoka, played by Rosario Dawson, who did a fantastic job portraying the character for the first time in live-action. In fact, the episode she’s featured in is probably the best episode of the series so far, and she’s the primary reason why. She absolutely needs to be brought back for future episodes.
I hope they bring Cara Dune back as well, but just tone it down a bit. She’s supposed to be a human female, not a Wookie.
Another small criticism is that much of the show seems to take place on Tatooine. This made me roll my eyes. There are supposedly thousands of planets in the Star Wars galaxy, yet time and again, we find ourselves on Tatooine. At least they didn’t try to pretend that it was another desert planet that looks exactly like Tatooine the way The Force Awakens did, but we have yet to see a truly fantastic new world in The Mandalorian, like Kamino, Coruscant, or Geonosis. And I’m guessing The Book of Boba Fett show takes place primarily on Tatooine as well. But of course it does. For being an isolated backwater planet in the Outer Rim where supposedly nothing ever happens, a lot in the Star Wars universe seems to to happen on Tatooine.
And finally, Moff Gideon. He looks a little too much like Darth Vader in his attire. Maybe his character is intentionally trying to emulate Vader with the black cape and black armor with something on the front that looks like lights, but isn’t. He doesn’t act like Vader and he has no Force powers that we know of, but his dress definitely raised my eyebrows a bit. Overall, I liked his character, but it seemed a little too on the nose.
So far, I can say The Mandalorian is significantly better than the sequel films (admittedly, a low bar). For Disney’s first live-action Star Wars TV show, it’s a great start. There’s very little about it to dislike and I’m just thankful there’s at least someone at LucasFilm that still knows how to make good Star Wars. Disney hasn’t completely won my trust back, but at least I know now that they’re capable and Rogue One wasn’t a fluke.
If there was any remaining doubt in my mind about whether Favreau and Filoni are the right persons to lead Star Wars into the future, it’s being erased right now. I’m looking forward to Season Three.
Any lapsed, jaded Star Wars fans like me who haven’t yet given The Mandalorian a shot should give it a chance. It’s legit and worthy of your time.
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