The Mandalorian The Mandalorian 3.01 - Chapter 17 - Discussion Thread (Spoilers Allowed)

That's exactly my take-away too. TBoBF really brought this whole thing down. It's pretty clear they only intended on two seasons and the success caught them with their pants down.

I'm also really tired of Grogu in general. Is he a literal baby? Is he a young child? His behavior is incredibly inconsistent. He spent months (days? Years?) training with Luke, as well as a separate amount of time with Din. Yet apparently he's still so young he think a sentient being, talking and working, is a pet? Like this little green punk was doing jedi training, what's he doing here? Stop having him regress so much.

The cynical business side was just so clear this episode. Why would Grogu think he's a pet? Because it'll be a cute gif. People will draw fanart of it. You can sell a funko pop of it.

Same for IG-11. There's literally no reason to bother bringing him back. It makes no sense a single shred of that bot still exists. It self-destructed in a River of lava, but apparently only lost two legs and an arm. It's back to sell more merch and have some memba berries.

The whole thing just made me sad, especially off the back of Andor, which wasn't just good Star Wars but one of the best seasons of dramatic television released last year in general. This was just meandering fluff, cynically motivated.

I thought it was a pretty poor sequence too. I honestly thought we were opening with a flashback, and that sounds like a much more interesting idea. As it is, it's some random planet. It's not mandalore, and there's no reason given that they need to stand in a lake with apparently dangerous creatures a few feet away. Did they need dirty lake water that bad?

 

One thing I always feared with this show is their use of Grogu once he became popular... Less is more - always! All they needed to do was keep him consistent with the first season (because people fell in love with him as is)

What I noticed with the episode was that they incorporated a lot more baby noises from him than usual. It was really irritating. It becomes distracting and it's incredibly lazy. He is already ADORABLE just sitting there! You don't have to add "Goo Gaa" every time he is on screen

Also (In regards to tension less action) Did 1 single Mandalorian fighter at the start bite it?? Each time one of them got in trouble they did the "heroic run in/drag out of harm" scene...multiple times! I've watched it twice and can't see a single death. For pete's sake - That's the time to do it!

Show us that the stake's matter!!

 

I enjoyed the episode. Would I have loved a longer episode after waiting a year and a half for new Mando? Sure, absolutely. But I felt like they squeezed in quite a bit in 35 minutes. Between re-establishing his relationship with the Mando cult, the run in with the pirates, setting up getting IG-11 up and running, and checking in on Bo Katan, the episode set up a lot of threads for this season to follow through on.

And yes, I unabashedly loved and laughed at Grogu hugging the Babu Frick alien.

We're back to the Star Wars I know and love.

 

One of them was eaten i believe.

 

That’s what Mando said. Maybe Grogu just wanted to hug a Babu Frick and being sentient didn’t matter.

I’m still waiting for Grogu to pull a Baby Herman from Rodger Rabbit. Another possibility could be Grogu has some sort of disability or trauma.

 

Wow never thought of that. I guess i should adjust my expectation from hoping it being a good episode to being a mediocre one lol. This argument never has or will make sense to me.

That is sweet idea, but lets just be real. they are milking grogu bc disney knows he is a cash cow. Which im ok with for now, bc it has not crossed that line for me yet. But it is dancing on it.

 

Folks, we've peaked. It won't get any better than this.

 

The only question remaining:

Is that the peak of the Mandalorian? The peak of all Star Wars? The peak human civilization?

 

Peak of commercialism maybe.

 

Star Wars and commercialism kind of go hand in hand.

 

So, will we see the New Republic Special Forces in action?

 

Merch, merch, merch

 

I'm also not against what you mentioned happening either. I would fully embrace this change in the Armourer and Bo-Katan too, as long as it's not done in a fairy-floss or a "Marvellized" rubbish formulaic method of characterisation. The characterisation and storytelling surrounding this change in both must be on an "Andor" level.

Because when I said what I did, I guess I compare the characterisation to that of Syril Karn from Andor. Syril starts out who he is and every step of the way throughout the first season of Andor, he is presented directly in his face every reason to hate the Empire and run far in the opposite direction. There were even some points where I thought he would become a Rebel. Yet when the time comes, he just doubles down on what he does because it's who he is. He is the product of his upbringing and from the hurdles he continuely faces in his job. He is stuck in this rut because there has been no monumental event to force change in him.

And that's what I can see with the Armourer and Bo too; no monumental reason to change just because Din goes to the waters beneath Mandalore.

But I am open for them to change if it's done in a manner that one would expect a fundamental change in who they are and what they believe in - just as I embraced the change in Luke Skywalker in The Last Jedi. I know I'm preaching to the wrong person here, but for me, Luke Skywalker had a monumental event occur to him that forced him into something unrecognisable. The same for Anakin Skywalker....twice - learning about a power to save people from dying and then finding out he has a son.

But at this stage where the Armourer and Bo are concerned, I can't see what will change them fundamentally. The Armourer is so deeply fixated on not removing helmets and Bo is fixated on the Darksaber and the wish to rule Mandalore.

 

agreed, and I think the villain thing especially is a good point!! IMO they’ve more than milked the “Din has to protect Grogu and deal with his growing attachment to
him” conflict for all its worth, and the show
Is in desperate need of some conflict that presents new challenges and brings out new sides of Din beeides just showing him gradually developing a soft spot. It’s definitely a major contributing factor to why the story is rapidly feeling more stale.

Luckily I think the stuff with Mandalore and Bo Karan has a lot of potential if they can just get themselves to actually focus on that instead of never ending boring side quests that are just all plot. I think presenting her as exasperated and defeated in this episode was a development for her that felt both somewhat unexpected yet interesting and totally believable given her story so far.

 

Welp, more for me.

 

It is getting harder to come up with good reasons for Mando to bring BY in his adventures.

As long as it was about protecting BY it all made sense, but now that he's just going to do stuff for himself, it seems that Mando is exposing the child to unnecessary danger.

If the plot didn't demand BY to be around for his cuteness etc, the most logical thing to do for Mando would be to leave him somewhere safe whenever he has to go on some mission, and go back to him afterwards.

If Mando rather wants to adopt BY completely, than it would have been best for him to settle in Greef's city.

 

Grogu was left in a 'very safe' place when Din originally found him. There is still a bounty out on the kid's head and Din has seen that Grogu has powers that have already helped out with the Mudhorn, on Tatooine, Nevarro and so on. He also knows that the kid is really attached to him and he is really attached to the kid. The kid is not exactly helpless either, so it makes total sense for him to keep him around as that is where he is safest and he knows exactly where the kid is and doesn't have to worry about him like he did when he was with Luke. Karga's city isn't exactly a total safe haven either as evidenced by the pirates being around.

 

I gave this an 8/10.

I thought the beginning was a flashback and when I realized it wasn't I wasn't bothered by it. I do like how he seems to be teaching or introducing the concepts of being a Mandalorian to Grogu. I think that could develop well.

I liked seeing Greef Karga. It seems he's aged a bit (lol) but he's really made Nevarro a nicer place...well that is a low bar considering it was a hole. I can say I was a little surprised to see IG-11 again. It didn't even occur to me Mando would need him. The rest of Nevarro scenes to show how it improved.

I did like seeing Bo-Katan and while it was for a short time we know she'll be a major player this season but here we see someone demoralized. I'm interested in her arc this season.

I like Grogu. I would agree we may not need the noises, his mere presence says a lot but it doesn't annoy me either.

 

I was hoping with Luke’s training we’d se the next level of Grogu. He’d sometimes hope instead of walk - so he could keep with humans. He’s be less of a baby. He’d be able carry out certain tasks reliably.

In short we’d go from baby or toddler Grogu to little kid Grogu.

 

He's a friend.

*Drops mic.*

...is pretty much their reasoning so far.

 

Not only that, but Grogu has saved Din’s life on several occasions. They need each other. It’s not like Grogu can’t protect himself. Hell, the little guy saved all of Mos Espa from a rampaging rancor by himself.

 

Very true, which is why grogu at this stage needs defined characteristics. Is he a cute cooing baby aka what disney wants lol. Or is he a character in his own right who has some actual agency.

 

Spoiler

@Sarge The Apostate is "objectively" better than ANH and ROTJ. Grogu alone makes this so.

 

Anakin's turn to the dark side was nothing but fully consistent with his character. There was no monumental change there. He was always on the fence, and he had definitely crossed the line more than once before. Completely surrendering to the dark side was only a matter of time. Which Palpatine knew, and manipulated him perfectly to that moment. In fact, Palpatine was hoping this would happen earlier, but Anakin shocked him by going to the Jedi Council first. Now about Luke.... yeah I don't agree. We don't have to go there. I don't even think I consider that expensive fan fiction canon, so there's no point.

The Armourer is not deeply fixated on not removing helmets unconditionally. If Din Djarin goes to the mines of Mandalore and redeems himself, her character should accept this. There is absolutely no reason at all for her to be stubborn, when she always follows their code so religiously. Their code tells her that he will be redeemed if he completes the task, so she has to accept it. And there is no ulterior motive for her to be playing a game. Bo Katan already has a reason to unite forces with Din Djarin and the Armourer. She has lost all of her followers, and now understands that a union is far more important than a stupid sword and silly superstitions.

Sometimes character progress and evolution comes slowly over time, they don't need a huge monumental shock to change. They just need to mature because of a sum of many tiny moments in their lives. If anything, that's far more realistic than changing because of one shock. We all mature and evolve because of hundreds and hundreds of experiences we have, not just because of one shocking event.