The Mandalorian The Mandalorian 3.03 - Chapter 19 - Discussion Thread (Spoilers Allowed)

The New Republic is definitely occupying an interesting moral gray space. The electro treatment does seem intended to have some therapeutic effect, but nevertheless, used against prisoners of war without their consent is ethically questionable to say the least. Then again, if the only other option is killing prisoners as the Imperials surely would, or just placing them in actual prisons to rot, the rehab program and electro treatment seem a lesser evil (or maybe rotting in an actual prison is a lesser evil?).

And yet again, that the rehab program has obvious echoes to the Imperial prison workers in Andor -- both programs are kinds of prison labor -- the New Republic really does seem pretty questionable at this point.

Of course, the idea that governments can avoid these sorts of gray areas is naive. The most moral thing that could be done -- just letting the former Imperials have total liberty -- would certainly hurt the New Republic (and hence, be immoral).

 

Hmmm... This felt like a poor mans Andor episode.

The writing and acting is terrible. Did anyone think for 1 second Pershing was not going to get betrayed?? The female Amnesty officer that betrayed him, gave one of the worst one note performances I have seen in any of these shows...ugh! What was the direction? "Act nice" "Look evil"

Positive - Coruscant looked amazing!

 

Absolutely brilliant. Linkages here, linkages there. Heaps of linkages to the post-war New Republic greater story.

In the Andor-like Syril work center (except it's now contrast with sunlight and a "softening" of the decor and people with a humane manner), the guy with the trolley speaks about how far they are behind in their processing and there are still all of the "Alliance Fleet" decommissioning files to do. This is a direct linkage to the Aftermath trilogy with Mon Mothma's act of de-militarization of the Galaxy; where both Imperial and Rebel Fleets and military hardware are destined to the scrap-heap.

The further linkage to the Aftermath is associated with this Amnesty stuff following the Rebel / Imperial ceasefire and subsequent treaty - which also has some ties in theme to some characters of the Alphabet Squadron novels.

There are linkages to TLJ (particularly those who reside or patronize Canto Bight) when the upper class snob, following Pershing's speech, talks dismissively about the post-war Coruscant society run by the New Republic. As he says, it doesn't matter who is in charge, it's all the same to him. Like those on Canto Bight, it just means the business focus changes to accommodate the "new way".

There are ties to Andor - where things (brain stimulations and resets) are still done, but from an apparently "acceptable" way to do things. How far is the New Republic in parts removed from the Empire? An interesting thought.

Loved that opening sequence with Bo and Din and the Tie Interceptors. Extremely cinematic, engaging and just the right amount of time.

And two key moments of unsaid thoughts. Bo at the start whilst sitting on the bank of the Living Waters just staring. That moment of pause said a million things about where she was at the point of her Mandalorian faith. And then with Paz towards the end once Din arrives with Bo. After the Armourer gives her helmet speech and says Bo is redeemed, Paz just stands there and stares and is the only one who doesn't welcome Bo in. There is a serious unsaid story going on there.

Still so much to unpack.

Oh, and take a bow @Sarge. The Armourer and her vial to make Beskar. I think you were spot on in your thoughts. The Armourer's vial does contain the Living Waters.

 

I definitely didn't think Bo-Katan was likely looking "disgusted" under her helmet at the end. She's seen the mythosaur, she's lost her home, her crew, her family, and now this group that follows the old ways (which she just recently realized are not based in pure myth) is willing to take her in. She's probably flinching a little at their ways, and the need to keep her helmet on, but if this show is actually doing character development, she was likely feeling a bit emotional there, not disgusted. She has a family again. This was a complex moment for her, and I thought it was very well done.

Separately, I also thought the first time the Children of the Watch really felt like a scary, dangerous cult was when Din and Bo approached the cave and were confronted by them, and then escorted in. They just....looked super intolerant and threatening. That was great staging.

As for the rest of the episode, I enjoyed the Pershing on Coruscant bit as a concept, but found the execution a little lacking. If you take an Andor-esque "day in the life" approach to a narrative, but the cinematography, shot composition, acting, characterization and writing are clearly not as good (and the music, which was oddly syrupy) it just...doesn't work nearly as well. Felt a bit like "Rebels does Andor" if you catch my meaning. I didn't dislike it, but it seemed like Pershing was living in a Star Wars theme park (perhaps part of the point...), and not a real urban space, as I felt was the case in Andor. The latter did it much more convincingly, IMO. And to me, Coruscant just looked more convincing in Andor. I chalk that up to the style of cinematography, however, which is a matter of taste.

Finally, I don't like the simplistic message some online are taking away from the episode: that the New Republic is evil and/or (ha) just as bad as the Empire. By letting Pershing only speak pablum about how his research will be good for the New Republic, the narrative tricks audiences into being overly-sympathetic to Pershing, and into feeling that the New Republic is being authoritarian vs. maintaining responsible ethical approaches to science (something Pershing was violating by...kidnapping children and forcing experiments on them). The electroshock moment didn't help, of course, as that clothed the New Republic in nearly-Imperial evil. I don't know. There just seemed to be a kneejerk anti-government libertarian bent to the whole thing. Felt almost Ayn Randian. I suspect, however, that this is a deliberate trick - showing us Pershing's perspective so that we sympathize with him, but then later, we'll see that the New Republic was right to keep a lid on his stuff. But I don't like being tricked, and I don't think it was subtly done.

Anyway, I quite liked the idea of the Pershing Diaries (and the villain narrative it's clearly setting up), Bo-Katan's long stare into the Living Waters was very effective, the opening battle was thrilling, and the ending at the Mando covert was excellent, so there's that.

A for effort and a C for execution. 7/10, in the parlance of these threads.

 

Well this was certainly something, a lot to discuss for this one. This episode actually proved once again to me at least, that longer runtimes in the 45 minutes to 1 hour mark are hugely preferable to the short 30-35 minutes Mando sometimes does. Though contrary to my usual refrain I actually think that this one could have been 5 minutes shorter because the Coruscant sequence was maybe drawn out a bit too much.

But let's start with the Mando episodes. I love that Bo-Katan is struggling with the whole Mythosaur thing and I think it will be really intresting to see where this is going. I do hope she doesn't become a faithful Child of the Watch and all the Mandos will start to return to the old ways and not take off their helmets. Din as a sort of Mandalorian Martin Luther is not what I want to see, I hope they make a new Mandalore and don't just return themselves to the Stone Age culturally. But maybe Bo-Katan's experience of living in a covert for a while will help her understand Din even better and help them make said new way for Mandalore in the future. I'm certainly hopeful this is the actual end game here. The destruction of her palace also gave her some momentum again, which is nice. Also the whole remark about it being unusual for an Imperial Warlord having this many ships is probably forshadowing for the blue guy indeed. Probably wants to either prevent Bo-Katan from rallying the Mandos against him, take out an ally of Ahsoka's or both. Will be intrested to see where this goes.

As for the Armorer, as much as I don't like her, I'm not surprised she takes Din back and Bo-Katan in with open arms. She is a cult leader yes and that makes her myopic to a certain extent but I also think she is genuine and fully believes in the Creed herself. The true source of tension within the Children of the Watch in the forseeable future seems to be Paz, which is perfectly on brand for him. He does not seem happy with Din's return and Bo-Katan's inclusion in the covert at all and that will probably have consequences in the future.

Now the Coruscant scene's. First of all, I was incredibly happy to see Coruscant again and it looked absolutely stunning in my opinion. The actual story was very reminiscent of Andor and I do agree with some people here, that it wasn't as good as the latter. Usually I think the shows are not particulary comparable and I try to avoid it but when they tread similar territory, the comparison is just natural. That being said, I also don't think this was terrible by any measure and I'm happy Mando is even doing a storyline like this, something I've sorely missed in previous seasons.

For me it seemed obvious from the beginning that Officer Kane was still working with Gideon in some capacity, I just wasn't sure what her end game is. The fact that she led Pershing into a New Republic ambush actually kind of surprised me and I do wonder how she got out of it so easily. Does the New Republic actually employ her to tempt her fellow former Imperials, to see whether their regret is genuine? This would be pretty dark in my opinion. I have no doubt whatsoever that she isn't genuinely working for the New Republic though. She definetely still has some ties to Gideon and/or the First Order. At first I actually thought she was really trying to help Pershing with his research, to then presumably take it for the Empire. Now it just seems like it all was a pretense to get Pershing into the mind-flayer. The only question is what is the end-game of that and why does she turn it up. Does she just want to kill Pershing or at least wipe his memories to the extent that the loses all his valuable knowledge about Gideon's cloning project and can't get used against them any more? Or does she want to brainwash him into working for the Empire again? In that case she'd probaly have to pull him out of New Republic custody though, can't see them letting him anywhere near lab equipment ever again. Or was she even maybe just using her manipulation of Pershing to further ingratiate herself with the New Republic and move up the ranks for espionage purposes and just turned up the dial for sadistic reasons? I definetly think that with her we now have a character that moved up from background character to a compelling villain, also with hints at a perhaps intresting back story in her conversation with Pershing. A villain like her is something the show can profit from though, I think.

The sequences with Pershing got a bit tiring though, so this storyline could have been a bit shorter. Overall I nonetheless still liked it. What I'm less sure about is the presentation with the New Republic though. The whole rehabilitation of Imperial prisoners follows the lore established in the Alphabet Squadron novel trilogy and expands on it to a certain extent. How to deal with former Imperials after the war, is of course a very thorny question and I did find it nice that most of the former Imperials actually seemed to see the New Republic as better than the Empire, even when speaking amongst themselves, though there was also a certain hint of brainwashing there. The dehumanisation of the Imperials with the prisoner numbers and the whole mind-flayer thing, even if genuinely made with therapeutic intentions do seem pretty reminiscent of the Empire and squarely put the New Republic in a very gray territory. Makes you really see how someone like Officer Kane can infiltrate the New Republic hierarchy easily. Overall this seems to be gearing towards a certain government bad, scrappy heroes out on the frontier good vibe that is very Star Wars, but something I also don't necessarily appreciate that much, especially when treating a democratic government like this. I'd like to see some actually good and functioning democracies in my fiction, they have enough issues in real life as it is.

Overall this was a really good and thought-provoking episode, 8/10.

 

Well, regimes rise and fall, but good old LAAT/le gunship is still used, although this time is somewhat modified.

A great episode, really liked the tension. Expected that Gideon will appear at the end as a hologram. Doubt that fighters at the start of the episode are one of his, maybe other Imperial warlords, mentioned by Bo, started to team-up or it is even the first wave of Thrawn's attack.

 

Well, now I really don't know what comes next.

 

Really things will depend on how that plot even remotely ties into the main plot. What we just watched currently has nothing to do with whatever Din is doing. If the clone subplot somehow reaches Din, I still think I won't feel like the plot couldn't have been done in the length of a Clone Wars episode or shorter instead of 37 minutes. In Andor, you couldn't just put people's subplot's in different episodes, because the stuff that was happening on the other side of the galaxy was affecting how things were going back on Ferrix or in the ISB. But given how this plot runs completely parallel for now, I think it's an odd choice to structure an episode of a show like this.

Stinger focusing on main plot

Opening titles - THE CONVERT

37 minutes on a new plot with no current relevance

5 minutes back to the main plot where said converting happens

Episode over.

Why not just cut back and forth? You can just begin the plot in the season premiere and sprinkle it in.

Well, she was originally doing a bit part, so that could be the reason. Why they felt the need to have it be the same character from this random scene, who knows. Nobody would have been able to tell had they not put it in the recap.

 

I did completely forget where I saw her, indeed.

 

This is where the fun begins.

 

Yes, he was relevant, but what he's currently doing right now has nothing to do with what Din is doing. If the episode started being the "Luke Skywalker", I'd consider his plot irrelevant despite him training Grogu, and the Mandalorian episode of Boba Fett was also irrelevant until Fennec met up with him. The Grogu side plot was also irrelevant at the time. Grogu later was crucial in the final battle and the same type of thing could happen here. But as of now, what the doctor is doing isn't connected to what Din is doing.

 

37 minutes of no current relevance??

The Mandalorian story isn't just focused on everything solely "Mandalorian". It's woven amongst the fabric of the greater Star Wars story; especially the events of post-war ROTJ. That's why we have Imperial Remnants, new Republic X-Wings showing up at odd times, etc.

Having been driven from their homes and hiding out on various planets throughout the Galaxy, all of these Mandalorians are linking into these non-Mandalorian events.

More like 37 minutes of linkage to the greater story.

 

This episode felt like a perfect tonic after watching this week’s Bad Batch. Focusing on the New Republic is exactly what I’d been hoping for from this era of storytelling.

 

There is a link, sure, but it was in the past. Right now, the reason for following him again isn't obvious. I'm assuming this stuff will be relevant to Din's story, but since it currently isn't, I think it's an odd way to place a side plot and it would just make more sense to start the subplot in the season premiere and cut back and forth.

The setting of the story is the Star Wars Galaxy during the New Republic Era, but that doesn't mean the story is about that era as a whole. There are many shared universes, and while Superman appearing in a Batman comic isn't weird, him just being the main character would be odd despite both occupying the same universe. Batman comics show the DC Universe in how it's relevant to him in his city. Mandalorian shows the Star Wars universe in how it's relevant to him, because it's Din story. Din doesn't exist in a vacuum so other people like Ahsoka, and Bo-Katan showing up is fine as long as it's ultimately in service of his story. I do think what we just saw will somehow service his story, just the way they integrated it could have been better.

 

I have not watched the episode yet but it all depends on execution. I don't think it's odd at all, many shows do that where they focus an episode on something that doesnt have real impact on the main storyline. The Last of Us did that two or three times this season and some have called episode 3 the best episode in TV history. And it had nothing to do with the main plot of The Last of Us. But it needs to be executed well and it will be compared to Andor and that show's execution because of the subject matter. Truth be told I feel like it won't hold a candle to andor because John and Dave arent half the writers, tony gilroy and company are.

 

I don't think there's anything wrong with not always advancing the main plot or focusing on other people, just the way they did it for this specific episode was oddly structured.

 

That was great new look into Corucant in the Post ROTJ era. Great character development for Bo Katan and DR Pershing. I think this all Gideon doing with his comms officer. That starfighters at the beginning i can think of only one

Spoiler

Thrawn.

 

I haven’t watched the episode yet but I have one question concerning Coruscant :

Spoiler

Is there any mention about Mas Amedda’s fate ? Aftermath Empire’s End did confirm he was allowed to rule Coruscant as a figurehead overseen by New Republic officials.

 

Excellent and unexpected episode.

Pen Pershing is his full name.

Very good using the communications officer. She knows that Pen Pershing is the one who betrayed them and helped the Mandos on the ship. It’s not a retcon or stretch. We see it all play out in chapter 16. Perfect fit.

Did she do what she did to Pershing on higher orders or was this her own personal revenge. It could be either.

We saw a Star Wars Ted Talk. Loved the call backs to Kara Dune sending a blaster shot so close it nicked Pen Pershing’s ear. Does he still have hearing damage?

That was like live action The Clone Wars Coruscant. Compared to the grim Andor Coruscant it took a moment to get used too.

The tone of Coruscant under rehabilitation was interesting and ultimately worked. The overtly sacrin music during the ‘fun times’ really paid off at the end. How about when the Snoke / Revenge is the Sith Opera scene music played. That really worked for me juxtaposed with the earlier light hearted music.

I was full expecting Dr. Pershing to be extracted at the end by Imperials. Instead he was given up to New Republic forces for agressive treatments.

We see the New Republic police uniforms again. The white belts and shoes remind me of the police I saw in Venice Italy.

And now we have Bo Katan in a crazy situation where she is questioning if she has faith. Not questioning her faith - which she didn’t have before. Now she is questioning that she is feeling faith.

 

From a certain point of view, I can see what you are saying and agree somewhat. Up until now, the story has been focused on Din and Grogu and they have been central to virtually all character interactions. So it's abit of a shock all of a sudden when we are following a character journey outside of Din's current involvement; despite having a very strong connection to the events surrounding Season's 1 and 2.

But I think that Fav has started to take the right approach here in doing what he has done. Instead of this Lone Wolf and Cub story, it has grown now to involve what happened to Mandalore, being Mandalorian, etc. So there will need to be more complexity in respect of character relationships with Fav's writing now; as Din is definitely not central to everything Mandalorian. So with there seemingly being alot of unsaid tension between Bo-Katan and Paz Vizsla (just to use this as an example), this character relationship / interaction / conflict does not require Din's involvement at all. The same with the exchange of ideals between Bo and the Armourer; just to highlight another. Sure these two examples are direct "Mandalorian" based and are very current to the story in the present, but there is a significant Imperial element to the Mandalorian story and Fav's writing needs to evolve to alot more "non Din and Grogu" character interactions and development.

I agree with Bor Mullet that this episode felt abit Andor-like in that regard, but is not on the same level in respect of story development and character development and interaction. However, this is the level it needs to get to when dealing with a massive story idea like it is and there are so many players involved; ranging from major to minor and including Imperial people. And I applaud Fav on beginning his journey in this episode in starting to remove all of the focus from Din and Grogu.

 

A ''Andorism'' episode, really interesting, and, the new republic, well, it's not that cute...
Another solid episode.

 

Well, this meme is officially canon