Summary: Mando finds Bo Katan and gets her help to track down Gideon. The crew steals an imperial shuttle containing Dr. Pershing and they get information from him. They all get in the imperial shuttle and sneak into Gideon's light cruiser, staging an attack from Boba Fett. Once inside, the girls fight off the stormtroopers and stage a distraction while Mando sneaks off to the cargo bay where the dark troopers are. After battling and defeating one, Mando manages to eject the others into space. Mando goes to Baby Yoda's cell and finds Gideon already there. They fight and Mando defeats him, leaving him alive. Mando returns to the bridge and learns that the darksaber is his now since he defeated Gideon. Suddenly, the dark troopers return and enter the light cruiser, trapping everyone in the bridge, which Gideon expressing that only he and Baby Yoda will survive. An X-wing appears and enters the light cruiser. Luke Skywalker is inside and he destroys all of the dark troopers. Gideon tries to kill himself but Cara stops him and knocks him out. Luke gets to the bridge and Baby Yoda decides to go with him. Baby Yoda says goodbye to Mando. Later on Tatooine, Boba and Fennec take over Jabba's palace.
The Good: The second half of this episode was really well done. I thought that the mission to rescue Baby Yoda gave this episode far more stakes compared to everything that came before and there were some excellent moments of drama that came up later in the episode. The action in particular really stood out. Mando's initial fight with the dark trooper was tense and exciting. It was great to see Mando legitimately pushed to the limit against this thing, and seeing him get utterly decimated by just a single dark trooper made it far more intense when dozens of them returned at the end of the episode. The action sequence against Gideon was also excellent. The choreography, visuals and sound were superb in this sequence, and it was a very intense fight heavy with stakes and suspense. The whole sequence felt gritty and real in a way that most lightsaber duels in "Star Wars" haven't felt since the original trilogy. I was very pleased with this skirmish. Amazingly the episode only got more intense once Gideon went down. I thought the twist of Mando getting ownership of the darksaber was a superb moment that ratcheted up the tension by suggesting some ingroup conflict that has been orchestrated by Gideon, who has become more and more enigmatic as the show has gone on. Gideon was fascinating throughout the episode no matter what he did. His attempt to get Mando to lower his guard was great, his cocky words while in custody did a terrific job of demoralizing the heroes, and his terrified reaction when Luke arrived was priceless. Speaking of which, Luke's appearance was a huge surprise that delivered on every level. Once again the jedi feel mythical in nature, and Luke's silent arrival was tense, exciting and mysterious. Seeing him mow down the dark troopers was brilliant entertainment, and an example of fanservice done well. I thoroughly enjoyed this sequence, and I thought that the decision to use CGI to bring in a younger Mark Hamill was the best choice here for the brief appearance of Luke. The ending of the episode was an emotional high for the show. Having Mando say goodbye to Baby Yoda was a sad moment, and seeing him take off the helmet without hesitation to say goodbye was very powerful stuff. I'm pleased that this season ended on such an emotional and conclusive beat, serving as a perfect conclusion to the story of Mando and Baby Yoda. I also quite liked Cara's conversation with the pilot that happened early in the episode. It was some of the best dialogue written this season and it continued to examine the show's themes. The Bad: I had several issues with the first half of the episode. First of all is the issues with logic. We aren't given any explanation how Mando's group found the shuttle that Dr. Pershing was in. How did they know that this shuttle was coming in? Without this convenient bit of knowledge, their plan would not work at all. This needed to be explained. Furthermore, it's very strange that Dr. Pershing cooperates so much with Mando's group. We don't know why he would do this and we don't even know what happened to him since he cooperated. This should have been addressed. The plan to attack Gideon's ship was pretty terrible. Had there been even a single darktrooper activated in preparation for Mando's attack that he stupidly announced last episode, they would have been screwed. The darktroopers need to charge, but can they not just have 1 patrolling the ship while the others charge? Furthermore, it's ridiculous that Gideon didn't immediately fortify Baby Yoda's holding cell. He knows that Mando is going for Baby Yoda, so everyone should have been sent to defend him. Plus, Mando sneaking around unexpectedly should never have worked, again because Mando stupidly announced to Gideon that he was coming. The final scene of the previous episode has gotten worse and worse as the story moves forward. As a final note, why did Gideon just wait for Mando to show up? He's on a ship! Just fly somewhere else. I thought the assault itself was also lacking. It was more dumb, boring action which didn't do much for me until the darktroopers came out. With the stormtroopers being portrayed as total geeks for 3 other episodes in this season, I felt no tension at all when they were attacking the main crew. Furthermore, the entire sequence was blatantly put together to provide a "strong women" moment. I'm fine with having strong women and showing it off, but it's frustrating when it's so obvious that the writers manufactured the story to make it happen in numerous ways. Some key examples being Mando being off on his own, Boba not helping out with the assault at all, and the third Death Watch member from "The Heiress" (a male character) being conveniently absent. What makes this even worse is that none of these people are well defined characters. This is proven when there is absolutely no interaction between the characters in this episode, which is a shame because fun interactions are a staple of "Star Wars". That tells me that character work was sacrificed in favour of this unnecessary scene where a group of women can dominate the enemies. Again, I am fine with portraying women like this, but the problem comes when the story and characters are ignored in favour of doing this. In this case, it badly hurts the narrative as well as my immersion. I want to return to my statement about fun interactions being a staple of "Star Wars". I firmly stand by this, and I believe that this is what made the original trilogy so engrossing. There's dramatic action, but through it all, there are very strong main characters who are fn to watch and show lots of personality when talking with each other. Nobody in this crew outside of Mando and Cara had any personality, and even Cara hardly has any since she has been handled so poorly this season. Cara had an interesting scene to start the episode where she murders the Imperial pilot who pisses her off, but she doesn't get any character work done outside of that. This is very disappointing since that initial scene didn't explore very deep into the character, and seemed to suggest a character trait that could cause problems during the assault. Instead it never came up again. Something else that never came up again was Bo Katan and Koska Reeves hating Boba for being a clone. This started up as a big deal, but like all other interesting character arcs, was dropped the moment the assault began. I would have much rather seen these stories develop during the assault instead of getting a brainless sequence of women being cool. While I loved the climax of the episode, some small things bothered me about it. For one, when everyone was making their final stand I was confused by the fact that everyone was holding blasters. Blasters don't work on the darktroopers and they know that! Why would they not prioritize using the darksaber and Mando's Beskar spear, the only two weapons in the room that could kill these guys. Also, I thought that Mando taking off his helmet for Baby Yoda had diminished impact since he took off the helmet in the prior episode. Had this been the only time he took off his helmet this season, the moment would have meant so much more. The ending sequence annoyed me a lot. I had hoped that Boba would be an addition to the main cast of this show since he would do well as an engaging supporting character. But since Disney wants more money, he becomes yet another character to get his own spin-off. I'm also very disgusted by his and Ahsoka's presence in this show as they had no impact on the story of "The Mandalorian" and only served to hype up completely different shows that Disney wants us to watch. It's the same tactic they use for the MCU and I'm very upset to see business taking precedence over telling a good story. Furthermore, we still don't know anything about how Boba survived, what he did on Tatooine, how he brought Fennec back, what his motives are, etc. I guess we'll have to watch yet another "Star Wars" TV show to find out, and that's not even a guarantee. Boba's return this season was botched really badly and I'm incredibly disappointed with the lack of character work done on him. The Unknown: What is going to happen with the darksaber? Will Bo Katan allow Mando to have it? Will she fight him for it? How will this be handled? I'm guessing that season 3 will be taking us to Mandalore to see how this is resolved. What happens to Gideon now that he has been captured? I hope we get to see a lot more of him so we can learn more about his motives which are still unclear. The character has thrived purely on Giancarlo Esposito's natural charisma, there is still a lot that we need to learn about him. Will we see Baby Yoda again? What will happen when he joins up with Luke? We know in the future that Kylo Ren will burn down Luke's Jedi temple. Will Baby Yoda die in this sequence or will he escape again? What will Boba Fett do now that he has taken control over Jabba's palace? Best Moment: Mando giving up Baby Yoda and taking off his helmet to share one final moment with the little guy. Character of the Episode: Luke. Seeing him again was wonderful. Conclusion: This episode had a lot of cool stuff in it and the second half in particular was a joy to watch with some exciting twists and dramatic moments. However, this show continues to get in its own way with its insistence on cool stuff being more important than storytelling, and it once again significantly damaged the quality of the episode. As for the season overall, I can't say I was a fan of it. It was watchable stuff, but the lack of character work in favour of self-contained action spectacles that completely lacked in personality was a very uninteresting choice for me. Looking back on this season isn't very pleasant as all I really got out of this was mindless fun that didn't capitalize on any of the potential that this series had. I had a good time for sure since a show as well produced as this will always be entertaining, but I was emotionally unengaged for 95% of this season and I finished every episode except the first one want for more character work, world building and storytelling. This is decent television, but it takes no risks to be anything more and that's very disappointing to me. Score: 62
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Summary: Cara takes Mayfeld out of confinement so that he can use his knowledge to help Mando locate Gideon. Mando and Mayfeld hijack a rhydonium transport into an imperial base and enter it, with Mando taking off his armour to don imperial armour. They get attacked by pirates but they survive and make it to the camp. Mando takes his helmet off to use a facial recognition scanner to get Gideon's coordinates. An imperial officer, Valin Hess pulls Mando aside and Mayfeld steps in to save him. Mayfeld served under Valin Hess. Valin Hess asks the two of them for a drink and after discussing the past, Mayfeld snaps and kills him. Mando and Mayfeld manage to escape the facility and blow it up. Cara and Mando decide to let Mayfeld go free. Mando sends a message to Gideon to let him know that they are coming for him.
The Good: I definitely preferred the pacing and themes of this episode compared to the last one which ended up being mostly just an action spectacle. This episode told a much better story, opting to center on a supporting character in Mayfeld while exploring several interesting themes and ideas as we learn more about Mayfeld. I enjoyed this and I thought it made for a richer viewing experience as Mayfeld went from reluctantly doing Mando's bidding to save his own skin to actively working against the Imperials who seemingly abused him and his comrades when he was likely in service (see: The Unknown). I really enjoyed this story for Mayfeld and I thought that there were some unique ideas explored here like freedom vs order and the justification of the empire's cruelty presented by Valin Hess. Mando's story was pretty good as well. I love the idea of him having to take off his helmet to save Baby Yoda and I thought that this was executed mostly well with a few issues (see: The Bad). Overall I thought this was a good development and it gave the episode a more emotional and thoughtful edge to get us to question how far Mando can bend his own rules for Baby Yoda's sake before realizing that Mando is willing to do whatever it takes to get Baby Yoda back. I liked the pacing of this episode too. It was refreshing to see several characters going together on a mission while moving along their own individual character arcs in the process. This is the heart of what "Star Wars" is about, and I thought that this was missing in the previous episodes. Having a team set up and enact a plan while encountering dilemmas that forced inner conflict within the characters is a simple but effective way of storytelling, and it helped make this episode stand out. There were some details I liked. The seismic charge was a nice callback to the prequels and it was produced amazingly well. I also really liked that Mayfeld's concern for being recognized was misplaced and Valin Hess didn't remember him at all. It really showed that the lives of the soldiers who served these officers are not considered important at all. Lastly, Boba Fett's line about having a recognizable face was a clever bit of humour that made me openly laugh. The Bad: While I applaud this episode for exploring meaningful themes, I found them to be alarmingly black and white. "Star Wars" has always been about looking at the world as either good or bad, but I would have preferred to see a deeper and less simplistic view of things as a way to grow the scope of the franchise. Leaving things in black and white makes it hard for "Star Wars" to tell more meaningful stories. The whole pirate attack sequence was really bland television. It's the kind of boring action filler that I would expect from a procedural drama, not a show like this. And it wasn't even good action. So many things about this sequence made no sense. First of all, the motive of the pirates is never revealed so we don't know why they are targeting the rhydonium. This is a severe flaw because we learn later that the rhydonium would be used as a weapon to kill. So was Mando killing pirates that were simply trying to save their own planet? This should be a big deal but it is never mentioned or explored and the pirates remain as generic bad guys. It's very poor writing. Furthermore, a lot of details were horribly inconsistent. It's apparently really risky for Mando to shoot a blaster near rhydonium, yet the TIE fighter blasts were somehow acceptable? Furthermore, if rhydonium is so unstable, why would the thermal detonator need to be placed directly on top of it? Just throw the damn thing and watch it detonate! The pirates are stupid for even attempting to board the Juggernaut. The end with them all being detonated at once was also absurdly stupid. Did they really not expect Mando to throw the detonator back at them? Also it was mighty convenient that the detonators always took forever to explode when Mando needed to throw them away. This is just atrocious writing for an action scene. And as a final quibble that really frustrated me, defining these guys as pirates is factually incorrect since pirates pillage and steal, they never just destroy things without expecting to collect plunder. The writers couldn't be bothered to come up with motives for these people so they incorrectly decided to call them pirates instead. It's woeful writing made worse by the fact that having these "pirates" be village folk instead would have made for a much more compelling story. There were several moments that broke my immersion. For one, why was Mayfeld the only person that wasn't wearing a helmet? That's just incredibly suspicious and it makes him stand out when there's supposed to be a stealthy mission happening. I understand that they wanted Bill Burr's face to be visible, but it really breaks your immersion to see this. Another detail was the facial scan that had to be completed. Facial scans are meant to determine if the person accessing the system has the authority to do what they need to do. Running a facial scan to simply verify that there is a person there is a lousy system that feels like it was lazily slapped into the episode to give Mando a reason to take off his helmet. Finally, there is the convenient idea that Moff Gideon's coordinates could be easily tracked from an Imperial system. This is a very easy solution to be sure, and it's made way more ridiculous when you realize that if Gideon simply moves his ship, Mando's team would never be able to find him since his coordinates will have changed and they have no way of knowing where he went. Another immensely dumb scene was Cara and Mando deciding that Mayfeld died in the blast. I thought they sprung him out of jail in secret, so why would they acknowledge that they went with him to this planet as the reason for his disappearance? Also wouldn't Cara be in huge trouble for this? She took Mayfeld away in broad daylight and never brought him back. Plus she deserted her job posting to help Mando. Having her join the New Republic is a development that keeps getting worse and worse. It seems that the show has no interest in exploring a single thing Boba Fett has done since "Return of the Jedi". This is an unfathomable skip in character development and it leaves me feeling absolutely nothing towards Boba Fett. The final scene of the episode is highly problematic for me. Having Mando remember exactly what Gideon said to him back in "The Reckoning" is very implausible, and it made for an absurdly cheesy ending speech that made no sense. Having Mando passionately express his desire to get Baby Yoda back would have been much more relatable and emotional, but instead Mando mocks Gideon in a way that forces me to suspend my disbelief a great deal for a speech that doesn't have any emotional impact at all. Furthermore, notifying Gideon of his impending arrival seems like an idiotic idea, and unless Mando is somehow preparing a trap, this has to be one of the stupidest things he has done so far. My final point is a familiar one. Yet again we have an episode of this show where Mando goes to a new planet to accomplish a small task that he needs to do to progress the plot which results in an action sequence that has absolutely no tension because we know the characters will make it out okay. This formula has been frustratingly repetitive throughout the season and it continued to annoy me in this episode. The Unknown: Does Mando have a plan to get Baby Yoda back? If so, what is it? Who will he recruit for help? Was Mayfeld a stormtrooper in the past? What exactly was Operation: Cinder? I know it was an event from one of the video games but I never knew what it was. Will it be explained in the show? Best Moment: The table scene between Mayfeld, Mando and Valin Hess was excellent stuff, nicely exploring the character of Mayfeld and the themes of the episode. Character of the Episode: Mayfeld. Conclusion: This episode impressed me with its exploration of themes and Mayfeld's character. However, there was a whole myriad of stupid writing that plagued this episode and makes it completely fall apart under further scrutiny. Despite all I liked about it, the disaster that was the writing meant that this wasn't a good episode overall. Score: 53 Summary: Mando arrives on Tython and takes Baby Yoda to the seeing stone where Baby Yoda uses his powers and separates from reality. Boba Fett and Fennec arrive to the planet and start negotiating with Mando to get Boba's armour back. A sudden transport of stormtroopers arrives and attacks and the three team up to take them down. They are eventually overwhelmed but Boba gets his armour and chases them away. Moff Gideon arrives on an imperial cruiser and blows up Mando's ship. He sends dark troopers which take Baby Yoda and takes him. Mando goes to the New Republic and meets up with Cara as he, Boba and Fennec plan to get Baby Yoda back.
The Good: I thought that the opening scene of the episode was really good, far more emotional than anything we got in the last episode, which was quite hollow. This time we actually get to see how Mando feels about Baby Yoda, with his encouragement of his training and the realization that he won't be able to be with Baby Yoda forever since he isn't able to go with him into the world of the force. Mando isn't force-sensitive so there's forever going to be a barrier blocking him off from Baby Yoda, and he's never going to be able to cross that barrier. I enjoyed Moff Gideon's arrival in the episode. Much of what happened before he arrived was fun, but it was lacking in true suspense and tension (see: The Bad). But with Moff Gideon arriving and destroying the Razor Crest, a vehicle we have grown to love over the past 14 episodes, it elevated the stakes immediately and the episode reached a brilliant level of tension as Baby Yoda is surprisingly kidnapped and Mando loses everything he has. It's an effective sequence that serves as a surprising climax for the show while leaving an exciting cliffhanger as Mando prepares to get Baby Yoda back. Additionally, I quite liked the final scene between Gideon and Baby Yoda as it emphasized the tyrannical nature of Gideon and the angry defiance of Baby Yoda which could make him very susceptible to the dark side. I probably will not use the name Grogu. I don't like it very much and Baby Yoda sounds much cuter. The Bad: The return of Boba Fett was badly botched. This doesn't feel like the character he used to be, and not in a good way at all. Suddenly Boba has become a chatterbox which is far removed from what he used to be. And this would be fine if we got to see how he became like this, but it's never revealed to us, which is very disappointing. In fact we learned nothing about Boba at all in this episode. We don't know his motives, we don't know much about who he is, we don't know why he wants his armour, and this prevents me from relating with the character at all. He feels like he could be replaced with literally anybody else and it would not make a difference. I feel nothing towards the character and even though his return had some cool moments, it left me feeling extremely empty inside, not dissimilar to Ahsoka from the previous episode. The show is just lacking storytelling with its characters. It doesn't help that Boba's arrival has several plot holes to it. If Boba was simply after his armour, why didn't he just get in from Cobb? He clearly knew he had it, so it makes little sense that Boba wouldn't have done anything about it. Furthermore, it's been 5 years since Boba was eaten by the Sarlacc which is a long time. We needed answers for what he's been doing since then and why he hasn't gone for the armour or left Tatooine in this time. We get no such answers and that is very sloppy. Furthermore, we need to know how he survived being eaten and how he somehow ended up away from his armour. Getting no answers for this is really weak character work and it leaves me with too many questions for Boba's return to feel even slightly satisfying. Additionally, why didn't Boba confront Mando when he saw him on Tatooine? Instead he has practically chased him across the galaxy! This seems incredibly counterproductive for Boba to do. And even more annoyingly, how the heck did Boba chase Mando through hyperspace? This was established in "The Last Jedi", it does not exist yet. And it's impossible to believe that Mando flew to both Corvus and Tython without using hyperspace since Mando has clearly stated that hyperspace is essential for his survival. On top of all that, the dialogue between Mando and Boba isn't good either. Boba was just looking to get the armour which was rightfully his, knowing full well that Mando would give it once he proves that the armour is his, which as we saw, he could easily do. But instead, Boba comes in with hostility and threatens Baby Yoda while also making it seem like he was just some random guy who wanted the armour instead of the rightful owner. All he had to do was explain to Mando that his father was a foundling and the tension would have deflated. Instead Boba inexplicably kept saying the exact wrong things to make things more confrontational. It ended up being a frustrating sequence. The ensuing action sequence also did not do much for me. The stormtroopers keep getting effortlessly destroyed by the main characters so they have already lost any sense of danger that they originally had. Seeing an entire transport run away from one man wearing armour only to be blown up immediately was incredibly silly, and now even an entire legion of stormtroopers pose no threat in the show. I will never be able to take them seriously, and that removes any sort of stakes to the action as I'm never concerned for the fate of the heroes. I thought the action in this episode ended up being hollow and boring because of the lack of stakes, and I didn't get into it until Moff Gideon arrived. I found the end of the episode to be disappointing too. Mando lost everything and it feels like he should be in a really bad place right now. But the episode doesn't spend enough time focusing on what the events of this episode have done to Mando, instead they are happy to gloss over his emotions to set up a rescue mission immediately. Also, the episode reveals that Cara is now part of the New Republic. I'm very disappointed that this key decision for Cara was glossed over entirely, making it almost entirely meaningless to see her there. Furthermore, she's going to be breaking the rules immediately which should be a key point of inner conflict for Cara. Instead it's not explored at all, and the kidnapping of Baby Yoda gets Cara on board right away. Is it too much for me to expect even a little bit of storytelling and character conflict from this show? The lack of details also completely ruined the planet of Tython. Tython ended up being nothing interesting at all, which is hugely disappointing when you consider that this is a planet in the deep core that used to house a jedi temple. The total lack of worldbuilding is a massive disappointment, and I find myself wishing that we had gotten much more than what we actually got. Also, why was Fennec coming back to life not a bigger deal than this? This is literal resurrection and it should be a massive deal for this universe, instead Mando shrugs it off entirely, and the moment isn't treated like as much of a big deal as it should be. It's very disappointing since Anakin's entire turn to the dark side hinged on him wanting the power to save Padme's life. For Boba to just have this power now is absurd. As a final point, this episode wasn't even 30 minutes long which is absurdly short. It makes me even more frustrated to see so many key storytelling details skipped over when there easily could have been another 20 minutes to this episode. It's one thing to have short episodes that make me wish for more, but it's another thing to have short episodes when there is clearly a lot more story that should have been told. The Unknown: What does Mando need Mayfeld for? How will he try to get Baby Yoda back? What happened to Boba that allowed him to survive the Sarlacc? How did he lose his armour? Why does he want it back? Why didn't he get it back sooner? Why did he stay on Tatooine for so long? What are his goals? How did he bring Fennec back to life? Best Moment: The opening moments between Mando and Baby Yoda. Character of the Episode: Baby Yoda. Conclusion: This episode had a quick pace and lots of action but not much more than that. The character dynamics, worldbuilding and storytelling was hugely flawed and I did not enjoy much of it at all. This episode should have had a lot more to it. Season 2 has been fun but the lack of quality storytelling is hurting it massively. Score: 52 Summary: Mando arrives on Corvus where the planet has been desolated. A village has been taken over by Morgan, a Magistrate who is opposed by Ahsoka. Ahsoka decrees that she will come back to kill her and free the village. Mando is offered a Beskar spear from the Magistrate to kill Ahsoka. Mando finds Ahsoka and introduces Baby Yoda to her. Ahsoka learns his name is Grogu and that he was trained in the Jedi Temple before it fell. Ahsoka trains Grogu a bit but after seeing his attachment to Mando, she refuses to train him. Mando agrees to help Ahsoka save the village in exchange for her training. Together they take down the village and Ahsoka defeats the Magistrate, demanding Thrawn's whereabouts from her. Ahsoka still refuses to train Grogu and tells Mando to take him to Tython where he could potentially connect with another Jedi using the force.
The Good: Some context before I start this review. I haven't watched "Rebels" but I have been filled in by a friend on key characters and storylines in the show so I am familiar with things like what Ahsoka has been up to and with the identity of Thrawn. That being said, I thought that Ahsoka's return in this episode was near perfect. Rosario Dawson did a tremendous job of capturing the essence of the character and bringing her mannerisms, personality and charisma to a live action TV show. Never did I feel like I was watching an imitation of the character, and that's due to some very impressive work by everyone working on this episode, but especially Rosario Dawson herself. This was truly an inspired bit of casting. The opening scene of the episode was terrific and allowed for the return of lightsaber action in a tremendously enjoyable way. Seeing Ahsoka dual wielding was a treat and the entire action sequence was wonderfully shot, memorable and brilliantly choreographed. The same can be said about the climax of the episode which was very entertaining. It was a fun action setpiece with lots of superb shots and well directed action. This is certainly an episode that will please just about every Star Wars fan out there. I really liked the Japanese theme to this episode. We've seen "The Mandalorian" parallel western films before, but now we get to see it try its hand at a samurai film, complete with the imperial rulers, the samurai playing both sides, and the showdown between Ahsoka and the Magistrate towards the end of the episode. On top of that, this episode did something really unique by intersplicing a samurai-inspired duel with a western-inspired showdown between Mando and Lang. It was a unique clash of styles that offered up something I had never seen before. The standout scenes of the episode were definitely the ones with Ahsoka and Grogu. This is the most information we have got on Grogu and it was all very fascinating to learn. The biggest of course being that he has a name! It will be tough to get out of the habit of calling him Baby Yoda, but giving him a name does give Grogu a greater sense of identity as a character which I really like. I thought that his backstory was very intriguing and raised some interesting questions (see: The Unknown). I especially enjoyed the brief bit of force training that Ahsoka did with Grogu and seeing Mando excitedly helping him unlock his powers was a wonderful character moment. There were a couple other details that I really liked. I enjoyed seeing Ahsoka fighting in a style similar to "The Clone Wars" showing that this show does care about the little details in lightsaber fighting styles. I also quite liked the reference to Anakin's fate, with Ahsoka refusing to train Grogu because of what happened to him, which makes sense following her encounter with Darth Vader in "Rebels". Ahsoka has learned from her past experiences, even if it leads her to make the same biased decisions that the Jedi council made back in the prequel trilogy to not train somebody out of fear of what they could do. This is in contrast to the lessons learned by Luke in the sequel trilogy, which is a fascinating bit of deep storytelling. Lastly, I liked the nod to Grand Admiral Thrawn, who it seems will be returning in this show. The Bad: While I had just praised this episode's creativity for paying homage to samurai films and western films at the same time, I wasn't entirely happy with it. The episode ended up feeling a bit phony and inorganic because of how both of these references were thrown at us towards the end with such little subtlety. I think the episode actually lost a great deal of emotional engagement and suspense by trying too hard and being too cute with the homages. I've seen a lot of people praising this episode as near perfect and I honestly do not agree. I enjoyed much of this, but I had issues with it as well. For one, the world of Corvus was a complete disappointment. I was excited to travel to a new planet in this episode but we have pretty much no world-building done here at all. We're not given any information on this village or how it works, and we're given less information on why the Magistrate is here on this planet. Apparently she is here to just cause destruction because that's all that burning the trees is going to do. Furthermore, we also have no idea why Ahsoka is on Corvus and how Bo Katan knows this, which is a question that should have been answered. If she was simply tracking the Magistrate, would she really have stayed on Corvus for as long as she does? This episode feels very familiar. Even though a lot more happened in this episode, it still follows the same basic formula of Mando arriving on a new planet, meeting some characters, getting a quest, finishing the quest, and then leaving. This is not new content at all and it's starting to become old since the characters aren't being explored very much during these adventures. Much of what we saw in this episode was familiar stuff. The action sequences lacked tension completely and relied heavily on the gorgeous cinematography to be good. Luckily for them, they were very well done, but there's only so much I can get out of good looking visuals. Furthermore, the homages in this episode were mostly already done. The western homages are starting to get old, and the slashes homages that were present here had already been explored back in "The Prisoner" from last season. Additionally, Ahsoka's current story feels like a carbon copy of Bo Katan's. Both characters have gone to a specific planet to complete a specific mission while on the hunt to find a character that they want to fight. Both storylines are very similar, and they don't have enough storytelling potential to interest me in seeing the same idea explored twice. Looking at things like that, a lot of things in this episode were recycled and while that doesn't make this a bad episode, it blocks it from being anything truly special since I feel like I've already seen a lot of what this episode has to offer. And that is the problem I have with "Star Wars" as a whole in its current state. "The Last Jedi" was a mixed movie to say the least, but it's the only "Star Wars" product that has come out since Disney acquired the license to have a unique vision and try something new. As much fun as "The Mandalorian" is, it plays it completely safe and relies far too much on fanservice and "giving the fans what they want" to tell its story. But in doing so, the show feels rather hollow and lifeless, as if it is only focused on pleasing the fans and nothing else. The show has forgotten to tell a story that's worth watching. There is nothing underneath the surface, no emotion, no complexity, no substance. The show feels empty in spite of all that it is doing right, and this is one of the biggest reasons that I just can't view this episode as any more than good. Shouldn't Moff Gideon have found Ahsoka through the tracker he planted on the Razor Crest? The pacing feels strange since the last episode ended with such a big cliffhanger and reveal but none of that was important in this episode. While I typically like standalone episodes like the ones this series is specializing in, I feel that this show could be paced better to service the overarching story. The Unknown: Who took Grogu from the temple? How did he manage to get away in the chaos? Why was Grogu prioritized to be taken out of the temple? Has Mando led Moff Gideon to Ahsoka? Where is Thrawn? Why is Ahsoka hunting him down? What has he been doing since he was sent to the unknown regions in "Rebels"? What will Mando find on Tython? Will a Jedi respond to Grogu when he gets there? Best Moment: Mando reacting to Grogu successfully using the force. It's the closest this episode got to genuine character investment. Character of the Episode: Ahsoka. Conclusion: I liked this episode. There is a lot to love with how Ahsoka's return was handled, and there was plenty of interesting lore and mythology revealed in this episode to keep things interesting. However, this was by no means a classic episode of television. It's excellent "Star Wars" content, but unfortunately the repetitive, shallow and unsatisfying nature of "Star Wars" following the failure of "The Last Jedi" means that excellent "Star Wars" content doesn't translate to excellent television. This is merely good. Score: 63 Summary: Mando stops on Nevarro and gets help from Greef to repair his ship. He catches up with Cara and Greef and learns that they have been rebuilding Nevarro, also with the help of Mythrol from "Chapter One". But there is an inhabited imperial base that remains and they need to destroy it. Mando agrees to help and they go to the base. Once inside, they discover it's a lab where force-based research is being done for Moff Gideon. They blow up the lab and escape after a chase. Mando leaves quickly. Moff Gideon is updated that the imperials have placed a tracker on the Razor Crest.
The Good: This was another really fun episode. I thought that a lot of things about this episode were better than the previous one. For one, the story was paced better and included more world building and story progression. Last episode was good but it felt quick and had an air of unimportance to it despite the big appearance of Bo Katan. This episode felt much more significant as a piece of the story. Last episode felt as if it was structured around Bo Katan telling Mando to go find Ahsoka. This one felt like it had a worthy story to explore. The second big reason I liked this more was that the characters were more enjoyable. Bo Katan's crew were new characters and were honestly a little boring in the prior episode. Returning to familiar characters like Cara, Greef and Mythrol worked really well here and made the mission to destroy the lab much more exciting than the mission to steal the weapons from the last episode. Overall, I thought that this episode was executed better despite feeling similar to the last one. The assault on the imperial lab was a lot of fun too. This is classic "Star Wars" with a group of characters going on a mission into enemy territory together and having it result in some wild fun, which is exactly what happened here. Even though the logistics weren't all there (see: The Bad), I greatly enjoyed the chase that served as the episode's climax and I thought it was very impressive to see this whole sequence in a TV show. The worldbuilding on Nevarro was much more satisfying than the worldbuilding on Trask. We already know this planet, so it was wonderful to come back later to see how much it had changed. I thoroughly enjoyed seeing the quality of life improvements on the planet and I thought it was a nice bit of worldbuilding. Thankfully this episode had lots of elements related to the overarching plot and I really enjoyed that. The mysterious message in the lab was very interesting and raised tons of questions (see: The Unknown) while the ending scenes did a magnificent job connecting the events of this episode to other aspects of the story like the New Republic and Moff Gideon. The Bad: I've compared this episode a lot to "The Heiress" and for good reason. This episode felt extremely similar in structure to that one and it felt like I was watching a very familiar episode this time around. Sure it was a better structured episode, but this one had the misfortune of coming afterwards so a lot of what happened here didn't feel as original or impressive as the content from "The Heiress". Some of what happened at the imperial compound didn't make sense. First of all, how many imperials were on Nevarro to begin with? Didn't Gideon bring his full force in "The Reckoning' last season? It doesn't make sense that there are more troops that were just hanging out and not helping with the capture of Baby Yoda. Furthermore, the design of this lab was perplexing. There are speeders intended to protect the lab, but they are almost useless because half of them crashed and burned just trying to get out of the lab because of the cliffside location. Why would they not bring more ships instead of speeders that would be useless? Finally, how did the speeders even catch up to the vehicle that Cara, Greef and Mythrol hijacked? They had such a big head start that somehow completely vanished in between shots. Lastly, the heat shaft was unrealistically dangerous to be around. Are there no health and safety regulations in this universe? It's difficult to buy into the self destruct button to be so easily accessible, and it's difficult to buy into it being so easy to fall to your death into the heat shaft. The jokes with Mythrol's cowardice got old fast and were constantly repeated to the point of annoyance. This season's jokes haven't been very good so far. The Unknown: How much time has passed between season 1 and 2? Nevarro has been drastically improved and Greef's facial hair has gone completely white. Surely it has been a while, but how long? What is being studied at the lab? Will "The Mandalorian" tie into the sequel trilogy? Are we seeing the story of how Palpatine was brought back from the dead? It seems like a plausible end goal for these research projects. Did the people say that they have another child used in experimenting? How many others are there? Who deployed the tracking beacon on the Razor Crest? Was it a character we know? Did Greef or Mythrol betray Mando? Best Moment: The mysterious lab footage. It was very intriguing stuff that built the mystery of the show tremendously well. Character of the Episode: Cara. Conclusion: This was another pretty good episode. It had ups and downs, but overall it was an effective piece of entertainment that really got this season moving. Score: 64 Summary: Mando arrives on Trask and goes to the inn in search of information. He connects with a crew of sailors who offer to take him to the other Mandalorians. Along the way they try to kill Mando for his armour, but the other Mandalorians arrive and save him. They are Bo Katan who has a small squad. Mando agrees to help them steal weapons from an Imperial ship in exchange for directions to the jedi. The group successfully steal the entire ship and Bo Katan reveals that she is looking for the darksaber. Afterwards, Mando is given directions to Ahsoka and goes to meet her.
The Good: This episode is a joy for all "Star Wars" fans with the return of Bo Katan, further information on what's happened on Mandalore and the mention of Ahsoka. The overall narrative of the "Star Wars" saga got a lot more clarity with this episode and that's definitely a good thing. But what's best about this is that even for people who aren't big "Star Wars" fans, this is still very watchable stuff and it doesn't require prior knowledge of the series to be appreciated. I liked the introduction of Death Watch. Their different lifestyle compared to Mando was intriguing and it made it very interesting to see if Mando would accept them as Mandalorians even if they take off their helmets. I was also very engaged while the episode was giving us more information about Mandalore. The attack on the ship was a lot of fun. It was all-out action with a couple of pretty funny moments thrown in there as well. It's exactly the kind of wacky fun that I want to get from this show. Speaking of wacky fun, I once again loved the opening scene. I wasn't really into it for a while since it seemed clear to me that the Razor Crest was going to stick the landing no problem. But then there was that hilarious subversion as the ship plummets into the water at the very end, a moment that made me laugh out loud. The Bad: As you can see I don't really have much to say about this one. And that's because this episode was actually less than 30 minutes of content. It feels like far too short of an episode, and some extra time would have served the show well to better develop the new characters and spend more time exploring Trask. The frog characters ended up being quite useless. Here they are just a means to watch over Baby Yoda. Furthermore, Mando risked his life and money for this mission, and the reward that the Frog Man gives him is pointing to the inn where Mando has to ask and pay somebody else for more information. Is Mando really just the world's biggest chump? Plus how am I supposed to like the frog characters now since they basically just conned Mando into helping them with his only reward being a finger point towards the inn. Simply poor writing. Something about this episode makes it feel worse than it should be. Things feel somewhat rushed the entire time and you get the feeling that the story is hampered by the writers doing their best to keep things vague. The dialogue doesn't feel natural and it doesn't feel like there are actual characters on display here. The whole episode is very plot-heavy and doesn't do much of anything for the characters at all. That makes it feel pretty dull. The Unknown: What is happening on Mandalore right now? Why does everyone die when they go there? What happened to Bo Katan after The Clone Wars? How did she lose the darksaber to Moff Gideon? Will we be seeing Ahsoka next episode? What has she been up to? Best Moment: Probably Mando learning about Bo Katan and the disconnect he felt from her. This was the only part of the episode that actually explored a character in conflict. Character of the Episode: Bo Katan. Conclusion: This was a decent episode overall. While very short, this was a significant episode for "Star Wars" and it was exciting to watch. The show didn't care enough to try to make this a special episode, but it's fine for what it is. Score: 62 Summary: Manda returns to Peli who has arranged a deal for him. She found somebody who has information on a Mandalorian living on Trask, but in exchange Mando has to help transport a new character, the Frog Lady to Trask where he gets the information. Mando accepts but gets questioned by the New Republic and flees. In his escape he crashes into an ice cave and is attacked by spiders. The New Republic people find and save him, choosing not to arrest him after searching up his record due to how he allowed for the arrest of 4 other criminals back in "The Prisoner". Mando fixes up his ship and leaves.
The Good: There were more fun Easter Eggs here, as is expected from this show. I enjoyed bits and pieces of this episode. Mando's encounter with the New Republic was fun and it was nice to see that the show had the budget to pull off a ship chase sequence. I really enjoyed the opening scene which served as an exciting standalone opening sequence, showing Mando getting into trouble but fighting off the people who attacked him. Baby Yoda had cute moments in this episode that were fun, especially after he did almost nothing in the first episode. The Bad: This was a huge step back from the first episode and I disliked vast majority of the episode. The biggest problem was how pointless this whole thing felt. Nothing in this episode was important barring a few lines of exposition early on. Quite literally nothing about this episode progressed the storyline and it felt like a meaningless side story that could be skipped altogether. To make matters worse, there was also no character work in this episode at all, and the worldbuilding was lackluster, especially when put up against the brilliant work done in "The Marshal". This was by far the most pointless episode of the show so far. Furthermore, this is the only episode of the show that didn't end with a resolution of some kind. Mando is still flying towards Trask and all that was resolved was the threat of the New Republic and the spiders which are threats that just scream filler to me. I was never emotionally engaged in either of these storylines so getting resolution to them made me feel nothing. Not having Mando get to Trask by the end of the episode was a poor decision, and it feels genuinely perplexing when you realize how short this episode was and how easy it would be to squeeze in an extra scene to finish this story. The story itself was terrible. The Frog Lady is one of the most forgettable characters so far and there were so many inconsistencies with her. For one, she somehow switches from being able to understand Mando and not being able to understand him at will. In the first scene, she doesn't understand him at all, yet when she speaks through Zero (why is he even here, surely the droid-hating Mando would have sent him away ages ago), somehow she is able to understand Mando without translations. It's very inconsistent. Even worse are her eggs. Apparently these eggs are so important that they drive the entire plot. These eggs would be her only lineage so it makes sense. What doesn't make sense are her motives. Is the criminal Mando really the best way for Frog Lady to secure passage to Trask? She is in Mos Eisley, surely there are hundreds of others that could provide passage. Yet she insists on going with Mando for some reason. How did she get here anyways if her species is only able to survive on Trask? The writers don't care enough to answer this. And also, how the hell does she not notice Baby Yoda eating her spawn? The show plays this off as cute but it is quite horrifying to see Baby Yoda eat Frog Lady's babies and I don't find it anywhere near as cute as the show thinks it is. But it also feels strange that these eggs are so important yet Frog Lady doesn't notice when Baby Yoda eats them. Mando's motives in this episode are also terrible. Quite frankly there is no way I would believe that Mando would ever risk going on this mission, especially since, as he said, it's not safe for him to fly around slowly since he's a criminal. The only motive we are given is that Peli vouches for Frog Lady with her life which seems to convince Mando (although I really don't know why Mando trusts her so much anyways). But even that is proven to be worthless since Peli has only known Frog Lady for 10 minutes! So if that's the case, there is no reason for Mando to risk this! And the mission almost costs him his life anyways, so it makes Mando look incredibly stupid for taking this unnecessary risk. The actual story of this episode is based off of contrivances as well. The entire spider plot is only set into motion by the stupidity of the characters. Baby Yoda just has to eat everything to kick off this story (eating the spider was gross television that didn't need to happen) and that is just silly. Mando should know better than to leave Baby Yoda on his own, especially in an ice cave where he could easily get lost. Furthermore, Mando should be watching Baby Yoda closely with the frog eggs being out in the open, so it's absurd that we're supposed to believe he would look away for so long. Lastly, Frog Lady marching out into the cave alone for an inexplicable reason was just awful storytelling, and it's such a bad trope to have an important character leave for no reason and get themselves into trouble. The New Republic's involvement at the end of the episode was awful. First of all, they serve as a very unsatisfying deus ex machina. Secondly, their involvement makes no sense. These guys hunted down Mando and apparently could not find him so they went to the base and ran tabs, which is when they saw who he was and decide to let him go. Yet after that they apparently decided to go looking for him anyways and find him in the ice cave? Somehow? Why on Earth would they go back to find him, especially since he would most likely have been long gone in any other case!? Furthermore, these guys proceeded to save Mando's life by killing the spiders, yet inexplicably left him in the ice cave with a destroyed ship to die. Why did they bother saving him anyways? Nothing adds up and the motives of these characters make no sense. It's horrific TV writing. Furthermore, Mando tried to hide Frog Lady's presence from them in the earlier scene. Why? We aren't given any good reason why she should be kept secret and I was horribly confused by this. The Unknown: What will Mando find on Trask? What is the lead on another Mandalorian? Will Mando have any other encounters with the New Republic? Best Moment: The opening sequence. Character of the Episode: Baby Yoda for being cute in most scenes. Conclusion: This episode stinks. It was pure filler so it was almost impossible to emotionally engage, and on top of that it featured the worst writing that I have seen in this show so far. This was a huge step back after the season premier and it's an episode that I would honestly just skip. Score: 42 Summary: Mando gets information that another Mandalorian resides on Tatooine in Mos Pelgo. Mando arrives there and meets Cobb Vanth who bought Boba Fett's old armour from some Jawas to save his village. Mando comes to a deal with Cobb: Cobb will give him his armour if Mando helps defeat a krayt dragon that's terrorizing the village. Mando and Cobb form a plan to defeat it and ally with the Tusken Raiders. The village people and the Tusken Raiders battle the krayt dragon and Mando defeats it. Cobb gives him the armour and Mando leaves. Boba Fett watched him go from a distance.
The Good: The opening sequence provided a lovely return to the star wars universe. It was a tense and fun sequence with some brilliantly choreographed action that was a ton of fun to watch. Furthermore, it neatly pushed the plot forward by sending Mando on a mission to Tatooine to locate another Mandalorian. The sequence worked well and got the episode off to a hot start. The rest of the episode strayed away from a plot focus however. I was surprised to find out that "The Mandalorian" chose to open season 2 with a self-contained story rather than a more serialized episode. I actually thought that this worked in favour of the show. We were given enough of a plot hook to invest us early in the episode, and the big reveal at the end of the episode certainly suggests that Mando's trip to Tatooine will play an important role in the story even if we don't know exactly what it is yet. So even as a self-contained episode, this had enough significance to work as a season premiere. What helped this episode most was how good the main story was. Unlike the half-baked and sloppy self-contained episodes of last season, this episode had fantastic world-building, intriguing character development and explored some interesting themes. There was much more purpose to this episode and I found myself being much more actively engaged in the storylines here. What also helped was the decision to make this episode 50 minutes long. One of my biggest complaints from last season was the short episode length and thankfully that was rectified here, allowing this episode enough time to explore its potential. The Mos Pelgo storyline was really engaging. It was tons of fun to visit a new settlement on Tatooine, allowing us to explore the planet in ways that we never did before. The amount of worldbuilding we got here was outstanding with new depth given to the Tusken Raiders, their relationships with the townsfolk, the cultures of both communities and also the various species that reside on Tatooine like the krayt dragons and those new wolf-like creatures. I also greatly enjoyed Cobb's backstory and the history of Mos Pelgo that was shown through it. I really like how the show is addressing how the dissolution of the empire has affected various areas around the universe. This was easily some of the best worldbuilding that Star Wars has ever seen, and I enjoyed every second of it. I thought that the krayt dragon was handled magnificently. Not only was it a lovely nod to "A New Hope" (a krayt dragon skeleton is seen) and apparently some of the video games as well, but it provided an engaging threat for the heroes to deal with. Unlike the AT-ST from season 1's "Sanctuary", taking down the krayt dragon felt like a genuine struggle for the characters and there were times where victory looked difficult. I appreciate the effort that was taken into making the krayt dragon a credible threat that made sure that the heroes didn't seem needlessly overpowered. Additionally, the visuals for the krayt dragon were outstanding. The episode also nailed some smaller details. The western influence of the show is still a joy to watch, and I loved how western everything felt when Mando first arrived in Mos Pelgo. I really liked the return of the mechanic character from season 1 at the start of the episode. It was a harmless cameo that continued to make the world feel lived in. I also loved things like the addition of a pearl inside of the krayt dragon, the weird blue drink that was served in Mos Pelgo and Mando hitting Cobb's jetpack in a similar way that caused Boba Fett to fall into the sarlacc pit in "Return of the Jedi". These little details are satisfying additions to the show. The Bad: Standalone episodes still suffer from the fact that it's obvious that the heroes will succeed and that the events of this episode likely won't have much consequence on everything else. Luckily, this episode avoids that for the most part with its outstanding worldbuilding and the Boba Fett reveal making this stand out further. But it still doesn't completely avoid this trapping and I was still convinced throughout the entire episode that Mando would succeed and that the krayt dragon would be killed without any major losses. While I appreciated that this episode tackled a lot of deeper concepts, I thought that a lot of them were half-baked or rushed. The conflict between the Tusken Raiders and the village folk was incredibly rushed. Cobb treated it like it would be a big deal for the village people to accept working with the Tusken Raiders. Yet somehow there was never any issue aside from one minor altercation when an explosive was dropped. That's very disappointing and I wish that this conflict was explored in more meaningful fashion. Since it wasn't, and since it was obvious that the village folk would work with the Tusken Raiders, all of the scenes with Mando and Cobb trying to convince the village folk to ally with the Tusken Raiders were a complete bore. The Unknown: How did Mando learn how to speak with the Tusken Raiders? Last time he only used the sign language and didn't actually speak. What has he been up to in the time that we haven't seen him? How does the Tusken Raider language work? They seem to be able to communicate either verbally or through gestures. Both seem to work. Do they have multiple languages or is there some other system at work? I would love to learn even more about them. So Boba Fett is alive. What has he been doing all this time? Was he the mysterious person at the end of "The Gunslinger"? What are his current motives? Does he want his armour back? What does he make of Mando? When will we be seeing him again? I'm very curious. Best Moment: I really liked Cobb's backstory. It was an enjoyable 5 minute short story. Character of the Episode: Mando. Conclusion: This was a solid return for "The Mandalorian". This episode won't blow everyone away but it was a very well executed self-contained story with a lot to enjoy. I might be a little kinder to this episode than most, but I had a blast watching this. A good way to start season 2. Score: 65 |
Aaron DhillonJust a university student who loves to watch TV. And analyze it way too much. Archives
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