#The Mandalorian critical

[corellianhounds]

Though I love “The Tragedy” episode in Season 2 of The Mandalorian, one element that’s always bugged me is Mando not retrieving his jetpack and flying up after the Dark Troopers to save the kid

They establish in that season that Mando is able to control the jetpack from his vambrace and call it back to him, so even if he removed it in the standoff with Boba Fett, they’ve already set up his ability to retrieve it. Him not doing so makes it look like he didn’t do absolutely everything he could have to get the kid back, even though we as the audience know that’s what that character should/would do

Have Mando recall the jetpack to him and take a running leap off of the closest ledge, jetting up after the Dark Troopers as fast as he possibly can. We see him catch up to the droids before they get to the Star Destroyer, but then one of the Dark Troopers not holding the kid falls back to halt his ascent midair. The two of them start to fight, grappling with one another as the child sees Mando falling behind, desperately trying to fight this terrifying, impersonal machine in an effort to save him

And then the Dark Trooper grabs the Mandalorian by the throat with one hand and tears the jetpack off his back.

The next thing we see is the Mandalorian in free fall, looking upwards at the retreating figures of the Dark Troopers in silhouette against the Star Destroyer as he plummets towards the ground, the child he’s protected for so long in their grasp with him unable to do a single thing to save him

Though Boba Fett will manage to save the Mandalorian as he falls, either with his ship or with the use of his own jet pack, the child is still lost and those on Tython can see the clear evidence of the Empire’s continued existence hovering a mile above them, tangible and menacing. As the Mandalorians return to the surface, the Star Destroy shoots the Razor Crest, destroying it completely.

Mando has little to nothing of his own left that will help him save his child. This is the point where he should be at his absolute lowest because it’s that desperation that will force him to break a tenet of his own Creed just for the possibility of getting his child back.

[technoturian]

I miss the Razor Crest. I miss a big ol' ship full of unknown history with lots of dark corners and room for interesting things hidden and forgotten inside of it, rather than a shallow and pretty and impractical thing designed to get you quickly from one point to the other and yes this has turned into an analogy for season three but also I just really liked that ship.

[alliwantistowearcomfypants]

I'm not gonna lie, I think mandalorian should have ended at season 2. It just buttoned up so well, and the message was incredible. It was touching and sad. And then, like a month later, it didn't matter. Season 3 was so disappointing to me, and I think a big reason for that is because it lacked that simplicity the first 2 seasons had. The show was just about a damaged man finding his humanity and helping various people along the way. I know that not everyone loved the simplicity, but I think it was the best thing the show had going for it. Star Wars often suffers from stuffing so much crap in the story that it forgets to add character arcs.

The first 2 seasons are super character focused. The plot is so intertwined with Dins' character growth that it doesn't focus on the big picture. But in s3, Din barely has any growth as a character. There's stuff happening left and right, but Din doesn't really have any emotional stakes in it. Him trying to get his mandalorian status back feels hallow because we literally just watched 2 whole seasons of him breaking away from it. One of the biggest character moments for him was taking off his helmet for grogu. He's telling grogu that he matters more. That he would give it all up for him. It's so touching and feels like his character's natural progression. And then we're supposed to care when all of a sudden he wants back into the morally questionable pseudo cult he broke away from for his baby? I don't care! That plot point also resolves itself in like 3 episodes with little to no confluct, so now what. He wants to help Bo Katan. Ok. Why. No idea. He's kinda just there, watching things happen around him. There's no inner conflict or tough decisions he needs to make. His character arc is over, and you can tell the writers didn't know what to do with him.

The show is honestly focused more on bo katan than din. Which, no hate to her, but I'm not here for her. She's treated like a wronged princess, not like a deeply flawed terrorist who saw the error of her ways way too late. She literally aided in getting her planet overrun by crime leaders and sith. And the show just brushes past that. They don't even mention Satine, which could have been a great way to humanize Bo. Have her struggle with the fact that she got her sister killed. Have her wanting to restore mandalor for her sister, who died trying to protect it. It would have been so much more impactful if Bo Katan's motivation was out of guilt for getting her sister killed and planet overrun. She could have slowly opened up about her complicated relationship with her sister. She could have had an obi wan kenobi type arc. Learning the only thing she can do is move forward. Try to right her wrongs. Restore Mandalore in the name of her flawed but deeply devoted sister. I do not understand why they didn't at least touch on Bo's personal ties to the planet. She feels so one dimensional, and they could have easily made her more interesting. Or at least motivating.

My biggest problem with the show is that I didn't really care. I didn't care about Bo Katan's goals or Din's. And I think the biggest reason is because the show forgot to add character moments that tied them to the things they want in a personal way. Also, Din's baptism thing was stupid. Just cut that out entirely. No one wanted that.

[fis-paprikas]

they've fully put din to the sidelines after he went through one of the most spiritually significant moments of his entire life -- So they can start explaining how palpatine returned. Am i having a stroke. do none of these people give a shit about the show they're making.

[short-wooloo]

Pedro Pascal isn't actually playing the character in person, Greef Karga's actor died, season 2's beautiful ending was made pointless, Gina carano got herself fired, the main villain was killed off, the darksaber plot amounted to nothing and it's increasingly obvious that fauvroni have no idea what to do with the show/plot/characters going forward

And they want to make a movie

[oatm1lkdr1nker]

reject modernity (live action sw) embrace tradition (animated sw)

[thebusylilbee]

"Bo Katan walks both worlds she can bring all tribes together" is genuinely such a fucking joke !

they had everything to make this journey significant to Din's character ! him TAKING OFF his helmet TO SAVE A FOUNDLING after a lifetime of keeping it on, out of faith in his people and their culture, is SO MUCH MORE poignant than Bo-Katan keeping the helmet on for like two days after being a little shocked to see a mythosaur... and he did it to save his jedi foundling no less ! him being the one "who walks both worlds" would have been a perfect parallel to Grogu being tied between Jedi and Mandalorian cultures, and could have been nourished by Luke Skywalker also changing the jedi way from what was done to Anakin ! cultures evolving for the good of their people !!! people being attached to traditions but also open to change !!! but fuck it, CGI Luke was too expensive and we're tired of Din being the main character I guess ?

not to mention the whole deal of Din being someone who prefers to stay in the shadows suddenly being shoved under the spotlights by fate alone ! like actually if you think about it : 1) his need for companionship, 2) his need for fatherhood that he doesn't even dare admit, 3) and his willingness to become "A Hero" because of his care for others, despite him actually hating being at the center of Significant Historical Events, all these things are all like.. his entire character !!! that's the whole core of this guy !!! What the fuck is left if there's 1) no conflict with the need for companionship (he's back to not having doubts and deep feelings about the helmet thing), 2) no conflict in fatherhood (the kid is no longer a jedi in the blink of an eye in a fucking spin off episode), and 3) no conflict with his willingness to become A Hero to save his son and his friends even if he doesn't like it (fate gave him that darksaber but actually he can remain Just A Guy it's fine, Bo Katan can take the lead) like ???

what's left is pure nothingness, this show means nothing and says nothing and that's why it doesn't bother with giving important moments that would have felt fully earned to its actual main character

[lunarspiral1127]

*The Mandalorian season three SPOILERS*

Okay, I need to point this out. I don't if it's just me, but has Din and Grogu not have been using their full arsenal like they used to?

Think about it. Not counting the N1, Din only uses his pistol, sometimes his vibro blade and the darksaber twice. Not once do we see him train to wield it or improve on it. You'd only see it once if you watched The Book of Boba Fett. But, Din has other weapons. Remember his flamethrower? Remember the Whistling Birds? Apparently, the writers forgot about those cause he never uses them at all in this season. It's only the Ragnar rescue mission that he does other things.

As for Grogu, I still love the little guy. But, ever since The Book of Boba Fett where he learned to force jump from Luke, that's all he does most of the time. Just force jump, force jump, force jump. He used the force on some occasions, but we've seen Grogu in previous seasons use it in different ways. He couldn't open Din's metal cage with the force when he got captured by the cyborg thing, yet back in season one, he was able to stop and slightly levitate a Mudhorn with the force. He calmed down a Rancor and put him to sleep, he force healed Greef when he was injured and poisoned, force choked Cara Dune, tossed around stormtroopers, he did many things way before he was taken in by Luke. But, in season three, he doesn't do much anymore. Just force jump.

[rexxdjarin]

Been rewatching the Mandalorian and it sucks so bad that season 3 is such a steep drop off in quality from how awesome season 2 was.

Im gonna list a myriad of reasons why I believe the show really tanked by season 3.

The main one in my opinion is that the incoming writers strike probably had a big effect on writing that season. It reads like they had to completely change their plans for some unforeseen circumstances and so much of it is just weak compared to the ones before it.

Like it or not - season 3 really reads like Pedro being less involved hurt the show. I am well aware he was busy doing other projects (mainly TLOU) but it really really hurt that this show we loved so much seemingly suffered because he didn’t really have the time to dedicate to it like he had in the past. I’ve been feeling like this about mando s3 for quite some time but haven’t felt ok to really say this up until now.

The whole season reads like them pivoting to make it the Bo-Katan show because Pedro couldn’t be as involved as they originally planned. And that really really sucks. We didn’t watch the show for Bo-Katan. We watched it for Din and Grogu.

Those scenes in TBOBF could’ve easily been put in the beginning of mando s3. They could’ve still had mando and grogu show up on Tatooine and then given the explanation for how they got there in THEIR show. Same goes for making boba show up in s3 to save their asses. They could’ve ended TBOBF with a post credit scene that’s like 6 months later and had him receiving an urgent distress call from Din right before the end of mando s3 that has boba come into save the day and have him declare to all the Mandalorian factions once and for all that there are many different ways to be Mandalorian and you choose what that means to you. Boba could’ve been a bad ass and it could’ve been a seamless tie in from one show to the next.

The cameos from random celebs got ridiculous in this season and they didn’t need most of them. The one with Bill Burr worked so well because he was immersed in the SW universe so well. The celeb cameos in s3 took you out of the universe. They weren’t good.

I could go on and on and on. But ultimately rewatching season 3 in the coming days is going to leave me feeling really really disappointed and I’m not ready.

[ooops-i-arted]

Hot off the press, a bingo card for the upcoming Mandalorian movie!

Feel free to use, use as a base to make your own, and to share what other squares you think belong on Feloni Bullshit Bingo!

[canonicallysoulmates]

The fact that Temuera Morrison was supposed to be in s3 of The Mandalorian but he never got the call and was left waiting.....he deserves better, the character of Boba Fett deserves better, and we the fans deserve better. And here I thought my anger at the show would lessen now that the season is over.

[corellianhounds]

In my criticisms of S2 and S3 of Mando and TBoBF, one of my complaints is with the scripts and stories themselves, and characters who could have been utilized better

I loved Carson Teva in “The Passenger,” but the dialogue and role they give him in “The Siege” could have been done better (like my suggestion here), and his encounter with Mando in TBoBF and the episodes he has in season 3 don’t feel like professional, meaningful dialogue or character structuring. Part of that is the bad writing and storytelling of whatever they were setting up in season 3, but his character in those seasons also sounds more like an actor reciting lines, not a fleshed out character. I don’t feel any reason to listen to this guy because he’s not grounded or weighty. It doesn’t feel like I or the characters should have to listen to what he has to say because there’s no meat to him. I’m not a fan of him being the Nick fury-esque connecting thread between these shows either but that’s a separate complaint.

And the thing is, I don’t think it’s the actor’s fault. I haven’t seen him in anything else, but this script and the direction is bad enough on its own I can tell those are the main problems. Teva could have been a really good lawman to balance out the rest of these people operating outside of the law! He could have been the more straight-laced white hat sheriff archetype you see in westerns, but lawful good characters don’t have to be boring, especially if you make them this grizzled old sheriff who’s lived and experienced loss for decades fighting the good fight and still come out kind on the other side. I would have liked to see a more weathered cowboy/ranger/marshal who’s still just as sharp, analytical, and observant as he was as a younger man, quick on the draw and two steps ahead of the people around him, younger officers and criminals and people like Mando realizing that just because he’s quiet, it doesn’t mean the gears aren’t turning. Make him an echo of Mando, somebody Din might have been if he’d been given different circumstances in life. The old wizened sheriff vs the lone gunslinger bounty hunter. They’re not on opposite sides, they just have different means of achieving similar goals, and because they’re too similar in personality and because their paths are too different from one another, they end up clashing by virtue of circumstance, not necessarily because they dislike one another

Right now there isn’t really a lot we get of Teva and it makes him feel shallow and uninteresting. Even small characters should feel like a person with a history. Make him a war veteran, but make him a survivor of Alderaan too. Make him the sheriff and detective people underestimate because he’s quiet and unassuming and uses his place in the background to observe and gather all of the information before being able to step forward with accusations and answers that confirm the suspicions and hunches he’s been following up to that point. Have people floundering when they realize they’ve been caught with nowhere to run. He never draws first when he draws first blood— He’s the guy who ends fights, and often ends them before they even begin. All it takes is him clapping a hand on someone’s shoulder for them to realize they’ve stepped out of line, or they’re in a lot more trouble than they realized. He doesn’t raise his voice because he doesn’t have to— People listen when he talks, a commanding presence that tells you he wouldn’t be saying something if it weren’t worth the time it takes to say it. Show me this guy has a history, show me that he knows the meaning of loss, and show me how deeply he cares for people and wants to see them safe.

All of that would make for a more compelling character in the midst of these antiheroes and gunslingers. These shows didn’t have to set up the sequel movies or the circumstances of the New Republic or how the Empire was able to linger for as long as it did after the war. They could have just focused on the regular people on the ground, living and surviving in trying times.

[ireallyamabear]

i am not like "how is andor and the mandalorian in the same franchise" in the way that i think they should be aesthetically or tonally the same or even go for the same audience. they should be different! but i am like "how is andor and the mandalorian esp. s3 so far in the same franchise", as in, how is one the story of how the empire subjugates and cruelly sanitizes local culture and forces people into terrible life choices were they ultimately might not come out as redeemable people; and the other one is like: yeah the empire was bad and kind of subjugated this place, but the problem with this was that it made this place so unpleasant and not digestible; but when a guy, who might or might not be democratically elected just cleans up everything, then it's just what nevarro needs bc the people who lived here before where so filthy and immoral. even though he was one of them. But what the citizens need is one of his vasals lording over them.

[sabines-wrens]

“the mandalorian is a blanket term, it doesn’t have to be about din!!” 

okay cool totally get that by the way the book of boba fett would like to talk 

[inquisitor-apologist]

My biggest problem with the Mandalorian is also my biggest problem with Felony in general: he doesn’t know how to make things small. He wants everything he makes to be big and epic and vital to the universe, which means that he’s gotta pull in cameos and big villains and force storylines that don’t really make sense. That’s why we’re getting all this weird Elia Kane working her way into the New Republic and Bo Katan’s Epic Quest To Save Mandalore (v3) shit. He’s gotta make Mando bigger and more important, and it’s really ruining the show.

[short-wooloo]

Ngl, it's pretty funny that filoni destroyed the darksaber so no one could challenge bo katan as leader, as if simply fighting it out wasn't a way mandalorians determined leadership, as if there wasn't a time in mando history before the darksaber (seriously, if filoni wants to make it that "the darksaber is the only means of legitimate leadership", he's gonna have to retcon tarre into the first mandalorian, which I would not put past him)