Star Wars: The Mandalorian

Yeah, those concept paintings are gorgeous and I appreciate how it ties back to the pre-internet years when storyboard books and clips in magazines were one of the best ways to imagine the wider universe.

I thought it was a great episode. I mean, if we are going to nitpick the recycled plots, it's not like there was ever any shortage of Westerns (on TV and film) that were consistently leaning on the "stranger rides into town and ends up defending it" trope.

Yeah, and the final big idea was so obvious that it took me a second to realize they hadn't planned it that way all along. But hey, so what. Yum yum, tasty Olyphant. Give me more, please.

I enjoy these breezy standalone self-contained episodes (though I'm sure we'll see a few characters come back later in the season). I know everyone's clamoring for more storyline action but this just isn't that kind of show half the time

if we are going to nitpick the recycled plots, it's not like there was ever any shortage of Westerns (on TV and film) that were consistently leaning on the "stranger rides into town and ends up defending it" trope.

my 11 yo son started picking up on the formulaic nature of plots in Mandalorian and I had to explain that that was pretty much what you expected for TV drama in the old days..

Kung Fu
the Hulk
A Team
Knight rider
Littlest Hobo
all westerns ever....

My criticism of the series is that they will never move forward towards a resolution, and it'll be 7 series of Mando talking to a man, who tells him to get a key which unlocks a box which contains a map which shows where a man lives..who tells him to get a key, which unlocks another box.......

till people stop watching, which thanks to baby Yoda reaction shots every 5 mins will be never.

Yum yum, tasty Olyphant

but it was Mando who got eaten ;)

...is Littlest Hobo a real show?

yep!

it’s about a dog not an irl hobo

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0078644/

dogs are hobos too

I know everyone's clamoring for more storyline action but this just isn't that kind of show half the time

I've problem with self contained plot of the week, in face find it quite refreshing. I just would welcome a bit more variation between them... We'll see what this season brings.

but it was Mando who got eaten ;)

Would've been snacked on by farming lady several episodes back if she'd had her way, too.

The Olyphant -trudging through the desert sequence called to mind the abandoned by Tuco sequence from The Good, the Bad & The Ugly.

I've problem with self contained plot of the week, in face find it quite refreshing. I just would welcome a bit more variation between them...

This is my feeling too. Less "another Western in space," more prison spaceship. Except not literally more prison spaceship, I mean more self-contained episodes as weirdly varying in tone from the series as a whole as the prison ship episode was.

Courtroom drama episode with salacious crumb as suspenders-wearing southern lawyer?

You joke but I'm pretty sure Clone Wars did that like 3 times

We had a midget alien R. Lee Ermey type in that series, anything can happen.

At the other end of that extreme, I totally failed to recognise the dude in the final tease and had to have it explained to me afterwards.

The same happened with me and my wife. I wonder if the makers of the series really expected the majority of the viewers to know who the dude was, or was it more like an Easter egg for superfans, since his identity will obviously be revealed in future episodes. Because in order to know who the dude was, you'd have to A) have seen the prequels in recent memory and remember what Temuera Morrison looked like in them, B) realise this is the same actor, even though he looked quite different in that short scene shot 20 years later, and C) remember that Boba Fett is a clone of the character he played in the prequels, so they would look alike. I can't imagine most casual viewers actually doing all that.

Yeah, the reveal at the end totally went over my head.

Would have been a great moment if they'd made it slightly more obvious who it was. I think I've only seen AOTC once and that was in the cinema when it came out.
And it was only on subsequent reading that I found out that the character that Olyphant was playing is actually from one of the many SW books and that the Mandalorian armour he was carrying is BF's

I did figure out who the armor belonged to, because, you know, how many of such pieces are there likely to be on Tatooine?

I also did not know who dude at the end was, but I agree that they probably will make very sure we know all about him if they start properly including him in the story, especially given dialogue like "it's come back!" when the enormous dragon thing bursts out of the ground right where we can all see it.

I had a hell of time explaining to my other half (who had a somewhat less Star Wars obsessed childhood than me) that the Mandalorian and Boba Fett are not actually the same person

...and that Boba Fett is not actually a Mandalorian. I can see why she was confused.

this continues to be a lot of fun! i really appreciate that the stakes and the emotional drama is kept in cartoonish check... the show doesn't want me to CARE about any of these characters and that makes it more easy for me to take it as the low-key, disney entertainment (tm) done right that it is. Favreau really has the formula down. Marshall Raylan Fett was a real joy.

i missed the "boba fett" reveal at the end entirely, not that it particularly matters at this stage. Working him into the storyline is a reasonable and good idea.

Glad I stuck around for the credits as I would otherwise never have realized that the bartender Weequay was W Earl Brown aka Dan Dority! Great thread here:

“What’s your feeling about a prosthetics gig? I know you’ve said you hate it,” it was my agent on the other end of the call.

My mind flashed back to my days of misery spent as the demon, Menlo, on the tv series, ANGEL. I had eagerly jumped at the chance...

1

— W. Earl Brown (@WEarlBrown) October 30, 2020

"Jon is ready for rehearsals” In a daze, I am lead to my Mos Pelgo’s Cantina. There’s Tim. There’s Pedro. I look around, but don’t see the other actor I’m supposed to be working with. I stand behind the bar. For shits & giggles, I say to Tim, “you oughta pin that fuckin’badge to yer chest, you’re hypocrite enough to wear it.” Tim and I proceed to play out scenes from our old show. We get a few giggles from the HBO watchers. Jon walks on set, laughing “I swear to God, I love that show — I absolutely idolize Milch. We cast you first,” pointing at Tim, “when I said ‘hire Earl Brown’ I did not consciously think I was recreating your DEADWOOD dynamic, but here we are — DEADWOOD In Space… Okay, let’s rehearse” “Can we improvise and throw a few ‘Cocksuckers’ into the dialogue, as tribute?”

Can someone summarize the timeline/backstory related to the character at the end? We’re all confused at my house

Long long ago in a galaxy far far away, fanservice

So, there are a lot of variations covered in the novels and expanded universe, but just sticking with the movies here. Boba Fett was a Mandalorian armored bounty hunter that, in the original trilogy, was knocked into the Sarlacc Pit on Tattooine "accidentally" by a temporarily blind Han Solo, presumably left to slowly digest for a thousand years. He hasn't officially been seen in the movie/TV universe since (although his origins were covered in the prequel trilogy). At the start of the episode, the implication is that maybe Jawas managed to somehow scavenge his armor to sell to Cobb Vanth, but the end of the episode reveals he very much survived the Sarlacc incident.

TY Jon

So the timeline of this series is after the orginal SW movie trilogy...

Yes, not sure this is a spoiler but it takes place about five years after the second Death Star blew up in Return of the Jedi.

That is explicitly referenced in this episode!

Tbf they mention the aftermath of the Death Star II but did they say anything about the amount of time that has passed? Might have missed that.

I mean, it might not be Boba Fett considering there were roughly eight zillion clones, although the non-Boba ones would be considerably older than him since he wasn’t fast-aged to adulthood.

Given the planet and this episode’s salvaged armor plot device, probably it’s just him

They should have given W. Earl Brown more lines so I would have noticed that it was him!
https://io9.gizmodo.com/the-mandalorians-w-earl-brown-recounts-his-special-dea-1845549470

absolutely loving the pure joy in this tweet

The teamster pulls into the gate. Another person takes over and drives me onto the set….

Its Tatooine. I AM ON TATOOINE!!! HELL YEAH!!! FUCK YEAH!!!

I get out of the van. Right next to me — is a life-sized Bantha puppet. I touched it — A BANTHA!!! I TOUCHED A BANTHA!

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— W. Earl Brown (@WEarlBrown) October 30, 2020

That's great!

It did bug me a little when Olyphant called the Weequay bartender "Weequay" instead of an actual name, but I wondered if that was a subtle commentary about when they'd call the Latinx characters in Westerns generic nicknames.

Why are we using spoiler tags? Are ppl coming here before watching each episode?

Tbf, so many Death Stars have been blown up over the years, it's hard to keep track xps

It would make a lot more sense honestly it was one of the surviving clones, as so many have been examined in Clone Wars (and from what I hear, Rebels) and the age of being ~60 yrs old makes more sense. Boba Fett should be in his 40s at the time of this episode, assuming it is him.

Oops, I mean, SPOILERS?

I was just following precedent when using the spoiler tags, since we have them now. Not sure how many that actually impacts.

I actually agree that the spoiler tags should be used this close to the airdate, I goofed.

Yeah, feel like it's pretty harmless within a couple days of a new episode.

If it turns out to be a random clone, that's really dumb.

Oh agreed, which is why I'm pretty confident that's actually him.

FWIW, here's an article with the same "maybe not..." speculation. (It points out that the clonetroopers would actually be older, due to accelerated aging - unless this one figured out how to reverse that.)

i think three days of spoiler tags is appropriate; how's the thread feel about that?

I agree! They're awkward

They should have revealed it was Al Swearengen instead.

perhaps sarlaac digestive juices have excellent anti ageing properties? xps

I didn't recognize that guy was supposed to be a clone trooper. I'll have ask the 8-year old superfan when he gets home from school if he figured that out.

xp No, it's the other way around - assuming it's BF, the No-Prize answer for why he looks older than 41 is that he's had a rough few years. There's no scenario in which a Clonetrooper ended up in the Sarlaac (unless there's some mega-retconning going on)!