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The Mandalorian Season Two Recap: Chapter Twelve

Nevarro is not a very interesting planet, too much of a Tatooine clone in a way that’s only exacerbated by the existence of Jakku. There are seemingly countless planets for The Mandalorian to explore, but so far the show has followed the Star Trek model of prioritizing places that piles of rocks. Piles of rocks make for easy reusable set pieces.

The Mandalorian has very few recurring characters, let alone ones who are friendly to Mando and Baby Yoda. Greef Karga and Cara Dune are about it among the living. By practically every measure of conventional television storytelling, it makes sense that they’d pop up in season two, even if the plot might be better off with heading into new territory.

Mando’s arrival to Nevarro was a bit awkward, featuring some pretty wooden dialogue between Mando, Cara, and Greef. The Mandalorian has never been much for exposition, but a scene or two with Mando laying out the stakes of the season felt needed in this briskly paced episode. It’s always fun to see Carl Weathers again, who also directed this episode, but the writing hardly did his character any favors this time around.

As often happens with The Mandalorian, the action sequences are used to cover up the rushed exposition and clunky dialogue. The return of the unnamed Mythrol (Horatio Sanz) who Mando first captured in the show’s very first episode was a fun callback, though Greef and Cara’s unnecessary meanness toward him in the Imperial base was a bit much. Yelling at a guy to hurry up the second he started pushing buttons on a control system is hardly proper manners!

The first half of the episode made no effort to present the mission to blow up the Imperials as anything more than filler. Things took a completely unexpected turnaround when the team discovered that Moff Gideon had been using the base for genetic experiments. Putting aside the sly reference to midichlorians, the whole sequence served to give this detour real stakes in the show’s lore.

The action sequences were unsurprisingly spectacular. To some extent, the Stormtrooper cannon fodder is getting a little stale, but the sets are so fun to look at that it’s hard to care. The Trexler Marauder ship battle between the speeder bikes and the Tie Fighters was one of the highlights of the whole series, something that could have easily been showcased in a feature film.

One of the big questions I had heading into the season was how hard the show would try and capitalize on Baby Yoda’s status as one of the cutest fictional characters in the world. Baby Yoda being dropped in a classroom only to steal a student’s blue macarons is the kind of sequence that pretty much solely exists for memes. The little fella has a one-track mind when it comes to food, and it’s pretty much the most adorable thing in Star Wars history. He may not be a very good ship engineer, but he’s got a career waiting for him on The Food Network when this is all over.

The return of Captain Carson Teva, last seen leaving the ice planet in his X-wing instead of helping Mando fix his ship, hints at a broader role for the New Republic. The Outer Rim has historically been a problematic area for both Imperial and Republic control, though Greef and Cara seem to be keeping Nevarro in relatively good shape. As a series, The Mandalorian hasn’t spent a ton of time trying to bridge the gap between The Return of the Jedi and The Force Awakens.

It seems unlikely that Mando will want to be a part of any broader conflict between the remnants of the Empire and the New Republic, exacerbated by the show’s fairly slow pace. The show does a good job presenting its adventures as existing in the larger canon without getting anyone’s expectations up. The Empire is tracking the Razor Crest, hinting that perhaps the broader New Republic will get involved after all.

Chapter 12 recovered nicely after a bumpy first act, putting forth some of the series’ best action scenes. One could be forgiven for an eye-roll at the return to Nevarro given how much this season has dragged its feet already. With four episodes left to go, hopefully the show will stop taking detours. For now, it’s still some of the best entertainment television has to offer.

Be sure to listen to Estradiol Illusions’ Mandalorian recaps!

The Mandalorian Season Two Review: Chapter Nine

Written by Ian Thomas Malone, Posted in Blog, Pop Culture, Star Wars, TV Reviews

Photo courtesy of Disney+

As The Mandalorian progressed through its first season, the question of narrative constantly presented itself. The show has existed in the fairly uncommon middle-ground between serialization and episodic, most often preferring the advantages of self-contained storytelling over a broader long-game. The season one finale suggested a turning of the page of sorts for the series, with the titular character embarking on a specific quest to reunite the beloved Baby Yoda with his own kind.

That held true for about ten minutes into the episode, until Mando found reason to return, yet again, to Tatooine. For all the endless possibilities out there in the galaxy, this same pile of rocks seems to be the only place that matters. Tatooine certainly does matter, for throwback references such as the return of A New Hope’s R5-D4 and his bad motivator. Between Tatooine, Nevarro, and Jakku, Star Wars certainly loves its shades of the same desert aesthetic.

Episode one is essentially a retread of season one’s fourth episode, both centering on villages coming together to defeat a giant big-bad. The Krayt dragon is another figure of franchise lore, the figure who Obi-Wan impersonated with a loud shriek to scare off the Tusken Raiders back in the first movie. The Mandalorian brought to life an abstract idea that has existed in fan theories for decades.

The CGI-crafted menace was pretty impressive, putting aside the obvious Dune comparisons. Tatooine has always been compared to Dune, but Tatooine didn’t have its own sandworm before (Sarlacc doesn’t really count since they stay in their pits). Dune comparisons surfaced again with talk of water feuds between the village of Mos Pelgo and the Sand People. At least there wasn’t any talk of the spice!

As the Marshal, Timothy Olyphant was pretty perfect, channeling his roles in Deadwood and Justified. Show creator Jon Favreau, pulling writing and directing duties on the episode, also threw in a nice touch with fellow Deadwood alum W. Earl Brown turning up as the Weequay barkeep, giving Mos Pelgo the feel of a frontier mining town. Olyphant was a bit more Raylan Givens than Seth Bullock, his obvious joy radiating in every scene.

Olyphant’s exuberant performance as book creation Cobb Vanth was enough to carry the episode, otherwise relatively light on its cutest asset. Seeing Vanth in the Boba Fett armor practically overshadowed the episode’s biggest reveal at the end, with Temuera Morrison returning to the franchise, portraying the adult Boba without his helmet for the first time. In theory, Morrison could be playing one of thousands of Jango Fett clones, but it’d be pretty shocking if it wasn’t the most famous wearer of Mandalorian armor.

Neither Boba nor Jango are actually Mandalorians themselves, a point of great fan interest over the years which should make for a pretty interesting showdown later on in the series. As far as Mando’s primary quest this episode goes, it’s a little weak to have him roaming around looking for others of his kind. Especially if that quest continues to take Mando and Baby Yoda back to familiar territory.

One aspect of the episode that didn’t really work was the return of Amy Sedaris as Peli Motto. Sedaris brought a lot of comedic charm last season, but her interactions in this episode felt rushed and perfunctory. For a nostalgia-heavy episode, I’m not sure we needed much nostalgia for last year. The writing simply didn’t give Sedaris anywhere to go.

The action scenes were extremely solid, if not a bit obligatory. There’s plenty to love watching Mando slay a dragon alongside Timothy Olyphant and celebrating with a big cut of Krayt steak for Baby Yoda to eat when he’s not chowing down on nuggies. I’m sure we all could’ve used a few more adorable moments from the little fella who took a backseat role this episode, the perfect antidote to 2020.

Olyphant’s exuberant performance carried an episode that was otherwise a bit too comfortable in familiar territory. Maybe the nostalgia will run out at some point, though the return of Boba Fett suggests that probably won’t be for a while. Endless callbacks didn’t exactly turn out so well for The Rise of Skywalker, but The Mandalorian has faired much better in this regard.

To some extent, one might want to expect a bit more out of a show that was nominated for the Emmy’s top prize. The Mandalorian is often better described as great entertainment rather than prestige drama, not the kind of fare that traditionally competes for Best Drama. As long as the show keeps putting out enjoyable episodes like this premiere, the long-game and serialization questions won’t matter all that much. We’ve seen this story before, but it’s a pretty good story.

Programming note: Estradiol Illusions will be featuring weekly podcast reviews for the show. Episodes will release either Saturday or Sunday after each new show. Thank you for reading!