It’s Star Wars Month 2
With the launch of Disney Plus just shy of 2 years ago,
there’s been a lot of Star Wars content dropped for the platform. We’ll be
looking at 2 of the primary series they’ve done as well as one of the biggest
Star Wars games that isn’t an MMO.
So let’s start with what’s arguably the most popular of the Star Wars series so far, the Mandalorian.
Set between the times of the main and sequel trilogies, we get to explore a time not heavily covered by anything other than expansion comics. This gives them a lot of free reign and with Dave Filoni at the helm, you know that’ll be put to use, let’s take a look at episodes 1 and 2 of season 1 and see where it takes us.
Chapter One: The Mandalorian
Apt title. We see our title character seemingly following a
tracking beacon. He saves a guy from being cut open and sold for parts, easily
taking out his captors, and cutting one in half with a door, you know, for
kids. Turns out the guy he saved is also his target and rather than being
killed there and then, the guy surrenders.
They need a transport but Mando insists on one without a
droid, even if the only one without a droid is a rust-bucket. But even a
shipyard isn’t without its issues as a creature lurks beneath the ice and takes
a bite into Mando’s ship. Still Mando is prepared and stuns the creature,
forcing it to let them go. The captive tries to bargain for his life and asks general annoying questions while Mando does not say a word. It’s a fairly unusual
in a medium like this that protagonist is a quiet one.
He says he needs to go somewhere and heads to the ship’s
lower deck discovering that Mando has other captives, all frozen in carbonite
like Han Solo was back in the day. Mando lands on the planet Nevarro and meets
with his contact, who is offering to pay him in imperial credits, which he
doesn’t accept as the Empire has fallen, agreeing to take half the bounty but
in a different currency. Business is kinda dry for the Bounty Hunters Guild as
few are wanting to accept their rates, and one job doesn’t really cover fuel, hence
why Mando is covering several of them at once.
There’s only one gig paying anything substantial right now,
but they require a face-to-face contact. His contact has a number of
stormtroopers at his beckon call. After a brief standoff it’s down to business.
The Client is offering Beskar Steel, strong and valuable in return for a living
asset. But things can’t be easy, no puck so he doesn’t know what the target
looks like. They have a tracker, and his last known location and that’s he’s 50
years old give or take.
They give him one bar of the steel is a down-payment, which
he takes with him into the underworld, to a forge. Another Mandolorian is there
waiting, he gives her the metal and the cash he obtained. We get a brief look at
his history, he was a child who was hidden away during some conflict or
another, who can keep them all straight, I’m guessing the Mandolorian tribe
found him and took him in.
With a new shoulder plate created he heads to the last known
location of the target. He uses his sniper scope to take a look around before
one of the indigenous creatures, known as a Blurrg attacks. It’s knocked out,
along with one of its friends by a stun dart. And the guy who fired the shot,
Muiil says this
“You are a bounty hunter. I will help you. I have spoken.” I
love him already. He tells Mando that others have come this way and died and
that he’ll need a Blurrg mount in order to pass. Mando eventually gets a hang
of the idea of riding one and the two set off. Muill leads him to it, telling
him that the area has a been a constant stream of mercenaries and bounty
hunters seeking the reward. His hope is that Mando will sort that out by taking
the target away, allowing the residents of the town peace.
Mando surveys the area, seeing at least half a dozen mercenaries.
A bounty droid, IG-11, also sent by the guild, arrives and begins shooting them
dead. Mando and the droid agree a partnership of sorts just as the Mercs set up
an ambush. The droid has a self-destruct feature to avoid being captured but
Mando has an alternative, especially as the mercs bring in a heavy cannon. The
droid draws fire whilst Mando takes out the gunner and takes control of the
cannon, easily taking out all the mercenaries and blasting a hole through the
door where the target is currently.
The tracker leads them to some kind of pod inside which is
The Child aka Grogu aka Star Wars’ next big marketing push, but apparently the
guild’s orders to the droid were different than that to Mando. He wanted the
Child dead, so Mando destroys it.
One thing you might notice is that compared to a lot of Star
Wars stuff, the pacing of this show is a lot slower. They use the time to build
atmosphere with walking and travel scenes, making the worlds feel more alive in
the process. This is doing what the prequels tried to do but better, in part
because of the stunning CGI innovations created for this series. But this isn’t
a mystery where you’re being spoon-fed information, it’s a journey piece and
the focus is very singular at least for now. This stops it from getting boring
in spite of this
Rating 9/10
Chapter 2: The Child
Mando walks, the Child floating along in his beside him, back to
his ship. He’s attacked by some mercenary stragglers but we see his staff is
incredibly versatile. Even so he took a hit during the fight and has quite a
deep cut. The Child reaches out to him, twice, but he just puts him back in the
pod. They make it back to ship but find that Jawas have been raiding it. He
fires some shots that get them to scatter but their armoured tank begins to
make its escape. Mando grabs on, avoiding their attempts to throw him off. He
gets the top but his still outnumbered 10 to one so he’s stunned and falls off.
He and The Child return to the ship but all his weapons have been stolen
along with pretty much everything necessary for him to make a successful
take-off. I mean the hull has been ripped to shreds, you’d be sucked out the
moment you entered orbit but sure, it’s the engine that’s the problem. He heads
to Muill for help. Muill offers to help set up a trade with the Jawas in
exchange for the parts, as the Child eats a frog.
The Jawas agree to exchange all the parts of his ship in
exchange for ‘the egg.’ The egg in question belongs to another creature known
as a Mudhorn. It’s pretty strong, damaging Mando’s amour and falling into the
mud jammed Mando’s blaster. Still, Mando has a flamethrower, a grapple, and a
knife alongside the ability to take a punch so he’s no slouch in this fight
even then. Still, the Mudhorn is formidable, until we see that the child is able
to use the force to lift the Mudhorn into the air, at least briefly. Mando is able to land a killing blow with his
knife and the child has fallen asleep from the exhaustion.
Mando finds and retrieves the Mudhorn’s egg and brings it
back just as the Jawas were about to leave. The Jawas then eat the contents of
the egg. With the parts all recovered, Mando and Muill get to work repairing
the ship. Muill is offered payment which he turns down and he also turns down a
crewmember’s position, too bad as I wouldn’t mind seeing him as a regular.
With the ship repaired, it takes off ready to return the
bounty, who is still very much asleep after lifting the Mudhorn. It finally
wakes up aboard the ship, showing that it is still alive but to find out what
happens to it we’ll have to wait till next time.
Not a massive amount happens in this episode, it’s fairly
standalone but the show is the master of pacing things subtly without being
boring
Rating 8/10
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