REVIEW: The Mandalorian Season Two (Spoilers)

By NICK VERCILLA

Right off the back, let me just say it will be very hard for me to talk about this season of the Mandalorian without going into spoilers, so, for those who haven't seen it yet, I'll state this. I thought this season was an improvement on the first season, which I also thought was very good. I thought this season did a good job of balancing the personal story of the Din and the Child, the overall quest of Din trying to find a Jedi for the Child, the amount of guest characters and fan service the show brings to longtime fans, and sets up future storylines and adventures that will be explored in future seasons and spinoff shows.

Overall, while I had a few small complaints, and some will argue this season was too much fanservice and advertisement for future Disney Plus shows, I think the showrunners had the right amount of balance, and feels rewarding no matter how deep of a Star Wars fan you are. From here on out, spoiler warning for the season.

Recap of episodes

I'll start by going over what I thought of each episode, or chapter this season.

Chapter 9, "The Marshal," deals with Din going back to Tatooine, hoping to find another Mandalorian, to help find a Jedi. I don't get the logic either, but we'll move on. From there, he comes across a character wearing the armor of Boba Fett, named Cobb Vanth, who is a sheriff of a small town. He agrees to give the armor back to Din in exchange for helping him and a tribe of tusken raiders kill a giant krayt dragon. For those who aren't aware, Vanth was a character created for the Aftermath trilogy of books, being one of the first book characters, after Thrawn, to make it to television, and the first to be in live action, which I thought was an awesome connection, and made sense to the story, as Din, throughout the season, has his beliefs challenged on what it truly means to be a Mandalorian, as well as what it means to wear a set of armor. The overall episode was good, but nothing amazing.

Chapter 10, "The Passenger," was my least favorite episode of the season, as it felt the most disposable or inconsequential, as Din escorts a passenger, known as "Frog Lady" from Tatooine to a planet where there are Mandalorians. They get trapped in an ice cave, and eventually have to fight off giant spider-like creatures. From that angle, being a throwback to old creature feature movies, I thought the episode was entertaining, but it was also the episode I figured you could skip the most.

Chapter 11, "The Heiress," was a really great episode. It brought another Clone Wars/Rebels character to live action, Bo Katan, played by the same actress who voiced her, Katee Sackhoff. I thought Sackhoff did a really good job in the role, and the episode builds off of previous storylines involving her from the past, as she is looking to get the darksaber back from Moff Gideon, as she believes that is the key to uniting her people and reclaim Mandalore. She also helps challenge Din further in his beliefs as a Mandalorian, as she reveals he was raised essentially by a crazy sect of Mandalorians who, among other beliefs, never take off their helmets in front of others. That explains why other Mandalorians did so in the past.

Chapter 12, "The Siege," was another really solid episode, as Din helps Cara Dune and Greef Karga take out the final Imperial outpost on Nevarro, as well as find out that the facility was a research facility of some kind, most likely dealing with cloning. My guess, this is the early stages of Palpatine coming back in his clone body for The Rise of Skywalker, as well as maybe explaining how they created Snoke as well.

Chapter 13, "The Jedi," was a monumental episode, as, on the advice of Bo Katan, Din, tracks down none other than Ahsoka Tano. Yes, after all these years, the fan favorite character is brought to live action, played by Rosario Dawson. Needless to say, as someone who was always a fan of her character, even in the beginning, it was surreal for me to see her in live action for a general audience, as I thought Dawson played her really well. She and Din help liberate a town from an evil magistrate, while also giving lessons and connections, with the force, to the Child, who has a name, Grogu, as well as a backstory, being a survivor of the Jedi Purge from Revenge of the Sith. I loved Ahsoka's appearance and action scenes, I loved the backstory of Grogu and the lessons of the force, and I loved that even with an episode whose highlight was Ahsoka, they still had time to focus on the bond between Din and Grogu.

Chapter 14, "The Tragedy," was only a tragedy in name only. Din takes Grogu to the planet Tython to have him try to reach out to any other surviving Jedi. While there, Din encounters Boba Fett himself, who was revealed at the end of Chapter 9 to be alive from Return of the Jedi. Together, with a surviving Fennec Shand, they team up to protect Grogu from Moff Gideon's forces. The action in the episode was incredible, in my opinion, with the highlight being Boba Fett kicking ass in his old armor again, and revealing that his father, Jango, was in fact, a Mandalorian foundling like Din. Sadly, Gideon destroys the Razor Crest, (which surprised me), and captures Grogu with his new dark troopers, which were from Legends.

Chapter 15, "The Believer," sees Din teaming up with Mayfeld from the first season, to get Moff Gideon's coordinates from an Imperial base. The show does a good job not only showing Mayfeld's backstory and perspective on the galaxy, but goes to show how far Din is willing to go to save his "son" by not only wearing an Imperial suit of armor, but also take off his helmet at one point.

Chapter 16, "The Rescue," was the show at its best in my eyes. The episode had great action in the beginning, a tense confrontation between Din and a dark trooper, as well as with Gideon, a new complication involving Bo Katan, and, when all hope seems lost, the appearance of Luke Skywalker himself to save the day. He agrees to take Grogu to train him, leading to an emotional farewell between him and Din, which, yes, got me teary-eyed.

Guest stars and fanservice

One of the biggest complaints I've seen from some fans and reviewers of this season is that it is nothing but fanservice with the guest characters, as well as advertisements for other Disney Plus shows coming down the line. These include an Ahsoka show, where she'll likely search for Grand Admiral Thrawn, who was name dropped in her episode, as well as The Book of Boba Fett, in which, in a post credits scene from the finale, Fett reclaims Jabba's old palace, signifying he will look to take over the criminal underworld.

While I can totally understand those viewpoints, and I'm not saying they're wrong, I didn't mind them for a few reasons. Reason number one was that I thought for all of the guest characters, they served a purpose, either to help Din and company on their journey, or to help Din grow more as a character. Essentially, I felt that each guest character was warranted and important to the story, and not come out of nowhere. It also helps we had a smaller-in-scale season in season one, where we got to see Din at the beginning, and see how far he has grown as a person with Grogu. I mean, he went from not caring about anyone but him and his armor in season one, to willingly work with others and bond with Grogu to the point where he willingly takes off his helmet to have him see his face for the first time. If that's not character growth, I don't know what is.

I also liked the guest characters because they make me feel the Star Wars storyline is more connected. Yes, I understand a lot of people wanted this story to be separate from the Skywalker Saga. However, I felt this show, in my opinion, is doing what the MCU (Marvel Cinematic Universe) does well, which is tell good individual stories, while at the same time connecting to other stories from the past and leading to storylines in the future.

Hopefully, we see more of a centralized focus in season three, and not rely as much in shock and awe, but overall, I thought the guest characters were worth it, as both for people casually watching the show, as well as for those like me who have followed the franchise for years.

Technical

I already thought the first season looked good, but this season was a technical marvel. The action, sets, effects, they were all top notch, and felt like I was watching eight mini movies. The music was also great as well, and throughout the season, all actors did a great job in their roles. The only thing that wasn't great was Luke, as they used a "de-aged" Mark Hamill, which, didn't look that good. Granted, it was only for a few minutes, and if that is his only appearance in the series, I'll accept that. If he does show up again, I would suggest they just get Sebastian Stan to play Luke.

Overall

In conclusion, I loved the Mandalorian season two. I thought it was better paced, better acted, and just better overall than season one. While yes, a lot has to do with seeing old characters through a new lens, I also liked the drama and dynamic between Din and Grogu, and how everything is connecting together both in and out of the show. I'm curious if season three will deal with the liberation of Mandalore, as Din unwillingly, in defeating Gideon and taking the darksaber, became the Mandalorian leader, in which Bo Katan would have to defeat in order to reclaim from him.

It will certainly be sad not seeing the show without Grogu, but I trust Jon Favreau and Dave Filoni with their work, and hopefully, season three will be just as entertaining and impactful as this season.