The official trailer for The Mandalorian Season 3 has finally dropped. I’m super pumped, buuuut a few things on the trailer has got me a bit apprehensive. Even nervous you might say. Let’s get a little personal for a second…
The Mandalorian is my favorite Star Wars spin off since-oh I don’t know-maybe ever? While the prequels were…movies. I still enjoyed them quite a bit. I love the pod racing, I love space congress!, and it’s got some really great villains-I’m looking at you Darth Maul. But, in hindsight, they were pretty sub-par compared with the original. The sequels Episodes VII, VIII, IX started off great for me. I loved Episode VII, and I was even on board with how left field The Last Jedi was. But man did they drop that ball in the third act. Which-I hate to say-kind of ruined the rest of it for me. What a boondoggle.
Rogue One fit in there somewhere, as did Solo, and since Disney has it’s own TV channel now, we’ve gotten several expansion packs that’s given us other vignettes of the Star Wars Universe. But, in my opinion, none have measured up to The Mandalorian (with the important caveat that I still have yet to watch Andor so please don’t @ me).
Here’s what I love about The Mandalorian First, it’s episodic. Each episode was pretty much self contained. There’s also an overarching story arc, but for the most part, you could enjoy each episode on its own. Second, it was slow paced. A lot of episodes in that first season were just long shots of Star Wars landscapes. I could watch those for freakin’ ever. Give me long, slow, panning shots of Grogu being adorable please, thank you. Third, no Jedi. Not only that, but not much Star Wars lore. The Empire was there in the background somewhere but it wasn’t out in front. The glue that held this whole thing together was The Mandalorian and Baby Yoda and I’m here for it. Four, the music! Five, Amy Sedaris, yes please! Six, Baby Yoda. Seven, Ah-freakin’-soka! Eight, Baby Yoda…
Assuming you’re getting the picture here let’s talk about the Season 3 trailer. The reasons why I’m apprehensive about it is simply this…I don’t want them to mess up a good thing. My first thought is, I hope they didn’t show all the good stuff in the trailer. There’s a couple of clips that made me smile, like this one of Grogu, force shoving some bad dude out of a cave.
I loved this moment in the trailer, but I think I would have enjoyed it more during the show. Which makes me hope that Grogu uses the force in more amazing ways than just that. This, if anything, should just be a teaser to what Grogu has learned about his powers since we last saw his cute little adorable face. Another read flag for me are these:
Lightsabers. Where’s there’s lightsabers, there’s Jedi. I know I’m the minority here, but one things I could use less of in The Mandalorian is any ties to the Star Wars movies. It seems they do pretty good with expanding the TV shows. Like I said, one of my favorite things about Season 2 was seeing a live action Ahsoka, and I haven’t even watched the animated shows. I hope they don’t spoil The Mandalorian by trying to bake him into the movies somehow. Seeing Luke Skywalker show up at the tail end of the last season was enough for me, actually probably too much. But, I digress…
What am I excited about? I’m excited about going to Mandalore for sure. I’m excited to see more Mandalorians in whatever color and helmet shape. And I’m excited to see Din Djarin shoot first and ask questions later. That’s one of my favorite things about the guy. He’s no nonsense. Straight and to the point. The best part of The Book of Boba Fett was undoubtedly the episode all about the Mandalorian. Give me more of that!
With all that said, I’m keeping an open mind towards some of the things that make me nervous for season 3. I’m hoping that the show runners haven’t forgotten what made the first two so great. I don’t need some visionary director with delusions of grandeur adding space teenagers with shiny new modified hover bikes to scene. Leave that crap at home. I need dusty, old, Dirty Harry space Western, take no prisoners, This Is The Way, shoot ’em up, big eyed baby Yoda, black sabered, shiny armored Mandalorian in the far reaches of the universe just trying to get by.
I have spoken.