The first season of The Mandalorian toed the line between looking towards the past and heading into the future, offering a winning blend of the new and nostalgic that hooked both longtime Star Wars fans and new audiences from the very first episode, yielding no shortage of critical acclaim and awards season glory.
The second run doubled down on fan service, and while nobody’s going to deny it was awesome to see Ahsoka Tano debut in live-action and Luke Skywalker make a shocking return to the franchise, criticisms began to creep in afterwards that Jon Favreau and Dave Filoni may have leaned a little too far into unabashed nods and winks at the expense of The Mandalorian‘s narrative.
The Book of Boba Fett finds a longtime cult favorite taking top billing in his own solo series, while the project occupies the same pocket of the universe as Din Djarin’s adventures, not to mention the fact it also boasts two-thirds of the key creative team, with Robert Rodriguez joining the executive producorial dream team of Favreau and Filoni to turn it into a Holy Trinity.
Expect plenty of Easter Eggs and callbacks to the past, present and future of Star Wars, then, with a new rumor offering that Cad Bane could be set for his live-action debut. The bounty hunter first appeared in The Clone Wars before making a recent return in The Bad Batch, and his inclusion in The Book of Boba Fett would at least make a great deal of sense when he’s got longstanding ties to the titular bounty hunter and newer connections to Fennec Shand, meaning it would tie the overarching mythology even closer together.