Plenty of people have voiced their opinions surrounding the new season of The Mandalorian, and to our surprise, not all of them are positive. Some seem to think that bringing Mando and Grogu — the galaxy’s favorite father/son duo — back together was an oversight of Imperial proportions, and we don’t entirely disagree. Now before you put a bounty on our heads, hear us out.
It’s true that The Mandalorian wouldn’t be the same if this pair was permanently split up, but bringing them back together so soon might be a mishandled narrative choice that expedited a more profound payoff down the line. Still, the show’s creator Jon Favreau seems to think that the choices made to reunite the pair make perfect sense.
If anyone knows narrative payoff it’s Jon Favreau, arguably responsible for kickstarting the MCU, and the director of Elf, and what sort of Scrooge doesn’t like Elf? In an interview with Empire (ironic), Favreau discusses why the creatives behind the show made the decisions they did — and, more importantly, why it all adds up.
“We couldn’t just hit a hard reset. It’s going to be interesting to see how this unfolds for people who may not have seen The Book Of Boba Fett. But I think The Book Of Boba Fett offered time to pass. You saw what Mando was like without Baby Yoda and we saw what Grogu was like without the Mandalorian and neither of them was doing too good. So them coming back together was a really good plot point that allows us to jump back into Season 3 while maintaining the central relationship.”
Frankly, Jon Favreau is right. The Mandalorian is about Mando and Grogu. If one or the other isn’t around, their relationship can’t drive the show, which would cease to exist. Essentially it comes down to an idea; if Mando and Grogu aren’t together, we don’t get a story. It’s really that simple.
Although the circumstances surrounding their reintroduction could have been handled differently, the fact that they were brought back together in the first place was a forgone conclusion. Watching Din Djarin (the Mandalorian himself) trudge around the cosmos without his little green buddy wouldn’t make much sense, in our humble opinion. Grogu is too darn cute to leave behind.
That fact might frustrate some people, but in the immortal words of Darth Vader — search your feelings, you know it to be true.