Star Wars: The Mandalorian [** Spoilers **] [Disney+] (US Pace)

EltonJohn69

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120500992#Comment_120500992

Yeah a little wooden but I liked that episode she is in and she sold me on being evil/a psycho. Mof Gideon just seemed like a parody of villain by the end of season 3, he was just a recycled version of something we have seen a thousand times.

AMKC

All I can say that of the three shows I have watched online this weekend that I love Star Trek Picard comes first The Ark comes second best and this well this finale was way down at the bottom. I did not find it good at all. Remember when the Mandolorians could not follow the Dragon as they did not have the range in there boosters on a planet and then yet here in this episode he could fly the whole way up into space with his suit and boosters and get on board the cruiser in orbit of the planet. That's a lot of fuel and power needed for that to break out of a planets atmosphere.

I found the whole episode dreary and boring.

Why does Din even think Grugo wants to be a Mandolorian lol. I know would not want to be wearing a bucket on my head nearly all the time.

Glebee

Struggled through this season if im honest and ive realized Ive no interest anyone in this, what started out great has just petered out into nothingness for me.

Tony EH

Finally dragged myself through the last 5 episodes of this and my god what a slog that was. There's some decent elements within, but the amount of crap that has to be waded through supersedes the enjoyable parts by a wide margin and there's at least one truly wretched episode amongst the 8.

There's just so many problems with the show by this point, but it's reason for existing is the most prominent. The show doesn't have a point any more, not that the central hook was all that engrossing in the first place. But when the Mando handed off baby Yoda to Luke, that was the natural conclusion to the story the audience was ushered into. But now the show is just lumbering on and has become very dull indeed.

Into the bargain, the Mandalorian himself has been largely reduced to a bit part in his own show. It's now really the Bo Katan show instead with Din Jarin playing a decidedly second fiddle. And speaking of which, Katee Sackhoff utters every line like she desperately wishes she was somewhere else. I don't know if it's just limitations on her behalf or whether she's genuinely uninterested, but wow she'd put years on you.

Aside from the poor writing and dialogue there's also just an enormous amount of stupid going on here. I lost count of how many times the Mandalorian (lol which one) was set on fire and his cape remained completely undamaged. Plus in a universe of fireable weaponry, it remains one of the most absurd things to sit though people using sticks to fight other people with or, worse yet, actually guard an important figure. I understand the medieval-type aesthetic the producers are going for, but it remains an utterly ridiculous visual. Plus, can the producers get someone in that could show them basic tactics? You know, like taking cover under fire? Simple stuff like that. It's eye rollingly frustrating to constantly see people in 'The Mandalorian' not bother to, at the very least, try to get behind something in a firefight and instead just stand in the open hoping everything will be grand. It can't be that hard to figure out.

Also, I think that episode 6 has to be one of the worst episodes of tele I've forced myself to sit through in a long time. Worse than the one and a half episodes of 'The Ark' that I suffered a few days ago. And Jesus, who was that fat black girl? How in the name of Christ did she get that gig, because there must have been a thousand other actresses in line that could have done a much better job, because she couldn't act her way out of a paper bag. Shocking stuff.

Additionally, I'm struggling to see Pedro Pascal continuing in the role unless there's some serious wonga being written into future contracts. As mentioned, he's already had his role whittled down greatly in S03, but when nearly everyone else gets to take their helmet off and the, supposed, star of the show remains buttoned up, that can only be irksome to the actor I would imagine.

Finally, I think I'm actually done with this show. A show that's never been without its faults, but at least in S01 and S02 the entertainment factor outweighed my criticism. But S03 failed to do that in a major way.

NIMAN

Nail on head stuff there, you got it all right.

Some of the set pieces have been embarrassing. Groups of fighters standing 20ft away from each other, shooting and missing multiple times.

The acting has gone to pot. The dialogue is like something you'd see at a high school play. Pascal should get out of that show asap. Then again he's probably getting paid a fortune.

That girl was Lizzo BTW. She's a big music star, hence getting the part. She may stick to music, cos she's no actor.

Tony EH

I haven't a clue who "Lizzo" is when she's out, nor could I give a damn. But fuck me if that wasn't one of the worst pieces of stunt casting that I've seen in...well...anything. That must have been a favour called in, cos I simply cannot believe that she won out in a normal casting bout.

What pisses me off the most about that kind of crap is that there are thousands of good (even great) actors and actresses out there that can't get a gig and a prominent TV show hires her, even if it is just for a bit part.

If I was a serious actor struggling and saw that, I'd seriously be questioning the whole point.

Relikk

Like I said in a post a few pages back about that, it's like they're Favreau's mates who he asked, on-the-fly, if they would like to be in this episode of The Mandalorian, and then wrote some half arsed characters specifically for them in a day. It was a shame, because the setting of that planet was actually visually interesting.

NIMAN

Watched final episode, and although it was all action, a lot of it was again very silly in places.

I would be tempted not to watch any more of S4 when it arrives.

Full_Circle_81

I'm just going to pretend that the show ended with two seasons. Nice little fun show there, so it was 👍🏻

AMKC

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120515441#Comment_120515441

Worse than the one and a half episodes of 'The Ark' that I suffered a few days ago.

Awe "The Ark" is not a bad show. It shows a crew learning and working together to get over their problems as well as growing together and it has great character development for them all too. It gets better with each episode. It already has a 2nd season confirmed and I am already looking forward to that. Hopefully it gets a bigger budget so they can do better CGI. That was it's biggest flaw. The CGI in it was terrible for the most part but all the rest the stories and the actors were good and sometimes even the science was good.

pixelburp

Finished this up and ... uhhhhhhhhh. There's nothing left to say really; a season that was rarely aggressively bad, but watching it was like the worst kind of self-induced fan obligation. If I wasn't a greying 40+ Star Wars fan I'd have dropped it much sooner.

If this is the kind of Star Wars we're going to get as a default - just a bunch of toy-box characters, and video-game plotting - I won't be on board. I don't have any resting fondness for Ahsoka so if it's more of the same that might be it 'til Andor Season 2.

Tony EH

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120520839#Comment_120520839

I just couldn't do any more of 'The Ark'. It's a nice idea, but the acting was woeful and the writing (at least on what I watched) left a lot to be desired too. And I, genuinely, know people who could knock out better CGI in their bedrooms using 3D studio.

I suppose I felt that it was just utterly charmless and it had no hold on me. Plus, my time is limited and I just don't have it to throw away on a TV show I'm not enjoying. I'll stick with a movie til the end*. But a TV show is a longer term investment as it were.

And I've still to watch the last series of the bleedin Expanse, so I reckon I'll put the time into that instead.

*tried to watch 'The Rock' a couple of weeks ago. Had to turn it off about 20 minutes in. My god, it was just awful.

Tony EH

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120522654#Comment_120522654

I stuck with 'The Mandalorian' only because it showed promise with S01. S02, while decent, started to show cracks. But S03 was a rudderless mess. I'm wondering if Favereux was just treading water and running down a contract here.

But as I said earlier, S02 finished up Din's story pretty well. He handed off baby Yoda to bad CGI Luke. There's now, literally, nowhere for him to go now. He doesn't even want to be on Mandalore.

pixelburp

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120523062#Comment_120523062

Thing is, there probably was a good story about taking back Mandalore - it's not like the concept isn't intriguing in its own right. But the manner in which it was executed was - at best - a total rambling mess. You'd still struggle to justify Grogu coming back, that'd probably remain the sacrifice to the Merchandising wing of the Mouse House. But Din's contributions absolutely could have been more coherently structured around "let's take back our planet".

Said it before but were this not Star Wars, it'd have been taken out back and shot in the head ages ago. It's hard to escape the cynical interpretation that those running the Star Wars TV wing think they can sling any 'aul shíte on the page and audiences will coo at the cute Yoda, or glowing lightsabers. And I do worry that they might be right and it's just us old farts on Boards who hate it.

Tony EH

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120523400#Comment_120523400

I've said it before and I'll say it again, Disney have no clue whatsoever how to use this thing they bought. And if anything turns out to be good, it's mostly accidental rather than design. And by "accidental", I mean that the execs have been marginalised to some degree. 'Rogue One' escaped, even though Kennedy stuck her oar in and demanded the ending be changed, but it didn't destroy the movie. I'd still love to see Edward's 'Saving Private Ryan' ending though. In my head that would be epic. 😆

And I think I read somewhere that Gilroy had some tight demands on 'Andor', as in "My way or the highway". Which is probably why that show was so damn good. Sadly, I reckon it'll be in a strict minority amongst Disney Star Wars fare.

Thing is, I reckon Disney thought that they could buy Star Wars and do an MCU on it. Except Star Wars doesn't allow itself to moulded in such a way. I think Disney have half sort of figured that out as this point, but are still clueless as to what they are to do with the whole thing, and every time they try to stray away from the golden era (Empire) they fuck it up.

Like yourself, I've zero interest in Ashoka. I've never found Filoni's creation to be compelling in any way. And while the live action version was fine in her cameo in 'The Mandalorian', I've no desire to sit through an entire series with her. Plus, we're back to Jedi supermen again with Deus Ex Force powers and that alone turns me off.

But if it turns out to be great or even just good, I'll happily be proven wrong.

Brief_Lives

I thought the character Ashoka was brilliant in Rebels.

And its also nice to know in that universe there is more than a couple of Force weilders that exist. Its why we tune in. the more force the better.

pixelburp

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120523706#Comment_120523706

Each time another survivor of Order 66 crops up, it kinda undercuts the whole arc of Luke Skywalker; and I don't even like the Jedi so certainly this SW fan doesn't tune in for those humourless monks. Though mind you, this show managed to conjure up a grouping somehow even more dour with those Mandalorians.

Brief_Lives

technically she isn't a Jedi, just a kick ass force weilder with weird rubber like growths out of her head, i don't want to get into the "origin of the species" thoughts I had on how they develop.

who survived order 66, Luke, Obi, Ashoka, Kanan, Yoda... is that it?

NIMAN

A summary of the show for me, as a middle aged man who grew up with SW.

S01 and S02 were good. Nothing more. Didn't understand the rave reviews, think a lot of it was just nostalgia and people wanting to like it and it to be good cos it was Mandalorians.

In between we had Boba Fett which was a complete mess. And Andor which was very good.

Then S03 came along, and continued the poor standard set by Boba. Lost interest and could easily have stopped watching except for the fact we sat and watched it as a family.

And there's the kicker, my kids enjoyed all seasons, and also Boba Fett. They never watched Andor.

So perhaps it's hitting its target market ok, and its simply not old guys and traditional SW fans. Hence they will probably continue to churn out mediocre shows like this.

Tony EH

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120523728#Comment_120523728

Exactly. There are more survivors of Order 66 than there are victims at this stage. I think I hate the Jedi and the Force at this stage.

As to the Mandalorians and their dumb ass creed, I laughed out loud when the Armourer told Bo Katan it was ok to remove her helmet. Din Djarin must have been like "Wait...WTF?"

"You're not Mandalorian if you remove your helmet". "But Bo Katan, you can remove your helmet, tis grand". 🙄

All of that crap was just really ill thought out. Surely they could have come up with a better line of thought there. Like maybe at communal meal times, the helmet can come off, or when you're getting jiggy with it. 😆

So bloody stupid.

odyssey06

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120524008#Comment_120524008

The simple rule for the helmets should be no removal in front of non-Mandalorians, or don't take your helmet off in front of a non-Mandalorian therefore identifying yourself. So you can still sneak undercover etc.

Foxtrol

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120524008#Comment_120524008

There were thousands of Jedi before Order 66. Given the powers Jedi have, it is far, far less believable that they managed to wipe out all but Yoda and Obi-Wan.

The Creed is like most religions, there is different levels of following it - some to the exact letter while others more loose. They made it clear in the show that historically the two didn't get along but the Armorer wanted to bring the two groups together to retake Mandalore and Bo Katan was the person that would fit between the two groups.

Plenty to complain about the show but that stuff isnt justified.

Tony EH

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120524448#Comment_120524448

That's not the point. All the way through the series we've been hearing that if you remove your helmet you're not Mandalorian. Then in the blink of an eye, it's all suddenly ok.

Hey maybe, Bo Bo can waltz around with her helmet off and then just have a bath at the end and everything will be hunky dory again.

Which makes a further mockery of the silly creed.

pixelburp

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120524008#Comment_120524008

Don't forget the big feast when the two tribes met: did the fundamentalists just disappear into the dark to eat their roast while the Night Owls ate? Once more in a hostile land in the middle of the night? The whole "culture" is so stupidly thought out. It doesn't need to be anthropologically accurate but the Mando stuff has got stupider the more it got detailed.

Foxtrol

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120524469#Comment_120524469

Because they have a greater good of retaking their homeland.

There are plenty of groups in human history that hated each other more that aligned for less potential gain.

Tony EH

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120524507#Comment_120524507

Agreed.

It kinda smacks of the whole "rule of two" shite. Something that sounds ok as an idea around a table in the moment, but ends up locking the writers into something awkward that they should have smoke tested at the beginning and eliminated. It's almost inevitable that those kind of hot takes will end up putting characters and scenarios into corners.

It's gas though. I almost spat my tea out when the armourer said that they all should feast to welcome the new guys. My mind's eye conjured up a number of really strained party scenes.

pixelburp

A Children of the Watch feast looks something like this:

Homelander

I enjoyed the season in general despite how silly it was but the last two episodes were shockingly poor. Like the finale of Boba Fett, the action scenes were incredibly badly done, groups of enemies trading shots at 10ft range, clunky choreography, terrible logic to quickly advance the plot, whole thing just felt like it was made specifically for kids rather than audiences of all ages.

Moff Gideon really outstayed his welcome as well, I sincerely hope we don't see him again in any form.

Mandalorian S1, Rogue One and Andor are the strongest things they've made by a country mile, I don't understand how they continuously let these shows and movies with reasonable premises be dragged down by horrible scripting and execution and why they cannot seem to maintain even any basic level of consistency whatsoever.

IMO Boba Fett was absolute crap, Obi-Wan was medicore at best, Force Awakens was lazy but reasonable, Last Jedi had solid ideas and excellent direction marred by some bad creative choices, Rise of Skywalker was absolute irredeemable trash and Mandalorian is now headed down the same path Boba Fett did in the latter half of that season.

Spon Farmer

Only getting to watch season 3 now so no spoilers please for anything after episode 3.

If the answer is a spoiler it will be revealed later then just tell to wait and see ;)

The Children of the Watch is an extremist religious movement wanting to take Mandolore back to the “old ways” but aren’t a lot of the Foundlings that they bring into the group, just not actually Mandolorian ?

Does this mean that they are not believers in a true blood Mandolorian race, just the Creed? Has Mandolore always taken in foundlings?

And do the Children of the Watch not consider ordinary civilian Mandolorians like we see in Clone Wars to be real Mandolorians?

surely they accept that a society cannot be just a warrior class and nothing else?

Spon Farmer

And it is good to see the stunt performers get recognition by listing them in the main credits.

The Duke’s grandson is in Star Wars - cool ;)