Maul Conclusion & Mando Hype!
Maul Shadow Lord is over, so here are some things I loved about it looking back AND rewatching the Mandalorian finale to get hyped for the new movie!!!
Enjoy!!
Send us an email! tvjpod@gmail.com
1 SPEAKER_00: I have a message from the Village Jedi.
Max Rebo hit it.
Hello there.
Welcome back to a special Star Wars Point of View brought to
you by the local Village Jedi.
My name is Marina, and if you're new here, welcome.
And if you're not, welcome back.
This weekend is for the history books.
The Mandalorian and Grogu movie just came out yesterday.
I am on my way to see it.
I'm gonna see it in T minus three hours.
So I wanted to get out an episode just for you guys, right
in the nick of time.
Happy Friday, everyone out there, including to myself.
Happy Friday, Marina.
Why thank you.
A couple announcements.
I saw this really cool TikTok.
I reposted it, um, and it was by a creator named Simon, and he
it's it's now this trend going around.
I'm sure you guys have probably seen it if you're on social
media, Instagram, TikTok, whatever, that people are using
parts from the plumbing and electrical department of
hardware stores to put together their own lightsabers.
And so I saw this, I reposted it um on my TikTok page, and he
outlines the pieces that you need specifically to make his
lightsaber.
And it I just wanted to put that out here on the show because
that is what Star Wars is all about.
It's kind of random, but it's just something that I wanted to
pass along.
If it's something that maybe you're interested in, just
tinkering a little bit and putting your skills to the test
to see what kind of lightsaber hilt that you could make.
It just sounded like kind of a fun activity to do, especially
as a fandom.
We are really in the Star Wars spirit right now.
We just came off of a high with the Maul Shadow Lord show.
Happy May the 4th, and now the Mandalorian and Grogu.
So we are all just collectively in the Star Wars spirit.
And this just felt like a cool, fun idea that I wanted to pass
along to you as a listener in case you are looking for
something fun and festive to do this weekend.
Um, my second announcement is that we will be doing a Mando
movie review next Friday.
Since I'm gonna be seeing it today, I'm actually seeing it
twice.
The first time is at 1.30, and then I'm gonna go see it again
at 8.
Um, the second time I watch it, I'm gonna be in my pajamas.
Right now I'm in my costume.
I'm all dolled up, ready to go to the show.
Um, but at 8, I'll be in my jammies with my iPad, brightness
all the way down, typing away to be able to give you guys a
jam-packed movie review.
So that will be next Friday.
And I think one week after the movie comes out is enough time
to sort of get into all the spoilers.
So it will be all the spoilers, deep dive review.
So that's exciting.
That will be next week.
I understand if you don't want to, you know, listen to that
quite yet, you know, you might be busy this weekend, might be
busy all next week, and you won't be able to watch it for a
while.
But please come back.
It's gonna be a great episode, so that will be next Friday.
But as for today, we are gonna do a mall conclusion, sort of a
wrap-up of some of the aspects of the show that I appreciated,
um, as well as my favorite episode.
And then some Mando final thoughts pre-hype.
We are getting into it.
Man, I am so excited.
Like I got all dressed up.
I'm in my Ray outfit, did my hair, I got my little eye
jammies.
Oh my goodness.
And we are so excited.
So I have um like a holster, um, like a faux leather holster on
my on my hip.
And I have my little baby Furby Grogu tucked in there.
We're just so excited.
Oh my goodness, I'm gonna go see it with my brother this
afternoon, and then Grant's gonna go with me after work
tonight.
If you can't tell, I am yapping and yammering on because I'm
just so pumped today.
But we are here to talk about mall.
We are here to talk about what we're going to see going into
the movie.
We're gonna channel all this energy into a village Jedi Yap
session.
Happy Friday, but first, let's go ahead and take a brief ad
break.
Hello there.
If you're looking to build your collection, the Village Jedi is
now collaborating with Sabermasters to offer you$20 off
your first Combat Ready laser sword.
You heard that correctly, Combat Ready.
The team at Sabermasters makes it their personal mission to
create lightsabers built to last using lightweight polycarbonate
blades with customizable settings and simple navigation.
Sabermasters has really crafted the ultimate experience.
Sabermasters is always offering a great deal for force users
everywhere, but with my code TVJ20, you can save an extra$20
at checkout.
Simply type in the code at the checkout screen, TVJ20, and
you're done.
Link will be in the show notes.
I feel as though I need to just take a chill pill, right?
Like let's just let's just relax.
I don't know what you're doing.
Maybe you're driving, maybe you're trying to do homework,
maybe you're working.
You don't really want squealing in your ear, or maybe you do, I
don't know.
But that's kind of what this episode is.
It's just a lot of squealing.
What I loved about Maul and what I am going to be looking forward
to with Mando.
We have a lot to yap about with all that out of the way.
So, first, Maul.
We got 10 episodes.
Let's go ahead and debrief.
A few things I wanted to write down is what exactly did this
show give us.
I have four major concepts that I wrote down that we're gonna
get into.
10 episodes later, Maul Shadow Lord really did give us fans a
piece of history.
We experienced history with this show, and that's not even an
exaggeration.
There were different things that happened in this show that fans
have never seen before.
That is history, my friends.
So this show I feel is on the same caliber as Andor as far as
storytelling goes, and it really is nothing but incredible.
There are nothing but good things I have heard about this
show.
We as a fandom, it has united us as fans.
No matter how you feel about Star Wars, I really do not care.
If you watch this show, you give it a fair chance.
You can't not enjoy it.
And if you didn't enjoy it, please feel free to write in an
email.
Oh my goodness, girly goo.
I totally forgot.
Hi, my name is Marina.
This is my podcast, TheVillage Jedi.
Just a couple things to get out of the way.
See, now I'm tapping into the script.
Wow, it really is a crazy day.
My brain is in shambles, jambles.
Feel free to follow me on Instagram or TikTok at the
VillageJedi.
But if you want to send in a more detailed message about Star
Wars media and you want it to be discussed on live, please feel
free to send in an email at tvjpod at gmail.com.
Perfect.
Slay.
C.
Crazy day.
Anyways, this show.
If you don't like this show, feel free to send me an email at
tvjpod at gmail.com.
We will talk about why you don't like that show.
I want to have a discussion.
Educate me from that side of the fandom.
But on the other side of the fandom, this was a piece of
history, and we're gonna get into it.
Number one, the score.
The score for Star Wars Mandal, Star Wars Maul Shadow Lord was
composed by Kevin Kine, he's the dad, and then his kids, Sean
Kiner and Deanna Kiner.
Okay, so I guess I didn't put an R on the end of Kevin Kiner.
He is also a Kiner, he's the dad.
It's the Kiner family.
The Kiner family, according to Google, was previously
collaborating on other Star Wars projects such as the Clone Wars,
Rebels, and Ahsoka.
They took inspiration from heavy metal music to craft a darker,
more distorted musical soundscape for the series.
Now, I get chills when I hear the intro.
You can hear Sam Whitworth, like he's like yelling, and the
there's like this echoing.
And then when you think about the inspiration they took, as it
says here, that it was like a heavy metal, more dark crafted
sound, you see that.
If Maul were alive in this galaxy, in this area, era, he's
in the Milky Way, say hi, slay, he would be a heavy metal
listener.
I'm not gonna name bands because I do not listen to that music
genre, but if you listen to heavy metal music, uh just try
to imagine it.
Would Maul like my music?
The answer is probably yes.
He also probably likes jazz.
Like if we're being so for real, like on one hand, he has two
personalities.
The personality that like gets down to business and gets things
taken care of, and like he locks in, you know.
But then the other personality is like, let's just, let's just
relax.
There's a live band down at my favorite cafe, and I would love
for you to accompany me while we discuss this over a game of
chess.
That is the other side of mall, the caffeinated mall, the mall
who had a good night's sleep, the mall who's you know, got a
handle on life.
But then when he feels a little out of control, it's heavy metal
mode.
So the score, the score that we got for this show, absolutely
incredible.
I did love that.
That's so that's our first major concept that I absolutely loved.
Second one, this show expanded Mall's story because we see this
side of his character between the end of the Clone Wars and
Rebels.
We see he survived Order 66, but then we see him again on Malicor
and Rebels.
What happened?
He popped up randomly in solo.
We're filling in more gaps with this show.
And a lot of people, myself included, they go off of this
definition as far as what good Star Wars is.
How does this story serve the greater story?
That's at least how I define what makes Star Wars good.
So if I'm like, yeah, that show's good, yeah, that book is
good, yeah, that movie's good, because there's aspects of it
that filled in gaps of other major Star Wars stories that
will now enhance my re-watch, my reread, my re-experience with
that story.
For example, why do I love Rogue One so much?
Why do we all love Rogue One so much?
Because it fills in the gaps.
When we meet Princess Leia and she has the plans to the Death
Star, you're thinking, okay, how did she get those?
Right?
Or you're thinking, how did they know?
How did they know that that was the one piece, the one area of
the Death Star that had a like weakness?
How did they know to pinpoint that one place?
Okay, they got the plans, where did they get the plans?
And now you have Rogue One, and so when you re-watch the
original trilogy, you re-watch A New Hope, it enhances your
viewing experience.
Same goes for Lost Stars by Claudia Gray.
That is a good book because when you read that book, it enhances
your experience watching the entire original trilogy.
Same with Revenge of the Sith, the Revenge of the Sith, Matthew
Stover.
He did his novelization.
When you read it, it enhances your viewing experience for the
movie.
Same with Bad Batch.
Okay, we have this really incredible story with clones.
It enhances my experience re-watching Rebels when I meet
Wolf and Gregor and Rex, and they're they don't have their
chips.
Like, what happened?
And now I see, like, okay, well, there was this whole rebellion
with the clones.
You see what I'm saying?
This show is good because it fills in the gaps, it enhances
your experience whenever you see him on the screen.
It enhances your Phantom Menace reading experience, it enhances
the clone war arcs that we see him take over Mandalore, it
enhances everything that we see him in with Rebels and how he
deals with Ezra, because now we're seeing parallels with how
he's dealing with Devin.
This show is good.
It enhances the greater story.
So I will humbly get off my soapbox.
My third concept, why I loved Maul overall, the animation
advancements from Google.
We're gonna go over this.
Star Wars Maul Shadow Lord features a gritty, high-stylized
painterly animation style.
Whoa.
It blends traditional 2D art techniques with modern CGI to
create a darker noir atmosphere.
The unique visual look combines variant neon aesthetics with
deliberate physical textures, moving away from past polished
Star Wars looks, such as maybe like Rebels.
Key features defining the animation style include one,
physical textures and paint.
Instead of standard digital renders, the background
environments resemble concept art or physical oil paintings.
Animators filmed actual paintbrush strokes on glass and
integrated them directly into effects like smoke, explosion,
and dust.
This show is good because of its animation advancements.
Science has advanced, art has advanced because of this
project.
And this was just one key element.
Number one, the physical textures and paints.
Number two, anime-inspired rigs.
The 3D character model utilized power rigs that allow for
deliberate distortions, forced perspectives, and 2D style
stretching during rapid movements and lightsaber duels,
y'all.
We can all get on this same page, get in this same boat, get
on the train, and fly away with the fact that this show's
lightsaber duels are elite.
I'm getting tired of saying the word peak, so I've started
saying elite.
Because that's what this is.
When we see physical uh physical bruh, take a second.
Your brain's moving really quick.
When we see lightsaber duels, those power exchanges between
these characters, and they are as clean as they are, it is
because there were developments on the back end.
Okay, how the shop is run was coming up with new ideas on how
to make it happen.
Star Wars Incorporated, in their little animation hut, decided to
come up with these new ideas on this new project, and therefore
it set a new standard for animation going forward.
Number three, they also utilized hyper-expressive facial
animation.
This was to capture Maul's aggressive and emotional state.
Animators studied video references of voice actor Sam
Whitware acting out the scenes.
For hyper-realism in the face, Whitware literally drew Maul's
face tattoos on his own skin so that the animators could study
how facial muscles stretch and flex.
The dedication.
The dedication.
We don't talk about this enough.
That's another aspect I just realized while I'm talking about
this, why I love this show.
Sam Whitwer, the main guy, the head honcho, cares.
He loves this character, and that comes across in every
episode, every frame, every line of dialogue.
You know, I don't know if you guys saw this, he would eat
green apples to train his voice so that it wouldn't crack during
those like gritty scenes.
He knows what he's doing.
He's a professional, but he's also an expert on mall.
He's been playing this character for so long, and now the
animators want to take it up a notch and say, hey, not only do
we want you to voice this character, we want you to frame
this character.
What you do with your face to bring out this emotion is what
we are going to do on our end.
Incredible! You cannot tell me that's not cool or a dream come
true.
Sam Whitware is the new standard for you're you made it, right?
Like if you are in a Star Wars project where they are animating
your face to be that character, I think they did that with the
actor who um they went off of forchestis.
How cool does that feel?
How cool would that be that you are this character?
Sam Whitwer and Ray Park, without those two guys, we would
not have Maul.
Without Sam Whitware, we would not have this Maul.
And that's just the facts.
So, number four, the fourth thing that they did as far as
animation advancements, pulp noir lighting.
This show pulls inspiration from live-action crime dramas like
heat.
I've never seen that.
The aesthetic makes heavy, heavy use of high contrast lighting,
intense neon glows, and distinct overexposed flash frames during
blaster fire and combat.
And we saw that.
And we talked about that over the weeks that a lot of scenes
in this show would not be near as intense if they hadn't been
framed and drawn at night.
You guys, the care that went into making this masterpiece, it
translates beautifully to the fans.
Every single week we were on the edge of our seats, every single
week we were deep diving, finding new pieces of dialogue,
finding new animated frames, finding new reasons why this
show is that show.
Okay, so that was my third major idea for why I feel this show
was incredible, things that it gave us.
My fourth thing risks that paid off.
Star Wars stories that take risks and ebb away from your
typical good versus evil, Jedi versus Sith are interesting to
me and to most of us.
That's why I love Andor, Skeleton Crew, Last Jedi Force
Dyad stuff, Mandalorian, etc.
When Star Wars projects decide to take a risk, I am sad.
Not because I'm bored, but because we people throw around
the word galaxy a little too quickly.
A galaxy doesn't just involve planets and moons and stars and
asteroids and whatever.
You are talking about cultures, languages, different traditions,
belief systems, family cores.
You are talking about fashion and history, music, what is
happening on Earth is happening on dozens of different planets.
So what's normal on Coruscant is not normal on Ord Mentel.
What's really culturally significant on Hoth, you will
not find on Yavin for.
You know what I mean?
And so when we see things that are not typical or that maybe
take a little bit of a risk, I'm here for it.
And so we saw that in Maul.
There were things that we had never seen before on screen.
And I loved those moments.
This show gave us immersive storytelling where we weren't
really sure why we were rooting for the bad guy, right?
The things he was, the way he was moving in the first two
episodes, you were like, oh, yo.
But then when we see him later in the show, you're like, oh,
yo.
Like you go through this emotional roller coaster with
the character, and that is cool to me.
That was a risk that highly paid off.
There wasn't anything that felt unnatural.
Every piece fit, every end was tied, every T was crossed, every
I was dotted.
I did not feel cheated as a viewer with this finale or with
the intro.
There was no filler episodes, there was no unintentional
moments.
I mean, even when people were like, oh, there's way too much
Riley and Captain Lawson.
I bet you wish there was more Captain Lawson now.
I bet you do.
None of us saw his death coming, at least I didn't.
So now when you re-watch the show, those moments are even
more gut-wrenching.
Those fleeting looks, those random lines of dialogue, those,
oh, I love you, son, hits even harder because the risk paid
off.
So those are my four major reasons why this show was
incredible.
Number one, again, was the score, it expanded Maul's story,
the animation advancements, and risks that paid off.
So what was my favorite episode besides the finale?
Because the finale is duh.
The Dark Lord was a huge slay, huge risk that paid off, huge
reward.
It made the cut as far as the edits go.
I've been seeing Dark Lord Vader edits from that episode day and
night.
But what was my favorite episode besides the finale?
Chapter eight, The Creeping Fear.
I'm gonna read this because otherwise I'll mess it up.
Because my brain is just going a million miles a minute, as y'all
can tell.
We're only 20 minutes in and I've already, I've just like yap
fested, dumped all of this on you.
Chapter 8, The Creeping Fear.
Seeing a Star Wars project take on the massive subject of mental
health using a fallen Sith Lord as a vessel was absolute genius.
Who would have thought?
Who would have thought?
And maybe it's just because I haven't read a lot of Sith
stories, I haven't read Revan, I haven't read Plagueus.
There's a lot of books out there that do explore Sith stories,
but we haven't seen it on screen.
And so as a primarily screen viewer, I'm slowly making my way
through the books, but give me time.
It's way easier to sit down and watch a TV show than it is to
read a whole book, depending on who you ask, but we're asking
me, and that's what I say.
Using a Sith Lord to explore this heavy topic of mental
health, we've never seen that before.
So I Loved that part of the episode.
I felt deep stirred emotions for someone I would absolutely be
rooting against every day in the real world.
It shed light on the fact that Palpatine has always been the
number one bad guy.
He always will be.
And this episode, really, this show cemented my trust in Star
Wars that it has the ability to tell compelling stories through
animation.
I didn't question it before, but now I feel it can't be argued.
Like if you are one that's like, Star Wars animation is for the
kids.
I don't like Star Wars animation.
Star Wars ended in the 80s.
Bro, red flag.
He's over there, officer.
Take him away.
Y'all, you cannot tell me that Star Wars animated stories
aren't good after watching this show.
And not only are they good, this is the standard.
This is the standard.
So that's what I wrote to conclude.
Overall, we are in good hands.
The creators of this show understand how to create
relatable moments and characters that we cannot help but root for
until the bitter end.
I can't wait to see more projects like this, and this
show really is the new standard.
I thought Andor was in a box all by itself.
Scoot over because Andor is the king of Star Wars live action
TV, and now Maul is the king of Star Wars animated TV.
In my book, in my opinion, at The Village Jedi.
So that's pretty much all I had to say.
I wanted to wrap it up, give Maul, you know, his flowers and
a little bow.
Thank you for being the main topic of my discussion these
last five weeks.
Thank you guys for listening.
Now let's let's shift.
Let's take a little, let's take a little hike.
The Mandalorian and Grogu hype.
Some of you who are listening, it's Friday.
I recognize that.
By the time I post this, the day is half over.
Some of you have seen it.
And Grant gave me a call this morning and was like, I'm
scared.
I'm scared to watch this movie.
And I was like, Did you see spoilers?
He said no, but he did see that Rotten Tomatoes, it's not doing
very good.
I told him don't trust those because a lot of times there's
review bombers who haven't even seen the film and they're
already rating it poorly.
He said, You're right.
But some of you out there have already seen the film, you've
made up your mind, and maybe it's not good.
And I have to brace myself for that.
I already stated this last week.
I'm not gonna be one of those fans that's like everything is
perfect.
I love Star Wars.
Star Wars, everything is incredible.
Oh my word, if it's Star Wars, I'm sad.
Because sometimes there are projects that I'm not a huge fan
of.
So I have to be open to the fact that there could be aspects of
this movie that I don't love.
But you know what?
Something we did say on the phone, at least we have a movie.
At least we're back in the theater watching Star Wars.
And that alone is exciting.
I'm all dressed up, I'm ready to go.
It's bringing my family together.
Like it's something we're gonna go see.
My dad's on vacation right now, but when he gets back, we're
gonna go watch it together.
Like it is something that families can do together.
We are putting Star Wars back where it belongs, and that is in
movie theaters.
It also belongs on Disney Plus, as we just saw with Mall, as we
see with Andor, as we see with other projects, but you can't be
watching a Star Wars project in theaters surrounded by other
fans like that.
Awesome.
So I'm trying to get hyped.
Like I said, T minus, two and a half hours.
Let's roll.
In order to get ready for this movie, I obviously watched the
final episode.
The Mandalorian, it has three seasons, and so since I'm gonna
see the movie soon, I wanted to see kind of where we left off.
Um, I've been trying to dodge spoilers, so there's not too
much to say about that besides what we covered in my
Mandalorian and Grogu trailer episode, which you guys really
appreciate, by the way.
Like every few days I'll see that someone listened to it or
someone's watching that episode, and it makes me really happy.
So thank you for supporting the show.
Um, and I hope you enjoyed that episode.
So this is kind of more of just like a brief recap of that final
episode.
If you are in the same boat as me and was just like, you know,
wait, where did we leave off?
Like it's been so long since I've seen that.
I don't I don't really remember.
Okay, this is for you.
Just a brief recap, kind of going into the movie.
My plan, as I said, dress it up, watch it twice.
Mando finale.
There were three seasons.
From the first moment we saw Grogu, I knew this was gonna be
a good show.
If you were one of the favorite fans and you listened to the
Empire Radio Guest episode I did last week, I put that in my top
two Star Wars moments of all time was remembering where I was
when I was the moment I saw Grogu.
The moment we all did.
It was episode one of The Mandalorian, November 12th,
2019, five and a half years ago.
We met Din and Grogu.
It was the day Disney Plus launched, and when I saw that
little froggy hand and those big ears, I knew this is gonna be
good.
What is Disney gonna do with Star Wars on this platform?
More of this.
So, fast forward, the saga ends up coming to a close, April
19th, 2023.
That's two years ago.
So now here we are.
The show featured altogether a lot of side quests, which week
to week was kind of challenging at times, but now that you can
sit down and just binge it, it's fun.
The episodes are fun.
There's a lot of cute, wholesome moments throughout the whole
show, even those filler episodes.
Season one, the main storyline is Din deciding whether or not
to turn Grogu over to the Imperials, and then ultimately
fighting over him on Navarro against Moth Gideon.
And then we see the Darksaber at the end of season one, and we
were all like, oh my god, the Dark Saber.
Crazy, crazy moment in history.
Season two, Grogu's a Jedi.
What does that mean?
Return him to his kind or train him as a Mandalorian watch
foundling.
We end up fighting against Moth Gideon again.
Luke shows up and Grogu goes with the Jedi.
Season 2.5, which was during Book of Boba, Din gets Grogu
back and begins his Mandalorian training.
Season 3, what it means to be a Mandalorian.
We're restoring Din's honor, we're inducting Bo Katan.
There's this final battle for the clan's survival, a mission
to retake Mandalore as a home, and then Din adopts Grogu, and
Grogu is officially now a Mandalorian apprentice.
And he takes the name Din Grogu, which we'll get into.
We learn throughout the show that the main antagonist, Moff
Gideon, his main mission was to acquire Grogu in order to
extract his force-sensitive blood, the Metaclorians.
He planned to use this in order to engineer an army of
unstoppable force-wielding clones of himself, which
ultimately led to him wanting to seize control of the whole
galaxy, reestablish the empire under his own leadership.
So Palpatine is gone, scoot over, I'm taking his place.
Me and my force-sensitive Besgarwarian clone army.
Which I'm I'm not afraid to admit, I love myself.
I have a healthy self-appreciation.
I don't know if I would want to be surrounded by clones of
myself who were stronger than me.
You know what I mean?
Like I and I don't think that's conceited to say.
I just know that I would not appreciate that.
Sometimes I think it would be kind of fun to have a twin.
But can you imagine a whole army of you and they're all force
sensitive and you're not?
That's a little sketch to me.
I could see it if he was force sensitive, because then at least
he could like have an idea of what's going on in their mind,
you know?
Like, but if you are not force sensitive at all, they could all
be like having a force conversation.
We've been seeing that.
If you're linked to each other, you can like send each other the
vibes through the force.
But if everyone's in the know except you and you're the one
that's supposed to be in control, that kind of sounds
like it was gonna fail, anyways.
So that's my two cents.
Take it or leave it, don't spend it all in one place.
Uh, we learn that he establishes a secret base on Mandalore, sort
of to carry out this Beskar bodyguard army plan.
He's based in Mandalore because he needs an unlimited supply of
Beskar in order to make all of their Mandalorian armor.
Okay, we get into the last episode, chapter 24, the return.
The return of Mandalorians to Mandalore.
Right away, I'm hyped.
I watched this yesterday, sat down, had my laptop, typing,
typing, typing, typing, click, click, click, click, click.
This movie is gonna be so much fun.
The Mandalorian Grogu.
I already know.
And I'm like, I'm I'm putting that into the universe.
You know, I'm like, this movie's gonna be great.
Low-key, I'm like, this movie's gonna be great, right?
Like, I'm just being real.
I'm just trying to keep it real with you guys.
All right.
The show emphasizes one of Star Wars' greatest appeals, which is
found families, a sense of belonging, purpose.
What is my purpose in this story?
And each character moves that way through the show.
What am I doing here?
What do I care about?
What's important to me?
And that's why we see so many dynamic characters throughout
the show.
You're kind of tapping in, like, oh, what's going on here?
What are you up to?
Oh, cool, like you're moving up in the world.
We see that with everyone.
So the map the battle of Mandalore for Mandalore
continues because the Mandalorians have come home.
They want to take it back, but Moff Gideon's kind of stationed
there with his baddies, and he's like, Yeah, if you wanna, if you
want, want Mandalore, you're gonna have to go through me.
And Bo Katan's got the Darksaber, she's like, Oh, I
plan to.
So she's got all the Mandalorians, she's united the
clans, and now they're fighting for the rights to take back
their planet from this.
And just had this thought.
Have you guys ever heard of squatters?
It's a term, at least that we use around here.
Um, it's basically when a homeless person breaks into an
unc an unoccupied area and lives there when they shouldn't be.
Typically, like a house that's on the market and it hasn't sold
yet, or an apartment that's pending, something like that.
Like you're you're a squatter.
You're somewhere where you shouldn't be because that's it's
that's not you don't own the right to be there.
So the Mandalorian clans are sort of going up against Moth
Gideon, the squatter king.
So that's kind of that's kind of how I'm I'm vibe in here.
Um Din is being taken away.
That's how the show, the episode opens.
He's rescued by a hijacked IG Grogu, which I like to think of
as improved, improved Grogu.
We see like he kinda refurbished this IG droid to be able to get
around quicker, you know, and he has like voice buttons that he
uses to communicate a little bit.
Super cute.
Bo Katan and her squad are under attack.
Din goes to look for Gideon, and all three of these characters
have such fun dynamics to watch on screen.
Watching Din and Bo interact and then throwing Grogu in there.
I'm telling y'all, join the dark side.
Join the dark side, King Dinjarin, Queen Bo Katan, and
their little prince son Din Grogu.
Come on, I'm always accepting.
We have we join what does Shrek say?
Join the club, we've got jackets.
That's that's how I feel.
Okay.
Come back to Gideon.
He has spikes on his helmet, which I was thinking, he
shouldn't even have a helmet at all.
Right?
Google described him as having a deep mocking obsession with
Mandalorian culture.
Basically, maybe these horns could be a way to remind sort of
like in a mocking way that, hey, do you remember when a Zabrach,
Dothmirian, basically took over Mandalore and even he ruled you
guys even though he wasn't even a Mandalorian?
Like, that's what I'm trying to do.
And they're like, no, never again.
Alright, so I did I did write down that is kind of cool that
it happened once, it can happen again.
Having a non-Mandalorian by-blood ruler, he wants to rule
Mandalore and the galaxy.
It's sort of a cool connection to the Mall Shadow Lord show.
It's just cool that we're getting these stories so close
together, you know.
Alright, so then we see these kind of uh red ray shield shots
of Din.
He's working with Rip Grogu and R5 to make his way toward Gideon
for that final battle.
So far, Din has come to terms that not all droids are bad,
which is really nice.
A great addition to his character.
Um, Din destroys Gideon's clone chamber, and so now we get into
a time of all times, which is a somehow Palpatine returned
discussion.
He sees all these clones of Gideon in these test tubes.
Um The creators of this show and Bad Batch, uh let me just yank
over the soapbox, take a couple little steps, somehow Palpatine
Return classes in session.
Here's how I feel.
The creators of this show and Bad Batch, they worked together
to create stories that would lead toward the understanding of
how and why Palpatine returned.
That's not the main reason that we got either of these shows,
but it is the reason why one of the largest parts of both of
these shows is protecting a child from an Imperial's mission
to extract their blood and midaclorians to create
force-sensitive clones.
As we see in Bad Batch, Project Necromancer, Dr.
Lawson, that's kind of his whole thing.
Is it Lawson?
Hemlock.
Dr.
Hemlock is trying to make clones for Palpatine using the
force-sensitive kids.
And now Moff Gideon is trying to make clones of himself using
force-sensitive Grogu.
So, episode nine, The Rise of Skywalker, at the time it made
no sense because it was before these shows.
So they really had to kind of work overtime to try and provide
fans the science and the context that they could buy into.
Like, oh, somehow Palpatine returned and he's a clone of
himself.
They wanted these two shows to work together to sort of show,
like, no, no, no, that happened.
Like, that's not a reach because little do we know, this is
actually kind of what the Imperials were working on on the
side, their crazy science project.
But that movie had already come out before these shows did.
And so the concept of these shows trying to work overtime to
make us appreciate that line and that concept, that final battle
in episode nine, make it make sense.
That's what these two shows are doing.
So it's not really subtle at all.
We love both these shows for more than just they help make
episode nine make sense.
But because we love them for more than that, that shows you
how well done they were.
Um, it can be argued that that was the main reason for both of
those shows.
Like that's their main storyline is protecting the kids from the
Midaclorian, power-hungry, Imperial scientists.
But we also got lovable characters, great music scores.
So, you know, take it or leave it.
Let's put the soapbox away.
That's all I got.
Okay.
Bo Katan is the vessel to connect the two clans, so I kind
of hope that she's in the new movie.
I don't know why she would be, because bounty hunting isn't
really part of her story, but it would be cool, especially
because Katie Sackoff said in an interview that Bo Katan's story
isn't done.
So it would be kind of cool if we did see her maybe in Ahsoka
season two.
Saw her in the new movie.
I don't know.
I just would love to see her because I do love her.
Um, we get kind of some cool shots from this episode.
Great costumes, great score, all the jetpacks.
It's super sweet seeing the Mandalorians fly around.
They're just so cool.
And then we get this cool show, this cool shot where the armorer
flies up by Bo Katan and then she takes out the darksaber,
holds it up, and then just like keeps flying.
Dope.
It's just dope.
Mandalorians are just cool to look at.
That's what made Boba Fett take off in the 80s was he was just
this rando side character in the background, and all the fans
were like, George.
Who's who's your friend?
You know, like my friend over there wanted me to tell you she
thinks you're cute.
Like, that's how all the fans were moving when they saw Bo
Katan and The Empire Strikes Back.
Or when they saw Boba Fett.
So now we have this whole show dedicated to the Mandalorians,
why they're cool, their culture, their belief system, their
traditions, their honor, all of it.
And it's just cool.
Their design is so sleek.
I just love and now we get a whole movie.
I'm excited.
T minus two and a half hours, two hours.
Let's let's roll.
Okay, so the attack begins.
Gideon sort of has these makeshift Mandalorians that
fight against the real ones.
We cut back to Din, who's still hunting for Gideon himself.
Gideon finds him.
His suit is still a little mechanical and blocky, which for
me is just an again another reference to reinforce his
desire to be a real Mandalorian, but he's fake.
He's low-key fake.
Don't trust him.
Um, Bo Katan and Gideon engage in this battle.
She uses the darksaber, he uses this Beskar Pink Electro Staff.
The fight is for Mandalore, whoever wins this duel.
Because Bo Katan wants to win for the Mandalorians to live
here again.
And Moth wants to win so that he can continue using it as his
secret base, continue on with his super secret plan.
Um, Gideon ends up crushing the Darksaber Hill, and I wrote down
that my artifact-loving heart was crushed too.
Because do you know how old that thing is?
Do you know how much history that thing carried?
Thrawn would be screaming, my little ring lag just died.
I was like, Bayo.
Um, okay, anyways.
He ends up ripping off her helmet, which to me seems like
the ultimate disrespect to any Mandalorian.
If you ripped off their helmet, bruh.
What if they're what if they took the creed?
Anyways.
Um, Din comes to her rescue because he's her husband, so no
one was shocked.
I especially was not shocked.
I was squealing.
Axe woves.
He is one of Bo Katan's followers.
He courageously pilots this massive Mandalorian capital
shift, this huge compromised cruiser right into Moff Gideon's
base of operations.
He has this fiery ball of destruction.
It disintegrates Gideon.
Grogu ends up using the force to protect his parents.
Since Bo Katan's dinner plate shield wasn't gonna work, like
she's like holding her arm up, and the the shield is literally
the size of a dinner plate.
Like, girl, I appreciate I appreciate the act, but like
just hug your husband, goodbye.
Like, just pull a Cassian gin situation, anyways.
But Grogu saved them, so it worked out.
This would have been a really cool shot to see in theaters, by
the way.
We cut to the Mandalorians at the Holy Water, everyone is
gathered for an induction ceremony.
Din legally adopts Grogu as his son, and the armorer says, You
are now Din Grogu, Mandalorian apprentice.
Grogu is named Din Grogu rather than Grogu Jaren, according to
Google, due to his cultural naming conventions for
foundlings.
Because Din Jaren is not a blood-based Mandalorian, he's
not born Mandalorian, but rather a foundling raised by the
children of Watch, the surname comes before the given name.
This family is heavily inspired by real-world East Asian and
European cultures where the family name is spoken or written
first.
When Grogu is officially adopted into Dinjarin's clan, he
inherits Din as his family name, making him Din Grogu to reflect
his new lineage.
Grogu using the force connects to the Mythosaur, who is a force
creature.
I wrote that.
What does this mean?
Again, according to Google.
There is an ancient Mandalorian legend that the awakening and
taming of this beast, which was believed to be extinct, will
usher in a new era and signal the rise of a new Mandalore, the
supreme leader who will unite the scattered Mandalorian clans.
So now let's get into this a little bit.
Let's let's break it down debrief, debunk.
The Mandalorians are all back on Mandalore.
The Mythosaur is awake.
Bo Katan made eye contact with it.
But this prophecy says not only is it going to be awake, but
it's going to be tamed.
So who is going to be the supreme leader?
I would love it to be Din, because again, the hero who
doesn't want to be the hero ends up being the one we needed.
However, I also would not be shocked if the direction that
this story was aiming at is that Grogu is the Mandalore.
Um he is the Mandalorian.
Like if you ask me, from episode one until the very finale of
episode three, where he he becomes a legally recognized
member of the Mandalorians as a whole, the show is called The
Mandalorian.
It's Grogu.
And so when we watch the movie, and the movie is titled The
Mandalorian and Grogu, friend, Grogu is the Mandalorian in my
book.
And so again, I I I I give to to the crowd.
I would have loved for this movie to be called This Is the
Way.
That would have been elite.
Okay, we now cut to Din.
He's speaking with pilot Carson Teva of the New Republic.
He sets the he sets up for this new movie now, rewatching it, it
all makes sense by saying Din is saying this to Carson, you don't
have the resources to protect the outer rim, let alone hunt
down Imperial Remnants, and I need work.
So this is a case-by-case basis as an independent contractor
working for the New Republic under the table.
And re-watching this scene got me so hyped for the movie
because at first I remember watching the trailer, and then
you know, we talked about it in my episode.
I was kind of like, okay, like cool, but now if I would have
re-watched this episode before I did that trailer debrief, I
would have been so much more hyped for the movie because it
just dovetails perfectly.
There's going to be no time jump.
We are just jumping right back in, picking up where we left
off.
Carson picks up the phone.
Din, there's trouble.
The galaxy needs you.
And they jump into their cute little ship and fly off into the
sunset.
Okay, we head back to Navarro.
Din receives a deed to a safe cabin, a home base for between
adventures.
IG11 is fully restored.
There's this full circle moment.
Everyone's clapping.
He's the new marshal.
Um, and the show sort of ends zooming out on this happy single
dad and his son playing in the pond.
At first, you're kind of like, that's it.
But it actually works out perfectly for the movie that's
about to be coming out.
So that is that is that.
That was the finale of The Mandalorian headed into the new
movie.
I will be seeing it in T minus two hours.
I am very excited to watch this.
This episode, I'm about to upload it for you guys.
Happy Friday.
And we don't have any letters to read today, so let's just go
ahead and get into the nerdy outro.
This is where the fun ends.
My only hope is you enjoyed, and I will yap at you guys again
next Friday.
Bye.
I was on something else today.
The energy is a little crazy.
This has been The Village Jedi.
Thank you so much for listening.
To support this show, please leave a rating or review
wherever you listen to your favorite podcast.
Go check out the YouTube channel or send me an email to be read
and discussed on air.
You can also tell a fellow nerd to build the community.
I mean this in the nerdiest way possible.
May the force be with you.