The Book of Boba Fett – Chapter Five – Return of the Mandalorian Review
**SPOILER WARNING**
Chapter Five of The Book of Boba Fett is directed by Bryce Dallas Howard (can someone please give this woman a Star Wars movie) and actually doesn’t feature the title character and is essentially an episode of The Mandalorian. As the title suggests the chapter is dedicated entirely to Din Djarin and while I find it odd that an episode of The Book of Boba Fett does not feature Boba Fett, I welcomed change of pace. This episode is loaded with callbacks and Easter eggs for all Star Wars fans. We’re having a good time this week in a galaxy far, far away.
Mando makes his return right at the top of the episode, sans Grogu, working on a bounty and ends up wrecking shop with the Darksaber in a violent fashion that I’ve been craving from Boba all season. Mando gets his man, well his head anyway and is on his way to collect his bounty. This episode wasted no time in rejoining Din’s story and I loved it. Perhaps I’ve got some sort of pent up tantric Star Wars bounty hunter violence frustrations that needed released. It was good for me, Din.
“Wizard.”
Din Djarin – The Book of Boba Fett – Chapter Five
Mando travels to somewhere that looks like the Halo Array or the movie Elysium and we find The Armorer played by Emily Swallow (Supernatural) and Paz Vizsla played by Tait Fletcher (John Wick) have established a new Mandalorian covert. Paz tends to a wound Din sustained earlier while The Armorer trains him in combat with the Darksaber. The scene reminded me of Sabine learning to wield the Darksaber in Star Wars: Rebels. It was nice to catch up with characters from the first season of the Mandalorian and see where they are now.
Now if you know your Mandalorian history the Darksaber originated in House Vizsla so of course Paz was going to challenge Din for the weapon. The Darksaber remains with Din but he is deemed no longer a Mandalorian when he reveals he has removed his helmet. I was kinda hoping he would’ve confronted The Armorer about meeting Bo-Katan and others that freely removed their helmets but he did not.
The Armorer explains the fall of Mandalore and the cautionary tale of Bo-Katan who unceremoniously carried the Darksaber and the curse that destroyed their people. There is a flashback that features some great shots that will surely become someone’s wallpaper. The Great Purge referred to as “The Night of a Thousand Tears” showing the Empire laying waste to Mandalore.
What about our favorite child? Grogu does not make an appearance in the episode but he is most certainly spoken of and teased throughout the episode. When The Armorer mentions the beskar spear Din is carrying shouldn’t exist as beskar is intended to be used for armor not weapons, Din requests armor be crafted for Grogu. We are never shown the completed armor but it appears to be some form of chain mail. The armor is wrapped in a cloth resembling the shape of Grogu’s head. And the world said “Aww!” or was that was just me at 4am?
No longer having the Razor Crest, Din has to take public transportation and travels to Tatooine where Peli Motto played by Amy Sedaris (At Home with Amy Sedaris) claims to have a ship for him. Peli is, as always, surrounded by droids and fans of the video game Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order no doubt had a little treat as a BD droid makes its first live action appearance. Having played it myself, I thought it was a great wink for fans of the game. Paging Cameron Monaghan as Cal Kestis to Disney+ please! They’d be silly not to but that’s for another post.
Peli Motto saying she dated a Jawa painted some unfortunate mental images but it did give me a good chuckle. Lots of great calls backs to The Phantom Menace including a Naboo starfighter. Peli and Din spend a good portion of the episode fixing up the starfighter as Din’s new whip complete with a repurposed service droid seat just the right size for a certain green foundling. Once Din takes the ship for a test run it’s just pure fun with a joyously familiar run down Beggar’s Canyon akin to young Anakin’s pod race. The prequels came out right around the time I was becoming an adult. Star Wars was back and I was on the hype train. The Phantom Menace remains the movie I have seen the most in theaters at eight viewings (and if we’re going for my top three Revenge of the Sith at seven viewings and Fellowship of the Ring at six viewings) and I know it’s certainly not the best of the bunch but I do have a special place for it so I loved all of these callbacks. Mando eventually leaves the atmosphere for a more intense joy run and is humorously pulled over by X-Wing pilots including Carson Teeva (Confession: I had to Google his name) played by Paul Sun-Hyung Lee (The Mandalorian).
Mando eventually returns to Peli’s shop from his “wizard” (another TPM callback) test run and finds that Fennec Shand played by Ming-Na Wen (Agents of Shield) is waiting to hire him to work for Boba Fett. Din agrees but says he must pay a visit to his little friend first. Credits. I loved this episode and it didn’t feature the title character but frankly I did not miss the presence of Temuera Morrison at all during the episode. In fact when Fennec showed up at the end I was snapped out of my Mando daze with “Oh yeah, this is The Book of Boba Fett you’re watching.” There is something to be said that I don’t really have an interest in what Boba is doing at this point and I just want to follow Din. I have found the series to be average at best with the exception to today’s episode that didn’t even feature the title character. Even from a child’s perspective, my 12 year old son lost interest in the show until I mentioned Din’s appearance today and he only caught up to see his return. Regardless, Bryce Dallas Howard knocked it out of the park again. I was enjoying the episode so much I knew it had to be someone versed in the content. Din slicing dudes up with the Darksaber brought me kid-like joy. Thankfully it appears he will be with us for the last two chapters of the series. I’m curious if we will actually get to see Grogu. Does that mean we will see Luke again too? Dave Filoni has a writing credit on next week’s episode so I have high hopes for what is to come. I’m still keeping my fingers crossed for a live action Cad Bane debut. This entire series feels like a prologue to something bigger. As if all of these episodes are just context you need to understand the feature presentation. I went back and forth on how to score this one as it’s really an episode of The Mandalorian not The Book of Boba Fett but it is what it is. The episode was essentially filler but with ties to the original and prequel trilogies, the animated series, and the video games I loved this chapter.
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