So there's some irritating lore-breaking going on here, mixed with some flat-out canon-breaking, with a garnish of dragged-out lack of resolution on related points. I think we all forget that Bo was Death Watch. Just because she refused to join Maul when he killed Pre Viszla and took over the group (and, later, Mandalore) doesn't mean she's suddenly a good guy. She had a good couple decades since then of seeing her people under Imperial domination -- with willing complicity from at least some clans, and deliberate "I'm staying out of this" from others -- and I don't know that she ever once had the realization of "I helped bring all this about -- if Death Watch hadn't been a thing, the Republic would never have conquered us."
Which brings me back to the confrontation in the cantina. Since they seem to be leaning pretty heavily on Jango's backstory as relayed in the now-Legends Open Seasons series, then yeah -- Jaster's group and Death Watch each considered the others to be traitors and not truly Mandalorian, etc. Add in the weird status Concord Dawn seems to hold (Mandalorian controlled, in Mandalorian space, with Mandalorian Protectors as the peacekeepers... but they themselves are not Mandalorian? Okay...), and I can see Bo's stance (that's Bo-Katan, not Boba). Jumping ahead to the post-credits sting (and yes, you are remembering correctly -- Bib Fortuna was on the sail barge, which blowed up
real good), I am hoping more than ever that this is, in fact, one of the clones, posing as Boba, complete with his own
Slave I that doesn't
quite match real-Boba's that we saw in ESB. Which would make sense since Jango's ship was blown up and rebuilt. All that was missing from that last shot was Boba resting chin on fist in a full pensive-Conan pose:
None of that -- or the rest of how he's behaved in this series -- feels like the Boba that we got the most OT screen-time of in ESB.
Anyway.
Psab keel, if you get a chance, you should find a way to play Dark Forces. It's very dated now, like the X-Wing and TIE Fighter games, but back when it came out, it was bleeding edge graphics and storytelling. The central characters and their ship are memorable, the Dark Trooper project was a legit threat, and the Phase 3 Dark Troopers were giant cans of "nope" you did your best to stay away from. This is an area that Star Wars has had baked into its lore almost from the beginning, and certainly by the time ESB came out. Combat droids were a thing in Han Solo at Stars' End. IG-88 was described in Empire publicity materials as a "battered chrome war droid" before the IG series
ever became "assassin droids". Han Solo and the Lost Legacy featured the ancient war robots of Xim the Despot... But then the Prequels gave us the battle droids that a) were used for comic relief, rather than serious threat, and b) were reaped by clone troopers and Jedi alike by their hundreds, further undercutting them as a thing to fear. Fight choreography aside, these Dark Troopers were quite scary to me, from both nostalgia and execution, all the way up until Luke arrived on the scene. I think that could have been handled better, but it would have required a different structure to the show -- at least one more episode, anyway, to establish them as more of a threat, and to take longer to overcome.
So. Luke. Glad they at least maintained continuity with his ship being Red 5. With the Rogue... *sigh* ...
Squadron movie upcoming, I was half fearing they'd retcon it to Red 1, despite what was saw in TLJ/TROS. This gives me hope that Wedge is still Red Leader -- even if Luke is or is not still Group Commander. But I agree with others in here that, while is ROTJ Jedi look is iconic and very cool, he shouldn've been wearing his flight suit. He found time to change in the middle of a sandstorm on Tatooine, after all. Only to change out of it on Dagobah. I've gotten the feeling ever since Han and Luke apparently put on their Stormtrooper disguises over their street clothes that those sorts of things -- body-armor undersuits, pilots' flight suits, etc. -- have some sort of smart-materials tech that lets one put on a loose garment that then snugs down over the wearer and their other clothes. It's obvious it can be put on and taken off in a right hurry and adverse conditions.
Also agree it should've been Sebastian Stan. Even Mark has been saying, "Get him!"
"OMG series over!" Not remotely. Now Din gets to put all that growth we've just seen to use. Cara and Fennic and Boba have left, to go back to their
shows lives, but Din and Bo have Gideon, the darksaber, and a lot of unfinished business and undelivered exposition. At some point, some characters' misconceptions need to be set straight, and some (at least seeming) contradictions addressed. In Rebels, Fenn Rau recognized the darksaber as "a symbol for the leader of House Vizsla -- and, later, the group known as Death Watch." Not all Mandalorians, even though House Vizsla used it to crush opposition and rule Mandalore. He seems to know what Bo hasn't said anything about, though -- that it wasn't just looted by Pre's ancestors, but made over a thousand years before by the first Mandalorian Jedi...
Tarre Vizsla. When he died, it was kept at the Jedi temple -- until Pre's ancestors "liberated" it. Maybe after the Republic bombed Mandalore, maybe after the ascendancy of the New Mandalorian movement, the line of tradition was apparently lost, if Pre didn't know it as anything other than a trophy his ancestors had stolen from the Jedi temple. But Fenn, from Concord Dawn, knew.
Sabine is Clan Wren, which is part of House Vizsla. Clan Kryze (Bo's clan) I'm not sure about. She allied herself and her followers with Pre's Death Watch. But her older sister, Satine, quite obviously didn't. Satine died after Maul had taken over, leaving Bo the eldest. After Death Watch had been suborned. Not sure how Clan Vizsla felt about what Maul did to Pre, but I imagine they weren't thrilled. Some probably recognized Maul's defeating of Pre. Some probably objected to the whole "non-Mandalorian" element, as Bo did. But, fast-forwarding... Ursa told Sabine that because she didn't defeat Maul herself, she had no claim to the darksaber. Sabine observed that she was holding it, and that seemed like a pretty strong claim to her. She had no problem with Sabine giving it to her, though. Or giving it to Gar Saxon, herself. No combat involved in either of those. But that then let Sabine best Saxon for it... And then she gave it to Bo, who, again, had no problem accepting it
then.
But then, that may have something to do with the Republic naming Bo regent after her sister's death...? Even though the Empire installed Saxon as Governor, Bo was still the
princess Duchess in exile. Fenn said many Mandalorians felt Bo was the rightful ruler, even fifteen years on. I could see her accepting the darksaber from Sabine, to unite the clans, and with a thought to then "earning" it fighting the Empire. From a certain point of view.
One thing that also would be nice would be clarification of "House" versus "Clan". There's, for instance, House Vizsla, which includes Clan Vizsla and Clan Wren, amongst who knows how many others. There is also both a House and Clan Kryze (Satine and Bo's family). A House obviously is a larger structure that encompasses multiple Clans, but it's definitely a distinction that needs some elaboration. Especially given Din's identity quest. He and Grogu were named a Clan of two by the Armorer. So he's gonna be wanting to figure out where the heck he fits in, given everything he's been learning this season. "You will find it is
you who are mistaken, about a great many things..."
And then there's the whole Purge thing. I still have a sense that's a term the Children of the Watch use to refer to the people who stuck with Maul getting kicked off Mandalore. Since the Armorer has the stylized Zabrak horns on her helmet, and that was an affectation of some of Maul's followers, it tracks. Not all were captured or killed in that final battle just before Order 66. And, while Saxon was taken into custody by Republic troops, it's obvious the Empire that came along turned that around and installed him over Bo. But the Maul loyalists would have already fled or been tracked down and exiled. I don't think, currently, that the Purge was something carried out by the Empire against Mandalore. But we
definitely have a big narrative gap between Sabine leaving Bo with the darksaber and multiple clans pledging themselves to her... and Gideon having it less than a decade later. I have a feeling season 3 is going to go into at least
some of that. Then there's the whole implied cloning Force-sensitives thing, too.
