The Mandalorian (TV series)

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Haven't posted in here since the show started, but just wanted to chime in with my overwhelming love for this series. I'll admit, I was bummed to discover that each chapter is under 40 minutes, but now that I've seen them and understand the format of the show, I don't mind it at all. The formatting is very clearly like a novel, with each stand-alone chapter contributing to the over-arching narrative. And at the end of the day, I'd take shorter episodes with a tighter script over longer episodes full of nothingness and meandering plot lines any day. They remind me of the old western serials with the length, themes, and plot. And for that I am so thankful, because its absolutely delightful.

The Mandalorian lore, the action, the costume and prop design, everything about this series is like a dream come true. And BABY YODA!? He could not be any cuter. How come no one here is talking about it being a puppet??? I've always thought puppets were awesome but this is the first time I'm constantly in awe at how lifelike they can be. In some moments I think it's CGI, but then he moves and it's got that imperfect charm that only puppets can provide and my mind is blown again. I don't know about you guys but I'd love a replica puppet of the little dude. That and literally every piece of gear the Mando has.

As for this week's episode, I enjoyed it a lot and thought it was a boat load of fun. Sure, it's a change of pace from the previous 3 and the acting was spotty at times, but it added a whole lot of depth to our title character and the Seven Samurai inspiration was a welcome surprise, even if it's been done before. In the end, I actually wished the Mando could settle down with the pretty lady and raise the child in peace. He definitely thought about it, but the poor guy can't catch a break with that little green guy by his side. I realized we've seen just about everything from the trailers except for Giancarlo Esposito's character, so I'm super curious as to what's next in the latter half of the season...I do hope the other mandalorians come back into play and we get to see IG-11 and Cara Dune again in some capacity. I'm willing to bet IG-11 will return as another hunter of the child

Lastly, I know there's been a lot of complaining about the score. It's certainly different than what we're used to with Star Wars, but it's really grown on me. His theme is awesome. I've been listening to it a lot at home and have it stuck in my head most of the day.
 
...True that the younglings have probably never seen The Seven Samurai or Magnificent Seven or old westerns on TV but Mr Favreau has to take his older audience into consideration...

To be fair, most adult start wars fans haven't seen 7 samurai either, let alone know what it is. I'm a big nerd, and I made it into my late 20's before I saw it, and that was only after purposely hunting a copy down (It actually didn't seem to be available anywhere for a number of years when I decided I wanted to see it).

Counting it up right now, I can think of over two dozen people I know that would consider themselves Star wars fans, and have or will likely have access to Disney+, but I can only think of about six that have seen seven samurai. All folks in their 30s, 40s, 50s,or 60s, with three or four of their teenage children thrown in.

...Cara Dune...

We should see her again. Some of the footage from the trailers has her in a firefight with that big German machine gun blaster. And she didn't have one at all in this episode.
 
If you’re wondering why this episode felt like Clone Wars or Rebels, look no further for an answer. Reason one: they once again have to hammer home that Star Wars is inspired by Kurosawa, so they did Seven Samurai again. You know, like the episode of Clone Wars were they did the exact same thing, right on down to the same montage/shot of the villagers practicing with spears/sticks. Reason two: bad acting. The villagers—really, most everyone on the planet—seemed like they had just come from community theater. Kind of disappointed in this episode, but the good news is that they can’t do another Seven Samurai episode. The walker also seemed too…agile…for its size. The CG walkers never work for me, except in Rogue One

I gotta agree with most your criticisms on this episode. The acting and directing was weaker. I wanted to like Cara Dune more but she just came across as, meh for me. Actress who played the sharpshooter mom wasn’t bad, have seen her in other shows. Other villagers were pretty weak. A lot of scenes reminded me of Ron Howards “Willow” for some reason, but I don’t think it was because his daughter was the director.

All that said I still really enjoyed myself. I enjoyed baby Yoda and the puppeteering work done, I’d love a featurette or behind the scenes on that.

Liked the Cheshire Cat (Lothcat ?) from Rebels.
 
To be fair, most adult start wars fans haven't seen 7 samurai either, let alone know what it is. I'm a big nerd, and I made it into my late 20's before I saw it, and that was only after purposely hunting a copy down (It actually didn't seem to be available anywhere for a number of years when I decided I wanted to see it).

Counting it up right now, I can think of over two dozen people I know that would consider themselves Star wars fans, and have or will likely have access to Disney+, but I can only think of about six that have seen seven samurai. All folks in their 30s, 40s, 50s,or 60s, with three or four of their teenage children thrown in.

They may not have not seen 7 Samurai but they probably saw the Magnificent Seven remake from just three years back which is basically the same thing. It even had Star Lord in it.

The trope is a well used one throughout many genres and my comments were more of a slight concern rather than criticism. I knew going in to it that this is the basic theme of the series. I just feel it hilarious that some get their feathers all raised when anything other than lavish praise is heaped upon this show.
 
This show is refreshingly different. Just as Rogue One was a familiar contrast to what we’d been given up to that point, so this is a nice change from the more traditional elements of Star Wars.

There is a huge universe out there and Jedi and Empire take up only a little bit of it.

It is great to see others existing in the sandbox.
 
Ah yes, the "Teach The Villagers To Defend Themselves" trope! A true classic, appearing in movie greats such as The Three Amigos and Army of Darkness!
I'm not sure how I feel about it. I guess I don't mind it being used here but they could have used this 30 minutes in other ways. Ah well, there's still more episodes to come.
 
There have been in total, 755 episodes of Star Trek, 12 movies, yet only 7 different stories were told through it all.

It comes down to how they are told that matters.

You will NEVER see an original theme on any screen in days to come. Everything you watch has been done in some form before.

For those who hate it and want to nit pick it to death, I’m very happy for you, that you have new Star Wars to hate.

For those of us who are enjoying it, I’m equally glad for us.
 
I never would have thought a Star Wars live actions series could be good, and I've dreaded it ever since rumors were first floated around even way before the Disney acquisition.

But I'm happy to see this series has proven me wrong. Basically, they've taken the writing of the Clone Wars and made it live action, which is perfect.

I did think it was bit bizarre that this episode is the second time we've seen a Seven Samurai episode between two different series and I wish they would have done something else, but I still enjoyed it. There was enough Baby Yoda to keep me happy.
 
Baby Yoda is awesome, and with a toddler in my house the parallels really hit home "Stop touching things" lol
So far this show is giving me just what I want from Star Wars. The music continues to grow on me as the themes develop, and I'm enjoying the drips of backstory as they come in.
My only nitpick:
What the hell are those fobs tracking? Is baby Yoda chipped?
 
Ideas get reused because they are good. The way the portrayed the at st we know so well the way the villagers saw it, like a monster. I enjoyed it. Star wars itself was patterned after serials. There have been many shows like the incredible hulk, the a team, touched by an agel, quantum leap, supernatural, where our protagonist finds himself helping a new set of strangers. It works and people like to watch it.
 
Good episode but definitely the weakest of the four so far by a long shot. It actually felt strange to watch at times because the acting and fight choreography were so painfully bad compared to what we've seen in the previous episodes, and were it better I think this episode would have been right up there with the rest.. Hell even if they just sped up the fight scene in post a smidge it would have vastly improved it for me, it just seemed more like fake wrestling than an actual brawl. Still hooked though, they can all be winners

Couldn't help but notice this, but it looks like Pascal's visor almost popped out in this scene. Bottoms totally out of place and pushed inward :lol:
Watch The Mandalorian Full Episodes _ Disney+ - Google Chrome 11_29_2019 11_52_05 PM (2).png
 
This episode reminded me of 7 Samurai/Magnificent 7 as well but you know what else it reminded me of?

The bad acting
The fight choreography
The setting
The helpless villagers
The marauders
The AT-ST "monster"

This straight up looked and felt just like an episode of Kevin Sorbo Hercules. Even his cohort looks exactly like Xena haha. I loved that series but it was entertaining because it was self-aware. The cheesy acting and fighting were part of fun. In this episode, the acting was genuinely terrible. Everyone except Mando was bad. That's not a nitpick. That's the truth. Bad acting falls on the director. Howard might be a great director but she did a bad job here. They really should just pick one good director and stick with them.

As for Mando and Mogwai. I liked that we saw his desire to find peace and consider maybe settling on that planet. It was good character building.
 
Good episode but definitely the weakest of the four so far by a long shot. It actually felt strange to watch at times because the acting and fight choreography were so painfully bad compared to what we've seen in the previous episodes, and were it better I think this episode would have been right up there with the rest.. Hell even if they just sped up the fight scene in post a smidge it would have vastly improved it for me, it just seemed more like fake wrestling than an actual brawl. Still hooked though, they can all be winners

Couldn't help but notice this, but it looks like Pascal's visor almost popped out in this scene. Bottoms totally out of place and pushed inward :lol:
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I swear there’s a shot just before this where Cara his his helmet and it’s a rubber stunt helmet that flexes out of the way.
 
For those who hate it and want to nit pick it to death, I’m very happy for you, that you have new Star Wars to hate.

For those of us who are enjoying it, I’m equally glad for us.

The last two years summed up in two sentences.
I have yet to see anyone hate on or nitpick this episode or series to death once yet but you feel the need to pigeon hole people into Star Wars haters and lovers.
 
Tracking the midichlorians of course! :p:p:lol::lol:

But seriously, I hope they address this tracking business. They can't have bounty hunters just showing up no matter where B Yods and Mando are in the universe, without Mando ever thinking "hmmmm, I wonder if I can stop this tracking business working".
 
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