the Mandalorian

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

I really enjoyed this so far. I wish the episodes were longer.

I enjoy the episodes, but I don't think they've yet matched the top episodes of season 1. Those would be Episode 3 (where he decides to rescue The Child), the finale, and the one on the New Republic prison ship (which is something that not everybody agrees with me on, I think).

The Tatooine stuff is leaning very very heavily on Westerns, which is entertaining.

 

[The Cat]

I enjoy the episodes, but I don't think they've yet matched the top episodes of season 1. Those would be Episode 3 (where he decides to rescue The Child), the finale, and the one on the New Republic prison ship (which is something that not everybody agrees with me on, I think).

The Tatooine stuff is leaning very very heavily on Westerns, which is entertaining.

Im letting the que build up a bit, i just finished season 1 last week. I really liked the IG droid and the Ugnaught.

 

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

Im letting the que build up a bit, i just finished season 1 last week. I really liked the IG droid and the Ugnaught.

Did you like the one on the prison ship with Bill Bur? Something about it reminded me of playing the original Dark Forces, which pleased me.

Also I feel like the level on the Gromas Mines in Dark Forces was inspired a lot by Total Recall, now that I've seen that. With a bit of the original Terminator at the end...

Dark Troopers were scary AF.

 

[The Cat]

Did you like the one on the prison ship with Bill Bur? Something about it reminded me of playing the original Dark Forces, which pleased me.

Also I feel like the level on the Gromas Mines in Dark Forces was inspired a lot by Total Recall, now that I've seen that. With a bit of the original Terminator at the end...

Dark Troopers were scary AF.

I loved that episode and yeah it totally rmeminded me of original Dark Forces. Also Bill Bur's weapons rig reminded me of the Dash Rendar action figure. I really hope he comes back I also liked Space Carl Weathers

 

[Totenkindly]

Did Season 2 end already? I didn't realize until last week new episodes were out and now I think maybe most of them are aired?

I'll be honest -- the series is a nice little diversion / time-passer and a small scale story, so refreshing in that sense. (It's been better than some of the films.) But on the other hand, I don't particularly get excited over watching it either.

It's more like a pleasantly warm bubble bath with an occasional scented rose petal falling down into the tub, versus hot steamy sexytime.

 

[The Cat]

Did Season 2 end already? I didn't realize until last week new episodes were out and now I think maybe most of them are aired?

I'll be honest -- the series is a nice little diversion / time-passer and a small scale story, so refreshing in that sense. (It's been better than some of the films.) But on the other hand, I don't particularly get excited over watching it either.

It's more like a pleasantly warm bubble bath with an occasional scented rose petal falling down into the tub, versus hot steamy sexytime.

it reminds me of the tales of series of short stories from the old EU Tales from the Mos Eisley Cantina, Tales of the BOunty Hunters, and Tales from Jaba's Palace.

 

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

Did Season 2 end already? I didn't realize until last week new episodes were out and now I think maybe most of them are aired?

I'll be honest -- the series is a nice little diversion / time-passer and a small scale story, so refreshing in that sense. (It's been better than some of the films.) But on the other hand, I don't particularly get excited over watching it either.

It's more like a pleasantly warm bubble bath with an occasional scented rose petal falling down into the tub, versus hot steamy sexytime.

There's only been two episodes released so far.

 

[Merced]

Yoda eat Boba

 

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

Yoda eat Boba

kinda, yeah.

 

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

Starbuck! Incidentally, Obi Wan Kenobi had romantic feelings for the character's sister, and considered leaving the Jedi Order because of it. I guess the original backstory for Rey that involved her being a Kenobi ( I wish they would have stuck with her being "nobody" but that would have probably been better than her being a Palpatine; they didn't really have the time to deal with any kind of internal conflict that would make the latter meaningful )would have made her a great niece of Bo Katan.

Also, despite the presence of Mon Calamari and Quarren (like that the mouth tentacles are now articulate!), the planet is not Mon Calamari/Dac, but rather a moon called Trask.

I really like the design of the Gozanti-class cruisers from Rebels, so I dug seeing an episode centered around a live-action one.

 

[Totenkindly]

Watched episode 2 over the weekend.

I am guessing now at the furor over the episode. (I was avoiding reading things.) I was actually put off by the same sort of thing, though, with caveats -- in regards to scripting Baby Yoda.

It just wasn't funny to watch him eat the eggs of the frog alien. She said they were the eggs of the last of her lineage and she had to get home so that their line could continue, after the father invested so much in finding a safe place to incubate their babies. Yet they made a running gag out of Baby Yoda essentially eating her babies. Like... not funny. And even sadder that, if you consider those eggs were the last of their family line, she no doubt knew EXACTLY how many she had and was well aware that eggs were missing ,but had no power or personality to fix that scenario since she was at the mercy of the Mandalorian, so... just kinda horrible.

THe only credibility I will give it is that we then have Baby Yoda eating the offspring of the giant spider monster. So why was the eating of the spider monster's babies funny (riffing off Alien) vs the eating of the frog lady's babies? I think in part it was because of the riff -- it was a genre joke, since the egg facehuggers they were spoofing normally prey on innocent humanoids, so the tables were turned -- and also the spider race was a predator, so our heroes were victims, not initiating the warfare but being preyed up. So that's why it was okay? But it is definitely a comparison of motherhood -- Baby Yoda is damned for eating the eggs of innocent frog lady in dire straits, while lauded for eating the Alien-spoof baby.

 

[violet_crown]

I’m going to have to start watching. My NZ bae Taika Waititi is in the new season. Overall casting for the show is pretty top notch.

 

[Totenkindly]

I’m going to have to start watching. My NZ bae Taika Waititi is in the new season. Overall casting for the show is pretty top notch.

I gotta finish watching Hunt for the Wilderpeople...

 

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

Watched episode 2 over the weekend.

I am guessing now at the furor over the episode. (I was avoiding reading things.) I was actually put off by the same sort of thing, though, with caveats -- in regards to scripting Baby Yoda.

It just wasn't funny to watch him eat the eggs of the frog alien. She said they were the eggs of the last of her lineage and she had to get home so that their line could continue, after the father invested so much in finding a safe place to incubate their babies. Yet they made a running gag out of Baby Yoda essentially eating her babies. Like... not funny. And even sadder that, if you consider those eggs were the last of their family line, she no doubt knew EXACTLY how many she had and was well aware that eggs were missing ,but had no power or personality to fix that scenario since she was at the mercy of the Mandalorian, so... just kinda horrible.

THe only credibility I will give it is that we then have Baby Yoda eating the offspring of the giant spider monster. So why was the eating of the spider monster's babies funny (riffing off Alien) vs the eating of the frog lady's babies? I think in part it was because of the riff -- it was a genre joke, since the egg facehuggers they were spoofing normally prey on innocent humanoids, so the tables were turned -- and also the spider race was a predator, so our heroes were victims, not initiating the warfare but being preyed up. So that's why it was okay? But it is definitely a comparison of motherhood -- Baby Yoda is damned for eating the eggs of innocent frog lady in dire straits, while lauded for eating the Alien-spoof baby.

Well, it seems like the spider things aren't sentient; they're not people like the frog creatures. Looking back, I did see the frog egg eating as kind of weird, but I guess I just don't see it as something worth losing sleep over. With that one Jaime Lannister/ Cersei scene in season 4, that played into real world issues, but this whole thing is so removed from reality that it seems like being vocal about it is silly. Which is I guess why I adopted the handwavey attitude of how she can produce more of those eggs easily enough and they probably don't expect most of the eggs to survive anyway.

 

[violet_crown]

I gotta finish watching Hunt for the Wilderpeople...

That’s been on a watchlist for me for a while, but I simply havent brought myself to see it.

Homecoming is another like that.

 

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

Episode 4 was pretty dope. I think this is my favorite episode of the series so far.

In addition to all that awesome action in the climax, I like that they're really exploring what the galaxy might be like after Jedi. I liked that they showed people trying to rebuild and so forth, and how the empire fits into the new order. It's not just this episode, but it something I really appreciate about this show. It was extremely disappointing to me that the sequel trilogy did not flesh any of this out AT ALL; they just reset everything and tried to pass it off as nothing changing, without ever explaining why in a convincing fashion.

 

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

I'd had a bit to drink last night but I shouted in excitement when

dark troopers showed up

 

[Totenkindly]

I ended up posting my thoughts on the first half of Season 2 here, so I will link it:
https://www.typologycentral.com/for...nt/106724-random-star-wars-3.html#post3291363

I'm aware of who shows up in S2E5 so.... not sure how much my opinion of the season will change with its final half, it's just I hear a lot of water-cooler talk (so to speak) about the season finale, so I'm trying to block all that out and just plow through the last four episodes before it is spoiled for me.

I think Season 2 is an improvement, the show seems to be finding a story through-line with more detail and also is getting a better grasp of its own tone. Also, despite it being a TV show, it's developed some somewhat harrowing action sequences with a bit of gravitas, so that has been cool as well.

 

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

Season 2 for me is kinda what I wanted the sequel trilogy to be, especially in terms of themes and political dynamics.

Season finale was an especially pleasant experience.

 

[Totenkindly]

Okay, I just watched Episode 5 & 6 (so two more to go), right after posting that last bit -- and the whole series has jumped up a notch. Damn. I don't know what they were waiting for, but I feel like there are real stakes now and decent character appearances etc, leading to me wanting to see what happens next.

Dave Filoni directed and wrote Episode 5, and it's definitely higher quality than what came before this season. Whatever the regards for Dawson's comments on Twitter, she does elevate the acting in this episode and is a decent Ahsoka -- I think the only weird thing is that the cartoons/shows previously with Ahsoka make her seem like a teenager, whereas here she is definitely a grown woman beyond her 20's... but whatever.

Decent fight sequences and staging. Love the architecture, which is kind of a scifi aging town with hutong and even an inner sanctum/garden area -- the Asian influences are clear despite the genre being entirely different. Lighting and fog was really great. (I think the only dumb bit is sending pairs/trios of guards into the narrow alleys against a stealth Jedi -- their only real play was the original group cluster with concentrated firepower... this was about as effective as the crew of the Nostromo going after an alien in cramped air ducts... but okay fine.)

But seriously, on the action sequences -- the choreography actually felt movie-quality here, some of the better sword-play -- and especially when Ahsoka and Mando have a short go at it. That is likely how it would have played out.

And we FInALLY have a name for the child (Grogu) and a history for him, at least so we can trace him a bit. I had also forgotten where in the timeline we were -- this is about 5 years after Return of the Jedi, and some years before the First Order appears in the ST.

Getting onto Episode 6, I cheered when Boba gets his armor back and appears just in time to save the day -- and that was AFTER he kicked ass with the tusken raider weapon. Again, decent action sequences with the stormtroopers. How remarkable.

it was also hilarious when the moff enters the cell and Grogu is throwing stormtroopers around -- and the moff just smiles and lets him have his fun. Poor troopers, they get no goddam respect... even by their own side.

Personally, I think some of the cameos are wasted, like Michael Biehn. (Boy he's looking weathered. I kinda had a crush on this guy in the 80's.) But I am always happy to see Ming-Na Wen show up; she has such a great voice. I also appreciate they were able to get Temuera Morrison into this because he has such a pedigree in the role that he took over in the 90's/2000's -- he's looking a bit messed up after his apparently short tenure in the sarlacc, but hey surviving all this shit is pretty impressive.

I should say too, I like how it's actively tying back into the other properties now, and make a deal of locations like Tython, bringing up Alderaan actively, and so forth... it feels little more anchored in the history of the time. Also, seeing a mandalorian take on a jedi briefly... brings more viability to various types of characters we see. In SWTOR half the classes are Force related, but I appreciated their attempts to make bounty hunters and ruffians and troopers viable class types .... and here we do see they actually all have different but powerful capabilities. We even say the HK47's (or whichevere model was used) dragged into things -- the way one of them flipped up on the rooftop was so fluid.