CoughBoxOfficeDisappointmentCough
I’m a bit confused by the backstory
So the Mandalorians hate the Empire for killing their tribe and stealing their metal, but in the flashbacks it’s the Trade Federation killing them all? Which fits nicely into the timeline as we know it with the Clone Wars being 35 years before the series but also I thought nobody knew the Empire had been secretly backing the Trade Federation?
The flashbacks are about the main character’s childhood. I don’t think he was always Mandalorian - ISTM he was adopted into the culture. So the Mandalorian history is probably separate from his own back story.
Latest episode (4) was lots of fun, IMO. Cliché and not quite as good as the last episode, but still very good. Heavily reminded me of Firefly.
It bugged me that he was taken by surprise by the tracking fob, he knew about those.
Yeah, that was a bit silly.
Is part of The Way of Mandolores that they grow by way of taking in orphans??
In the Amory he essentially tithed some of his beskar to “the foundlings” with either him or the Armorer (forgetting which) saying as a mantra “The foundlings are the future. It is The Way.”
His story may be the archetype for Mandolore history instead of separate from it, and why taking on an orphan and making sure it is safe resonates with them. The bit with never taking off their helmets thereby making more cultural sense as the species we are underneath is immaterial - our helmets, our armor, what we haven chosen as our skin, as our faces, is what matters, it is The Way.
Imagine though if you will a Yoda species Mandalorian!! Way!
It would have to be if almost all of them got wiped out in “the great purge”.
Firefly? It didn’t remind you of Seven Samurai, The Magnificent Seven, Battle Beyond the Stars, The Three Amigos, A Bug’s Life, and an episode of Clone Wars?
Yeah, that only works for very nearly human species. You would have a pretty easy time distingushing between a “Yoda” Mandalorian, a “human” one, a Chevin one, an Amani one, and a Dug one.
I’m imagining a longer standing tradition than that, one that counts as a central tenet of the culture. After all, pregnancy is a bit inconvenient for a dedicated warrior. My imagined bit is that The Way has always been to adopt, not bear children, and their tribe has always been a mix of many species sharing a culture that they actively choose by wearing the helmet and presenting that as their identity, not what species they are. There may be individuals who are the adoptive parents but that to no small degree the tribe raises the foundlings.
Yeah and you can tell Heavy Artillery is a bit different than the others. Big ass human or another species underneath? Maybe others stand out even more. But no shortage of humanoid species in the SW universe and no shortage of ones whose parents are killed off or otherwise absent either …
It would be a nice contrast to the bloodline importance of the Skywalker saga. Among Mandalores our true family is who we actively chose to be of our family as the conscious choice symbolized by never removing the helmet, and our talents are not by accident of birth but by learned skill.
Those too!
Really enjoying the series. I’m getting a firefly vibe as well, not because of the Ep 4 plotline, which as pointed out was hardly original to Firefly, but from that high-tech/low tech mix, I mean you have a droid using a cane basket to catch krill! 
One thing that is bugging me a bit is those trackers. What are they actually keying in on? Surely not some kind of tracking chip on the subject, I’m sure Mando would know of those and destroy it. I know this is space magic, but tracking an individual by what? DNA or something over interstellar distances? I find that hard to swallow. For me it makes the the whole bounty hunting profession a little less impressive. “Yeah, so I just follow the blip anywhere in the galaxy, and capture the guy, easy peasy” Where’s the tracking and hunting skills, that would impress anyone?
Looks like allusions to various Westerns and samurai TV shows and movies.
My impression is that the tracking fobs are short-range - a few hundred meters at best - and that the bounty hunter arrived at the village following rumors of a Mandalorian being involved in a fight.
This was a really good episode that actually got me a little teary-eyed at the end - it was hard having to see Baby Yoda leave behind the friends he made in the village and knowing that the Empire is just going to keep hunting him. There must be very few of his species around if Grand Moff Herzog is so fixated on capturing this one individual.
Incidentally, the latest episode was directed by Bryce Dallas Howard, star of the Jurassic World films. Maybe that’s why the AT-ST was basically a T-rex.
That was literally the best AT-ST driver in the Star Wars universe for not immediately crashing into their boobytrap.
Sure, in addition to the Seven Samurai & associated remakes and retellings, you can also see references to Lone Wolf & Cub; 47 Ronin, The Good, the Bad & The Ugly, etc.
The Star Wars universe owes a lot to Akira Kurosawa and Sergio Leonne.
That doesn’t fly. The timeline, according to IMDB, is set approximately 5 years after Episode 6. The “baby” is supposedly 50 years old.
Now, Son of Yoda, I might go for.