The Mandalorian | Season 1 | Episodes 1 – 8
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For a quick read, go to Review. For a complete summary, go to Recap.
KBear Recap [Read time: 5-7 min]
“I will help you. I have spoken.” Kuiil
Chapter 1: The Mandalorian [Season 1/Episode 1]
The Mandalorian/Mando (Pedro Pascal) uses a tracking fob to find his bounty a Mythrol (Horatio Sanz) in a cantina. Some Trawlers are messing with him; they decide to mess with the Mandalorian, and he quickly kicks their butts. Mando bypasses a land speeder driven by a droid to take one driven by a human to take the Mythrol to his ship, the Razor Crest. A ravinak attacks the land speeder and then the ship. The Mandalorian fights it off and they escape. The Mythrol talks a lot annoying the Mandalorian, he asks to use the Vac Tube to evacuate his thorax, he uses his potty break to try to escape. Mando places him in carbonite. He goes to a cantina to meet with Greef Karga (Carl Weathers), head of the Bounty Hunter Guild. He offers him a big job that doesn’t follow the usual procedures. The Mandalorian meets the Client (Werner Herzog), he is surrounded by Imperial Stormtroopers. Dr. Pershing (Omid Abtahi) walks in the room, the Mandalorian pulls out his gun, the stormtroopers pull theirs, it’s a standoff for a few moments. Pershing wants to make sure he brings the asset back alive. The client doesn’t give him that much info to find it. Makes a down payment of a bar of beskar. He goes underground to a Mandalorian covert, where the Mandalorians are staying. He presents the beskar to the Armorer (Emily Swallow) who makes it into a pauldron for his shoulder. She asks if his signet has been revealed, he replies not yet. He has a flashback to when he was a foundling in a middle of a battle. He goes to planet Arvala-7 and fights two creatures called blurggs. He is saved by an Ugnaught named Kuiil (Nick Nolte [voice over]). The Mandalorian learns to ride one. Kuiil is helping Mando because he wants him to get rid of the Nikto gang holding the Mandalorian’s asset. When he gets to the compound, an IG-11 droid (Taika Waititi [voice over]), who is another bounty hunter begins a fire fight with the gang. After agreeing to split the bounty, the two take down the Nikto gang. The asset is a child, from the same race as Yoda. IG-11 was commissioned to kill Baby Yoda, the Mandalorian kills the droid, saving the child.
Chapter 2: The Child [Season 1/Episode 2]
Baby Yoda is in his floating pram next to the Mandalorian, Trandoshans attack Mando, he successfully fights them off, he finds tracking fobs on them. As he tries to mend his injury, Baby Yoda tries to heal the wound, Mando doesn’t know what he’s trying to do and puts the child back in his pram. When they get back to the Razor Crest, Jawas have stripped it down. The Mandalorian chases after them in their sand crawler. He tries to climb on top of it, but the Jawa shoot and throw objects at him, knocking him off the sand crawler. Mando and Baby Yoda go back to his ship, it can’t fly. They walk through the desert to get help from Kuiil. The Ugnaught tells him he can trade with the Jawa to get his parts back. Kuiil takes Mando to the Jawa. They welcome Kuiil, but not the Mandalorian, probably because he disintegrated some of them. Kuiil convinces Mando to put his weapons away so they can talk. The Jawa want him to bring them The Egg. They drop the Mandalorian and Baby Yoda off in front of a cave. Mando goes in and is attacked by a huge mudhorn. His rifle jams, he uses his flamethrower on the creature. The mudhorn is kicking his butt. The Mandalorian pulls out his knife to fight the charging mudhorn, preparing to die. Baby Yoda uses the force to lift the mudhorn, allowing Mando to stab it in its head. The strain of using the Force knocks him out. The Mandalorian goes back into the cave and finds the mudhorn’s egg. The Jawa are preparing to leave when Mando and Baby Yoda show up with the egg. The Jawa crack open the Egg and eat its yolk. They use a blurgg to carry his ship parts back to Kuiil’s farm. He helps Mando put the ship back together. Once they are back in space, Baby Yoda wakes up.
“This is the Way.” The Armorer
Chapter 3: The Sin [Season 1/Episode 3]
Baby Yoda gets out of the pram and plays with a knob on the control panel. They land back on Nevarro. The Mandalorian delivers the child to the Client. Dr. Pershing examines Baby Yoda. The client pays Mando the rest of the beskar as promised. Mando asks what he plans to do to the child, the Client won’t tell him. He goes to the underground covert to have the Armorer make him new armor. Other Mandalorians gather around him, a large Mandalorian, Piz Vizsla (Tait Fletcher) accuses him of consorting with their enemies. The beskar bars have the Imperial stamp, the beskar was gotten during the Great Purge. It’s the reason the Mandalorians are in hiding. The two men pull knives on each other and begin to fight, the Armorer stops the fight by reminding them the Empire is defeated. She asks Mando has he ever removed his helmet to others, or had it removed, he says no. She is satisfied with his answer. The Armorer tells them their way of life makes them hunters or prey. They all say, “This is the way.” Back to Mando, the Armorer wants to make his signet the mudhorn, but he says it wasn’t an honorable kill, his enemy helped him, she asks why, Mando admits because the asset didn’t know he was the enemy. Since she won’t make him a signet, she’ll make him some whistling birds for close combat. While that is going on, the Mandalorian has another flashback to his family being attacked by droids.
The Mandalorian walks into the cantina with new armor. He sees that all the bounty hunters had also gotten tracking fobs for the child. Greef is happy, he made a nice profit off Mando turning in the child, he shows Mando a bar of beskar. The Mandalorian wants a new assignment to Greef’s surprise. Mando asks Grief what they are going to do the kid, Greef didn’t ask because it’s against the Guild code, he advises Mando to forget about it. The Mandalorian is back aboard the Razor Crest ready to take off, he sees the knob that Baby Yoda was playing with. He decides to get the kid back. Mando goes to the Client’s residence, he finds the child’s pram in the trash. Using his helmet, he listens in on the Client and Dr. Pershing’s conversation about the child. The Mandalorian begins his assault into the stronghold. Dr. Pershing begs Mando not to hurt the child. He tells Mando he protected the child. Mando takes Baby Yoda as they make their escape. The Mandalorian takes out some stormtroopers, when he is surrounded by others, he uses his whistling birds on them. The tracking fobs in the cantina go off, all the bounty hunters are after Mando and Baby Yoda now. After beating the stormtroopers, he must now fight his fellow bounty hunters. He gets on a speeder and shoots it out with them. Mando runs out of ammo, it looks hopeless, but his fellow Mandalorians arrive in jetpacks to save the day. Paz tells him to get to his ship, they will hold the bounty hunters off. When he gets to the Razor Crest, Greef is on board waiting for him. They shoot it out and Mando hits Greef, fortunately for Greef the shot hits the bar of beskar he was carrying. As he’s taking off, a Mandalorian wearing a jetpack salutes him. The Mandalorian: “I gotta get one of them.”
Chapter 4: Sanctuary [Season 1/Episode 4]
Villagers are fishing for krill, they hear gunfire in the distance, a mother grabs her daughter, and they hide under a basket in the pond. The Klatooinina raiders attack and steal the village’s supplies. The mother Omera (Julia Jones) and her daughter Winta (Isla Farris) are safe. Aboard the Razor Crest, Baby Yoda is playing with the lights on the control panel. They are heading to a backwater planet, Sorgon to hide. When they land, Mando tells Baby Yoda to stay while he checks the planet out and finds them lodging. When he looks down, Baby Yoda is right beside him, so he lets him come. They walk into the local watering hole. He spots a woman who looks out of place, he asks the common house proprietor (Ida Darvish) about her, she doesn’t know who she is, she’s been in town for about a week. When he looks up, the woman is gone, he asks the proprietor to look after the child. The mystery woman, Cara Dune (Gina Carano) ambushes him. They are evenly matched as fighters. They pull their guns on each other on the ground, they look up and Baby Yoda is enjoying a cup of bone broth, Mando asks Cara if she’d like some soup. Over soup, Cara explains she was a shock trooper for the Alliance, left after the war when her unit’s mission turned to peacekeeping. She’s hiding out in Sorgon, she thought he was a bounty hunter looking for her. Since she got here first, he’ll have to leave. The krill farmers arrive at the Razor Crest and ask for his help in protecting them from the Klatooinina raiders. He isn’t interested until they mention they live in the middle of nowhere. The Mandalorian goes back to the common house to get Cara to join him, it would be a great place for her to hide out too. He thinks the job should be easy for both of them to handle.
Omera sets up his and Baby Yoda’s living space. Winta asks if she can feed Baby Yoda, and play with him. Omera bring Mando some food, she asks how long it’s been since he’s taken it off in front of anyone. He tells her since he was around Winta’s age and took the creed. Cara and Mando go on patrol, they find Imperial Walker tracks in the woods, the Klatooinina’s have an AT-ST. The Mandalorian and Cara inform the villagers they must leave, the villagers say they won’t go, they volunteer to fight. Cara doesn’t think it’s a good idea, but Mando agrees to train them. We get a montage of Cara and Mando training the villagers to shoot and use sharpened sticks as weapons. The two draw up a plan, they will go to the Klatooinina’s camp and draw them out, they have the villagers make barricades around the village for the Klatooinina raiders and dig a deep ditch for the AT-ST to trip and fall in. The Mandalorian and Cara attack the Klatooinina raider’s camp, causing a lot of damage and they get the AT-ST to chase them back to the village. The village children and Baby Yoda hide in the barn, while the adults wait for the attack. The AT-ST won’t step in the trap, so Cara goes out to lure it in, once she does, Mando throws a detonator into the command center and blows it up. The other attacking Klatooinina raider’s see this and run. A few weeks later, life is peaceful. The village kids really love Baby Yoda. Omera tells Mando that Baby Yoda really loves it here and it is a good place for them to stay. Cara smiles and asks the Mandalorian what happens if he takes off his helmet, will the other Mandalorians kill him; he tells her he just won’t be able to put it back on. She tells him he could stay here with a pretty, young widow and enjoy life. He points out that people will hear about their fight and it will attract attention. They should think about leaving, but he thinks he is going to leave Baby Yoda here, being with him is no life for a kid. Cara tells him it will break the child’s heart. Mando says we all live through that. A Kubaz bounty hunter with a tracking fob tires to shoot Baby Yoda, but Cara gets the drop on him and shoots him. People know they are here, so they must leave. Winta cries when she hugs Baby Yoda, Omera will miss Mando. He says goodbye to Cara who will stay on the planet.
“Your name will be legendary.” Fennec Shand
Chapter 5: The Gunslinger [Season 1/Episode 5]
A bounty hunter in a fighter is chasing the Razor Crest, he damages one of the ship’s engines, but the Mandalorian outmaneuvers him and blows up the other ship. Everything on his ship begins to shut down, Mando restarts the ship with auxiliary power. He is forced to land on Tatooine at the Mos Eisley spaceport. Three repair droids head towards the Razor Crest, but Mando chases them away. The human mechanic, Peli Motto (Amy Sedaris) looks over the ship, massive repairs will be needed. He leaves to find work to pay for the repairs. She hears crying on the ship and is surprised to see Baby Yoda. She holds the child and playfully tells him she is going to charge extra for babysitting. The Mandalorian goes into the cantina and a man named Toro Calican (Jake Cannavale) has a job for him, helping him bring in Fennec Shand (Ming-Na Wen), a wanted assassin. Mando has heard of her, she’s an elite mercenary who has worked for the biggest crime lords, he doesn’t want the gig. Toro needs this job to join the Guild so he will give Mando all the money for it. Mando agrees, asks for the tracking fob, Toro destroys it so Mando will need him. He tells Toro to bring two speeder bikes and leaves to check on Baby Yoda. He can’t find him on the ship, but finds the child with Peli, who lectures him about leaving a baby alone on a ship. He thanks her for looking after the child and he leaves with Toro.
They spot two Tuscan Raiders in front of them, suddenly two are behind them. Mando trades Toro’s macrobinoculars for safe passage. They find a dewback dragging a man behind it, the Mandalorian goes to investigate, it’s another bounty hunter, Fennec shoots at him but hits his beskar armor. He advises Toro they wait tonight. Riding towards her on their speeder bikes, they toss flash chargers to blind her scope. She hits Mando but Toro gets behind her and captures her. Mando tells Toro to get the dewback so they can bring her in, he doesn’t trust Mando and tells him to do it. When the Mandalorian leaves, Fennec tells him that Mando is wanted by the Guild for shooting up some stormtroopers and taking the asset, a child. Toro saw Baby Yoda when he brought the speeder bikes. She convinces him that Mando is a bigger prize than she is, he agrees, turning in the Mandalorian will make him a legend. He shoots Fennec and thanks her for the idea. Mando comes back and finds Fennec dead. When he gets back to the space dock, he finds Toro holding Peli and Baby Yoda hostage. He uses a flash charge to blind Toro and shoots him. He pays for his repairs with Toro’s money. Someone comes upon Fennec’s body.
Chapter 6: The Prisoner [Season 1/Episode 6]
The Mandalorian lands on a space station, run by Ranzar “Ran” Malk (Mark Boone Jr.), someone he used to work with. Ran wants to spring one of his associates, he has a four-person crew, and he wants Mando to join them, he needs the Razor Crest for transport. The crew: the man running point, Mayfield (Bill Burr); the muscle, a Devaronian named Burg (Clancy Brown); a droid named Zero (Richard Ayoade [voice over]); and a female Twi’lek named Xi’an (Natalia Tena), an old flame of Mando’s. She still has some issues with him. The prisoner is on a New Republic prison ship, Mando doesn’t want to run afoul of the New Republic, but he’s back on board the mission when they tell him the ship is manned by droids. Ran wanted the Razor Crest because it is off the grid, it’s not on the New Republic or Empire register, it’s a ghost. It can sneak up on the prison transport and jam the New Republic code. Zero will fly the ship because it’s a better pilot than Mando. They take off. The crew are assholes, and they keep messing with the Mandalorian, they want to see what is beneath his helmet and Mayfield tells Burg to take it off. When they scuffle, the compartment that Mando hid Baby Yoda opens. He tells them the child is his pet to get them to move on.
They make it to the prison transport, Zero gets close and scrambles their signals. Mando, Mayfield, Burg, and Xi’an board the ship. They avoid some security droids, but Burg shoots a maintenance droid bringing the attention of some other security droids, Mando gets behind them and takes them out. Zero gets control of the ship’s surveillance system and cuts off any other alarms. They break into the control room, and a New Republic Soldier (Matt Lanter) is there. He holds a gun on them, the Mandalorian tries to calm the situation down. The rest of his crew aren’t following his lead and soon he has his blasters on Mayfield and Burg, Xi’an throws a knife and kills the New Republic soldier. When she does that, it sets off his tracking beacon. A New Republic strike force will be there in 20 minutes. The person they were sent to rescue is Qin (Ismael Cruz Cordova), Xi’an’s brother. He hates Mando, and they lock Mando in his cell. Zero receives a message Greef Karga is trying to send to Mando. It sees Baby Yoda but before it can get him, the child hides. Mando breaks out of the cell and proceeds to hunt down his former crew. Qin is ready to abandon his sister. The Mandalorian uses the transport doors to take out Burg, Xi’an throws knives at Mando, but he overpowers her, he and Mayfield fight and he defeats him. Qin surrenders to Mando, his code requires him to turn Qin in to Ran. Zero catches up with Baby Yoda, preparing to shoot him, the child tries to use the force to protect himself, but Mando shoots Zero. Mando hands Qin to Ran, he pays him. As the Mandalorian takes off, Ran plans on using a gunship to blow up Mando’s ship. Qin realizes he has the tracking beacon on him. Three New Republic X-Wings show up and destroy the space station. Mando didn’t kill Burg, Xi’an and Mayfield, he threw them in a cell together.
Chapter 7: The Reckoning [Season 1/Episode 7]
Greef sends Mando a message, he wants him to kill the Client. He’s taken over the town with more stormtroopers. His death is in both their interests. Greef wants to use the child as bait; if Mando kills the Client, he can keep Baby Yoda and Greef will clear him from the Guild’s books, he won’t have to live in exile. The Mandalorian goes back to Sorgon to pick up Cara Dune, she is fighting a male Zabrak fighter, they are connected by a laser tether, she beats him and collects money from him and the other cantina patrons. He tells her what Greef said and he’d like her to cover his back. She initially doesn’t want to get involved fighting a warlord until she finds out the Client is an Imperial. She’s in. Baby Yoda is messing with the control panel, so they pick up Kuiil to watch the kid. When they get to his farm, IG-11 serves them tea. Cara and Mando pull their guns but Kuiil assures them that he rebuilt it and retrained it. It’s not a hunter now. Kuiil will help them to keep Baby Yoda from Imperial slavery, but he’s bringing IG-11 to be Baby Yoda’s nurse, and his blurggs. He asks why Mando hates droids, Mando says he hates IG-11 because he tried to kill Baby Yoda, leaving out why he hates all droids. On board the Razor Crest, Mando and Cara are arm wrestling, Baby Yoda thinks she’s hurting Mando, so he tries to force choke her. Mando convinces him Cara wasn’t hurting him, she’s shaken up about it. Kuiil has heard of such things but isn’t sure what it was.
Greef is waiting for them in an isolated spot in Nevarro. He brought some men with him but is surprised Mando brought some people with him. Later that evening they are attacked by flying lizards, they take a blurgg and one of Greef’s men and injure him before they can chase the creatures away. The creature poisons him, it looks bad, but Baby Yoda walks over to him and heals his wound. When they get to the edge of town, Greef’s remaining men slowly pull out their guns, but he shoots them. He explains to the Mandalorian that his plan was to kill him and take the child to the Client, but he can’t do it now because Baby Yoda saved him. They draw up a new plan, Greef and Cara will pretend like they captured Mando. Kuiil will take Baby Yoda back to the ship. Greef and Cara deliver Mando to the Client. He wants to see the child, but before he can open the pram, he receives a call from Moff Gideon (Giancarlo Esposito). He has his Death Troopers shoot up the room, killing the Client and his stormtroopers. The Mandalorian, Cara, and Greef were able to dive for cover. Moff Gideon lands in his TIE Outlander fighter, his stormtroopers arrive to back up the Death Troopers. Mando calls Kuiil to see if they got back to the ship. Two Scout Troopers (Jason Sudeikis and Adam Pally) intercept the message and take off on their speeder bikes. They catch up with Kuiil and kill him, taking Baby Yoda.
“Come on baby! Do the magic hand thing.” Greef Karga
Chapter 8: Redemption [Season 1/Episode 8]
The Scout Troopers are at the edge of town, talking about how terrifying Moff Gideon is, waiting for permission to enter with Baby Yoda. The Scout Trooper who has the child keeps smacking the knapsack he’s in. The other Scout Trooper wants to see what he looks like. They shoot at an object for target practice and miss it. The other Scout Trooper checks in on Baby Yoda, he bites him, and the Scout Trooper smacks him. IG-11 appears, it tells them it’s the child’s nurse. They order it to leave, but it violently kills them and rides off with Baby Yoda. Mando tells Cara and Greef that the Mandalorians live down in the sewers, so they should escape through them. Greef wonders what the stormtroopers are waiting on, they find out it’s to set up an E-web heavy repeating blaster. Moff Gideon addresses them, he shows that he knows who they are, he knows that Cara is an Alderaanian survivor, he knows who Greef is, and he calls the Mandalorian by his name, Din Djarin, and tells him he was at the Siege of Mandalore and the Night of a Thousand Tears. He tells them they have until nightfall to surrender. Cara can’t believe this is Moff Gideon, he was convicted of War crimes. The Mandalorian confirms he is Moff Gideon, he was on Mandalore during the Great Purge, he was in the Imperial Security Bureau office, that’s why he has records on him. That’s the only way he’d know his name, he wasn’t born on Mandalore. Flashback: his village is attacked by Separatist droids; his parents hide him in a basement. They are killed, a droid opens the door and prepares to kill him but a Mandalorian destroys the droid and safes him. He flies him to safety with his jetpack. Mando realizes the only reason he hasn’t killed them because he doesn’t have Baby Yoda. He tries to contact Kuiil but IG-11 answers, it tells him that Kuiil was terminated and it has the child. IG-11 is riding back into town, it guns down the stormtrooper in its way, using its body to shield Baby Yoda. This allows Mando, Cara, and Greef to get out of the Client’s headquarters and shoot up stormtroopers. The Mandalorian gets hold of the E-web blaster and guns down the stormtroopers. Moff Gideon shoots the ammo next to Mando and injures him. Greef and Cara drag him back inside. IG-11 and Baby Yoda have made it to the site. Cara has IG-11 open the sewer crate they had found. Mando gives her his mythosaur necklace and asks her to take the child to the Mandalorian covert, give them his necklace and say that Din Djarin sent her, they will help her. He won’t let her take off his helmet to help him. Gideon sends a trooper to burn the cantina down, Baby Yoda uses the force to send the fire ball back on the stormtrooper. Cara makes IG-11 promise to bring Mando with it. IG-11 convinces him to remove his helmet since it isn’t a living thing. IG-11 patches him up and brings him down to the sewer.
They are looking for the rest of the Mandalorians to escort them to safety. What they find instead are Mandalorian helmets, they are all dead. Mando accuses the bounty hunters of killing them, but Greef says it wasn’t them. The Armorer appears, she confirms Greef’s story, the Imperials arrived and killed them. She is melting their helmets. She asks if Baby Yoda is the enemy Mando spoke about helping him with the mudhorn. He tells her the child can move things with his mind, she tells them of an ancient order of enemy sorcerers to the Mandalorians called Jedi. She assures Mando that Baby Yoda isn’t an enemy, but that he must take Baby Yoda to his people or the Jedi. Until he does, since Baby Yoda is a foundling, Mando must act as his father. The Armorer make him a mudhorn signet and tells him that he and Baby Yoda are a clan of two. She tells them to go to the river, she’s staying. They leave her and the stormtroopers show up. The Armorer uses her tools to wipe out the stormtroopers. The crew makes it to the lava river and get in a boat piloted by a droid. When they get near the end of the tunnel Mando detects stormtroopers waiting for them. IG-11, against Mando’s protests, uses its self-destruct mechanism to kill the stormtroopers to save its companions. Moff Gideon shows up in his TIE fighter, Mando uses the jetpack the Armorer gave him to fight him in the air. He uses his grappling line to attach himself to the TIE fighter, he places a denotator on it and blows it out of the sky. Greef invites the Mandalorian back into the Guild, but Mando declines, he must find Baby Yoda’s people. He invites Cara, she tells him she has warrants, he tells her he can take care of them if she’s his enforcer. So, it looks like she’ll be staying around. The Mandalorian and Baby Yoda are back aboard the Razor Crest and they take off. The Jawa surround Gideon’s wreck, to their surprise, he uses the Darksaber to get out of the downed fighter.
KBear Review [Read time: 1-3 minutes]
I used to watch old westerns with my late father, one series we used to watch was Wanted: Dead or Alive starring a pre-movie star Steve McQueen. It was about a bounty hunter who went throughout the west chasing down wanted men. He was good with his gun and fist, and always got his man. That sounds familiar. Back then, [late 50s early 60s], a lot of the westerns were 30-minute long episodes. The Mandalorian reminds me of those old westerns, especially with its episodic structure. Like those shows we go on fun adventures with our hero every week. One of the strengths of this show is its ability to introduce new characters, new planets and adventures each week. It’s not heavily serialized like most shows on streaming services are. The action is fantastic, the fights are well choreographed, and the stunts are executed with aplomb. When I think about it, it reminds me of the original trilogy. It also has a western feel, with all the planets they went to being backwater planets. As in the original trilogy, the world the Mandalorian lives in is lived in. The towns are dusty, the machines are dirty and rundown looking. The creature design is excellent, all the actors look like the Star Wars aliens we remember. Their greatest creation is Baby Yoda. Using a real puppet instead of special effects was a brilliant idea. It feels alive like the original Yoda did. It’s easy to see why he’s so popular. The first season was fun, exciting and vibrant. The plots were straight forward. Mostly it’s the Mandalorian doing something cool and badass while Baby Yoda does something cute and adorable. Why mess with a winning combination. The show doesn’t have a lot of hidden meanings, but I guess you could say it’s an examination of a society emerging from a fascist state, something we might be going through after this election. Mainly though it’s about a dude who does cool stuff with his cute sidekick. The high production value you expect from the Star Wars universe was evident in each episode. I can’t wait for the second season starting this Friday.
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