'The Book of Boba Fett' Episode 5: "The Return of the Mandalorian" Recap and Review
The series stealthily inserts an episode of ‘The Mandalorian’ as this chapter of the book of Boba Fett is missing its titular antihero.
WARNING: Contains Spoilers
This episode should be seen as a cautionary tale. Even though the temptation is there, thus far The Book of Boba Fett had avoided any direct comparisons to The Mandalorian (at least here at FilmSpeak). This was intended to let ‘The Book’ breath on its own and carve out its own identity without the pressures of being compared to an already successful and beloved series. But it is hard to avoid the comparison when Star Wars creators insert an entire episode of The Mandalorian mid-way through The Book’s first season. What is obviously a fan-service move has served only to highlight the flaws in the series compared to it’s predecessor. The really sad part is that this is a just a mediocre episode of The Mandalorian, and yet it may be the best episode of The Book of Boba Fett.
The episode begins as we join Din Djarin (Pedro Pascal) while he hunts down a bounty in a meat packing plant. He confronts his target and gives him the usual offer of easy way or hard way, his target chooses the hard way. Din fights off his attackers by wielding the mythic Darksaber but it catches him in the leg and injures him. After negotiating with the workers at the plant, he takes the head of his target to the bounty holder located in a bustling club. In exchange for the bounty he trades information that could lead him to familiar friends. He follows the information to the feet of The Armorer (Emily Swallow) and Paz Vizsla (Jon Faverau), his Mandalorian allies. Paz tends to Din’s wounds as he presents The Armorer the Darksaber. She precedes to explain the history of the Darksaber and it’s significance. Din helps The Armorer set up her forge and as her first use of it, she reconfigures the Beskar Spear Din received from Ahsoka Tano (Rosario Dawson) into a gift for Grogu. As The Armorer trains Din to use the Darksaber, Din is challenged by Paz Vizsla for ownership of the Darksaber. Paz and Din duel and the Din finds himself in trouble while trying to wield the Darksaber against Paz. But Din gets the upper-hand and The Armorer stops the duel just before Din can finish the job. It is here that Din reveals that he has broken his creed by removing his helmet in front of others. Din is sent away. Now without allies again, Din takes a commercial flight to a familiar planet, Tatooine. Din visits Peli Motto (Amy Sedaris) to inquire about a ship to replace the Razor Crest. She shows him a broken down Naboo Starfighter. After some major convincing, Din and Peli start on repairs to the ship. After a little elbow grease and help from some resourceful Jawas, they complete the ship, so Din decides to take it for a little spin. The new ship is fast, but maybe too fast, Din is pulled over by a couple of Republic Officers in X-Wings. Din tries to talk his way out of the situation but when an officer recognizes Din’s voice and asks the wrong questions, Din decides to run, but the new ship is too fast for the X-Wings and they let him go. After giving the officers the slip, Din returns to Peli when they are joined suddenly by Fennec Shand (Ming-Na Wen). Fennec offers him money to help Boba in his troubles but Din offers to do it for free, if he can visit Grogu first.
This episode acts as an epilogue for season 2 of The Mandalorian. We see how Din learns of the importance of the Darksaber and it’s meaning to other Mandalorians and how Din replaces the Razor crest. Peppered in the story was a wealth of Easter eggs thrown in for good measure. He returns to the Armorer having broken the creed and is ostracized. This is a nice little way to ensure that Din’s character moves forward and not regress in his character development given that the only way he can restore his honor is seemingly impossible. His duel with Paz could also hint at his future with Bo-Katan (Katee Stackoff); Paz barley hesitated to challenge Din to a duel claiming his right to ownership as his ancestor built it. Paz’s claim was shaky at best, compare that to Bo-Katan’s belief that her destiny to rule as Mandalore and her martial history and it could lead to a very interesting conflict between Bo and Din. The Beskar spear is now no more, The Armorer turned the spear into what looks to be Beskar chainmail for Grogu whom we could be seeing again shortly. During the forge we are treated to a look at the Purge which was fantastic. The scene of fire and destruction gave a nice visual to what has been referenced multiple times in The Mandalorian. After an exciting duel with Paz, he returns to Amy Sedaris’ Peli Motto for a new-ish Naboo Starfighter and any time spent with Amy Sedaris is a treat. The ship looks amazing as a cross between a hot rod and a Naboo ship but might be impractical given Din’s occupation is transporting people against their will. This isn’t the only nod to the prequels either, Din takes his new ship through Begger’s Canyon last seen being raced around by Anikin Skywalker in a Pod Race. A really cool nod for the video game enthusiests was the inclusion of a BD unit like the one used by Cal Kestus who was portrayed by Cameron Monaghan in the game Jedi: Fallen Order. Given the timelines of the game and the series, it’s not impossible that Monaghan could reprise his role in live-action eventually.
The failure of this episode is that it built more excitement for the next season of The Mandalorian than it did for the final two episodes of this season. Seeing Din Djarin in action again just emphasizes the mischaracterization of Boba Fett. Stoic, mysterious, dangerous; these all used to describe Boba Fett but now only describe Din Djarin. What makes it worse is that the episode feels different than the others. The episode’s story progressed Din’s story more than Boba’s has in four episodes. The change in setting made the episode feel fresh even though we returned to the desert halfway through. And despite spending a few minutes too long on the rebuilding of the ship montage it ultimately felt earned given Din’s history with his former ship the Razor Crest. Overall, this is a decent episode of The Mandalorian but another fail for The Book of Boba Fett and points to a lack of effort when planning with Boba Fett’s story.