NOVEMBER 22 2019
VIEW: (1080p)

Bravo! I consider this episode slightly inferior to its predecessor, but it's still substantially superior to Ep. 1, so I'm happy to take it. Great story.

I now better appreciate why he's able to bond with the baby Yoda: it hits too close to home and his own traumatized childhood for him to ignore the child's plight. That, and the interesting twist with the Mandalorian Code: an enemy, "unwittingly" helped him. He thus owes baby Yoda a kind of life debt. These two pincers, his own childhood trauma, and the honor built into the Code, dovetail nicely to supply motivation for him to uncharacteristically have empathy for a target. Clever writing, and necessary to establish his character and to propel him further towards even greater development.

This is the stuff that Star Wars has always been made of. Kennedy and her cabal must see The Writing on the wall. How they must hate it.

They arrogantly think that Spectacle trumps Heart. It never has. It never will.

I think that with this episode, we can certainly identify where this series will be consistently hitting a Wall, and what that wall is, and why. The action - it's pretty bad, honestly. Stiff. Up close and not to create a sense of tension filled claustrophobia, but rather to mask the shortcomings of its budget, and the time constraints of a TV series production pace (which is, in itself, enormously tied to budget). Had this had the budget of a film, more careful planning and a ton more retakes would've ensured stronger results when it comes to the action.

Even so, I'll take this any day. No Rey leaping onto the Falcon will ever replace just how vapid and shallow a "character" she actually is. Space horses prancing on the hull of a Star Destroyer won't advance any of Dinsey Wars' characters one whit. Mandalorian's super stiff, "got to (try to) hide the budget constraints" action is eclipsed by the real heart these characters have, and that will always win in the end.

I didn't understand why Crylo's First Order troops had FLASHLIGHTS on their guns. And I don't understand them here, on their ancestors' blasters either.

lol

After all, they had nightvision built into their helmets in the Star Wars Dark Forces game, and that was waaaaaaaaaaay back in 1995! Oh, that's right, "A long time AGO..." Back when Star Wars happened, they didn't have nightvision available.

lol

Again, a budget-friendly way to try to create tension: a dusty dark room, with flashlights shining the potential deadly path of the emitting blaster bolts.

One more point. With this episode, Favreau and company, those who truly love Star Wars and "get it," also get its roots. They are definitely dipping back into superb Japanese source material. In this case, the terrific "Lone Wolf and Cub" series. Kudos to them for being true to Lucas' vision. The glory is theirs, and the enjoyment is ours.

More please!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lone_Wolf_and_Cub

https://duckduckgo.com/?q=lone+wolf+and+cub&t=ffsb&iax=images&ia=images

You're damn right this thing has a lot of heart. I had fucking tears in my eyes while watching this, as I had believed that Star Wars (as I knew it) was over.
If anyone can bring it back, it's Favreau and Filoni. I haven't felt this way about SW since Lucas and Filoni were way into TCW.
I can feel the passion seeping through while watching this show; which I do not feel when watching the sequels. They feel so hollow creatively bankrupt to me.
Deborah Chow did a great job and I have no doubt that she'll do great with the Kenobi series. I hope that Favreau, Filoni and even Lucas will be on hand to assist.

Yeah man, I feel it too. I forgot to mention the one choice that they made with the limited budget that was ABSOLUTELY ESSENTIAL and worked enormously well...

...the effectiveness of baby Yoda's presence. No doubt, that little creature is gobbling up tons of the budget, but it is money very well spent. He feels THERE. Like as in ALL there. Like he has HOPES. Like he KNOWS that he is going to go through ENORMOUS SUFFERING and for all of the wrong reasons. The fuzzy hair on his ears! They had an important purpose, and not just to make him LOOK real, but to also make him feel VULNERABLE. And that made US want to PROTECT him as well.

Is that an accident, that they put those fine baby-hairs on his ears? Those of us who are parents, those of us who STUDY our children in AWE, we SEE those hairs on our own wee ones. Hell no, that is no accident.

And THAT is the level of ABSOLUTE CARE that they're putting into this show. They know that the visible REVEALS the invisible!

Is there ANY of that in the Kennedy Cabal's abomination? Nope! Not a single instance of that. Such a shame. What a waste.

Let's keep our eyes, and ears, and hearts on the Mandalorian, for it is earning our attention with the one quality that always matters.

This episode more or less affirms my guess as to what the Imperial remnant want from the Yoda baby. I think they said 'Extract what you need'. So I'm pretty sure we're talking about Midichlorians here. So that's Force related and I can only assume this has something to do with old Palpy, which we know will return (or appear in a flashback?) in some form in IX.

I liked pretty much the entire episode but I'm starting to feel our Mandalorian has a bit too much luck on his side from time to time. Then again, he never feels invincible either, so I guess it's a good balance. I loved that one shot where the camera was real low during the Stormtrooper shootout and he blasted the Stormtrooper he pulled to the floor with his cord. It was a real beautiful shot, that one.

I also like how they showed the struggle of the Mandalorian to break the code and rescue baby Yoda. There's so much expression without words and no actual face to read in all his actions. You kind of knew he was going to get the kid out of there, but there were some moments I really started to doubt. The moment he picked up the little knob from the lever on his ship, beautiful turning point. I cheered and hoped he'd get him out in time.

What an absolute killer show this is so far. I hope they can keep this quality up for the remainder of the episodes. For sure will buy this series if they release it on BluRay.

I feel there's something horribly broken with Disney Star Wars at the moment. Sure, I like The Mandalorian, for what it is, but it's hardly pushing the concept. It looks and feels like a live action cartoon (which isn't a bad thing), but for me this isn't in the same league, quality wise, as something like Watchmen, Westworld, The Crown etc. (IMHO). I'm now reduced to having to illegally download the best Star Wars currently has to offer (and I appreciate this site for making it possible), because Disney/Lucasfilm have determined content is only available on demand (and not available in the UK).

Another badass chapter. I really think it gets better all the time.

And now we at long last know what that mysterious Cloud City ice cream maker thing was!

In those closing shots of the episode where he takes the throttle knob off the lever and hands it back to baby Yoda with his little hand out stretched !