I'm not watching the show but I'll skim a recap article occasionally. Did anyone see this angle coming? All the promo/marketing positioned this as a "old west"/bad-ass bounty hunter type of thing, but the twist of having a "heart of gold" and the "hard-case does the right thing to protect/befriend a child" (a la
The Professional and a half-dozen others that spring to mind). Feels like it may have been a "from the top" mandate to soften the character. Disney+, after all, isn't about to have a show focusing on a complete tough-guy with no redeeming qualities and who's only concerned with collecting his reward. Not sure that would fly?
"We need to make him a 'good guy' in the eyes of viewers! Oh, and we need to make sure the infant bounty is revealed to definitely be a female at some crucial point...are we allowed to show a vagina on Disney+? Get Iger on the phone..." - K. Kennedy
Not even saying that's a bad thing (the softened, noble tough-guy thing), but it definitely wasn't how the thing was promoted. I guess they wanted to keep the cute baby under wraps until the show actually aired. But do any of you feel like it changes the overall tone of what you expected/bought into? I know he's still a "bad-ass", but it appears those moments will now be more in the protecting of this baby than anything (someone cheating at cards, knocking his helmet off, etc.). Which means, whenever this show wraps up, he'll likely make the Ultimate Sacrifice™ to see that through, and, with his dying breath, telling Baby Yoda to "earn this" as his bounty hunter soul floats up to space heaven.
Serious question follow-up: considering the timing of the release of this TV show, just over a month or so prior to the opening of
Episode IX, is anyone expecting/assuming something will appear in this show that somehow has a connection or payoff in the upcoming trilogy wrap-up? Some sort of character or motivation, tech, location, alliance/partnership, vehicle, weapon, group, etc. that will all make sense when seen in the bigger picture, come December 20? I know the timelines are different, but so was that of Palpatine in ROTJ and this upcoming movie, so that sort of thing obviously matters little in all this (they've established that things happening 30 years ago either mean nothing at all, OR, when convenient, still bear heavily on the events taking place in the sequel trilogy). I just find the timing interesting, two SW releases practically on top of each other, with the first one given a 35-day or so run-up to the big theatrical release, perhaps to set up "something big" (and kinda reward folks who chose to give Disney+ a shot). Chronologically this show does take place prior to
Episode IX, so the idea of some holdover event, character, nugget of information, "the reason why/how", etc. isn't out of the realm of possibility. According to IMDb, there are eight installments in this first season/run. Three have aired and #7 is set to air on December 18, two days prior to the opening of
Episode IX, and the season finale, #8, on December 27, one week exactly after TROS opens. Episode #7 is certainly positioned nicely to drop something interesting that could pay off in the multiplex just two days later...
Or was the timing of the release of
The Mandalorian nothing more than good ol' fashioned marketing/PR, helping stir up interest in
Star Wars as December approaches, and that this is a totally self-contained TV show with no ties whatsoever to anything else? Just something I was wondering about...I can see it going either way, really. Your gut (and history) tells you that nothing regarding this property is done by accident and that everything is planned down to the nth degree, effort is made to ensure all these things "live together", etc.
...but then you also watch the sequel trilogy and realize everyone involved is on dope, working alone in their own offices for months/years at a time, and that
none of it hangs/works together.
