As someone who was feeling pretty burned out on Star Wars, I greatly appreciated that The Mandalorian and Grogu was a standalone story. It’s much easier to have fun when every scene isn’t trying to set up a spinoff, create an applause break for a legacy character, or push forward a larger phase of a cinematic universe.
We also get some solid action and a lot of great creatures—some CGI, some puppets, and some stop-motion. It’s a refreshing visual change that adds a vintage vibe to the film, making it feel more like classic Star Wars than streaming Star Wars.
And, of course, it wouldn’t be The Mandalorian without the incredible music of Oscar-winning composer Göransson. A major highlight is a sequence set in an urban underbelly reminiscent of Blade Runner with a synthy score that elevates the whole experience.
But even with all these solid elements, that’s not to say that The Mandalorian and Grogu is a great film.
The structure is strange. In many ways, it feels like a bundle of episodes squeezed together for a feature film. While that three-episode arc structure worked for Andor, in The Mandalorian and Grogu, it feels like the story concludes, only to keep going into the next story block with a major lag in the middle. Even the die-hard audience in my packed theater was visibly fidgety at the start of the second half.
Some of the dialogue is clunky and obvious, almost as awkward as the prequels. Rotta, in particular, spends the majority of his lines repeating the same two or three sentences about how he wants to be different from his father. It completely limits the character, making me wonder why they even bothered to put Jeremy Allen White in the role.
Overall, if you like the show, you’ll probably like The Mandalorian and Grogu. It’s not particularly memorable, but it’s a fine time at the movies—and at least we didn’t have to endure any CGI legacy characters to come take all the agency away from our protagonists.
Full review on Trashwire here.
