The Mandalorian and Grogu (2026)

Watched 5/21/26 (theater)

This was long found on my shortlist of favorite tv shows. It still is. Man I love those first two seasons and even have a bit of time for Boba and season 3. They’re such bargain-bin quality writing, but merged with the highest level of cool Star Wars toybox resources. Favreau thought of all the cool Western, Samurai, and fringe Star Wars details he could and he smashed them all together. It was the perfect gimmick for 30 minutes at a time of B-level television. With great setpieces never before seen on your living room screen, payoff-laden world building, and frequent flashes of lore-filled ingenuity… It was a fresh and unique corner of Star Wars—truly special—it gave me so much childhood wish fulfillment that I longed for as a kid growing up on a Clone Wars show that could only do so much with animation.

Mandalorian was the coolest thing ever for a while—but then it never evolved. It devolved, with shareholders forcing Disney (Disney loves to bend the knee) to forego Favreau’s meaningful story ideas for more toy-selling. They reverted on a big plot point. It was bullshit. Everyone hated it, including me. I somehow got my hopes up that a big screen adaptation could kick the creative juices back into gear.

Too bad then, that this same simple tv formula of cheesy new Star Wars mini adventures just doesn’t translate very well to the silver screen for me. The pacing is wildly off, the computer-generated effects are extremely murky/glossy/blurry/distracting, and I absolutely hated the digital creatures. It looked and felt so darn fake to me. Maybe it has always been this bad and my tv screen at home just didn’t expose it as much, but sheesh I was super disappointed in the look of this and it really wore me down.

After what was honestly a pretty badass opening shootout setpiece, the movie just abuses Goransson score beat after Goransson score beat to try and emulate some semblance of an adventure. When it’s 30 minutes a week of a cool lone gunman kicking ass in inventive ways in fancy new locations, it holds a lot of novelty. When 2.25 hours of it are broadcast onto the movie theater screen for all the lack of polish and lack of emotion to show, it’s a different story. I was bored, tired, and frustrated. None of it looks or feels real, and that’s a huge bummer when you go out to the local cinema.

Personally, I just think that 30-minute format afforded the creators a lot more freedom to get weird and immerse the characters in the worlds they visited. I remember each week getting a real feel for new planets and their inhabitants. Sometimes scary, sometimes funny, always visually dynamic.

This felt way too sterile and colorless. Mando and Grogu mostly stay on the same planets with the same EXTREMELY bland[alorian], mostly nameless characters (there is a huge Carl Weathers-sized hole in this movie) and the same piss-poor color palettes washing out any personality that even attempts to make the societies feel lived-in. It all feels so soulless and manufactured and fast! Too fast!! The pacing is wild.

Also—Din Djarin used to be way more clumsy and it added to the excitement. Now that he’s 100% undefeatable, it just kind of ruins the thrills and humor of it all. I liked it more when he had some Jack Sparrow in him. He’s a little less Clint Eastwood now and a little more Sylvester Stallone… Clint allowed himself to lose or be goofy sometimes—but Sly never had the same sense of humor.

Lowlights:

-The general artificiality of every single set and “location”

-Any action scene other than that opening oner

-Grogu roaming around providing plot armor in the shitty-looking forest

-Goransson’s score outside of the first 15 minutes

-Endo the bounty hunter

-Jeremy Allen White’s voice and lines

-Zeb the purple man (who belongs in a 2009 video game)

-The Hutt twins sleeping in 69 formation

Highlights:

-The oner of Mando shooting and flamethrowering stormtroopers on the AT-AT

-The fact that this movie knows what it is and doesn’t try to ascribe higher meaning on itself. Sometimes it is okay to be a movie about nothing.

-That’s it. Honestly, this was a waste of my time and money.

3/10