WARNING: Spoilers for Episode 1 of The Mandalorian follow.
In the excitement surrounding the debut of Disney+, one new show has stood out to fans: The Mandalorian. This is one of many original series that were announced for Disney’s new streaming service debuted with its first episode on Tuesday, soon after the launch of Disney+. Set in the Star Wars universe, The Mandalorian is an eight-part series, with a new episode coming each week.
As many die-hard Star Wars fans already know, a Mandalorian is a person who hails from the planet Mandalore. Mandalorians are a multi-species group of people, many of whom are warriors that work as mercenaries and bounty hunters. The planet Mandalore has a troubled past of war and violence, with the majority of the population being killed in a civil war. As a result, many people were exiled to the moon Concordia, a mining settlement located in the Mandalore sector. This is where Jango Fett, the best bounty hunter in the galaxy during the final years of the Galactic Republic, hails from. Fett was chosen as the genetic template for the Clone Army of the Galactic Republic. In exchange, he was given a clone son, Boba. Both Jango and Boba are known for wearing the distinctive Mandalorian-style armor that the protagonist of The Mandalorian also dons.
The Mandalorian is a space western, sharing as many characteristics with Once Upon a Time in the West and The Good, the Bad and the Ugly as it does with any previous Star Wars films or shows. Set five years after the events of Return of the Jedi, the story follows a lone Mandalorian bounty hunter far beyond the reaches of the New Republic. After turning in a series of bounties, the Mandalorian is hired by a man known as The Client to collect a mysterious bounty. Given very little information on his target other than their age, the Mandalorian sets off to the planet Arvala-7. Here he meets a native named Kuiil, who he helps escape criminals inhabiting the area in exchange for information regarding his target’s location. Upon arriving at the location, the Mandalorian encounters IG-11, a droid bounty hunter who is also in search of his target. The two reluctantly join forces in order to bypass the defenses of the facility where the target is hidden. In a small incubator, the bounty hunters find their target, which appears to be an infant belonging to the same species as Master Yoda. IG-11 prepares to terminate the infant only to be shot by the Mandalorian before he can.
So what should viewers make of this revelation? Not much is known about Yoda’s species, which has no name, which is an oddity for a franchise with such rich lore. Besides Yoda and the infant discovered by the Mandalorian, there is only one other known member of the same species in Star Wars canon: Yaddle, a female member of the Jedi Council who is seen briefly in The Phantom Menace. Could this infant be related to or have some other correlation to Yoda? Greenville University student Garrett Johnson certainly believes so. “I feel like if someone wanted him dead so badly, he must be pretty important, so he must be related to Yoda somehow,” Johnson explained.
To find out more about this mysterious creature, be sure to check out the next episode of The Mandalorian, which is set to be released on Friday, November 15th.
