An intriguing start that becomes glorified Mandalorian 2.5… but this is not a bad thing
Book of Boba Fett Volume one
The finale of Disney’s Book of Boba Fett dropped a few days ago and I had to binge watch the series to catch up. When first announced I was not interested at all, it just looked like another random side show that featured a side character from a popular franchise that Disney wanted to exploit for money, I’m looking at you Falcon & Winter Solider, Loki, Hawkeye. Was the Book of Boba Fett able to change my mind? Lets find out….
MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD FOR THE BOOK OF BOBA FETT & THE MANDOLORIAN
From the off, I will say that the Book of Boba Fett surpassed my expectations (although they were not very high”) even before the takeover of the Mandalorian.
Episodes 1-4
The fate of Boba Fett was that he was assumed dead after Return Of The Jedi, that was until he showed up in the second season of The Mandolorian and this show delves deeper into how he escaped the sarlacc pit and his road to recovery. I really liked the Tuskan arc, its believable that the Tusken’s would initially take a stranger captive only for him to prove his worth and gain the trust of them by saving one of their own. Star Wars is really good at making me care for characters that don’t speak a word of English and I ever thought I would care for a group of Tuskens especially after Attack Of The Clones.
The show spends a decent portion of its programming developing the bond between Boba and The Tuskans as they seek to end a spree of killings in the desert and It worked for me as we see Boba training to become back to his best. That’s why it was sad to see them massacred off screen, I think if they showed some glimpse of it, it would have been really powerful as I had become attached to them all.
I see criticisms of Boba Fett becoming too soft in this show and I agreed to until I thought about the fact he stopped with a village of people, become nearly a family with them to find them all brutally killed and with Boba’s history of killing I think this was the last straw and so he wanted peace over war which sets up his motivations for the present day portions.
I was not a fan of the group of hipsters (called the mods i think?) that aided Fett, they did not suit the planet at all and were just boring and unlikable. What were those light up bikes they drove too, deary me. They just seemed like a bunch of bratty teenagers trying to look edgy, why would Boba recruit them? I would say there the worst characters of the show to be honest and I can’t remember any of their names.
Episodes 5 & 6
The next two episodes completely change the focus of the show with the story now following on from the ending of the second season of The Mandalorian. I liked both of these episodes , I enjoyed the intense duel between Mando & Paz Visla for the Darksaber with our hero being manhandled and nearly tasting death. I also liked how we took a deeper look into the background of Mandalore and the children of the watch, the group Mando gets kicked out of after admitting to removing his helmet a big no no.
Episode 6 focuses on the training of our favourite little green friend Grogu as he tries to rediscover his force ability under the guidance of Luke. I’ve always wanted their to be some sort of film or TV show adaption that focused on Luke’s Jedi academy post empire after playing ‘Star Wars: Jedi Academy’ on PC. I enjoyed the training montage as well as the flashback to Order 66 which I am an absolute sucker for. It begs the question who saved Grogu? Hopefully this will be explored in Mando Season 3.
Note: I’m sorry but I don’t think I will ever get use to CGI Luke, it just doesn’t look right at all and his face is creepy at times.
Last episode we also see the live action of Cadd Bane the ruthless bounty hunter known for this time in clone wars and although his run was short lived he was quite the intimidating figure and I didn’t have any problems with his appearance like some did. His death was pretty cool with Boba outsmarting his fellow bounty hunter and delivering a quick fatal stab in a swift maneuverer. A quick death for someone of near iconic status but I’m still satisfied with what we got.
The Finale
I enjoyed the finale for the most part but it had it’s flaws. From my earlier point about star wars making me feel for aliens who don’t speak a word of English, you can imagine i was hurt to see the Gamorians fall to their deaths after being trapped. As much as I liked that our heroes had been betrayed it also exposed one of star wars flaws and that is plot armor. For example after being hit multiple times prior, Black Krrsantan was pinned down by multiple enemies all armed with weapons who looked like they would kill him and then next scene he appears out of nowhere, gets shot multiple times again and still manages to survive. It just kills tension and credibility really. Furthermore our hipster friends are backed into a corner heavily outnumbered and none of them die. Our heroes then fight back and kill a load of pikes all of which bodies mysteriously disappear as more reinforcements arrive its like a video game. Later on the Rancor throws a whole speeder ship at the good guys and none of them are even injured let alone killed.
Note: When facing the huge shielded droids why didn’t Mando double jump and slam the darksabre into the shield to break it :).
Last episode we also saw the live action debut of Cadd Bane the ruthless bounty hunter known for this time in clone wars and although his run was short lived he was quite the intimidating figure and I didn’t have any problems with his appearance like some did. I feel he maybe could have been introduced earlier in order to flesh out his character more for those unfamiliar with the animated series. His death was pretty cool with Boba outsmarting his fellow bounty hunter and delivering a quick fatal stab in a swift maneuverer.
It may seem I’m just criticising the final but there were plenty of parts I enjoyed:
- Boba & Mando teaming up
- Fennec Shand brutal hanging of the mayor
- Fennec Shand general badassary
- Boba and Cadd Bane standoff
- The Whole rancor sequence
- Grogu in Mando’s gifted armor
- Grogu’s hugs
Note: Is it just me or does Grogu walking around remind you of team America world police?
Overall Judgement
Overall, a decent show that I think surpasses Mandalorian Season one but not season two. Boba the main main seems to surrender the spotlight of his show within the last few episodes which disrupts the pacing of Boba’s story and adds very little to it minus the finale episode. I’m a big fan of Ludwig Göransson and his scores remains of the highest calibre for this show. A fun watch that has it’s pacing issues and flaws but overall brings the action and interesting characters that we all love from the Star Wars universe.
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