THE MANDALORIAN Episode 5 Discussion Thread

This is a discussion thread, so spoilers ahoy!

There appears to be a fine line between The Mandalorian’s quaint smallness being a strength or weakness because while I enjoyed last week’s sort of meaningless stop into a fun Western trope, I thought this one was way too cute. It all felt a bit too staged this time around. There were aspects of this last week as well, but the question of whether the Mandalorian could ever settle down had at least a little weight to it. Instead, this week co-starred Amy Sedaris as Carla from Cheers. And Mos Eisley Cantina. And some annoying twerp lounging in Han Solo’s chair. For me, it was too much.

And I will say, the green idiot wannabe gunslinger is a solid Western trope, though a tricky one since you have to get the right youngster. They didn’t have that here (his obnoxious introduction sure didn’t help). Really, everyone in this episode felt a bit too pedestrian, from the kid to the bounty to the grizzled rando dogfighting the Mandalorian in the opening. This show started out so weird and wild and full of cool-looking characters. These last two have felt like presentations at the Star Wars Stunt Ranch.

To a certain extent, that’s okay. I really don’t need this show to make groundbreaking narrative steps forward each episode. In fact, an episodic Star Wars Western sounds pretty good. But even in that reality, some will be better than others, especially the more they just lace Star Wars over the most basic Western frames. This is a lesser entry, and that’s okay. Though I am a little surprised Dave Filoni directed it.

Based on the final shot, it looks like things are perhaps going to pick up next week. Until then, what did you all think of episode five?