The Mandalorian is reaching for far more than just a story of Din Djarin and Grogu.

Today's post is about The Mandalorian. My particular review is different than ones I've been seeing online regarding The Mandalorian, and I'm going to say that this season has probably been its best yet (most people who write reviews don't seem to be liking it all that much). It's ending soon, but I don't mind at all that Din Djarin has taken a backseat to Bo Katan. The character of Bo Katan has always been interesting, but probably never so much as she is within the framework of The Mandalorian. Here, the story of Bo Katan has been allowed to come about full circle, growing from the Clone Wars character and surviving the death of her sister, the Duchess Satine Kryze, and the apocalyptic destruction of the planet Mandalore to now become a warrior and great leader who represents one of the last hopes of her people. I think that this is the kind of story that Star Wars was meant for, and the Disney + series is uniquely suited to make the whole thing pretty great.

And what was The Mandalorian supposed to be about anyway? It's easy to assume that it was supposed to be the adventures of Din Djarin as he navigates the various customs of his particular Mandalorian cult to which he belongs. Maybe some assumed that he was supposed to be "the chosen one." But it all seems to fit so much better that he isn't "the chosen one." I don't think leadership of that kind seems to be what Din is good at doing. This is in contrast to what Bo Katan is great at doing. I'll be honest here...were I a Mandalorian...I'd follow Bo Katan. She's got an amazing moral compass, and she's tough to boot. Those are two things that I look for in a leader, and I think others do as well.

So, I guess that the Mandalorian now has evolved into a series that is about the struggle of all Mandalorians to become relevant again in the Star Wars universe by restoring their homeworld and relighting the Great Forge. There's going to be a lot of obstacles in the way (as this season has shown us), and there are some pretty bad villains who are heavily invested in extracting beskar from the husk that was Mandalore. If you don't know, beskar is a kind of wondrous metallic alloy that has the ability to provide tremendous protection when it is made into armor, even repelling a blow from a lightsaber. And we've seen that (even though the Jedi are essentially gone) and the Sith are few in number, there do seem to be quite a few instances of people running into those who are wielding a lightsaber (or something similar). So that has gotta come in useful more often than not.

The Mandalorian is essentially morphing into more than what it started out as. At first it was this story of one guy in beskar armor and Grogu, the baby Yoda look alike. But it's now turned into this fascinating struggle of the rise of a great culture from the ashes of a cataclysm. How can you not be in love with that, no matter which character (at the moment) seems to be taking the spotlight? And also, many kudos to Disney to make the episodes so beautiful. Each one is dripping with details and amazing special effects, so that it is indistinguishable from a movie.