The Book of Boba Fett finale argues for community over self-interest.
Amidst the din (see what I did there) of an action-packed showdown, the show cinches its overarching themes.
The Short Take:
The big battle I expected juggles previous episodes’ balls (and mostly keeps them in the air) in an action-heavy yet emotionally satisfying finale.
[Riding these SPOILERS like a bantha.]
The Long Take:
If I’ve learned anything about these new Disney+ shows, it’s that they subscribe to the Chekhov’s gun principle. The Marvel shows especially have had a habit of getting fans worked up in wild speculation about which mega character could show up at the very end or who’s really behind it all. But, in retrospect, the answers were hiding in plain sight. I don’t want to spoil WandaVision for those who just came for a Star Wars review, but feel free to start playing the popular bop from that show in your head now, if you know what I mean.
Chekhov’s rancor is very much at play in The Book of Boba Fett. There may have been shocking cameos along the way, but in terms of how the story would resolve itself, we already have everything we need by the time the finale begins. Some Hutts gift a rancor to Boba Fett and he says he wants to learn to ride it? We see him riding it (in grand fashion, I might add) in the finale as a way to save the day at the 11th hour. The mayor’s majordomo says that his boss has joined up with The Pykes and a bunch of Pykes get off a commercial starship at the end of an episode? There’s your big bad for the finale. Mando visits Grogu but can’t actually see him? The little guy surprises his pops and saves his life — you guessed it — in the finale.
I had a feeling this would happen, and I tried to manage my expectations accordingly. I know there were rumors about Han Solo and Chewie showing up, and many were confident that a character like Qi’ra from Solo: A Star Wars Story was actually pulling the strings behind The Pykes. I thought at most we might see an end credits scene with Emlia Clarke’s Qi’ra; we didn’t even get that.
And that’s okay! What this episode demonstrated, more than anything else, is that this show, between the Boba flashbacks, Mos Espa in the present day, and the Mando/Grogu interlude, had plenty in it already. In uniting different subplots and characters against a common enemy, in rallying all of Tatooine to essentially boot the Pykes and take back their planet, this show took a lot of disparate pieces — including digressions that often confused viewers — and made them cohesive in the end.
My one ask for this episode was that the action remain coherent and not get too busy. And I think, for the most part, I could keep track of who was where when and how the cuts between different characters and locations fit together. The set-up of the three crime families and the three districts of Mos Espa earlier in the season certainly helped with that.
Even if the unification of disparate groups helped organize all the action, the tone felt a little off to me. The one world, one Tatooine, let’s join hands even though I’m a country girl and you’re a city rat bit was a little hokey. I’m all for two strong women teaming up, but the overt noting of the differences between the Freetown sharpshooter and Drash — seemed at best heavy-handed and at worst self-congratulatory. That may be worth effectively providing closure to an otherwise uneven season.
I found the resolution of Boba’s character arc more satisfying — and cared more about it — than the unification of Tatooine’s inhabitants. And that’s surprising if I consider the kind of criticism the show has received: namely that it’s not enough about Boba Fett or that Boba Fett is its least interesting character. Barring the moment Grogu Force-jumps into Mando’s arms, which, unsurprisingly, melted my heart, seeing Din and Boba fighting side-by-side was my favorite part of the episode. A lot of that, of course, stems from how cool their fighting was. I mean, two Mandalorians actually using their jet packs!? I could have watched that all day. Thematically, though, these scenes stood out to me because they started to prod at the question of what makes a tribe or a culture. And, more specifically, what constitutes Mandalore as a tribe.
I’ve argued across my reviews for episodes 5 and 6 that all the structural idiosyncrasies of this season are worthwhile if this last episode connects the Din and Boba storylines thematically. We briefly get that when they are holed up in The Sanctuary together, ready to make their last stand. Boba asks Mando if he’d like to cut and run, giving him a chance to save himself from what almost assuredly seems like a suicide mission, but Mando says that when he gives his word, he is bound to it. He will fight to the death because “This is the way.” Honor is the Mandalorian way. Favreau and Filoni could not have made this any clearer when they titled this episode “In The Name of Honor.”
Boba retorts by calling Din’s rigid creed “bantha fodder,” but he still bonds with Mando over their shared sense of honor. So, even though there may be disagreements between them about exactly how to live a Mandalorian life — how to manifest that honor — they forge a connection based on core Mandalorian values. This is probably the first time during the whole season in which Boba has a conversation with someone who doesn’t accuse him of being soft or weak, who isn’t confused by his decisions. They understand each other.
And that helps me understand what Boba has been trying to do all season. In the very first episode of The Mandalorian, Din could have operated in self-interest and turned Grogu in for his bounty. Instead, he chooses to protect him. Likewise, Boba wants to protect Tatooine, his adoptive home. He wants to remake Mos Espa as a community. His idea of protection is not collecting tribute to line his own pockets. He has no interest in self-interest. In fact, he gives up the spice trade, which would arguably, as Fennec points out, be his most lucrative business. He aspires to be a noble leader who respects his people and enables them to live honorably.
Would I have appreciated more scenes where Boba and Mando talk about their Mandalorian identities, a sense of belonging, and the DARKSABER that Din now has? (Does Boba even know about the Darksaber? He was fetching his rancor when Din started wielding it.) Of course. Boba’s general character development would have benefited from it. But we got just enough thematic storytelling and a whole lot of cool action, so I’m not complaining.
What — from a writing standpoint at least — was much more complex, fleshed out, and therefore compelling was Boba’s confrontation with Cad Bane, who is the anti-Din in this episode because he represents pure, unadulterated self-interest. As cool as the foreboding Duros mercenary is, and as thrilling as it was to see him enter live action Star Wars, Filoni and Favreau didn’t bring him in purely for fan service. Since I’m familiar with his character from the animated series, I see him as a stand-in for Boba’s past, the cold-blooded killer version of the character from The Empire Strikes Back — who Boba used to be before he spent some time in the Sarlacc pit and found a family in the Tuskens.
After The Clone Wars got canceled, Dave Filoni presented a series of unfinished scenes at various Star Wars Celebration panels. One of the arcs featured a young Boba Fett essentially working as a bounty hunter intern for Cad Bane, helping him with jobs and learning the tricks of the trade. I was lucky enough to attend one of these panels, in Anaheim in 2015. I remember it came across a lot like a Boba Fett origin story, where we got to see how he went from the small child in Attack of the Clones to the iconic character from The Empire Strikes Back. The implication is that Cad Bane is a big influence on Boba Fett, a warped father figure in the absence of Jango. If a literary reference is useful, think of them as Fagin and Oliver Twist.
The mock-up I missed at Celebration Orlando in 2017, though, has a much more direct correlation to what we see in the finale. Broadly speaking, Boba Fett turns against Cad Bane over a moral disagreement. Boba thinks Cad Bane has gone too far and he attempts to stop him in order to protect innocent people. They have a standoff, complete with a long, tense pause before someone takes their first shot. Sound familiar? Cad Bane actually says, mockingly, “Always fighting for those in need. That’s a quick way to wind up poor or dead.” And Boba responds, “No more innocent people are going to die. Or be locked up. Or live in fear.” There’s the thesis for the entirety of The Book of Boba Fett right there.
The Book of Boba Fett implies this backstory in the live action version of this scene, but those who were not aware of it before will have to tell me whether or not they picked up on it because it sprinkles information into conversation as opposed to doing a massive exposition drop at the beginning. I personally prefer inductive exposition like this because I like being a more active viewer, but I can see how those without the animated series context might have missed the significance of the scene.
Cad Bane’s dialogue in this entire episode is incredibly functional in reconciling the two Bobas and making sense of the then and now tension the show has created. I love that he’s so easily able to get in Boba’s head. He knows exactly what to say to push Boba’s buttons, reminding him of the Tuskens multiple times and jeering at him about the bacta tank. He’s a tough opponent because he’s known him since he was a boy.
Bane asks Boba what his “angle” is because he can’t understand what he’s been doing on Mos Espa. He wants to teach his former pupil one last “lesson”: “Look out for yourself. Anything else is weakness.” Boba rejects this lesson, rejects self-interest, and stands his ground.
After Cad Bane seems to dispense with Boba handily, Boba, of course, surprises him using his Gaffi stick, the weapon emblematic of his kinship with the Tuskens. He defeats Cad Bane in a brief but decisive show of strength. From a storytelling perspective, this is the perfect choice because Cad Bane thinks he knows Boba in and out, but he has no idea how Boba’s recent time with the Tuskens has changed him, making him a better fighter and person. This, to me, explains how one of the greatest bounty hunters of all time might actually lose. His intel is out of date.
All that said, my knee-jerk reaction was that there is not nearly enough fighting between Cad Bane and Boba Fett. I’m also a little disappointed that I didn’t get one last rematch with Fennec. But, upon further thought, I see a stark elegance that reminds me a lot of the Obi Wan v. Darth Maul rematch in “Twin Suns,” the twentieth episode in season 3 of Rebels. It’s over so quickly, but there’s poetry in the brevity.
We, here, at The Long Take shy away from any kind of brevity, so I’ll continue on about other high points in the episode. Grogu and the rancor stand out as the single biggest source of joy. Seeing Boba riding the rancor was thrilling, of course. I especially liked the monster movie intro with the rancor’s back peaking out from the tops of buildings and the giant claw reaching over the rooftop. The homage to King Kong towards the end worked really well. The visual effects looked great.
But Grogu using the Force to calm down the spooked rancor and then keeling over for a nap with said rancor is maybe a top ten all-time Star Wars moment for me. (I’m weak to creatures of any kind, but especially Star Wars creatures.) And it’s not only because it was downright adorable. I’m sorry/not sorry to keep bringing up the animated series, but Ezra Bridger, a young Jedi from Rebels, also relies heavily on what I would call a beast mastery specialization within his connection to the Force. (Shoutout to all my DnD, WoW, or general RPG fans out there.) So building out the scope of the Force by also giving Grogu this power will, I hope, continue to enrich the lore of live action Star Wars.
I was about to say that the rancor and Grogu were the MVPs of this episode. But that would be a huge insult to Fennec Shand, of course. She has been the most consistently cool character, and I wish she had had more to do all season. Her stealth assassin mission to take out the Pykes’ “central command” on Tatooine let her shine in a way I had been hoping for all along. Just pure, elite skills. I love her wry wit and eye rolling. She’s realistically what I’m most looking forward to if/when there’s a second season.
Not everyone wants a second season, probably, and I get that. Has this show been craggy terrain, not unlike Boba’s face after many acid burns and intense sun exposure? Sure. But when I think back on all the amazing Star Wars moments it gave us, I can’t help but wonder when we’ll see Tatooine’s most honorable bounty hunter again.
I enjoyed reading these! I know nothing of the animated shows, so it's interesting to get that context.
It's true that Boba Fett riding a rancor can excuse a multitude of sins. I think, though, the main reason the show didn't quite work is that it didn't quite make clear, to a non-hardcore audience, that the whole point of the show is watching Boba Fett adjust to his newfound moral compass. In retrospect, the stuff with the tuskens was supposed to be the site of that transformation, but it didn't really make that clear enough. I spent most of the season going "why is bad-ass Boba Fett trying to be the world's nicest crime lord?" It wasn't until the chats with Cad Bane and the Mandolorian that I realized what they've been trying to do all season. Because of this, he came off like a naive chump, rather than a man wrestling with a new code.