The Mandalorian and Grogu

What’s The Movie? The (first?) Mandalorian and Grogu movie, The Mandalorian and Grogu

What’s It All About, JG? Following the events of both Return of the Jedi and The Mandalorian (and, I suppose we have to acknowledge, The Book of Boba Fett) Mando and Grogu are doing missions for the former Rebellion / New Republic. This leads Mando to accept a contract to rescue Rotta the Hutt, Jabba’s son in order to get information The Hutt Twins, who have taken over Jabba’s criminal enterprise following his death in Return of the Jedi. Cue a couple of hours of shenanigans as Mando and Grogu try to rescue someone who doesn’t need rescuing (then very definitely does), a visit to the Twins’ planet, more creatures than you can shake a stick at, and an ending that very much promises us more fun in this little side pocket of Star Wars.

Why Did You Give It A Go? Despite relatively lukewarm reviews, the general consensus around it has been that it’s just pretty entertaining. And you know, it’s quite nice to just go see an entertaining film, especially one that doesn’t feel the urge to get bogged down in pretentious / portentous bollocks like Star Wars sometimes can (let’s mention The Rise of Skywalker here as Exhibit A). A nice, fun, largely lore-free knockabout in the Star Wars universe that doesn’t require acres of homework and can simply be enjoyed? That’ll do nicely, sir.

Is It Any Good? It’s a nice, fun, largely lore-free knockabout in the Star Wars universe. That’s what it’s advertised as, that’s what it is. So I suppose the answer to the any good question is rather dependent on what you want from a Star Wars film. There are no lightsaber battles, almost no lore beyond the fact that it’s set between Return of the Jedi and The Force Awakens, no mammoth threat to the galaxy, and no awkward shoehorning in of Darth Vader or some other legacy character (there’s an R2 unit in one shot, but that’s about your lot). If that’s what you want from a Star Wars movie, then this lightweight knockabout probably isn’t going to do it for you.

If, however, you rather warm to the idea of charming Lone Wolf and Cub shenanigans that can tonally land being silly, meaningful, exciting, and almost entirely self-contained, then this is very much the film for you. The cold open, which sees Mando and a pleasingly more involved Grogu completing a mission by blowing up three AT-AT walkers, is a terrific action sequence and gets everything underway in fine form. It also sets the tone for the film – there’s a genuine threat but it’s not too genuine, there’s a few funny bits in the action, the action itself is very well put together and there are Actual Consequences to whatever it is that’s happening.

Once that’s out of the way and we get to the meat of the story, we have Mando and Grogu jetting off to try and rescue Rotta the Hutt. This is probably the clunkiest bit of the whole movie, it’s just, “go there, do that,” and it’s all extremely linear. It’s nice to have Sigourney Weaver on hand as Wade to kick off our quest but yeah – it’s pretty straightforward. Still, once they get to Space Tokyo Shakari (people remember cyberpunk was meant to be a warning, not an aspiration, right?) and find Rotta, things settle down again.

A lot of the discourse around Rotta revolves around the fact that he’s swole. Which, yes, he very much is but he’s also much more interesting than that. Jeremy Allen White gives a slightly resigned, melancholic performance that does wonders for the character, far away from the cackling idiocy that usually makes up the Hutt clan and is all the better for it. He makes Rotta’s reluctance to go back to his crime lord family feel real in the way that a more bro-ish performance (that would have linked to his physical appearance) wouldn’t have, and it works wonders. If this film is to work, we need to be invested in Rotta and White’s performance gives us real reason to be.

For the rest – look, this isn’t really a film that’s desperately invested in giving its characters a huge amount of depth. Rotta’s nicely reflective performance is the only one with much depth. The crime lord twins are gloating crime lord twins who gloat and are twins (and cackle). That’s your lot. The collection of Babu Frik’s (Babus Frik?) are just that. Mando is stoic, Grogu is silly, Sigourney Weaver is Sigourney Weaver. If you’re coming here looking for deep wells of character and personality, you’ve chosen… poorly.

But look, that’s not really what this film is for. What it is, really, is a couple of episodes of The Mandalorian with a big-screen budget. And that’s what you get. Which loops us round to the start. If that’s what you want, then this is a good example of it. If it’s not what you want, you’re probably not going to find much here to satisfy you. Temper your expectations accordingly.

How Many of These Have You Seen? When it comes to Star Wars films, all of them. I’m (just) old enough to have seen A New Hope in cinemas the first time around, and it’s been all of them ever since. Yes, even Attack of the Clones!

Oh, except Solo. Because, come on.

Would You Recommend It? Not to sound like a stuck record but I’ve kind of answered that question already. Yes, if it’s what you want, no if it isn’t. In some ways, this is actually quite unusual for a Star Wars film. The Last Jedi was divisive but it’s clearly targeted at Star Wars fans specifically, even if it didn’t land with all of them (for what it’s worth, I think it’s by miles the best of the Sequel trilogy). But The Mandalorian and Grogu is something new – a TV show first and a film second. Every other part of Star Wars up until now has been the other way round.

This matters. Because the TV show has a built in audience, it’s easier to get away with something that exists outwith the usual lightsabers-and-family-dynasty stuff that the main series of Star Wars movies consists of. Of the two other Star Wars films, Rogue One is explicitly a run-up to A New Hope‘s opening moments, and Solo is just Han Solo: 90210. Not that there’s anything wrong with either of those two approaches but they’re still fundamentally films first. The Mandalorian and Grogu has a different task to achieve – it needs to be easily accessible to anyone who hasn’t watched the TV series but connected enough to it for those who have.

In this, the film largely succeeds. I mean, come on, it’s Guy In Armour and Baby Yoda Go On Adventures. The adventures stuff is what you’d expect – fights, battles, crime lords, some cool creatures, dramatic escapes, and whatnot – and you can’t really go far wrong with that. True, the film sags a little when we first get to the Hutt twins’ planet but it rallies and gets back to what we all want out of this film soon enough. And The Guy In Armour and Baby Yoda are The Guy In Armour And Baby Yoda. What more do you want from them? Sure, this isn’t even in the same galaxy as challenging but it’s also not meant to be. It’s just meant to be fun. And it is!

Want to argue that Sigourney Weaver is wasted? Well, maybe a little, but this feel more like a way of introducing her into the Star Wars universe than it does because they’ve not bothered to give her anything to do. She’s not the focus here because, well, have you read the title of this film? That’s the focus. Everything else is secondary to that. Hopefully she’ll get something much more meaty going forward. Are the Hutt twins pretty two-dimensional? Yup. Because this is a silly adventure where that’s what’s required. OK, we could have had a bit more detail then but honestly, the film doesn’t need to have its run-time extended. At a shade over two hours, it’s very nearly too long but just about gets away with it. Any longer and it would collapse.

And look, if you want to say this film is inessential, then yes, it absolutely is. If you want to say it’s inconsequential, well, yes, it’s probably that too. I don’t care, I still enjoyed it. It’s not flawless by any means but it sets out to be a fun, silly romp and that’s exactly what it delivers. Silly is so often used as a pejorative but it absolutely doesn’t have to be and most of the time The Mandalorian and Grogu falls on the right side of silly. There’s absolutely space for that in the Star Wars universe alongside everything else and there always should be. Repeat to yourself its just a film, you should really just relax.

Oh and there’s a cameo from Appa Paul Sun-Hyung Lee, which I will never not be down for.

Scores on the Doors? 7/10