I Was Not a Fan of The Mandalorian Season 2 Finale’s Last 10 Minutes
WARNING: MAJOR SPOILERS FROM CHAPTER 16 OF THE MANDALORIAN
The Season 2 finale of The Mandalorian starts solid and absolutely whiffs it at the last minute. A tender story of a man and his son was upstaged (yet again) by the apparent need to remind audiences that they’re watching Star Wars. The center of gravity for the narrative abruptly shifts towards Luke the moment his X-Wing appears. The otherwise solid episode never recovers.
The problems start with execution. For starters, let’s talk about how he dispatches the Dark Troopers. I understand that Din needs to see that Luke can keep Grogu safe. Fair enough. But this could’ve been a moment to highlight the contrast between the Jedi and Mandalorian ways. This could’ve been a chance to show that Luke’s compassion offers a way forward for Grogu that isn’t rife with tragedy.
Instead, Luke gets what fanboys have been clamoring for: his own version of the Rogue One Darth Vader hallway scene. I never really understood the desire to see Luke as a “badass,” given that the resolution to his story in Return of the Jedi was embracing nonviolence and compassion. However, depictions of Luke as a flawless warrior pervaded the Expanded Universe for decades and this is how many people view the character. I’m glad they got what they wanted even though I think the whole sequence was vastly more out of character than anything seen in The Last Jedi.
(The obvious defense of this is that the violence is fine because they’re droids, which A) is a real letter of the law vs. spirit of the law debate given B) Droids (no matter the model) are sapient beings.)
But fine, let’s accept that the violence is necessary to win Din over. Now, we have to address the actual “performance.” When “Luke” stands still, it looks great! As soon as he moves or speaks, though, the illusion is broken. I don’t like dogging on VFX work but the exchange between Luke and Din needed to be human. Din has to accept that his son will be better off with this stranger. This requires warmth, gentleness — traits Mark Hamill brought to Luke at all times in the Original Trilogy. None of that is present in this scene, as the Luke of The Mandalorian comes off as stoic and enigmatic, just another interloper who wants Baby Yoda for himself.
But of course, we as fans know Luke is good, so no worries! This is by far the biggest flaw of the way Luke was used in this episode. Luke’s impact is completely dependent on preexisting fan affinity for the character, to the point where he doesn’t even introduce himself. The show assumes that we all love the Original Trilogy and that this nostalgia will sell the choice Din has to make. Other than through violence, the show makes no attempt to humanize or develop Luke, even as his inclusion yields immense ramifications for the show’s future.
Contrast this to how other fan favorites were seeded throughout the season. Bo-Katan and Boba Fett were both reintroduced to serve as foils to Din, allowing for him to question his identity as a Mandalorian. While clearly they both have their own narrative baggage, their characters are woven in to support the primary story of Din growing as a person. Ahsoka’s inclusion is more problematic, but setting aside the spin-off planting and the questions her continued survival raises, there were some great moments with her that reinforced the central relationship between Din and Grogu. While I still think fan service has gone overboard this season in general, I was convinced that the creators were committed to telling the story at hand.
This sort of balancing act is completely absent from Din’s encounter with Luke. He just shows up at the end, a textbook Deus Ex Machina, and suddenly The Mandalorian is a different show. The most touching moment of the scene, where Din removes his helmet so that his son can see his face, only draws attention to how peripheral Luke is to the relationship. There’s no equivalent to Grogu hesitating to play fetch with Ahsoka. Luke simply arrives and the sequence of events that follows is perfunctory. Of course Luke is going to take Grogu to his Jedi temple. He’s the Main Character of Star Wars.
It’s not that Luke couldn’t have been included in this season. It’s not that Din and Grogu had to stay together. There are ways that this story could’ve been structured that treated Luke like any other guest appearance in this show, one that gave his character room to breathe and interact with Din and Grogu organically. Instead, Luke circa 1983 is beamed in to do “badass” combat and bring the episode to a halt just so everyone can bask in how cool this all is. It’s a transparently hollow reading of Luke’s character and, even worse, it’s lazy; if it were any other character, would the scene work at all?
Part of what I enjoyed about The Mandalorian was its scope. It was a small story about a man’s relationship with his adopted son. In its best moments, Season 2 embraced this. Think of Din clutching Grogu’s toy amid the wreckage of the Razorcrest or of Din removing his helmet to find Gideon’s location. What made The Mandalorian good was that it (just like its protagonist) was allowed to forge its own identity through tender moments like these.
The way Luke was used in this story is not just lazy storytelling reliant on fan devotion. On a broader level, the execution of Luke’s appearance serves to remind me that nothing in Star Wars is allowed to be contained. The warning signs were there with Ahsoka and Bo-Katan, for sure, but the focus only briefly wavered from Din and Grogu. Luke, on the other hand, completely upends the status quo of the show. From a purely narrative perspective, this all makes sense and connects the dots to the larger lore, but that’s all. Rogue One was once described as a film version of a Wookieepedia article. Now, that description can be applied to The Mandalorian — just another piece of product that ties to other products. A simple story must now bear the weight of being a franchise plank and spin-off generator, and Luke’s inclusion here epitomizes this direction.
I dream of a Star Wars where stories are allowed to exist in isolation. It’s a big galaxy, not everyone has to know each other. I thought The Mandalorian would be able to have it both ways, folding in fan favorites when it serves an otherwise siloed, smaller story. Now, I’m forced to accept that nothing good in the universe can last, that Star Wars always has to be Star Wars and nothing else. I don’t think the system works.
