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S02E55: Rapidly Rewatching mando S2E2
25 Plays11 days ago
We are FINALLY back with a mea culpa, followed by a deep dive on "The Passenger." Will we get munched on by killer space spiders, or will Trapper Wolf save the day? Tune in and find out!
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Transcript
Introduction and Hiatus
00:00:01
Speaker
We're finally back with more Mandalorian coming up now. Aren't you a little short? Aren't you a little short? Aren't you a little short for a star trooper?
00:00:14
Speaker
Hey everyone, it's Bob.
Challenges of New Job and Content Delays
00:00:15
Speaker
Before we dive back into The Mandalorian, I just wanted to acknowledge that yes, I have been terribly remiss at posting new episodes over the last couple of weeks.
00:00:25
Speaker
I imagine that most of my listeners know me pretty well and realize that I'm starting a new job tomorrow and I have just moved back to Chicago. This will be my full-time base of operations. Although I will still have my place in Long Beach. We'll be going back as forth as much as I can, but for now Chicago is home and it's been a little crazy as you can imagine.
Mandalorian Recap Introduction
00:00:49
Speaker
So I can't quite guarantee that we'll be back to weekly. Might be a little more delays as I get my footings, but in the meantime, ah thanks for bearing with me. And here we go back to our Mandalorian recap.
Mixed Feelings on 'The Passenger'
00:01:03
Speaker
Welcome back to short for a storm trooper where I am with Phil Salmo and Ben Dyer, and we are continuing our rewatch of the Mandalorian. We are up to season two, episode two, which is called the passenger and it is directed by Peyton Reed.
00:01:22
Speaker
um I think that it was written by Filoni or by, by Favreau. I believe it was. Yeah. I, I, again, I didn't generate the, uh, the AI summary. Um,
00:01:34
Speaker
I'm gonna jump in this time with my opinion because last week I said, before I started watching the episode that I had written the note, this was one of my favorite episodes. 2.1 is one of my favorite ones. This one, before I started watching it, I wrote, this is one of my least favorite episodes.
00:01:52
Speaker
of the Mandalorian. I've never really liked this episode. Although I do have to admit that this time around, i liked it a little better. i liked it a little better. And I realized that just a couple of things is number one, there are some really fun moments in this and I'm sure, you know, we will bring them up over the next 15 minutes.
00:02:14
Speaker
But the other thing is i just don't like spiders. And, you know, it's, I mean, i am a little bit phobic of insects at all. Like I don't like bugs touching me or crawling over me, but I'm not necessarily afraid of them. And so it's not that I have arachnophobia or
Baby Yoda's Controversial Actions
00:02:36
Speaker
anything. I just think that like somebody getting chased by millions and millions and millions of spiders, that doesn't do anything for me. That's all I have to say. it doesn't do anything for me. And so if you don't like spiders, this is not a great episode for you. Yeah, it's really, really true.
00:02:51
Speaker
So those are my initial thoughts. Ben, how about you? We'll start with you. Yeah, no, I, this is not my favorite episode. And i I think a part of that is tied up with the fact that I'm,
00:03:02
Speaker
I'm really not a fan of the fact that are the child, Grogu as we will come to know him, Baby Yoda at this time and among the fandom, um keeps eating this woman's eggs.
00:03:16
Speaker
Oh my God. what He's committing genocide. Oh my God. So, yeah, no, I, I, you know, I feel like that was something that made me um less sympathize with this ah yeah tiny cute creature. And now let's take a note. lets I'm going to come back to that whole thing, Ben, but keep going. you go I just, I feel like this was one of these things where, where the point of view of the show is kind of like, Oh, look, he's being naughty. Oh, he, he, he. And I'm like, dude, he's, this is awful. Yeah. So that said, I thought, you know, wasn't my favorite episode
Episode Length and Plot Development
00:03:50
Speaker
either. And I think a part of that is just, you know, when you look at any episode, again, with these short run series, it's always about opportunity costs. How long are you spending getting to know a given character? How much time is any given episode? spending like introducing you to some new aspect of the world or some secret about their past or, or take your pick, right? The shorter the series is, the more you've got to really economize on that. And I don't feel like I came away with a lot from this episode, you know, yeah get a little bit more, I guess, on the new Republic, we get a little bit on, you know, Grogu in that way. But, you know, I feel like this could have been half this time, and then we could have spent the rest of the time doing something else.
00:04:33
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Phil, what do you think? I agree with you guys on a lot. it It definitely feels like a downturn from the first episode, which I really liked. um i don't know if I quite feel as strongly as both of you about um it being not like your favorite. Like, I wouldn't say it was one of my favorites, but there were things I really liked. um A couple of things, you know, maybe this is just, you know, it's a very dark humor episode. I laughed really hard when he kept eating the eggs. I thought it was really funny.
00:05:05
Speaker
And, and, and, and I know it's really messed up. And part it, was like, Oh my God, like, are they really doing it? and they kept doing it. He ate like three or four. And I was like, Oh my God, so crazy.
00:05:16
Speaker
um i So I and then also in terms of the spider scenes, since I brought it up, I don't like spiders, but I'm also somebody that when I watch something, whether it's a movie or a TV series, I want to feel the thing that the creator is intending to make me feel. I want to laugh. I want to be thrilled. I want to be like like, you know, curled up in my chair. I was totally curled up in my chair. with the spider chase scene. I was like, this is probably my worst nightmare.
00:05:42
Speaker
um And this is great. And i'm I'm like, I'm loving it because it's not happening to me. um i you know I do the thing that I do now as my strategy when watching this is that I write out things as it's happening that I really like. um I wrote in all caps,
00:05:59
Speaker
um Nope, nope. They started moving. Nope, spider. This is all caps. Nope, spiders. Nope. No. um When they got into the ship, I was losing my mind.
00:06:12
Speaker
And then I will say I loved when he used the fire on his gear to repel them. That was great. um Yeah. I will say a little bit the end, a little bit of a Republic ex machina.
00:06:24
Speaker
You know, a little bit. Yeah, 100%. And so that and so sort of comes back to again, you know, wasn't, you know, an amazing episode, but there's certainly things that like are great. Some things I didn't like. um Overall, you know, hoping that we get the narrative a little more on track here as we get from season two.
00:06:40
Speaker
Yeah, great. There are a couple of, you know, kind of meta references that I did want to bring up around this. So one is, let's let's talk about the the eggs a little bit. Ben, my reaction, like I said, it was the same as yours. I was like, this is horrible. Like the woman said, like, without these eggs, her line will end. And baby Yoda is just chewing him down, right? And um ah The thing was, is there was a there was kind of a public outcry when this happened. There were a lot of people who were very upset and raged about it on social media. You know, as you can imagine, you know, vocal minority, all this kind of stuff.
00:07:21
Speaker
And the the producers just kind of came back and were like, yeah, we thought it was funny. i guess they looked at it the same way that you did, Phil. We were just trying to be funny with it. um I mean, it's really dark, but it is dark. I do think it's. Yeah.
00:07:34
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But as I recall, this was kind of like the first moment when the the shine kind of came off the Mandalorian a little bit when people are like, you know because when it first hit, it it was so hot.
00:07:51
Speaker
And people are saying, you know, Star Wars is back. people were just raving about it. This was the first time that people I think had kind of a loud critique of
Cameos and Character Developments
00:07:59
Speaker
it. And that was an interesting turn um that we saw with this. So that was interesting outside of the world of the actual story. The other thing I wanted to point out, which is really fun is um so our two X-Wing pilots,
00:08:14
Speaker
Of course, number one, Trapper Wolf. That's Dave Filoni. Dave Filoni is obsessed with wolves, famously obsessed with wolves. The fact that his character's name is Trapper Wolf.
00:08:26
Speaker
I kind of cringe at that a little bit. Like, dude, let it let the wolves go. But. You know, whatever. But um more fun is Paul Sun-Hyung Lee plays the other pilot who is Captain Teva. Captain Carson Teva is his name. ah Paul Sun-Hyung Lee, I didn't really know him beforehand, but he was the star of a show called Kim's Convenience, which I believe is a Canadian sitcom, was very popular. And so he's been a fan for while. He's been an actor for a while and been in the space, but he is a Star Wars super fan.
00:09:01
Speaker
And they kind of, i believe, put him in this part just to like, hey, he's always wanted to be in Star Wars. This is really fun. um Another spoiler, this won't be the last we see of Captain Teva.
00:09:17
Speaker
And i really believe that what happened was um when Gina Carano went and got herself canceled, um And they basically kind of wind up writing Cara Dune out of Star Wars. dumb They had a lot of plans for her as a leader in the old Republic.
00:09:39
Speaker
And I believe that some of those plans, they are now transferring on to Captain Teva. She's not in it for the rest of the series. I didn't realize it happened. this No, you'll see her. You'll see her again. oh you will see her again in the Mandalorian. I think it was, I think it was after season two that she wound up getting completely let go out from, ah from Lucasfilm, but they've kissed and made up too. So who knows? I mean, she could come back. ah You know, we don't know. We'll see what happens with that. Yeah.
00:10:12
Speaker
One thing I want to bring up is the scene where it's the traffic stop, right? So the first time we see the X-wing pilots. And it's clearly meant to evoke they've pulled him over, and he's bluffing his way through it. um I thought that that was hysterical. And when they lock their S foils into a attack position, that was just epic. It was like, okay, so that's the Star Wars version of turning on the rollers, right?
00:10:43
Speaker
Yeah. Like, and yeah, this just went from a routine traffic stop to, okay, this is a little bit more serious. That was really fun. Yeah. Yeah, I think when when you see the X-Wing wings change their configuration there, as you say, like that's that's the part where you're like, uh-oh.
00:10:58
Speaker
ah And I think, you know, If I've been a little hard on this episode in the opener, I do think there are some genuinely pulse pounding moments in the episode that are that are here to be really liked. I think the chase through ah into this planet's atmosphere, through these ice canyons, i thought that was really done because, really well done. Because frankly, you...
00:11:21
Speaker
know what an X-wing fighter can do. And you know that this ship that the Mandalorian is in is not up to that kind of intensity. So immediately it's a very mismatched chase and you really feel the stakes
New Republic Dynamics and Character Analysis
00:11:33
Speaker
for the Mandalorian. He could get trashed here in a half second. I also liked, by the way, that they at some point, I think it's on the front end of this chase. They're like,
00:11:44
Speaker
Were you the guy who was seen in the vicinity of that prison transport urban season one? And you're like, uh-oh, busted. He's got a rabbit at that point. Yeah. It was a great callback. And I liked that that is in some sense a little bit of his saving grace at the end too, when you're like, yeah, no, he's screwed. he's He's stuck inside this cave in a very tiny cockpit, sealed himself inside, you know and I have no idea. I remember thinking in the original episode, like it was claustrophobic. I'm like, I have no idea how he gets out of this. There's no help around, but it turns out.
00:12:19
Speaker
I really liked this chase scene too, as it you know, there are some great moments, I think sort of the stop them stopping him is great. Um, it was really cool. I don't know if they've done this before, maybe they have, but you know, given sort of where Mando is on like either side of the quote unquote law, sort of making the Republic, the enemy in this way is really interesting because you don't really have that in sort of main star Wars cannons. I really liked that inverse.
00:12:42
Speaker
Um, So yeah, I really you i really like the chase scene. I think like narratively, I was a little like, oh, he has to transport somebody mysterious. Like we have some backstory into her, but not a ton. i think that was sort of where I was a little like, eh, on the episode yeah in that way.
00:12:57
Speaker
um I will call out one quote that I loved. I wrote it in all caps. I liked it so much. um She said, the, and forgive me, at the who owns the droid station on Tatooine. Oh, Pali, Pali Motta. Yeah.
00:13:13
Speaker
Yeah. She says to Mando, stop your crying, you'll rust. loved i missed that I loved that. That was great. That was near the beginning of the episode. Yeah, sure. Yeah. yeah Yeah. Pelley was a character who as much as I love Amos Sedaris and I do love Amos Sedaris, I think she's great. It took me a while to warm up to Pelley, but I do really like Pelley. And every time I every time I watch anything with Pelley in it, I like it more.
00:13:43
Speaker
yeah She's got some interestingly weird maternal energy around our little friend. Yeah. Which I think is is is a nice counterpoint or compliment, if you will, to our Mandalorian's hard-edged upbringing. so Yeah. Yeah.
00:13:59
Speaker
The cantina scene was really fun. She's playing Sabacc with Dr. Mandible. I thought that was a great, I mean, they're back in Chalman's Cantina, the original cantina from episode four, and she's playing Sabacc. I thought just this crazy, you know, ah Lotus type character.
00:14:20
Speaker
insectoid alien, just a great callback to episode four and all the wacky aliens that you saw in that bar. So he was fun. And then, yeah, she does a great job of setting up Mando to pay a lot of money.
00:14:33
Speaker
So that's
Mandalorian's Parenting Style
00:14:34
Speaker
fun. Yeah. I met her 10, you met her 10 minutes ago. I thought you swore on your life that she was a good. Yeah. I'm a very good judge of character. I'm a good judge of character. That's right. Yeah, it's so good. The quote that I wrote down that I just laughed at again last night was when the frog lady is babbling at him and the Mandalorian says, sorry, lady, I don't understand frog. That was pretty great. That was pretty great.
00:14:58
Speaker
that was pretty I do love Mando speaking of parenting style. This comes back to the egg, why I think it like plays for last, but when he's like, nope. No, like he's just very like, like dad, like dad, Hey, stop that right now. And yeah just it would only get sort of the way that, you know, the Mando does it in a very kind of gruff way, which is great. Yeah. so Yeah, for
Conclusion and Future Content Teaser
00:15:16
Speaker
sure.
00:15:16
Speaker
And while the poor razor crest, man, that has seen some hard days. and It's a really cool ship. It has seen some really, really hard days. And this ends with them limping off to Trask.
00:15:30
Speaker
as he said, and we'll have to see in the next episode if they actually make it. So with that, we'll stay on time with this episode. We'll wrap it up. So Ben, Phil, thanks again for being here.
00:15:43
Speaker
And to our listeners, thank you for being here. May the force be with you. We'll see you next week. Until then, bye-bye. Who's that mindless choice to do? Podcasts help you see them through.
00:15:55
Speaker
Star Wars is your favorite unit. Let's chat for 15 minutes. Aren't you a little short? Aren't you a little short? Aren't you a little short for a sporn trooper?
00:16:06
Speaker
Aren't you a little short for us?