Earlier today, I went to Regal Cinemas to watch The Mandalorian and Grogu...the first Star Wars film to be theatrically released since The Rise of Skywalker in 2019. Needless to say, The Mandalorian and Grogu was a fun installment that's a nice addition to the mythology created by George Lucas almost 50 years ago!
If you watched the three current seasons of The Mandalorian on Disney+ like I did, you'll understand why director Jon Favreau structured the narrative of The Mandalorian and Grogu the way he did. The film fits nicely with its streaming counterpart—albeit with a higher budget ($165 million) that allowed more alien creatures and action sequences to be shown on the big screen.
One alien creature that stands out is Rotta the Hutt (voiced by Jeremy Allen White of such TV shows as The Bear and Shameless, as well as last year's biopic Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere), the son of Jabba the Hutt and a central character in The Mandalorian and Grogu. The movie's marketing campaign portrayed Rotta as a villainous UFC-type fighter who Din Djarin (Pedro Pascal), the Mandalorian himself, battled during his many adventures in the film.
In the actual film though, Rotta merely wants to separate his identity from that of his crime lord father. Rotta succeeds at the end, and will apparently become an integral member of the New Republic who might appear in future Star Wars shows. Another creature is Hugo Durant...a multi-armed food stand owner who's amusingly voiced by the great Martin Scorsese!
Not to be outdone by Rotta, Hugo and the other alien creatures (like the Anzelians, who were first seen in The Rise of Skywalker and Season 3 of The Mandalorian) are such human characters as Colonel Ward (Sigourney Weaver), the Mandalorian's New Republic handler, and Lord Janu (Jonny Coyne), who's responsible for Rotta's fighting career and was a former Imperial officer who still knows what the remnants of the Empire are up to in the galaxy. The Mandalorian and Grogu doesn't reveal any details about the Empire's secret plans...and rightfully focuses on the titular heroes of the movie instead.
Not only does The Mandalorian and Grogu have cool new alien creatures and action scenes (like a climactic X-Wing air battle), but it also had quiet moments that focused on the father-son relationship between Din Djarin and Grogu. At one point in the movie, Djarin is gravely injured during a skirmish on Nal Hutta (the homeworld of Rotta and the other Hutts), and it's in this sequence where we see how much Grogu cares for his father and how resourceful he's become under the Mandalorian's tutelage. From finding food and shelter for him and Djarin on Nal Hutta, to him using the Force to save another main character from imminent death in the film's climax, Grogu shows that he's not the helpless Jedi Youngling he was when he was rescued from Coruscant during Order 66, the Jedi Purge orchestrated by Darth Sidious in 2005's Revenge of the Sith.
A Season 4 is planned for The Mandalorian, and it's going to be exciting to see how The Mandalorian and Grogu influences the plotline for the next Disney+ adventures by Mando and company! It was The Mandalorian that ushered Star Wars into the post-Skywalker era in late 2019, so it makes sense that this particular film would be quite different from the 11 other live-action Star Wars movies that have been theatrically released since 1977. Just look at the kinetic music score for The Mandalorian and Grogu by 3-time Oscar winner Ludwig Göransson; there is not one single Star Wars theme by legendary composer John Williams in the new movie—only motifs that Göransson introduced in The Mandalorian Disney+ show itself.
Once again, I thoroughly enjoyed The Mandalorian and Grogu! I intend to watch it again on the big screen...and look forward to the next batch of Star Wars theatrical releases such as 2027's Star Wars: Starfighter. I can't wait to see how that Shawn Levy-directed installment contributes to George Lucas' mythology as well! This is the way.
