The Mandalorian Spoiler Thread

Who would you pick as an enemy? If the enemy were bounty hunters, then the character would know at the start of the episode that he couldn't leave the child, and we wouldn't have time to explore the character's growth moment. I get the impression we'll be seeing more storm troopers soon. The audience would need more time to set up rebellion soldiers as an enemy. I think a local group makes the most sense, although I suppose it could've been a planet he already had ties to, but they really want to play it slow on this character's reveal.

 

I knew right away it was going to be a "Seven Samurai" sort of episode. Seems fine, considering Kurosawa's impact on Star Wars.

 

I think Seven Samurai predates that show as well. The basic plot is villagers beset by a group of thugs from the mountains near the village. They send some of their fellow villagers out to hire people to help. The seven samurai are hired, come back, teach the villagers to fight so they can defend themselves when the next attack comes (and of course the samurai help too). It's basically the exact same plot. Seven Samurai was adapted as the western The Magnificent Seven for U.S. audiences.

Kurosawa, who directed Seven Samurai, was an influence on George Lucas. Lucas has talked about the influence The Hidden Fortress had on him. That starred Toshiro Mifune, who was also in Seven Samurai.

Given all of the above, I figured the Mandalorian episode was probably a conscious nod to Kurosawa and his influence on Star Wars.

 

Just after I posted, I found this article: 'The Mandalorian' star Pedro Pascal channeled Han Solo and Clint Eastwood for Disney+

The guy playing the Mandalorian talks about the influence:

“The character is very much built on the iconic presence of the Man With No Name in the Sergio Leone movies, played by Clint Eastwood, [and] the lone samurai in Akira Kurosawa,” he said. “It’s aesthetically and very, very much narratively built in that kind of iconic lone gunslinger/sword-wielder.”

He mentions Sergio Leone's movies, as well as Kurosawa, but it is worth noting that Leone's "Man with No Name" films were directly taken from Kurosawa. "Fistfull of Dollars" is a remake (that can be tracked scene by scene) of Kurosawa's film "Yojimbo" (incidentally, starring Mifune again). Kurosawa actually sued over Yojimbo/Fistfull of Dollars and won.

Not that this is a critique of any of the films--I like them all, and everything has inspiration (though Leone walked too close to the line between inspiration and ripoff). Kurosawa himself pointed to American writer Dashiell Hammett as an inspiration for Yojimbo.

It does, however, make it seem likely to me that the writers on The Mandalorian were going with a Kurosawa homage.

 

Just binged the whole thing off a free week from Disney and am baffled by the great reviews. I thought the characters were limp stereotypes, with inconsistencies trotted out whenever the plot needed it. And hoo boy did the plot need it. Holes big enough to ride a bantha through. Stuff the writers don't even bother to pretend to justify, like a gigantic walker that just hangs around a bunch of small-time crooks. Who the heck was driving that thing? Why did it pause short of the trap? Who knows? Who cares? Bam! Bam! The river of lava was silly enough, but then our heroes are surprised when the boat keeps moving. Hey guys, it's a river; it moves; gravity; you may have heard of it. And who connects a sewage system big enough to serve all Paris to *lava*?

Most of the acting was wooden and the writing was ... well, to quote a certain someone, you can type this stuff but you can't say it. Pacing was weird, the orchestration in the earlier episodes sounded like it was from a 50s pirate movie and it was mixed low. I just, I can't figure it. Highlight of all eight episodes was those two speeder storm troopers. The dialog was snappy, delivery was good, and for once it didn't sound like someone was writing something out of the Scarlet Pimpernel (all proper props to the baroness).

Anyway, I'm glad other folks enjoyed it. The sets were good.

Me, I'm glad I didn't pay retail.