First off, Jaba the Hutt is almost nobody’s favorite character, even if he is physically and politically evocative of at least one notable modern figure. Sure, there is probably some rabid subreddit demanding more Hutt-on-Hutt action. But they are inarguably goofy-looking one-note annoying characters, and that’s before someone makes Jeremy Allen White voice one that is absolutely yoked. Is there a fanbase for swoll overgrown slugs? Don’t answer that, I am aware of how the Internet works.

Second, instead of being a 135-minute movie, if The Mandalorian and Grogu was a three-part installment of the TV show totaling the same length, everyone would say it was the “filler” part of the season. They made a full-fledged, genuine Star Wars movie out of filler episodes from a TV show that passed its prime. Oops!

Third, the whole thing about The Mandalorian is that it was a swaggy space western about an outlaw who becomes a reluctant dad. This movie opens with our hero (Pedro Pascal) full-on operating as an agent of the New Republic. It doesn’t matter that his boss is Sigourney Weaver or that he still gets “paid.” He’s just a complete and total good guy now, which removes the Lone Wolf and Cub conceit of the show and makes it “hero who has bad childcare.”

Fourth, Grogu remains cute. The mystery around his origins is great. It would be cool if, I don’t know, you had a giant movie adventure in which to reveal something about him. Any tiny little nugget. Nope. The entire plot of this movie is that the total-and-complete-goodie-two-shoes Mandalorian tries to rescue a kidnapped Hutt from a gladiator fighting ring so that two other Hutts will give him information. While doing so, he gets hurt, and Grogu has to do some mild solo swamp adventures. That was the best 20 minutes of the movie by the way.

Fifth, Star Wars has always been myth and magic, mostly for younger-skewing audiences. It is a miracle we got Andor, but set that aside, and this whole franchise has always been fun special effect skirmishes with simplistic “do good, not bad” messages that a whole bunch of people still misunderstand. When those installments are good, they make us all feel like kids again. When they are bad, they read as insulting to older audiences and boring to younger ones.

Sixth, despite what’s above, The Mandalorian and Grogu isn’t that bad. It was never possible for it to have been truly bad. You’d have to make some kind of genuine effort to risk being bad. This is risk-free. God forbid, but one imagines this is what AI would burp and fart out if someone fed it all three seasons of Mando’s TV show. It is an uninspired regurgitation. There are some cute moments. The fights are mostly too dark to see. It’s cool that Sigourney Weaver flies an X-wing. That’s about it.

There has been a lot of noise about what Star Wars should do to right its increasingly unloved ship. This noxious discourse involves a bunch of gross and bad people trying to influence risk-averse executives. A humble suggestion: Don’t reuse existing characters. Don’t erase the most recent trilogy. Don’t make more prequels/sidequels/rebootquels. Move the story forward. Make a new space fable. Capture the spirit instead of trying to make the literal same thing. And, most importantly, don’t make anything like The Mandalorian and Grogu again or listen to anyone who thinks The Last Jedi was bad.

Grade = C-

Other Critical Voices to Consider

Laura Portier at Starburst Magazine says “For all its shortcomings, The Mandalorian and Grogu is nonetheless hard to resent. Made by people who love these references deeply, who want to share that love, and who haven’t quite figured out how to synthesise it all into something coherent, it’s simply too earnest a film to dislike wholly.”

Jeffrey Lyles says “On the lighter emotional spectrum than intense Andor, The Mandalorian and Grogu proves the Star Wars universe is massive enough to still be thrilling and thoroughly entertaining without a lightsaber in sight.”

Agustín Pérez at Emol.com says “At the end of the day, however little impact the story has, you buy your ticket to see your favorite characters in a new adventure, and this movie is precisely that.”