Since Disney bought the rights to the Star Wars franchise, there has been widespread outrage at their handling of the beloved cinematic universe. Movies like Solo and the sequel trilogy have caused a lot of division and anger within the Star Wars community. But the Mandalorian series may have saved Star Wars.
This time last year, the first season of the Mandalorian series aired on Disney’s new streaming service, Disney Plus. This new adventure set in the Star Wars universe was unique. It followed the life of a Mandalorian bounty hunter and his quest to protect “the child” who is essentially a miniature Yoda. This Star Wars show explored new parts of the Star Wars universe, while simultaneously pulling in callbacks to other Star Wars films. In my opinion, they did a rather good job at it as well.
At the time of writing, the first episode of season 2 of the Mandalorian has just been released a couple of days ago. While I do have some criticisms of the Mandalorian, namely that the storylines of the individual episodes are often very similar, I still recognize that it’s a great show.
What’s most interesting about the Mandalorian is its reception. It has seemed to cause widespread joy across the Star Wars community. The backlash against films like The Last Jedi was loud and hard to miss, but that isn’t happening for the Mandalorian. Of course, there are always SOME people who don’t like a film or a TV series, the Mandalorian is objectively well-liked by fans.
In my view, the Mandalorian has been the first real success since they’ve taken over the Star Wars franchise. Of course they’ve had tremendous financial success with other films, but this series seems to be a bridge between older Star Wars fans and new fans who are just now learning to love Star Wars.