The Siege
Episode 4 of The Mandalorian Season 2 begins with Mando trying to guide The Child while it hopelessly fixes their ship. After an amusing red wire/blue wire segment, Mando realizes they need to head back to familiar sights in order to get their bearings. Elsewhere, Cara clears out a bar full of scavengers and packs a bag full of items ready to take back to their rightful owners. She’s the Marshal on Nevarro now and on the way out the door, she and Greef Karga watch Mando and The Child touch down back on the planet. The Child is dropped off in a classroom and immediately takes an interest in its fellow student’s food. When this boy says no to sharing, The Child uses its force powers to steal them anyway. It’s an amusing little segment and one that reinforces the insatiable appetite of this creature. Meanwhile, Mando is briefed on his next mission. He – along with Cara and Greef Karga – need to sneak into an old Imperial base that’s apparently empty. It’s also somewhere Moff Gideon happened to use when the troops arrived to corner them during the finale last time out. Anyway, it’s most certainly not empty and the trio head inside to the access corridor. Therein, Mythrol (the blue alien forced along to work with them) hacks the main computer and starts overloading the system. Sensing that everything is going to blow, Mando and the others race out but become distracted when they realize there’s more going on here than first meets the eye. This Imperial facility happens to hold a lab where The Child and others of its kind were experimented on. There’s also an old transmission (old by 3 days) confirming that Moff Gideon is still alive. With Mando racing back to town to grab The Child, the rest of the group commandeer an imperial speeder and race away. They’re not alone though and after a brief chase sequence featuring speeder bikes and then tie fighters, the base blows up. With things looking bleak, Mando arrives at the last second with The Child and together they manage to save Cara and Greef. While Mando and The Child leave, back on Nevarro we interestingly find out Cara is from Aldaraan. She lost everyone when it was blown up by the Empire but refuses to sign up to the rebellion. She’s going to continue on as the Marshal. Out in space, we learn a tracking beacon has been planted on the Razor Crest at the request of Moff Gideon. It looks like things may be about to get interesting!
The Episode Review
With another simple and predictable episode, The Mandalorian returns with a tried and tested script that features a drip-feed of information and some bombastic action to boot. There’s nothing wrong with that of course, and everything feels very Star Wars-esque so far. However, there’s also an overwhelming feel that the episodic format here feels very Saturday-afternoon-cartoon style and a little dated. Still, what we do get is intriguing enough to stick with to see where the story is likely to go next.
