It’s been a year since the airing of Season 2 on Disney+ of the first episodes of The Mandalorian. As they say, “better late than never.” That applies to a round of craft patterns released this week for the first time by Simplicity, the pattern making company that has been making all sorts of clothes, craft, and utility item patterns for nearly a century. Although crafters have been making and selling items in places like Etsy and eBay, these are the officially licensed plans to make your own Baby Yoda aka The Child aka Grogu. Or make your kid into Baby Yoda. Or carry Baby Yoda–or the Mandalorian logo or helmet image–around town on a snazzy laptop bag and be the envy of your co-workers. The plush Baby Yoda evokes the plush Chewbacca and R2-D2 toys from the 1970s released for the original Star Wars. They are definitely cute, and no doubt will be fun to make. Check out the new product tie-ins for The Mandalorian from Simplicity below.
This is the way… to catch up on all you haven’t yet learned about The Mandalorian. In addition to Abrams’ brilliant high-end, behind the scenes book of original concept art The Art of Star Wars: The Mandalorian (reviewed here) and two volumes of Titan’s The Mandalorian: The Art & Imagery (discussed here), Titan has announced the next book of the series, The Mandalorian Guide to Season One. Compared to Titan’s The Art & Imagery books, this shiny hardcover book is more of a souvenir book, like the annuals UK publishers create for bigger franchises. You’ll find more than photographs–there’s discussions and interviews about the entire first season, including an episode guide. And you can now pre-order it here at Amazon.
Star Wars’ first live-action TV series, The Mandalorian was created by fans for fans, and every frame tugs at the nostalgia the franchise’s fans hold for the original 1970s and 1980s trilogy. With those films the most fans could hope for were magazines and books, often ordered via Scholastic book orders at their schools, each showing a few images from the films that could take us–in a snap–back to the movies. It’s something fans of the franchise have gotten excited about now for nearly 44 years running. From the first publication of Ralph McQuarrie’s earliest concept art, fans wanted more. We’ve seen several books on The Mandalorian, including Abrams Books’ The Art of Star Wars: The Mandalorian (reviewed here). The first of the behind the scenes books we reviewed in October here at borg was Titan Magazines’ The Mandalorian: The Art & Imagery, covering the first four episodes of the first season. Now The Mandalorian: The Art & Imagery Volume 2 is available, and you can order it here at Amazon or find it at any brick and mortar bookstore. Take a look inside…
Today we move from the big screen to the small screen with the Best TV Series of 2020. If you missed it, check out our review of the Best Movies of 2020here and the best Kick-Ass Heroines of 2020 here. We watch a lot of television, and probably love a good series even more than a great movie. We preview hundreds of series, but outside big franchise content you want to know about, we only review what we recommend–the best genre content we’re watching. The theory? If we like it, we think you may like it. The best shows have a compelling story, a full range of emotions, great characters, tremendous action, a sharp use of humor, and all kinds of well-executed genre elements that satisfy and leave viewers feeling inspired. Even better if we see richly detailed sets and costumes.
Without further ado, this year’s Best in Television:
Best Borg Series – Altered Carbon (Netflix). Showing life in a world well past the merger of the organic and inorganic via stacks placed in human individuals’ vertebrae in the back of the neck, the second season of the series further revealed the dark side of being able to live forever. What parts of life have the most value in a cybernetic world? What crimes emerge when body and mind can be separated and re-shuffled? Honorable mention: Star Trek: Picard (CBD All Access)–revisiting Star Trek’s old nemeses The Borg and introducing the cyborg-like nonbiological humanoids called Synths, the same term used in the BBC’s Humans.
Best TV Borg, Best TV Villain – Darth Maul (played by Sam Witwer and Ray Park), Star Wars: The Clone Wars (Disney+). The athletic performer Ray Park provided the best-ever lightsaber duel scenes in his co-starring performance in The Phantom Menace. Watching the animated series this year it was clear Darth Maul wasn’t just another animated character. Add another great duel to the books–Park’s motion capture abilities live on and continue to set the bar for Star Wars action sequences, and Witwer voices a character we never want to see go away again. Honorable mention for Best TV Villain: Grand Moff Gideon, Giancarlo Esposito, The Mandalorian (Disney+).
Best Sci-fi TV Series, Best TV Fantasy, Best Western TV Series – The Mandalorian (Disney+). Not a lot needs explaining with this series, which continues to be compared to the original Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back more than anything with the Star Wars label on it since. The Western motif is still alive, not all that hidden here in space fantasy garb. And we won’t get started on the impact of The Child (aka Baby Yoda) now called Grogu, on the genre-loving world and beyond. Credit Dave Filoni and Jon Favreau’s visible enthusiasm and love for the original movies for a series that only gets better with each episode, despite their short lengths. Honorable mention for Best Sci-Fi TV Series: Star Trek: Picard (CBS All Access).
With the second season opener “The Marshall,” I thought the new season would be more of the same (see my review here). A bit light on plot, and so similar to a few episodes from the first season, I figured Jon Favreau, Dave Filoni, & Co. were going to deliver some more good entertainment, but not take too many risks. Not one week later I had to take that back, as the episode “The Passenger” delivered a spectacular single-story episode reminiscent of Alien and The Thing. The fourth episode of the season, “The Siege,” was a return of characters from season one and more of the single most important, far-reaching draw for any age group or other demographic, Baby Yoda, given the name Grogu in last week’s episode. But if you take a look at this season, especially episodes 11, 13, and 14, what you may find is the third greatest Star Wars movie. Or at least your third favorite. I’ll avoid spoilers for yesterday’s new episode “The Tragedy” below except to mention the director and that the episode blew me away, but let’s dig into this season so far.
It’s not your typical holiday special, but it may be one to return to each year, The LEGO Star Wars Holiday Specialhas arrived, a parody of the franchise starring LEGO Rey as she attempts to find a way to teach Finn to become a Jedi, using information she learns on Life Day–Life Day the holiday first introduced in the original 1978 Star Wars Holiday Special, which was a perfect snapshot of what you would expect for a blockbuster movie’s TV tie-in in the 1970s. Disney has used this show as an opportunity to poke fun at itself, at the Star Wars ideas it has created since it bought the franchise from George Lucas, while also poking fun at some of the ideas Lucas created. It’s not just for fans of the third Skywalker trilogy of movies as time travel arrives in the Star Wars universe, allowing Rey to zip back and forth to every corner of the past, meeting all your familiar friends in key scenes from the movies.
Just in time for our holidays, the Star Wars Holiday Special is making a comeback later this month. It will be forty-two years to the day that kids like myself first saw Bea Arthur serenade a cantina full of familiar aliens as Ackmena, met Chewbacca’s extended family, and saw Boba Fett on the screen for the first time (after his preview as an action figure offer). The Special aired on television for the first time in 1978, and now Disney+ is bringing the holiday special to a new generation of Star Wars fans. The twist is your next celebration of Life Day is also the next LEGO movie, so expect loads of laughs and throwbacks in the animated LEGO Star Wars Holiday Special. Even better, it comes with time travel and mash-ups across the movie spectrum.
One of the oldest sayings of actors is never take a role with an animal or a child, because you’ll always get upstaged. That’s where the Disney+ series is currently stuck–they created a character in The Child (aka Baby Yoda) that we’d all probably rather see more than Pedro Pascal’s title character. Yes, The Mandalorian is back this weekend with the first episode of Season Two, more than welcome fun in the year of COVID-19 and real-life, high-stakes politics. The series is full of Easter eggs and good throwbacks to the original trilogy, the prequels, bits and pieces of the entire franchise. But the plot for the season opener is a retread of themes and scenes from last year, light on our favorite young green-eared friend.
Disney+ shared a new trailer for The Mandalorian late Monday, adding more great clips and images from the coming season, tying viewers back to the original 1977 Star Wars. The Mandalorian (Pedro Pascal), who we now know as Din Djarin, flying around with his backpack? Check. Cara Dune (Gina Carano) and Greef Karga (Carl Weathers) putting an Imperial troop transport through its paces? Check. Someone found Yondu’s Yaka Arrow? Check. The Abyssin cyclops from the Mos Eisley cantina? Check. More of The Child (we know, you know him as Baby Yoda)? Check.
Star Wars in pictures. It’s something fans of the franchise have gotten excited about now for 43 years running. From the first publication of Ralph McQuarrie’s earliest concept art, fans want more. So it makes sense we’re going to see three books are concept artwork this year for the first season of The Mandalorian, the best thing to happen to Star Wars since the original trilogy (OK, and one or two “Star Wars story” movies). The first of these behind the scenes books is Titan Magazines’The Mandalorian: The Art & Imagery, just released in three versions, one via newsstands, one via comic shops, and a hardcover version you can pick up here at Amazon and brick and mortar bookstores.
