Does The Mandalorian‘s Pedro Pascal have the best gig on television?
He’s the lead role in an Emmy-nominated show set in the Star Wars universe where it doesn’t matter if he’s sporting a five o’clock shadow, because his face is almost always covered, assuming it’s even him under the helmet and armor (which it often wasn’t in Season One). Plus, he gets to hang out with Baby Yoda. Even when the little frog-killer is committing genocide, he’s still sooooooo cute. I’m not saying Pascal doesn’t deserve every cent he’s getting paid (he’s got a great voice!). But I am saying that myself, and many others, would like to see his handsome face more, as long as it doesn’t look like this. Is that too much to ask? Apparently so, because as we discovered in “Chapter 11: The Heiress,” there’s a fanatical reason why Mando doesn’t take his helmet off.
After Mando returns the Frog Lady to her Frog Guy, he meets a Davy Jones-looking octopus man who says that he can help him find what he’s looking for: others like him. It turns out to be a trap, with a crew of octopus men feeding Baby Yoda to a giant sea-creature (the irony) and knocking Mando in the water, but the pair are saved by a trio of Mandalorians: Bo-Katan Kryze (Katee Sackhoff), who fans of Star Wars: The Clone Wars and Star Wars: Rebels are well acquainted with; Koska Reeves (Mercedes Varnado, a.k.a. wrestler Sasha Banks); and Axe Woves (Simon Kassianides). They are quick to remove their helmets, which makes Mando act like a wealthy dowager from the 1800s who’s seen something truly horrifying, like a woman’s ankle in public.
“Where did you get that armor?” he asks Bo-Katan. “You do not cover your face. You are not Mandalorian.” She is, though. The armor has been in her family for three generations, and she was “born on Mandalore and fought in the Purge,” she tells Mando. “I am the last of my line. And you are a Child of the Watch,” a “cult of religious zealots that broke away from Mandalorian society. Their goal was to re-establish the ancient way.” Mandalorians agree that “this is the way,” but “the way” means different things to different people. Bo-Katan’s way is to find the Darksaber, as seen in the season one finale, while Mando is off to the city of Calodan on the forest planet of Corvus to find Ahsoka Tano. There’s been no previous mention of Calodan in Star Wars canon, but Corvus is a type of ship that’s likely under the control of the New Republic during the events of The Mandalorian. Either the show is charting its own path, or a skeptical Bo-Katan doesn’t trust Mando yet (he is a zealot, after all) and gave him dicey information.
We’ll find out next week. Meanwhile, this is what I’ll be thinking about until then.
An accurate peek inside my mind.