The Mandalorian Season 2 Finale Breakdown Review

Marley Eleven Bury brings us his Mandalorian Season 2 finale breakdown of what has been an absolutely astounding bunch of episodes in the Disney Plus series.

Spoilers ahead!

Directed by Peyton Reed; returning from episode 2, the episode opens and within minutes, I become like Thanos towards Nebula with Peyton Reed:

Peyton Reed knocked my socks off with this finale. After years of seeing him do films I considered largely mediocre-to-average, I had become cynical and in fairness, I stand by my appraisal that episode 2 was largely a flat-energy story.

Nevertheless, he showed me that he has a lot of talent within him, as we will soon explore and I am now far more intrigued by the possibilities of Antman & The Wasp: Quantumania.

For now, however, on with the breakdown.

The capture of Doctor Pershing starts this episode on a strong note, as Cara Dune leads the charge in the first of the episode’s highlight scenes: Confronting an extremist Imperial Remnant pilot who witnessed the destruction of Alderaan and the first Death Star.

Though trying to throw her off balance, he gets a blaster bolt to the face for his trouble and it is a standout scene for unique empire perspective on that atrocity, while tying in in effectively to the enormous reveal later, hinting at who is to come.

Moving forwards, Boba and Din arrive on a planet where Bo Katan and Nite Owl Koska Reeves are drinking away their frustrations at being unable to track down Moff Gideon.

Din then reveals his knowledge of where the Moff is, yet not before Boba and Nite Owl Koska come to blows, in a brief but strong understanding of Mandalorian power dynamics.

Boba is stronger and more focussed, easily throwing her to the ground initially, while Koska has far greater agility and knocks him down once she has recovered, with both of them stalemating with a duel lock flamethrower attack, before Bo-Katan breaks apart the exchange.

It is a unique insight into the rivalries, bitterness and in some ways, elitism of different Mandalorian factions.

Bo Katan dismisses Boba’s right to the armour, while he cares little for their crusade for Mandalore and values the armour for the right he has to wear it through his father and skill.

Establishing the conflict Din will face later and likely into S3 itself, they all agree to work together, using theatricality and deception to board Moff Gideon’s light-cruiser, upon which time Cara, Fennec, Koska and Bo fight their way through the ship to the bridge, while Din heads to recover Grogu. Firstly, the bridge team.

As several have noted, an all-women team lead the attack here and to the show’s credit, there is no fanfare around this. 

While I’ve never had any issue with films like Avengers: Endgame or The Boys S2 having moments of all-female character kickassery, some have taken issue with the self-congratulatory nature of these moments, a reasonable criticism.

The Mandalorian shows far more restraint by contrast, simply allowing the moment to occur without drawing any attention to it and I commend them for that.

After Disney’s frankly bad-faith LGBTQIA kiss in The Rise of Skywalker; edited out in homophobic countries, this kind of equality-in-story writing feels far more genuine, not tainted by the same corporate cheapness as that now infamously pathetic display.

Meanwhile, Din struggles against a single Dark trooper, establishing their terrifying strength level, resistant to whistling birds, flamethrower attacks, blaster fire and only, finally and narrowly taken down by Din’s Beskar spear.

Ejecting the rest of them into space, viewers may initially find themselves disappointed by their ejection from the rest of the story until you remember: This isn’t Rian Johnson writing. The plot-thread will not be dropped that quickly.

Din then confronts Moff Gideon, who holds the Darksaber above the head of Grogu and proceeds to use clever psychological trickery to gain an advantage in the situation.

Manipulating Din’s code of honour, he offers to allow Din to take Grogu, having already secured enough of his force-sensitive blood, an intriguing detail in its own right.

In return, Din will leave his ship immediately, which when Din goes to do, the Moff then lashes out and attacks him with the Darksaber.

This feels believable for the characters as Moff Gideon is well-established as a ruthlessly intelligent sociopath, while Din was a culturally sheltered cult-child and has only recently expanded his worldviews on several things.

As such, this deception shows a strong understanding of good character writing, as does their battle.

Gideon is clearly far less technically skilled than Din, yet gains the upper hand initially through surprise, sheer ferocity and viciousness.

Nevertheless, the duel persists and Moff Gideon is disarmed and defeated but not killed, something the Moff himself notes: ‘Well this should be interesting’.

Din then escorts Moff Gideon to the bridge, where a furious Bo-Katan realises that Din has beaten him in single combat, making Din the rightful owner of the Darksaber.

Though he offers it to her multiple times, Bo cannot accept; much to the Moff’s delight, as he realises the chaos this sows in the Mandalorian ranks.

An even greater joy is shown as the Dark Troopers, returning from being ejected into space, catch back up with the ship and re-enter, lining throughout the ship and outside the bridge blast-doors.

Here, they begin punching viciously against the doors, slowly breaking through in a terrific build-up of tension through sound-design.

All seems lost for our heroes, as the Moff notes, stating: ‘Everyone in this room will be dead, except me and the child’.

The Dark Troopers cannot be stopped in numbers that high, with so few of them, ill-equipped and outmatched.

Almost anyone would be and the situation looks without hope.

Until, someone arrives and with them, brings a new hope: Luke Skywalker.

The legendary Jedi Master arrives, in a scene that builds through the best original track Ludwig has composed for the entire show, titled: ‘The Friend’.

An astonishingly good piece, the entire atmosphere of the scene slowly changes, as first the Dark Troopers stop attacking the door.

Then, they turn to face their enemy.

All of them turn to face him and are then dismantled, one-by-one, methodically, with precision and skill unlike anything we have seen Luke do on-screen before.

It is a true, pump-your-fist in the air moment, a scene for tears, laughter, ecstatic relief and uncontainable excitement.

Regardless of Pablo Hidalgo’s comments towards reactions like Star Wars Theory, emotions are most certainly for sharing here and anywhere else, yet at this moment, they go completely out of control.

I know mine did, as seeing the original trilogy hero in his prime, before the botched characterisation of the sequels, post his self-actualisation in Return of the Jedi: It was the treat we all needed after 2020.

Moff Gideon’s terror for this man cannot be understated. The man who inspired suicides earlier this season now tries to blow his own head off, after a desperate and failed attack on Bo Katan and Grogu, yet Cara Dune prevents such an easy escape.

Meanwhile, Luke’s ‘Vader Hallway Scene’ moment continues and climaxes with such a gorgeous takedown of the Dark Troopers that you wonder how Jon Favreau and Dave Filoni aren’t already the heads of the Lucasfilm Story Group.

Regardless, Luke is let into the bridge by Din Djarin and here, we get perhaps the strongest emotional sequence in the entire show: The goodbye between Grogu and Din.

A dynamic two-seasons in the making, their storyline was the heart and soul of the show, providing humour and emotional introspection for our main lead in equal measure. Grogu was a source of drama, mystery, intense conflict and loving moments of tenderness.

It was one of Star Wars’s best dynamics and hopefully, in time, they will see each other again.

Until then, just the act of Din revealing his face to Grogu for the first time and watching him, teary-eyed and vulnerable as Grogu leaves with Luke Skywalker and R2-D2; a wonderful additional cameo, is enough to end the season on a fantastic high.

There were a handful of small issues with the story.

Bo’s waiting on the bridge after discovering Moff Gideon wasn’t there, rather than actively seeking him out.

Boba also left the narrative unceremoniously, though the post-credit scene with him seizing Jabba’s Palace as his spinoff show was announced practically made up for it by itself. 

Yet it didn’t stop this episode from being a phenomenal standout.

With strong action, effective villain writing, superb emotional highlights and earth-shatteringly good cameos, this show knew how to craft a compelling story for its season finale once again and one can only hope that going into S3, with the loss of Grogu, they can keep up this superb quality.

To see all of the other Season 2 The Mandalorian episode breakdowns CLICK HERE