The Mandalorian review: “Chapter 11: The Heiress”

The new episode of The Mandalorian has a tight plot, great action sequences, and gives us a better idea of what it means to be a Mandalorian. It’s one of the best yet!

The Mandalorian braves high seas and meets unexpected allies.

RECAP

“The Heiress” bolts out of the gate: Mando arrives at the estuary moon of the planet Trask, his entry into the atmosphere made perilous by the battered condition of the Razor Crest. Reunited with the Frog Lady, her Frog Husband directs Mando to an inn where he claims there are locals who know where to find more Mandalorians.

Mando meets up with a Mon Calamari fishing boat captain who offers to transport him and Baby Yoda to the new Mandalorian hideout, but the captain betrays them on the voyage, tossing them into the hold to be eaten by a sea monster while he takes Mando’s Beskar armor. Three blue-hued Mandalorians, led by Bo-Katan (Katee Sackhoff) arrive in the nick of time to knock off the Quarren and rescue Mando and Baby Yoda, but Mando rejects them when they remove their helmets. After Bo-Katan’s trio help Mando survive another Quarren ambush, he agrees to sit down and chat at the inn.

Bo-Katan says she can help Mando find members of the Jedi, who can help locate Baby Yoda’s people. But in return, she asks Mando help her crew hijack an Imperial Gozanti freighter loaded with weapons. Moff Gideon (Giancarlo Esposito) appears to the Freighter Captain (a cameo by Titus Welliver) via hologram and orders him to destroy the vessel in a suicide dive to the moon’s surface. Mando and Bo-Katan save the ship, and she tells Mando where he can find the Jedi.

REVIEW

Launching with the best opening sequence of the season so far — that landing was filled with fun and danger — “The Heiress” immediately promises to be another great episode of the show. The Trask moon, heavily populated by Mon Calamari (Admiral Ackbar’s species) and Quarren, is new to viewers, although the worn down, spaceport/seaport colony fits right in to the established Star Wars aesthetic. The Mandalorian is a space western at heart, but this maritime setting works well: the action sequence where Bo-Katan and her warriors attack the Quarren boat packs a serious punch.

Bo-Katan’s arrival also gives us information about the wider Mandalorian universe: normal Mandalorian warriors do remove their helmets, but Din Djaryn is a “child of The Watch,” part of an offshoot military religious cult dedicated to returning to the ancient way of the Mandalore. He’s unfamiliar with that phrase, hinting that there’s a lot about Mandalorian culture we don’t know. “The way” of these other Mandalorians is represented by the aggressive and manipulative Bo-Katan, who’s obsessed with regaining her ancestral family throne on Mandalore. (She’s also obsessed with getting back the Darksaber, which probably means a clash with Moff Gideon is coming.) This catches Din Djarin a bit off-guard.

Sackhoff, best known for her role as Starbuck in the Battlestar Galactica reboot, also voiced Bo-Katan in the Star Wars: The Clone Wars animated series. She knows the character well and brings plenty of natural grit, so this is perfect casting. The other two blue Mandalores are Kaska Reeves (played by Mercedes Varnada, aka wrestler Sasha Banks) and Axe Woves (Simon Kassianides).

Beautifully cinematic and driven by a story that takes no prisoners, “The Heiress” delivers memorable action sequences and engaging plot twists. While this episode clocks in as the season’s shortest (35 minutes), this streamlining gives it a clean narrative through-line that entertains even as cracks open the wider universe (if only a bit). And while this installment is filled with throwbacks to the original movie series, they’re subtle enough not to distract.

The episode ends with Mando and Baby Yoda taking off in the Mon Calamari-repaired Razor Crest, a scotch tape and rubber band fixit job that’s turned the spacecraft into a hilarious, panel-shedding jalopy. With its masterful mix of derring-do, humor, intrigue and sweetness, “The Heiress” is one of the best episodes of The Mandalorian so far.

EPISODE GRADE: A+

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