When The Mandalorian premiered on Disney+ in 2019, it seemed like an exciting new beginning for the Star Wars universe. It revolved around interesting new characters we'd never met before, the episodes mostly stood on their own, and Baby Yoda, aka Grogu, became a pop culture phenomenon. Star Wars was back, baby, ushered into a new era by showrunner Jon Favreau and over-boss Dave Filoni!
This is just my opinion, but I was less enthusiastic about the next two seasons, which brought in a lot more characters from other shows and movies (Boba Fett, Luke Skywalker, Ahsoka Tano, Bo-Katan Kryze, etc). The Mandalorian started to blend into a new rush of Star Wars shows like Ahsoka, The Acolyte and The Book of Boba Fett. I don't think the series ever delivered on the full promise of that exciting first season. It just felt less special after a while.
Now, Disney is trying to reunite interest with a Mandalorian movie called The Mandalorian & Grogu. Does that mean we're not getting a fourth season? We don't have a firm answer to that one, but it seems likely. According to Giancarlo Esposito, who played the villainous Moff Gideon for the first three seasons of the show, it's all part of Disney's master plan.
"As in the MCU…Disney will figure out how to join all of these characters into one really great movie or TV show," Esposito said on a panel at Dragon Con the other month, according to Culture Slate. "That’s my sense of where it will go…Dave Filoni and Jon Favreau have a new vision, continuing on with a Mandalorian movie…My sense is that it’s all going to converge at one point or another and we’re going to have another set of… trilogy, or more, of films."
Disney loves itself a densely connected cinematic universe, so Esposito is probably on the money here. Of course, Disney also has a history of failing to get new Star Wars projects off the ground, announcing and then seemingly shelving films from the likes of Taika Waititi, Rian Johnson, Patty Jenkins, Kevin Feige and Game of Thrones showrunners David Benioff and Weiss. So they have some trust to rebuild.
The Mandalorian & Grogu sounds like it's really going to happen, along with a new film following up with Rey (Daisy Ridley) after the events of The Rise of Skywalker. They also have a lot more TV shows in the works, including a second season of Ahsoka, which has already intersected with The Mandalorian. I'm sure Disney can think of a way to take all this material and fashion it into a new movie trilogy. But will they be able to follow through, and will fans be interested if they do?
Whatever happens next, Giancarlo Esposito may have to sit it out, since Moff Gideon seemingly died in The Mandalorian season 3. But death needn't be the end in a franchise like Star Wars, or at least that's what Esposito is apparently counting on. "I want to live! There was a f*cking clone. Make it true!" he said.
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