Guest: Jess Tompkins (BFFC) Returns | A look back @TheBookOfBobaFett

Time to abandon ship. Oh no! Here we go! Can I persuade you to join us for a drink? It's a tradition. Here, here. Jar Jar, homie, my main man, quick! Before the separatist attack, get into the escape partner. Hey! This is escape, and we're the party! Welcome back to Star Wars Escape Pod. And our reunion with our previous guest that we had on the show, a friend of ours from the Bookaboo fan club, Jess.

And she's been very, very great at saying she'd love to come back, and we loved chatting her last time, and we have some follow-up questions we wanted to ask her about her thoughts on the Bookaboo fit. Now that's all wrapped up on Disney+. So she's going to be jumping into the escape pod any moment here. And we'll get into that in just a bit. Another happy landing. Alright, we are in the escape pod. And Jess, welcome back to the podcast. Hi, thank you so much for having me back.

It's good to see you both again. It is good to see you too. You jumped in at the right moment. I said to Blake here, I said, you know, we should, you know, you know, we should go back to the escape pod. You know, we should go back to the escape pod. You jumped in at the right moment. I said to Blake here, I said, you know, we should, we'll get the chair on the road that way when she jumps in, we're ready to welcome her in the recording. Yeah, it was extremely well orchestrated.

Super, pretty well timed. Yeah, yeah. So how are you doing? You're doing good? Yeah, pretty good. All things considered. How about you both? It's been busy. Yeah. It's been busy. Yeah. That's accurate. I'd say busy as well. But yeah, things are good. I think we're going to have a book of Boba Fett finishing up here now. Just kind of bide my time till Obi-Wan comes out. I know. Aren't we all? Where's that trailer? I know. Right? Well, man, that's a good point. It's coming out so soon.

I haven't put a trailer out, which is kind of nuts. Speaking of the trailer. I mean, have you guys seen like the rumors that they're going to be dropping a trailer pretty soon here?

Because I've seen some, some locked accounts for social media presence with the, the, the handle at Obi-Wan Kenobi and they're, they're like verified or whatever accounts, but you know, they're, I think they're just keeping them in reserve so that like day one, they can just unlock it and then boom, like the, the accounts there kind of thing. So they have one on Twitter and Instagram. How was that not already taken? I don't know about them.

I think if you have enough money, you can buy any account you need. Yeah, that's true. I've heard that done with websites where people will like, uh, buy a website domain in the hopes in the future, it will be valuable and they'll someone, whoever owns that will get like a windfall because some corporate, you know, entity. Yeah. Decides to use that as their brand and then they have no choice. Makes sense. Club Obi-Wan. As we're saying this, I'm like putting, putting. Get it now while you can.

That's right. Everyone's looking at their Twitter. Like is Ahsoka taken? Yeah, I'm sure all that stuff was taken a long, long time ago. So they got to probably buy each and every one back. Yeah. So yeah, this is it. This is the, uh, this is the profile. So it's, it's locked and it's just got a star Wars logo on it. And it's at Obi-Wan Kenobi, you know, joined October, 2021. So it's not that long ago, but it's just been sitting there. Empty, I guess.

I guess maybe they just secured the handle and they just wanted the account, you know, they're keeping in reserve until they launch a trailer and do all their promo stuff. But, uh, yeah. So would you guys say it's more official if Lucasfilm runs it or more official than Ewan McGregor? I think Twitter account. It'd be kind of funny if Ewan McGregor ran a Twitter account. Yeah, I think it'd be great. He's trying to just play the character the entire time. Just role playing. Yeah. John Cena style.

You know, he, he wore his peacemaker costume to every interview just so that people, uh, you know, got used to seeing the character. But, um, yeah. Boba Fett's finished. So, uh, you know, we were curious.

I mean, you know, we, we did, we did like a review every week and you know, we've kind of thrown our thoughts out there to the internet and such, but, uh, you know, I remember we, when we chatted with you first time around, uh, you know, we really interested in like what you had to say because, you know, you, you had, you guys with the Boba Fett fan club stuff been active. Yeah. You live and breathe it, right? Yeah. Yeah, exactly. You know what's going on the best here. Yeah. Yeah. Funny.

Yeah. Interestingly enough, I had a chat with, uh, three other members of the fan club, including Aaron, the website founder. We had a zoom call earlier today as sort of our post-mortem, I guess, or, or fan therapy maybe is a better word for it. But yeah, we were sharing our thoughts on it. And, uh, so I, I kind of, that was helpful, I think, for also having this conversation too, just to, to get their perspectives on it as well. That's great timing.

Yeah. Yeah. I guess you can share a little bit about what they, what they thought as well, what Aaron thinks of this whole thing. Yeah, of course. I mean, well, I am curious to know what you all think as well, but you all have already have your own separate opinions. So we'll get to that in terms of my feelings.

Um, across the board, I think the show was a little uneven in terms of pacing and story, and I still walk away from the show wondering, and feeling that just the motivations for Boba Fett himself were a bit weak and could have been executed a bit better. At the end of the day, I'm not like angry or upset about how he was portrayed. I, I'm not like thinking, oh, they should have never even made a show. I would never go that far.

Um, could I, could I have appreciated and enjoyed the character just as much without it? Yeah. I think I, I, I don't think it, it's, it's made me more of a fan. It hasn't made me less of a fan either though. So I think it would have to be pretty rough for you to become less of a fan. I'm talking, that was a Christmas or like holiday special levels, probably. Probably, I guess. And I think the, the quality control for Star Wars content is a lot higher these days. So thank goodness for that.

But yeah, it's, I have mixed feelings about it. I think there were some high moments. I think there were some low moments. There were some really awkward moments. Um, but at the end of the day, I'm, I'm not like upset. There was a show. I think, yeah, I think I am glad that there was a show. I'm glad Boba Fett gets his moment in the spotlight. And I think a lot of casual fans enjoyed the show. A lot of the people enjoyed the Mandalorian, enjoyed the book of Boba Fett.

And I'm, I'm glad that that's there for people to consume and, um, enjoy for what it is. Uh, but as a, yeah, as a Boba Fett fan, definitely had expectations. And I think a lot of fans had expectations because this is a character with pre-established lore and, and canon before Disney took over. And I think we all understood as Star Wars fans that the canon was going to change. Yeah. But still, I think your, your heart is always in the place that you want it to be as close as possible.

Yeah. If you appreciate an aspect of a character that was told, you know, if there was a certain story or narrative arc or whatever, that that depiction is going to resonate with you and it's going to resonate with you no matter what. And that's the case for me. I think it's the case for a lot of Boba Fett fans too, is, you know, we fell in love with this character initially because, you know, wow, he looks cool. But I think people who have remained Boba Fett fans are fans.

Yeah. Because he looks cool, but there's also something under that hard exterior too. There's, you know, a character with an interesting, um, you know, background. There's still a lot of mystery and enigma attached to him. And he has his own moral code as well that I think resonates with a lot of fans too.

So when you have those expectations, especially having, I think, you know, expectations that have existed for many, many years, because some of the earliest books with Boba Fett, you know, go back to the nineties, maybe even earlier than that, with some of the comics and in books as well. But when you have those stories that you've been carrying with you for, you know, 10, 20, 30 years.

And in the terms of the older fans who fell in love with Boba Fett through the action figure on the back of a cereal box, you know, those expectations stay with you for a long time. And then you, you consume a piece of media like this. And so the bar is set really high and the creative, you know, the creative direction for that team, for that show, the creative team obviously had their own story that they wanted to tell.

And, you know, they told that story, but they're not going to make everyone happy. And I think it's very clear with, with even the Mandalorian and the book of Boba Fett, there is, I think, a desire to be appealing to a broad audience. And if this show was catered to hardcore fans, hardcore fans would pay for the Disney Plus subscription. But would casual fans watch a show about Boba Fett, you know, just bounty hunting? It's a good question.

And that's probably something that was talked about from the very early concepts. It's like, which do you want to go for? How are they going to get the biggest market? And it's funny how sometimes catering to the hardcore fans, you actually pull in more people as well too, right? Cause they, they want something more serious. Yeah, I think it depends. I think it depends. And, you know, I think it depends on what like intellectual property, property you're talking about.

Like I work in video games. And if you make a hardcore game that attracts to a very specific type of game, or it does not appeal to everyone.

And, you know, we have seen pushback from communities of players when a hardcore game does maybe make it more, you know, I hate, I don't like the word casual when applied to games, but if it's something has changed about it that alienates the core fans, we all in the industry, you see a lot of pushback, like it's a very common thing if you are at all familiar with the video game space and how audiences respond to it. So I think it depends. We've just followed Blizzard over the last 10 years.

Yeah, MMO players are, I mean, gamers are opinionated, but I think MMO players in particular, but I don't know. I don't, I've never worked on an MMO title, but yeah, I think it just depends. But I think Star Wars in general, there's been this shift for, I think, you know, almost everyone is a Star Wars fan, right? Like it's actually unusual when you encounter someone who isn't a Star Wars fan or says, I haven't watched any Star Wars shows or I don't watch any of the films, right?

It's pretty rare. Yeah. Yeah, I know. It's true. It's, I think I was trying to explain this to somebody else, you know, within the last two weeks that Star Wars is kind of elevated above being just a media franchise. It's almost just, you know, it's almost even outgrown pop culture in itself. It's like its own entity of a pop culture because it extends. Star Wars is pop culture.

Yeah. Because the thing is like with pop culture, like you get these very iconic franchises in pop culture, like Jurassic Park or Back to the Future and stuff, you know, things that are just part of the pop culture medium. But Star Wars extends so much farther beyond all those things because it's a multimedia story initiative where there's, we have stories being told across video games and shows for younger audiences and live action shows and movies and audio books and novels and comic books.

And like there's all these different things which reaches different, different audiences. Right. And so it's almost like a, like pop culture, you have so many ways into certain, certain stories and certain franchises by going to a theater to see this or that, or reading the tie in comic book to this or that. But there's so many ways to just kind of get into Star Wars, you know, and to a lot of people book above it might even be their first experience with Star Wars.

It might even be their first show. So I know what you're saying when it comes to trying to diversify who they're targeting here. Like the, you know, I don't know if the hardcore fans is necessarily the root of where they're going after.

They might just be, you know, maybe maybe their their goal or their agenda was to make a story that just connected with general audiences that was about this character and kind of had some nods to the hardcore fans, but then in a wider spectrum was able to set up what they're planning for Mandalorian because we had a lot of focus in this show on characters we've seen before in in the last two seasons of Mando. Yes, we did. Very surprising. So I don't. Yeah. Yeah. We can go back to that later.

Yeah, we can, we can go back to that. Yeah. But, but yeah, yeah, it's, it's, it's a, it's a, it's an interesting, it's an interesting world we live in, in which, you know, I think there's definitely some things about the show that lived up to my expectations. And then there's other things that sure didn't.

I remember something that Blake frequently brought up a lot of the time was how, how, or maybe even Darien mentioned as well when we were chatting about episode to episode, but just how much I don't know how much they tore him down as a character just to try and build them up again, which I don't know if it was the right way to approach the story because they could have done that with a different way of evolving that character rather than just making him lose every fight in every episode.

Yeah. You know what I mean? Like it was just, I don't know. I think that part of it was a little much. But it's tough because they were starting with this character is supposed to be like the best bounty hunter of the galaxy. So obviously he's a super bad ass and be really good at combat. Yeah. But then every time we saw him fight, he was always needed help to, to win every single time when he's supposed to be like a lone wolf. He felt very out of character.

And the fact that he seemed to progressively get worse as the show went on, he was better at fighting when he was fighting with the Tuskens. Yeah, that's a really good observation. Cause I saw a lot of people talking about that too. And among ourselves in the Boba Fett fan club too, was that he just kicked ass on season two of the Mandalorian. He made an entrance and everyone talked about it and he made a fantastic

entrance. Even people who were Boba Fett detractors and thought like, Oh, Boba Fett is overrated. Even I saw people chiming in saying, you know what? I get the hype now. He's, he's fantastic. That was great. And that was Robert's episode too. There was a bit of a backpedal, right? Yeah. Yeah. Cause, cause Robert's been getting a lot of flack for all the episodes that he did in the show were the least good ones, right?

And you know, it's kind of, it kind of sucks to hear or to observe literally the evidence of that, because he did such a good job in that, in that entry, you know, in Mandalorian and that was, that was his, his, his baby, right? Like that was what kicked started this whole show, I think. But yeah, it just, it just kind of sucks to see it kind of backfire in a way.

Yeah. So I'm just sitting here thinking about it and it, it seems like they should have approached it more like the Marvel's, the Punisher where he's really good at like fighting everything, but he is as more social, like difficulty, like trying to, so it's going to be trying to build this crime syndicate. He should have struggled more to actually get people to help him.

Whereas they kind of flipped it the other way around where he was all about trying to do teamwork and it was really bad at combat, which was kind of bizarre from what we knew of the character. Yeah. And I think it's, there was a, there were a few gaps in the story and that was one of them.

And they did try to explain it with, it was, it couldn't, it's easy to miss, but after, after like episode four or something, he came out of the Bokta tank and his little droid companion says, congratulations, Lord Fett, you are now fully healed. And it, it felt, it felt oddly gamey. I don't know. It felt like something I would hear in a video game. Level up. Yeah. You finished the prologue. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. So again, a bit inconsistent.

It's still inconsistent though, because we saw him kicking ass, taking names in season two of Mando. And even with the Tuskens as well, but then suddenly for him to be on that decline, that still wasn't fully explained very well. Right. Even if they could have just talked about, you know, the long-term ramifications of being in the Sarlacc, you know, how long was he in the Sarlacc? But again, when we saw him in Mando season two, that was post-Sarlacc.

Yeah. But it makes me wonder, you know, if I'm really stretching it, it's like, is there something about being digested for a period of time that has symptoms that will flare up, you know, eight years later or something like that? Or even an easier solution is the old EU, he was dealing with clone cancer because he was a cloned person. His DNA was degrading. So if they wanted something along those lines, I would have been very much on board.

You know, anything to explain that, I would have been on board with that to see that make a return. It even crossed my mind that, you know, because Boba Fett is supposed to be an unmodified, pure genetic clone who doesn't have any of that age acceleration. But what if at a certain point he did start aging rapidly, like you said, like clone cancer or just some kind of defect kicked in because, you know, that's, he's just not, wasn't produced organically. Yeah, exactly.

That's an interesting side story to pursue. But no, at least not now at this time. It would have, it would have brought in some, some interesting story threads too, because perhaps the cure to save his life exists within another pure genetic replication of Django, which as we know is Omega in the Bad Batch. That would have been a really nice tie in. And I hope we get there. If there's a season two, I hope we get there.

And that's like one of the most interesting angles of Boba Fett is that he is a clone of Django Fett and none of that is explored in his own show. And that was disappointing for me. There was those brief Camino flashbacks, which I feel was symbolic. They were great. I love them. And I wish that it had delivered on a deeper level. But to me, what those flashbacks were signifying was, you know, a reminder that Boba Fett is a clone of his, of his father.

And it's a weird dynamic that no one else in Star Wars has where they, where their father was an exact copy of who they themselves are. But, and that has so many other interesting ramifications, right? Because we all know that clones like Rex fought alongside Ahsoka. Rex might still be alive. We don't know for sure. And so there's interesting things that could be, I think, explored. And especially with Omega. And I do hope they're saving that. I hope that comes down the road.

Yeah, if we had like old man Rex meet up with Boba, I think that would be a really cool interaction. Because last, last we saw Boba interact with any of the clones, they kept referring to him as brother, as they always do. And he was just determined to not be a part of like their family. Yeah. It's never really been touched on again since in Clone Wars.

Yeah. When one of the superior clones, when he was trying to go after Windu, one of the generals or something, one of the admirals aboard the ship was, he was like taken hostage, right, by Bosc and such. And he was like, hey, I can tell you're not like any other of those cadets, you know? And he's like, I'm no clone, not like those two. And then he points to like the other two guys in the room, which are just older versions of him.

And he's like really ticked off that people recognize that he's a clone and that he shares the same face as everyone else, because he doesn't feel like everyone else. He's the son of Jango, right? Yeah. So even though he's the body of Jango and has all the same features, he himself doesn't necessarily think of himself as just a clone. He knows he's more than that. That's something that comes up a lot with twins, like identical twins.

It started to feel like they're treated as one person instead of being an individual. Yeah, like they're treated as like a unity almost, you know? Yeah, yeah, it's interesting for sure. There's all these things that we could have got into. I know, the ears of my head are just spinning right now. Rewriting the whole show in our minds. What did you think of the first? So the first episode was kind of like it was either a make it or break it, I feel like, for a lot of people.

But, you know, personally, between the flashbacks, which I think was the first or second one, and him climbing out of the Sarlacc pit from a get-go, I thought that was pretty cool, and it certainly grabbed my attention. They didn't really go as far as to explain how long he was in there, because they're just very vague about the entire flashback sequences being, this was before now, and the time period between him going into that pit and now is about five years or six years or so at this point.

So, you know, my question to you is like, was all those flashback sequences that told that story, was that enough? And, you know, how did you feel when that kind of kicked off and you climbed out of the Sarlacc pit, you know, all the way up until, you know, the train heist and just everything in that flashback segment of his life? Like, what were your thoughts on that? Yeah, I think for the most part, some of the highlights of the show were in the flashbacks.

I wouldn't have mind if the first season was literally just flashbacks of his times with the Tuskens. I think I saw other people chiming in on social as well, that maybe the pacing would have been better, it would have been a more cohesive story to tell, setting up season two.

But I think it was very clear that the showrunners also wanted us to stay in the present because they clearly had, they wanted to bring back Mando and Grogu as well to, I think, provide some content for everyone eagerly awaiting season three. So I did enjoy the flashbacks. I think coming out of the Sarlacc was definitely one of the more enjoyable ones.

I think it was very validating for a lot of Boba Fett fans, including myself, was having that moment recanonized because obviously we seen that he survived from the Mandalorian, but we didn't know how. We reasonably assumed it was coming out of the Sarlacc with his bare hands and his arsenal of gadgets. So seeing that happen and just recanonized was epic. It was definitely a strong way to start off the show. Great scene visually, I think the way it was shot.

I think a few of my friends were like, oh, I wish it was longer. I thought it was okay. I mean, I don't know how long I necessarily need to see Boba Fett struggling around inside of a really technical creature. Struggling in his stomach. Yeah. So I enjoyed it. In terms of the flashbacks overall, though, I do feel there were a few things missing from that overall story that left me wanting for more.

For one, the buildup to when he finally meets Fennec Shand, and I think that's maybe episode three or maybe episode four. I think episode four. When he finally meets up with Fennec Shand, we finally get the motivation that we've been wanting the entire show, which is why he's becoming a crime lord, why he has this sense of duty and protection over the people of Tatooine. And he tells Fennec that he's tired of seeing their kind dying. And I can get behind that.

I think I can understand that for someone who's lived that life, that mercenary life, for most of their life as their profession, seeing people that they've worked with die constantly, his own father being a victim of his profession too, and getting killed in the line of work as a bounty hunter. I think that does resonate with him on a personal level. But then to just have it kind of delivered in a one-off, like in a brief conversation with Fennec left something desired for me personally.

I think if there was maybe a clearer buildup in the actual show to that, that would have been stronger. I think it would have been more clear. And I think that motivation should have been provided earlier because I don't think I was the only one there watching the show, kind of scratching my head episode to episode up until that point wondering like, why does Boba Fett want to be a crime lord? I do not get it whatsoever.

Yeah, I think we talked about that last time we had you on because we were comparing it to the EU where he eventually became Mandalore. And this is like, oh, now he's going to be a crime boss. And none of us could figure out what his motivation would be for that because it felt so out of character for him and everything we knew about him. Yeah, even Cad Bane asked that question at the end. He's like, Boba Fett, I don't get your angle. And it almost like made me laugh internally.

It was like, yeah, I think a lot of us are wondering the same thing, Cad Bane. Yeah, yeah. Actually, speaking of Cad Bane, now that you brought it up, you know, he's a very important staple figure in Boba's life from his younger years. And we didn't, of course, see the completion of that story arc in The Clone Wars where he was supposed to mentor Boba for a little while. But, you know, as a fan of Boba Fett, I'm sure that character has some sort of importance to you as well.

Was he, would you say that he was kind of justified, you know, in his portrayal and stuff? Because I know there's some, you know, I personally have some gripes with just the look and I know that, yeah, they changed the voice a little bit as well and just almost needlessly. And, you know, I have my minor gripes. I was still really happy to see him. But, you know, Josh, you're partially ignored by that because you yourself are a cat being a personator. That's right. Not a very good one.

Oh, well, you can't, you cannot not show us. I have to hear the impersonation. Hey, Boba, what's your angle? Hey, that's pretty good. He's mad at many talents. Yeah, what's, yeah, I mean, what's your angle on Cad Bane? Like, what's, like, you feel like he was, he's played well or, you know? I, yeah, so based on, like, I'm not the biggest, I guess you could, I mean, I like Cad Bane as a character. I think he's pretty interesting. He always shakes things up.

So I don't, but I don't know much about his character beyond the Clone Wars. I don't know if there's much content about him, to be honest. You would probably know better than I, but I was satisfied with his depiction. I will say because I have pretty much only seen him in the Clan Wars. I think his initial appearance did throw me off a little bit because he's like, oh, his face is like much longer in the cartoon. But then the more I saw him, it grew on me.

So I think where the point, I think when I go back and see him and say, like, the bad batch, I'll probably be like, oh, he looks a little weird. He looks a little off. So the, I think it grew on me and I think he fit within the, you know, the real world depiction of what the character should look like. I think it meshed pretty well overall. In terms of his depiction, though, in the show, I think, again, just a missed opportunity where he was kind of shoehorned in at the end.

And I think having him introduced in a lot earlier would have, I think, created more tension, potential for more storytelling opportunities, maybe even some flashbacks. Like, if you're going to bring in this character who was a former mentor of Boba Fett and is going to duel him at the end of the show, why not? Shouldn't the audience care about that? And use some devices to get us to care about that. Use some flashbacks.

You know, they could have shown a younger Boba Fett with, I mean, like, you know, have Tem, Tamora Morrison play Boba. You know, those signs of aging. Or just keep him helmeted the entire time. You know, a younger person in a suit of armor, keep him helmeted the entire time. You could still pull off those flashbacks, especially if they're more vignette style flashbacks where it's not like a cohesive story like we saw with Boba's time with the Tuskens.

So again, I think a bit of a missed opportunity. I appreciate that he was brought into the live action Star Wars show. But I think it's just another example of how uneven the story was overall. You know, initially they brought in the Hutts and the Hutts were going to be the big bad. Then the next episode, they're gone. We have Black Cursanton entering. And of course, he becomes an ally. But I think it's a similar problem that the prequels had where there's too many villains.

And this show had too many villains. There's the Pikes and the other syndicates. And yeah, the Hutts, you name it. It just goes on and on. And the Pikes, right? The speeder gang as well. So I think it would have been stronger if we had maybe less of those other fingers and more emphasis on Cad early on. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that actually came up when we were discussing the final episode. It was it was almost a question of this should have been the big lead up.

You know, like him, him killing Cad Bane in the streets of Mos Espa should have been the the foreshadowed kind of moment. You know, other than him using the gaffy stick to do it and the entire time he spent training with the Tuskens to master that weapon, which ended up saving his life in the end, it was still almost a matter of like this. This moment should have meant more.

And you know, and I think a lot of people recognize Cad Bane for being a character, you know, from the Clone Wars and everything. And, you know, he's made his appearance in the Bad Batch now. But, you know, it was he's had his other appearances here and there, you know, with comic books and whatever on the odd occasion. But to I think of people like Dave, who is who is one of these people that are running these shows.

It just kind of blew my mind a little bit that we just didn't get more more villainy out of him almost, you know, other than just this guy that shows up. And it was a surprising I didn't expect that at all, you know, especially like the second last episode, you know, and to make his entrance in an episode that was just jam packed full of cameos from like everybody. Yeah. Yeah. But yeah, yeah, definitely could have. I think this could have been at least an eight episode season, not seven.

And, you know, more like five because there's two full episodes are devoted to the Mandalorian. Right. Yeah. So there's less time spent on Boba as a whole. And it's almost it was just really rushed like the finale episode. It just felt like that could have easily been two parts and that that western standoff in the streets was just like so I don't want to say sloppily done, but it was just it was just not as epic as it could have been.

And yeah, and then going back, I talked about the fact that they actually put more time into the duel with the marshal. Yeah, cat baiting the marshal than they did with Boba. That was a better, a better portrayed standoff. Yeah, yeah. Mind you, Dave Filoni directed that episode. And again, not to dis Robin or anything, but you know, he did the finale. Right. And he did the scooter chase scene. The scooter. The director has to work with what's written. Yeah. Yeah, they do.

They do. They do have to work with what's written. You know, it's just, I think with the screenplay though it's it's like a majority is like script and then general kind of like what happens, you know, in the main events of things. But then as a as a director for for for an episode like he's one of the producers of this show. Right. So he has a lot more control over other directors that just show up for one episode at a time.

And he has the majority of the season that he directed. So, you know, just it just still just kind of shocks me. Maybe maybe Cad Bane just wasn't important to him. You know, maybe that was a possibility. But yeah, I think I think that whole thing could have been done a little better. Still very happy to have seen him. I just always feel like it could be better if Dave Floney just does all of it himself. That's a lot of work for one guy. It is a lot of work.

But I feel like he knows all the characters the best. Yeah. Compared to all these extra directors coming in who have technical talent. But I don't think they necessarily understand the characters themselves as well. Yeah. And, you know, probably is the most, you know, the most I think of. I guess adapt in terms of the right everything. Yeah, yeah, I think he's the go to guy.

And I think he's there every day, you know, on set, kind of like a Lucas figure when on Empire and Return of the Jedi, which is part of the reason why he just did the prequels himself. Because, you know, even though another director's name is stamped on the credits, he was just he says this in Empire Dreams, I believe. But he was just there over the shoulder every shot, you know, just basically telling the director what to do. And then it's like, well, you know, why do I need it?

I mean, aside from other units that might be shooting other types of menial footage to slot in between sequences just for the continuity of things and unit B, C or two or three, whatever you want to call them. Assistant directors that is like he I don't know he could have he could have done it himself. And I think he just preferred that when he did his own films, you know, after after episode four took a break, went back to do the prequels and such.

But yeah, I mean, you know, maybe maybe Dave is that guy these days. Maybe he's over the shoulder, you know, just kind of giving his guidance to all these directors coming in and shooting Star Wars shows. But, you know, but with Dave's involvement, though, it does make me wonder, you know, we have Fennec Shand who's met Cad Bane. None of that is introduced like none of that is played off in the show. It seems like a wasted opportunity. I don't think she mentions him.

No, did she? But she does see him, doesn't she? Or is she gone before he shows up? I think she's gone. She's there. She's there for the first interaction. Oh, yeah. They're about to duel and they don't, but she's not there for the actual duel. Yeah, that's right. So I feel like there's some of that prior history just is never addressed. And the same for Boba Fett and Kersantin. They have met in a Darth Vader comic. They were working a job together. Yeah, they've crossed over quite a few times.

Yeah, the fact that that's never acknowledged just feels a little odd. Same with Fennec and Bane. You know, Fennec is also aware that they're like, from my understanding, you know, Fennec tried to kidnap Omega, right? Like she not kidnap, but she was like was assigned to, I guess, steal Omega and bring her back to the cloners. Thank you. I was like, it's been a while since I've seen the show. The fish people, the fish dicks. She was like, so she must know the significance of Omega.

But now she works for Boba Fett and never mentions like, oh, hey, by the way, like, I don't know. How long ago was it? Twenty years ago? Yeah, something like that. Twenty, twenty five years ago. Twenty five. I actually worked a job where I had to try to kidnap your kind of sort of sister. Yeah. Isn't that funny? Now I'm working for you. Like, why is why is that never brought up? You would think that. Yeah, you're right. You're right.

And there tends to be a lot of that kind of thing when when I think building a story like Star Wars and multiple different parts in the timeline, because simultaneously as this show was being done, you know, they're also planning to do Ahsoka. And at that point, before Rangers was canceled, there was that as well to consider an and or, you know, all the shows plus Bad Batch, which happens many years before. They're also doing the High Republic Initiative, which is hundreds of years before.

And then, you know, they also had, you know, stuff going on with possibly, you know, post post prequel era, we have, you know, the whole fallen order era that they're kind of trying to build out, which is around the same time Bad Batch happens. So it's like they're kind of building the structure within multiple different areas. And it's like, I can imagine that should be an excuse to forget stuff that's happening within your own story, though.

Yeah. Well, especially when Dave's the guy in charge, right? He's like, yeah, came up with this stuff. Like, why is it not referenced here? Right. So, yeah, it seems to be a common problem in this in this series, though, because I don't one of the first things I noticed that bothered me is Boba gets out of Starlight Pit. And then he passes out. And then the job was steal his armor. And then three or four episodes later, he's back trying to get his armor out of the Starlight Pit.

Yeah. How did he forget that? I think he was unconscious. So he was like, like, did you think it just fell off of him while he passed out and roll back in? I tried to justify this dress. I'll have you know, I tried to I tried to do to come up with some sort of creative reasoning for for all of this and Calvin and Blake both. Yeah, just my I mean, if he maybe he is he just was so exhausted. He just couldn't recall.

But that was my but you're totally right, though, because to get, you know, yeah, just to get out. He didn't need the armor to, like, crawl his way through the sand and everything. Yeah. When you really think about it, it just doesn't make any sense. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Too bad. That's hard. That's a that's a tough one to explain away. I know it's one of the the major I guess you say plot holes that like just I couldn't have a hard time letting that one go. It seems ridiculous to me.

You know, there was this there was this crazy episode. Of course, we mentioned it with all the cameos. Dave Filoni is very famous episode. Bring it back, Luke. Grogu, you know, Mandalorian, even Paz Vizsla, the armorer, you know, just just frickin everyone that showed up in this episode. Ahsoka when, you know, taking a sidestep outside of Boba's story for just a minute. What was your thoughts when you saw that episode?

Because it is an exciting episode to see when you're looking at the context of Star Wars. But I guess as a Boba fan, was it something that kind of the the the amazingness of that episode? If you consider it amazing, did that kind of outweigh the the I guess the the time that it took out of Boba's focus for you? Or was it just like, you know, was it worth it? Or how did you like that? That's a great question.

I'm kind of looking back and kind of chuckling at the past version of myself because I do remember watching those episodes. And I remember feeling on edge because I was like, this is great content, but this doesn't belong in the book of Boba Fett. And it actually made it very hard for me to focus and enjoy it in the moment because I kept wondering, OK, when are we getting back to Boba Fett? You know, we left off on an interesting cliffhanger. He says they're going to war.

You know, what's happening back at Mossespa? Instead, we are taking on this side quest with Mando, a very fine, perfectly fine, interesting side quest. But in my head, I'm thinking I'm watching the beginning of Mando season three. I this is not what I expected. There's a bit of a dissonance for me. And so I think if I and those and those episodes are the highlight of the show for a lot of people.

And I think if I and if I can objectively look at it as a piece of Star Wars media, though, especially the one with Luke and watching Grogu Train, that was probably the highlight of the episode. That was interesting story and character interactions and growth for Din, who clearly has a has a lot of affection for Grogu. So that was that was interesting. But I couldn't like actually relax and appreciate it while watching it.

So I do really need to go back and watch the show and I think fully appreciate it for what it is. Yeah. I think that's more or less exactly how I felt about it, honestly, because there was great story content, but it felt very out of place. Like, I get that they wanted to cover the gap of what Mando was doing from what he said he would help to when he comes back. But at the same time, it felt like we're spending too much time away from what's going on with both Boba and what he's dealing with.

It should have at least caught between the two. And the fact that I would even argue that maybe I'm with that like the group of fans you're referring to, where it felt like almost the highlight of a Boba Fett series wasn't anything to do with Boba Fett, which is kind of a big problem. It is a problem. I even have friends on Twitter who tweeted basically, how is the least interesting thing about the book of Boba Fett Boba Fett?

And I was like, damn, that's a burn if I ever heard one, but a valid burn. Totally valid. I can just imagine Robert, Roger Ghez just looking at Dave and going, Dave, you made your episode too good. It's overshadowing my show. You know, they're a creative like collective unit, Rodriguez, Favreau, Filoni. You think there would be more synergy there and it just, it does, I think, leave you wondering, you know, why they made certain decisions.

If they had a story where they wanted Din to be integrated, you know, why not just tell a more cohesive story and go from there. I think it's just another signal about some of the lost potential in this show, especially discussing some of the Mandalorian history, the purge of Mandalore. You know, those could have been conversations that Boba Fett was a part of too, and I think would have been meaningful, especially.

And I actually thought at one point that if Boba had a chance to meet the armorer, like what kind of conversation would they have? Because armor is obviously a very, very different with your philosophy. She's a zealot, like she's a zealot of that specific Mandalorian path that they follow. And yeah, I think just what her thoughts would be with him wearing that armor. Oh my gosh. Yeah, being a clone and all sorts of stuff. Fascinating.

So I think there's a lot of interesting possibility space in all of these different characters that were thrown into the pot. But the overall like recipe that the overall dish that came out of the pot afterwards was, I think, leaving something to be desired. Yeah, for sure. This brings me out to a topic that I said the blaze.

The thing is that at some point we got to do a recording, do an episode of just called Star Wars Missed Opportunities and talk about all the missed opportunities that that could have been in in Star Wars, because there's a lot of Josh. There's a lot of just got added to the Google Playlist, whatever. So we don't want to get kicked off. Yeah, it's it's it's it's but it's a popular topic, right?

Because, you know, another way to describe that would just be, you know, I guess maybe fan theories as to what what could happen and what might happen at some point in a future show. And, you know, hopefully if Lucasfilm is listening to just fans, they actually pull off some of this stuff. But yeah, it was it was like me, like like many other people. That was my favorite episode with no both in it, which is sadly enough today.

But I think it's just because I have so much more more attachment to these other characters, possibly. I think Luke being a really big one for me, who was, in my opinion, not really well justified in the more recent films. And this episode really, really corrected a lot of that for me. It really kind of made a difference.

And at the same time, trying to bridge that gap in a way that, you know, we're not fully decanonizing what they've done, but it just kind of tries to smooth over that that gap, you know, between seeing him to return the Jedi to seeing him in The Last Jedi. And so, yeah, for me, that episode was a huge, a huge deal, which was just a little more substance than than the really awesome cameo that we had in the end of Mando season two. And visually, just he looks so good.

It was just, oh, it was amazing upgrade. Oh, yeah. Yeah, it was just fantastic. So I was loving every second of it. And there were there were moments because I rewatched it. I watched like two, maybe three times. And I paused it on these just random moments where you just saw Luke and there was just his picture perfect, you know, and you can only kind of tell when he's talking a little bit. But but it was picture perfect looking at him standing next to Ahsoka.

And I was like, this is a dream come true right here. Like, I mean, to kind of gotten over the yeah, over the uncanny valley. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I mean, I mean, I love The Clone Wars. And I've seen that show too many times to count and seeing the son of Skywalker and the apprentice of Skywalker standing next to each other like that, never saw it coming. Never never saw them doing anything like this, you know, a couple of years ago. And and yet here we are.

And so that's kind of the reason why it's my favorite episode. But as far as Boba episodes go, like, you know, the finale and the first episode to me were pretty cool. But yeah, I mean, it is kind of one of those questionable things like we just have another show for this kind of content. Or maybe they can drop like, it's Disney Plus, they can do anything like they can just make a short film and throw it on there. And that would make sense. Like a Doctor Who style.

Like they always when they do a transition between doctors, they always do like a special, right? Yeah. So they could just do something like that. TV movie style. Yeah, yeah. TV. They don't need to make it like a theatrical Star Wars film. But yeah, I mean, make it make it a TV movie like they did. You walk adventures, you know, like Caravan of Courage, Battle, Battle for Endor, like there's that.

I mean, I don't even want to mention the holiday special, but a lot of people, you know, they see that every year. And so, I mean, having like a really high quality content like TV movie on Disney Plus being launched as like an hour long. This bridges the gap between this show and that show. So this is the season two point five, if you will. Right. You know, I'd be fine with that. So might be a good a good spot for content like that.

Yeah. I think that probably would have been the smarter move and then use some of the budget that they got back from that to fill in the rest of the Boba Fett story that we're missing. Yeah. Yeah. I got a question for you, Jess. So now that we've seen the Mandalorian series and the Boba Fett series, the Boba Fett that we got, comparing him to a Din Djarin, which character actually feels more authentic to the original Boba Fett?

Oh, I'm sure you've seen this conversation already then because that that is something that comes up a lot when people talk about when Boba Fett fans talk about the Mandalorian. Yeah, I think in a lot of ways Din Djarin does exemplify a lot of the characteristics of Legends Boba Fett. He's a lone wolf. A few words. You know, even in the Legends comics and books, he was not taking off his helmet frequently, which we saw the opposite of in the book of Boba Fett, which I'm like okay with.

I didn't think it was terrible that he had his helmet off. That's also like a prequel verse, like original trilogy thing, right? Because we didn't know what his face was before the prequels. Yeah, yeah. So there's, you know, a bit more rationale for that. So, yeah, but I guess just to answer your question succinctly, like yeah, Din has a lot of characteristics that are shared with Legends Boba Fett, and to see, and that's been a point of contention for a lot of fans, quite frankly.

What we were talking about earlier today on the Zoom call with a few of the folks in the Boba Fett fan club, someone raised, you know, if you had swapped season one of the Mandalorian and probably season two with Boba Fett instead of Din, and give or take a few changes here and there, probably you could have told that story with Boba Fett. And there is concept art from Mandalorian that had Boba Fett in the concept art.

Now, maybe that was just a decision because they hadn't fleshed out who the Mandalorian was going to look like yet, but it does leave you to suspect, like maybe at one point there was, maybe initially they had conceptualized the show around Boba Fett and then decided for whatever reason that was too risky, and they needed to start with a blank slate. You know, someone without the baggage that Boba Fett has, you know, the fact that he's a clone and whatnot.

So yeah, there's a lot of similarities there. I think there's still a lot exemplified by Boba Fett in the book of Boba Fett that rings pretty true to the Legends depiction. When he took out that train smuggling spice, I actually thought that was one of the moments in the show where he resonated most strongly with the character from Legends.

Again, it's been a while since I've read the books, but there's, I think, a short story in Tales of the Bounty Hunters or Tales from Jabba's Palace, but there's a story where he took out a crime smuggler and he had all this spice and he took his flamethrower to it. He burns the spice because Legends Boba Fett was straight edge. He was not into drugs, not into premarital sex, any of those things that a lot of vices that a lot of people have. He was very much against that.

So when he, you know, he took out the spice train and confiscated their spice, it was like, yeah, that that almost seemed like an homage to that story where he destroyed the spice because he disliked everything that it stood for. And that was part of his moral compass was that, you know, things were, for Legends Boba Fett, things were very much black and white. You know, if drugs are bad, you know, they're bad for society and so on and so forth.

Yeah. And I guess, I guess, I mean, he didn't destroy any personally other than Cobb Vanth kicking some into the dust. But I guess his whole in this show, his whole motive was really getting rid of that that trade in in Tatooine. So I guess I guess that concept kind of remained true. Would you feel that the character was, I guess, from a continuity standpoint, looking back at the other content that he's been in over the years? You know, Clone Wars, some of the comic books, stuff like that.

I felt it kind of deter it was a little a little different than some of the more violent stuff that we've seen from him in the comic books. Mind you, the comic books tend to be a little more exaggerated, obviously, than a different audience to a different audience. Totally, totally. Did you feel, though, that it was kind of in the ballpark at least? Or did you feel that this depiction was like kind of wildly different than than than what you were expecting?

I think it was ballpark, but leaning towards I mean, it's definitely a departure for the character. But I think and I can believe that departure I can I can believe like I can I'm willing to, you know, take it into consideration. Well, he fell into a Sarlacc. He almost died like he had a near death experience and probably not his only near death experience. And so maybe that was the straw on the Bantha's back that led him to turn over a new leaf and say, you know what?

Like he tells Fennec, I am tired of seeing our kind die. I don't want to die prematurely. Like I'm willing to accept that. But I think it came down to the execution. And that's where I still struggle to understand. For example, like his time with the Tuskens, like it's very clear that he formed a connection with them. But I feel like that time was in terms of telling that story was cut a little too short. He wasn't treated very well initially by the tribe, right?

He was a slave. He was a slave. He wasn't treated very well at all. And in order to prove himself, he had to like kill some horrific sand monster. And he could have ran right then and there, especially with the way he was being treated. But he decided to just kind of go, you know, join the fold, join the tribe. And it's still like I still struggle to understand that a little bit.

And I mean, and I'm not against that because Tamora, his heritage is of the indigenous people of New Zealand, the Maori. And that was something he talked about in telling that story with the Tuskens and that the Tuskens are the indigenous people of Tatooine. And that's a story that resonates with his with his heritage. And I thought that was awesome. But on the other hand, in terms of that making sense for Boba Fett, I just I just don't know if I really get that.

Like, I would I would think that for a character like Boba Fett in terms of how he's acted in legends, but that armor being so important to him and his identity, I would think that would be the first thing he would set out to do. And we still don't understand how he came to find out that the armor was in Din's possession. Right. And that was something they could have told us, but decided not to.

And I feel like that's another missing piece of the puzzle is why exactly did Boba decide to stay with that Tuskens for the period of time that he did? You know, why does he feel indebted? Why does he feel indebted to a group of people who held him hostage and treated him like property? No, that's a good point. Yeah, that never really felt clear to me. Right. And I felt like there's several small changes they could have done to alleviate a number of those issues.

I think so, too. Like they could have. But it's I feel like they wrote a script but then didn't question any decisions that they made. Yeah. And I don't know if maybe it was because they tried to write it all at once and they wrote the episodes out of order. But even things right around the time the story of what you're referring to, when he first tries to escape, he tries to help the Rodian and get the Rodian to join him. Well, at this point in time, he's supposed to be really selfish.

So didn't already they're starting off with the character not feeling like Boba Fett before he becomes more of a family oriented character. Yeah, that's true. That's just changing maybe using the Rodian, like setting it up so maybe the Rodian takes the fall while he tries to escape and then adding a scene where he and the Tuskens actually need to work together to do something rather than him just beating the monster and then suddenly being freed and then joining them.

And then adding a he wants to leave to get the armor. But something's going on maybe with the Tuskens and he has to make the choice and he decides to stay with them. Just adding scenes like that and then the whole thing would just become so much more cohesive. At least that's my opinion. I think you're right. I don't think anything that I'm critiquing would take like a dramatic rewriting of the show.

Just give us more context, make it more believable that Boba Fett decides, you know what, it's not worth it trying to find my armor. I'm moving on. I'm looking for a new way of life, a new lifestyle, and I found it. I found it with this group of people, the Tuskens. And other than having him go on the Vision Quest journey when he had the lizard up his nose, even that, I don't feel like that provided the bonds that would have, I think, provided more substance and made it overall more believable.

And then to your earlier question about some discrepancies in the characterization, I really wanted him at some point to just shoot some of the people who were being, quite frankly, just being major douches to Boba Fett. There was that character Peele, I forget his first name, something Peele, Lortha Peele. That character was super indignant.

I wish when he confronted them out in the streets when Boba Fett offered a job to the mods, I wish he just shot Lortha Peele, because that guy was just so irritating. Oh, it's the water guy. Yeah, the water guy. Legends Boba Fett just would have shot that guy, but instead he gives him money. He gives him money. He gives him his hard-earned credits. And then Maksha, he's the mayor. At some point, that guy is just stringing you along.

I don't know. Show those characters that they need to respect you. Set an example. Yeah. I don't know. At least shoot a warning shot or something. I think it all goes back to that statement about ruling with respect and not with fear. But I agree. At times, it almost feels like a complete, almost too harsh of a 180. It's fine to evolve characters like that, but I think it was just too fast of a transition. Yeah.

And it's not a practical place for that either. If he's going to be paying people, whatever, deal with problems, try to bring in the modders, like, there, I saved you now. You guys can work for me or whatever. That wouldn't work in a place like Tatooine where everyone's so scheming and just waiting to get the upper hand. I would have thought then that both sides would just immediately betray him.

Here's one thing that I keep on thinking back to is in the first Star Wars volume where he's hunting down Luke Skywalker for Darth Vader's mission for him, for Boba, that is. And Darth Vader basically says to him, I want the name of the pilot who blew up the Death Star. And this is the same crossover which he first meets Black Chrysanthemum and he has his own mission going on. But, you know, he's in this in this can't I think he's in the Cantina in in Mos Eisley.

And there's this farm boy who he's questioning, beating to a pulp on a table for the answer that he's looking for, which is basically where can I find this this guy? And I guess maybe he's like a friend of a friend knows Luke through somebody else from just small town style, you know. And he basically just tells tells Boba where he can find the homestead that he's looking for. And as he's exiting the canteen, he shoots, he shoots this kid on the table. Oh gosh, Boba is ruthless.

Yeah. And this is canon material here. Like this is kind of this comic was done after the Clone Wars depiction of Boba had kind of already gone down a road of this guy is not just a villain. Like he's kind of turning into this maybe an antihero, but a likable guy. Right. With, you know, with honor. And there's this farm boy that you just kind of just straight up murders in front of the whole place just for the reason of don't take me off. I'm a bounty hunter. Respect me kind of thing.

I think that's the only motive that he had. And it was just kind of like it was a very stark comparison. It was like comparing black and white here. And that event's not supposed to be that far down the road. So this is only like maybe 10 years at the very most, which is, you know, not a whole lot of time when you're comparing those two contrasts. But yeah, you know, I felt like at times when I think of those kind of moments, it was a little different. But I don't know.

Yeah, I think it just goes back to like it's not I don't I don't think it's outside of the realm of possibility to make the pivot that he has. Especially after several events like almost dying and, you know, getting exposed to different cultures or different ways of life. You know, falling outside of that that career that almost ended his his his life. I don't think that's outside the realm of possibility, but I think the execution of it like you're it.

It does leave you wondering exactly how how has he come? How has he gone from that hardened killer essentially to I am a man of the people. I want to rule out of respect and never assess second guessing himself the entire time after everything just keeps like failing. Yeah. Yeah. But I think and I think what it comes down to is that the showrunners clearly wanted to take someone who's popular like Boba Fett. But for him to be the star of the show, he has to be, I guess, likable.

Like he has to be a hero. My only caveat to that, though, is the Logan movie with Wolverine. It was fantastic. And yeah, but this is Disney we're talking about. Yeah. Right. You can still be able to take like, OK, then let's just do the the old original X-Men trilogy. Wolverine. That's like that's for a younger audience. And Wolverine and that is still this antihero who's like really hardened, but he still has that sense of honor.

Right. So you could just kind of take the same concepts. But I don't know. Yeah, I think that's fair. I mean, I think that's fair. I think I would have liked the show more if he was still more of a antihero, you know, rough around the edges. You know, I don't mind Boba Fett occasionally showing some humor because people are multifaceted. Right. You could still be a killer and a bad ass bounty hunter and crack a few jokes here and there.

But there were questions how to ride speeder, become a meme. But but I think like the the incident in Jabba's Palace where there's like a little robot and robot like clearly the little robot guys got a bit of the upper hand. And Boba Fett's getting frustrated. And then he like knocks him out or whatever and is like, I am Boba Fett. And it's just it's just so silly. Right. It's definitely that slapstick Disney humor that got thrown in.

But it doesn't gel very well with a character who, like you said, murdered a farm boy in cold blood just a few years prior on the very same planet. Yeah, exactly. You know, I think I think you put it exactly. There is this Disney slapstick is not even just Lucas slapstick humor, which was just very kind of background.

Haha, nobody cares. You know, this one is just like up in your face and it's like cheesy dialogue or maybe there's maybe the way it played out was just didn't agree with my stomach. But yeah, when he says that droid of all places, I was like, really? I don't know. Yeah, didn't agree with me too much. What about you, Blake? Yeah, as far as that scene, it did feel a little Jar Jar Binksie, I guess. But yeah, I think we're all kind of the same page.

I wish they had kept closer to the original Boba Fett that we had the gruff Boba Fett. I felt like the transition was too much and it didn't feel natural, which is more or less just rehashing what we talked about for an hour. But it's that is the root of the problem. What what was Aaron's thoughts on this? You know, because you mentioned you had a Zoom call earlier earlier today with with the with the team.

What were their thoughts and anything specific that they really loved and and maybe things that they spent a lot of time with things that we don't like? I'm sure they share some of the same opinions. But yeah, what were some things that just stood up from that conversation?

I think Aaron I think Aaron had brought up an interesting point, and I think we were all in agreement that ultimately the creative directors, the creative team of the show, I think, had a certain story they wanted to tell, but fundamentally didn't understand the core character of Boba Fett. And I think we would have had a very different show if the showrunners really understood that character and his history.

And, you know, this is and this is a character who has been retconned before, interestingly enough, right? He he had a history prior to Attack of the Clones and then Attack of the Clones came out and suddenly Boba Fett is a clone. He had a father. He was once a five year old ten year old boy who cackled like a little maniac in the cockpit of of his father's starship.

Yeah. So, and that presented, I think, a bit of a retcon for prior material, but still early enough in the Star Wars canon was it where I think it was a hugely disruptive and you could even weave in some of Boba's previous backstory into the new canon. But, you know, essentially Boba Fett has been retconned with the Disney acquisition and those legend stories falling, you know, into the legends category.

Now, granted, the comics you're referencing are published under Marvel, which is, of course, owned by Disney. So there are still elements of that. I think of that prior characterization where, you know, things are very black and white. The job comes first. His reputation often comes first as well. And that reputation is about being the best bounty hunter in the galaxy, essentially.

Right. I think what Aaron, I think what we had talked about on that call was, yeah, I think we would have gotten a very different show if people kind of understood what really was appealing about the character beyond just here's someone who looks cool and does cool things and has a jet pack. And so, unfortunately, we didn't get that version of the show. We got a version of the show where they I think clearly they wanted to bring in certain characters.

They wanted Cad Bane. They wanted, you know, they wanted Ahsoka. They wanted Luke. They wanted Din. They wanted Grogu. And they needed just random huts. And they still needed to tell that story. Yeah, I don't know. It's still a little baffling to even think through and try to rationalize because the show has some of the most awkward pacing of a show I've ever seen. Not just Boba Fett's story, but 2.5, episode Mando 2.5 just being cut into the middle of it.

There's some very interesting creative decisions made. Maybe one day we'll get to hear about it at Star Wars Celebration. But, you know, it is what it is. It's a show. It's not the worst show I've ever seen. It didn't meet my expectations either. Yeah, that's fair. Yeah. Yeah, I was sitting here trying to think of the parts that I really enjoyed. And the only thing that comes to mind immediately is just watching Boba gun down those bikers from Slave 1.

That was a very satisfying moment. That was probably my favorite scene of the entire season. That was a great scene. That was a fantastic scene. I think we needed more of that. Yeah, I agree. Because that felt like Boba and it felt like something you would do. Oh, yeah, absolutely. Yeah. I know something that peeved Aaron was the fact that Boba didn't destroy the Sarlacc. It was technically Fennec because she deployed the...

Yeah, it's always Fennec. Yeah, she killed it. And I think that upset Aaron. That was the finale, too. We're talking about Fennec. Fennec was also the one who killed off all the other crime bosses in town, you know? And that was also a bit of a shock because we spent all this time over the course of the show leading up to Boba versus these other people. And then within the last 30 seconds of the last episode, we just had this scene where boom, boom, boom.

And then Fennec just kills all of them. And she's Batman. Because it's almost like, oh, this is what she's been doing in the absence of this massive battle that's taken up 20 minutes of this episode. And then, oh, yeah, that's where she went off to on her speeder bike, you know, just motored off to the next town just so she could kill these dudes. And it's like, OK, that was a really quick... Why couldn't that have been done in the beginning?

Yeah, we're talking about Boba Fett who previously, I guess, was a bounty hunter. And, you know, it would have been interesting to have an entire episode to try and track these people down maybe one at a time. And Blake and I made this comparison to the first season of Arrow where we just... You know, there was one episode, it's like this guy has a full episode, got to hunt this dude down. And it was exciting and it was cool.

And then that show became a springboard for all these other shows that just kind of... You know, and then it got boring and it got a little convoluted. And now I think that's happening a little bit with these shows. Like, yeah, book a Boba Fett and then boom, a whole episode geared for just launching off the next shows or whatever. And not that I wasn't happy with that. Yeah, and I mean, seeing all these returning characters gets me really amped and excited.

But, you know, I can also see why it's a bit of a ding when it comes to a show that's only got seven episodes to tell a certain story. And, yeah, I mean, you know, Fennec had a lot more killing going on than Boba did, so... Yeah, I was just going to bring it back to that. Now that you mention it, I do feel like if they had just had Boba do Fennec scenes, whereas instead of her being the muscle, he just was his own muscle, that would have helped a lot to allow him to feel like Boba.

That would have made a huge difference. Yeah, I didn't mind. I think Boba took a backseat to Fennec a few times, but I didn't really mind that for one. I think the actress is phenomenal and she deserves to be, you know, a bit of an equal in terms of screen lines and screen time. And I think there was an interview where Tamora even said, oh, I kept giving her my lines because Boba Fett should be speaking less and I want to be speaking less. And he was offloading lines to, oh, gosh, Ming Na Wen.

Yeah, Ming Na. Yeah, he was offloading lines to her. And I don't mind that. In fact, I kind of support that because it's like, all right, yeah, you know, give her more screen time. She's a great character. Yeah. And he also kept on saying on some press interviews, he said Boba is not supposed to talk that much. So anytime Dave or John left the room, I would try and not say the lines. Yeah, I think that was the same interview. Yeah. Yeah, I agree with all that.

But I just I guess the point I was trying to make is I wish Boba did more of his own action. Like, yeah. Right. Well, because he does stand around a lot, you know, just kind of talks. His other people do. I mean, he's supposed to be a crime lord now, but yeah. No, I think that's fair, Blake. You're right. He was he was depending on the mods. He was depending on Fennec. Yeah. Even black. After he hired him. So it was a little I think a little clumsy.

It's like, OK, he's this, you know, badass hunter. He's got all these gadgets. I think this is where all of that is kind of explained away with the fact that he was healing in a back to tank for most of the episode for a reason we quite don't understand. Right. Yeah. And I think I think that's that's perfectly well said.

Like I think this all goes back to kind of my wish that the show was a bit longer because because then we would have had more time to kind of focus in on these other things that we would have wanted because I don't want to take away from characters like Fennec. You know, you know, she's a great character and I can see they're trying to root this character a bit more in the canonicity with her appearances in the Bad Batch and such.

And it would have been nice to have, you know, just seen a little bit more action from Boba while not taking away from other characters. Right. Because it was cool to have those characters and their moments and, you know, they got to have something. Right. So, you know, it's like I'm not saying take away all of it for sure, but more just the I guess some of the some of the really strong story point. Yeah, moments, because we see him fight, but it's always in a soldier kind of warring action.

We never see him like hunt anything. Right. Whereas the scenes where people like the villains are being hunted down. It's always Fennec. Yeah, yeah, totally. Are you hoping for a season two? I would like a season two. Yes. And I think I think I've expressed a number of things I'd like to be explored in season two. So for that reason, I hope we do get that. I hope Boba Fett gets that chance.

I almost feel like the line at the end of the season where him and Boba, sorry, Boba and Fennec are talking and Boba says something like, you know, I'm not really sure I'm cut out for this. It almost gives me hope that maybe he decides to go back to bounty hunting or do something where he's going to be a little more interesting. Because, yeah, what is what does he do now? Now that, you know, there's there's peace and prosperity.

Is he just going to kind of retire in the palace with the feast surrounded by, you know, the decadence of it all? Yeah, it's going to become the Boba Boonta Eve. Well, that's that's a great prediction prediction. I look forward to seeing. Can't wait to see a pod racer painted in the same color scheme as the slave one. You guys have any any last minute things to say on on Book of Boba or anything, anything you're hoping for for the next show?

I'm just curious where it's going to go. Yeah, because like, yeah, it's just saying, like, what's next? Look, I'm looking forward to Mando season three. Yeah, that'll be yeah, yeah, I am, too. I think I think Boba will be back, especially as they explore more of Mandalorian history and culture. I do want to see Boba Fett be a part of that because, well, it doesn't look like it's going to work out for him to be Mandalore like he was an old canon.

I still very much think he has a part in that story in terms of what comes next for the future of the Mandalorians and bringing these disparate groups together. You know, Din's group, Bo-Katan, you know, bring these different parties together and unify them. And I think Boba Fett himself, although not identifying as a Mandalorian, it is part of his heritage.

It's part of who his father was. And I I hope that can be something he comes to recognize because Mandalorians, you know, it's all about being a foundling. And it's not necessarily about who you are or where you're from. It's that you're you're taking on that culture and you're a member, you're accepted. And I want Boba Fett to be accepted and to recognize like that's also part of where he can find family.

Like he found family in the Tuskens. He's found, I think, found family as well with his, you know, the teenagers he's adopted and Fennec. And I would like to see that maybe carry forward to him, I think, recognizing that the Mandalorians could be part of his family, too. And I think, yeah, just being part of that story with Din in terms of the unification and, yeah, the next generation of Mandalorians. I think that's actually a really good point. I never considered that.

But that actually does make sense in the idea that he could become Mandalore. And this was him more or less having a dry run of being a leader. You know, I hadn't I actually hadn't thought of that because I really did think the showrunners are setting up that role for Din. But that's what it seems like. But yeah, sorry. He's not also not showing being a leader, right, as in everyone's grouping around him and he's trying to do leader characteristics.

The main reason why it seems like it's him is he's got the darksaber. That's true, which would be really interesting because that would mean Boba and Din would have to fight each other and Boba would have to win. Yeah, so that could be really interesting. I wouldn't it would be interesting. I mean, it would be an interesting story. I have to say I wouldn't want them to fight and be in conflict with one another.

But as much as I would dislike seeing that, I think it would be an interesting story and it would be a bold direction for the show to go in. I'd watch it. I'd watch that. Yeah, I think I think we would because I think something that we all can agree on is that maybe this show is just a little too safe. Yeah, I didn't really do anything bold or particularly novel. I guess maybe the wildest thing is Boba riding a rancor. I appreciated that.

That was enjoyable. That was not something I would have conjured up in my head. But seeing it on screen was actually pretty badass. Yeah, I agree. It's like the ultimate fan fiction. Actually, I forgot to ask you, now that we're closing up, we'll just get your quick response. What do you think of Grogu now being basically brought in as a foundling and possibly just being a Mandalorian?

Yeah, I think I'm a little torn. I think it's I think it's what's probably best for the show and telling Din's story because clearly Din is on a similar path to Boba where Grogu is his found family and they're clearly going to do a lot together and achieve a lot together. On the other hand, I felt I did kind of assume with Grogu being dropped off to daycare with Luke, I did think we were going to go at least a season without Grogu.

And we would have seen more of that character development of Din like maybe struggling or finding his purpose, even just a few episodes without Grogu. But as soon as so we're not left with that tension or that wondering, like they're already reunited before season three even officially starts. It was a fast turnaround. Yeah, it was a very fast turnaround, extremely fast. So I think it ultimately makes sense. And even if they had given it more time, it would have happened regardless.

But it just makes me wonder if the showrunners got nervous about Book of Boba Fett. They're like, oh, we don't have enough material to tell the story. So let's bring back Din, let's bring back Grogu and we'll tell that story here and we'll generate more views. People will extend their subscription to Disney Plus. You know, just it just it just kind of make like that's the more cynical side of me.

Just makes me wonder, you know, what kind of things were they worried about at the business level or Disney Plus subscribership level? The money, the money side. Yeah, like we got to sell Grogu toys. How do we wrangle them back in? How do we sell the same action figure with a new card back? That's right. Grogu, but now with chain mail. Yeah, that's right. Grogu with an additional accessory. I just can't wait till he's got full Beskar.

So I'm excited for his little green ears poking out of a helmet. That'll be really cute. Yeah, I look forward to that too. Cool. Jess, thanks so much for popping back on here and chatting with us. And, you know, we have a good time. So, you know, I hope you hope you enjoyed a little chat here. Oh, absolutely. Yeah. Anytime. Thanks so much for having me. Oh, yeah. I'll be back for season two of the Book of Boba Fett. Yeah, or even Mando. Yeah, or even Mando.

Yeah. If Boba makes an appearance there or you just want to guess for Mando, feel free to let me know. Oh, yeah, totally. I'll hit you up. Yeah. Cool. Cool. All right. Great seeing you both. Have a great night. Have a great night. Bye. Bye. All right, Blake, is there any any last minute things you want to bring up before we wrap up here real quick? I'm not really excited to see the duel between Boba and Din Djarin and see how Boba gets the Darksaber and becomes Mandalorian.

Look, the EU's canon all over again. You heard that, Lucasfilm? We're calling a plan right here. We figured it out. That's right. Spotlights on you now. Your balls in your court. This is what the people want. All right. Yeah. Well, you know, it's it's been a crazy time with all this Kenobi buzz. So, you know, you can expect we'll be we'll be chatting a little more about that in the coming weeks.

We got a few what happened episodes to do at some point with with some characters that showed up in the Boba finale, which, you know, we'll cover those at some point as well. Probably worth also doing what happened to Obi-Wan. Yeah. Fill in the comics. Speaking of which, there is a comic book coming out very soon. Mini series that's going to tell a story that pre before the Kenobi series takes place. That's going to be really cool. But anyways, we'll catch you in the next one. Keep flying.

All right. And thank you all for tuning into the show. As usual, our social handles, email, voicemail link are all in the description of this podcast episode. The best way to help us out is by leaving five stars a nice review and sharing this podcast with a friend until next episode. May the force be with you.