OT: What Happened to The Mandalorian?
There are some natural preambles here (following a near-perfect debut season is impossible, flaws in exceptional shows tend to be ignored), but for as great as the show as the Mandalorian was just 20 episodes ago, it has become almost unwatchable. the latest episode with Lizzo and Jack Black felt so ham-fisted and silly that I could barely contain my outrage. In fact, it’s the lowest-rated episode in the entire series and I have no idea where they go from here. To be even more frank, this season has blown, comparatively to seasons 1 and 2 and what was once the best original series in Disney+ history is now near relegation.
So what happened? Writing? Directing? Studio meddling? It’s not just the character actors or the arc, it’s like everyone who made it, from the writers to the animators, stopped caring.
Oh it's ok for sports though? If u watch anything else and have opinions on it's " humans spend a lot of time in front of the TV"
That last episode felt like a bad SNL skit. It was corny. Plus lizzo sucks and Jack black isn't much better.
April 11th, 2023 at 12:38 PM ^
Jack is light years more enjoyable than anything Lizzo has done or will ever do. That being said, I saw that clip and thought it was a lame and skit. Just a goofy mess
We want it to be good but it never is. Season one was solid, I enjoyed season 2. I’m find with suspending belief but they get stupid at times as well.
I will say, the flashback with Ahmed Best as a Jedi to save Grogu was nice, and glad he was given that role. He took a beating for Jar Jar, which I didn’t’ like the character but it was unfair to him.
Imo Star Wars franchise doesn’t know what it wants to be and it’s a problem. Part political, spiritual warfare, part alien war and now it’s introducing social justice tropes into movies and series. Imo what made Rougue One so good was it lived in the world without the cynicism even thought things were around. Movie, plot, really solid script, solid acting and wrapped up the story line and made it Star Wars without having to fall into the traps of the trilogy movies.
So, this means I can post my thoughts on the totality of three seasons of "Star Trek: Picard" in a few weeks, right?
(No opinion here, not a Star Wars person honestly, but my sister most definitely is)
Off season is off season. If you're coming in hot with a topic, post away until August.
Personally, I'm waiting for Red Letter Media to finish their review before I bother checking out Picard.
I was really excited about the 1st season, but then things just went to crap. Didn't even watch a second of the 2nd season. But if they can stick the landing, I might check out season 3.
I was looking forward to where I thought it was going, where the grizzled MC adopts Baby Yoda and has to learn how to balance fighting for what's right and becoming a foster father for a creature he knows almost nothing about.
But it seems the show dropped that possibility almost immediately, and Baby Yoda was quickly relegated to window dressing and occasional comic relief.
Lost interest halfway through the first season, and it seems that was the right call?
The Critical Drinker is a good source for the behind the scenes happenings with some of these new streaming shows. They essentially say it's the fault of mismanagement and Hollywood power dynamics.
Just to highlight the incompetence, Disney engineered the cutest most likeable character imaginable in baby Yoda, but had no merchandise at all ready for over a year, so people were crafting baby yoda-like merch on etsy and raking in cash while Disney played catch up.
They demonstrate almost a compulsion to buy a beloved franchise, kill off or diminish the beloved characters, and replace them with new "exciting" characters they want to be the stars, a-la optimus prime in the 80s, but are incapable of making the new stars interesting or likeable, and now they're just jumping the shark, throwing awkward and pointless cameos at episodes. It was leaked that they all but wrote Luke out of the new trilogy because he was "getting in the way" of all the new characters.
Some of these shows have been pronounced dead, and so management doesn't care what happens to them, so creative minds are able to play with them and make them good again, hence the season 3 turnaround for Picard, but at Disney Kennedy is all but banned from making new movies, so instead she's running the shows into the ground, like Kenobi or the Book of Boba, etc. and none of the talent beneath her has any power or say in improving the product. Andor looks promising, because it's a bit of a side project, and not important enough for Kennedy to ruin.
It's easy to blame Kennedy (because, well, it is) but this is the standard "gas giant" phase of bloated main-sequence corporations uninterested in the creative process.
Consider that for some years now, Disney has been going the Smaugcorps route: hoarding IP, jealously guarding it, then monetizing into ruin. It's the EA model -- why bother with the risks of innovation when you can just buy something successful and milk all the life out of it? The world isn't going to run out of creativity, so just suck up others' successes -- Star Wars, Muppets, Simpsons -- and squeeze until you make your money back ten times over.
It's a predictable pattern, and the only way to stop it is for consumers to punish Disney for its creative mismanagement -- but considering everyone's doing the exact opposite. . . as long as they're making money hand over fist, why would anyone expect things to change?
It's unfortunate for us, but us calling it "mismanagement" is actually a bit of a stretch when the goal of management is to make something profitable, not memorable.
This x10000.
I will say, JJ Abrams was a solid choice for the first new Star Wars movie. The guy is pretty good at executing the opening phase of a movie/TV franchise due to his ability to get multiple primary and secondary stories started in the beginning. He just also happens to be the worst at ending a franchise due to his inability to wrap up his plots.
At the end of the day though, Disney is certainly in their twilight, and I think they will be acquired by Apple within the next few years to give them an ungodly advantage on beloved IP for streaming - and the cycle continues.
Sorry, changed up my post quite a bit. Michfan777 is replying to an earlier draft.
I changed my mind. Disney isn't making mistakes. Abrams was a horrible choice for adding something new to the franchise -- but Disney doesn't care about that. He was an excellent choice for monetizing their newly acquired IP. TFA grossed $2 billion; I watched it, and I remember almost none of it. Disney really doesn't care about the latter, even though capturing the audience's imagination is what made Star Wars worth buying in the first place.
And while I originally said Disney is in their twilight, in hindsight I realize I meant creatively, but that no bearing on the viability of their current business model. Disney consumers are infinite in their griping, but also infinite in their willingness to keep throwing money at them, so as long as there are beloved franchises to plunder, Disney's only going to keep growing.
The fable was wrong. Killing the golden goose is sustainable when suckers pay you far more than what you'd gain if you kept the goose alive.
It's responsible to blame Kennedy for the franchises mismanagement. Disney has yet to break even in their purchase of Lucasfilm over a decade ago, the main protagonist of the new trilogy, and the next film recently pitched, is literally a self insert of her, the Wesley Crusher of star wars. Disney executives also blame her, as she had free reign to make any movie she wanted to, at first, and now any new films must be approved by several layers of higher ups, and her employment is now contingent on nearly unattainable box office performance goals. The next film has to basically be as big a hit as Avatar, or she's out. TFA made money, yes, the rest of the films had increasingly diminishing returns, were stuck in production hell, with directors being replaced repeatedly, massive reshoots, some even losing money, and numerous film cancelations.
Star Wars has always been the peak of cinema in the western world.
When you are 5-10 years old.
It’s always been stupid nonsense that’s also simultaneously very fun to watch.
Unfortunately, people remember how good it was in the past when they had nothing truly great to compare it to as kids. But then your horizons expand and you see true great movies and riveting plots elsewhere. Then a new Star Wars thing comes out that has the same wacky adventures, dialogue etc and you just think it’s terrible because you’re taste have evolved.
Is Mandalorian getting worse? Probably - it’s plot has always been fairly repetitive and about 2 inches deep. Is it still a show where one of the central characters is a puppet that was made solely to sell toys and dolls? Yup.
Overall, though, I gave up on it once they started tying the Bobby fett show to it. It’s similar to how I quit watching or even trying to understand marvel once every show was directly tied to future movies. That’s fine when maybe 1 or 2 miniseries tie to movies, but you can’t release a new series every couple of months and expect people to follow along that well. Simple over-saturation combined with too much to watch (almost like homework) mostly.
Star Wars was amazing when you consider it came out in 1977. And as a kid you grew up on garbage that only your parents liked such as On Golden Pond or Chariots of Fire. Hell Citizen Cain is considered GOAT by a lot of people. I lasted 20 minutes before falling asleep.
Mandalorian is not great. But it is an easy watch. You could watch any single episode on its own and not miss anything. Each one is the same episode just different planet and some new actors replacing ones from the previous episode.
I actually liked the Boba Fett series except for the finale. It was Power Rangers meets Star Wars and horrible.
The one epically bad part about Mandalorian is Tracey Ullmann. She looks gross with no eyebrows and is the Jar Jar Binks of this show. And I will never forget her for suing the Simpsons trying to get rich just for playing an extremely small part in making that show famous.
Who does Tracey ullmann play? Are you thinking of Amy Sedaris?
The Mandalorian was created to sell toys theory is quite fun. However they really executed that poorly considering they had no toys at all until Season 2 was about ready to come out. They missed out tens of millions of dollars by being slow to the Baby Yoda merch game.
Yeah not great, Bob. Please turn your direction to Andor. If you've not yet seen it you won't be disappointed.
Jack Black is extremely talented. And they cast him in a very stupid character that is nothing more than comic relief. I don't know about Lizzo's other career, as I am not a fan of that genre of music. But she can't act to save her life. I have seen HS theatre kids with better acting chops then her. Talk about shoehorning someone into a role because they are famous and Disney thinks they will bring some eyeballs to the table.
I would not say it is unwatchable. My son and I watch it Friday nights. But it has become a show I am on my iPad diddling around while I watch and not giving it full attention.
Also, don't underestimate the impact of "firing" Gina Carano. Without getting political, there is a substantial number of people who will push back on things like this and stop watching because someone they like got "cancelled". As far as the quality of the show? I have not noticed much decline. I honestly don't think it started amazing. Just ok, and has mostly held that level or had some slight degradation.
Identity politics happened.
Next question.
Haven’t watched season three yet. Not really interested after last season. Andor is more my style.
Best in Disney+ history? Nah. That’s Andor, but I have no faith that they’ll follow that show up with a good second season. From its beginning the Mandalorian has been decent at best and the majority of that success came from its Luke cameos.
I don’t know to what extent the creators can deepfake, so maybe it wouldn’t be possible but the “Luke and Grogu” show is honestly what they should’ve gone all out on with Din Djarin just being a reoccurring character. Leave it Disney to get it ass backwards.
Star Wars had been done to death. MCU is approaching that. New Fantastic Four/X-Men May save MCU.Death of Boseman was catastrophic for the MCU.
Hollywood is out of ideas. So they are resorting to rebooting shows(X-Files) with diverse casts in the hope that beloved old shows will bring in both old and new followers. I am not a fan. I would rather see new ideas explored with these diverse casts. Let them make their own legacies rather than piggybacking off others.
Calculated risks has always been at the core of innovation regardless of the industry. In our post-industrial age risk aversion is king in the corporate world. That is lethal for creativity.
As a history geek there are so many subjects that would make for excellent miniseries or series, but I know won’t be touched upon because of the fixation with winning younger demographics. There also seems to be a preponderance of shows directed at women. Far more than the % of the population they make up. It’s great that women are being represented in large numbers I would appreciate more of a selection in terms of male oriented shows.
Netflix has a six part series dedicated to African folk tales which I think is absolutely fantastic idea. That is what these companies should be doing more of. Exploring the stories of people from around the globe.
I do agree that there are a lot of opportunities for new stories and ways to tell them. Netflix and others can create these shows cheaply and often get tax credits to do so which results in shaky historical miniseries vs something like Rome from HBO. That can be ok as long as it adds to an internationally-available catalog. As Hollywood continues to smolder, its machinery and products are more diffusely utilized and created & distributed. They knew it was over by the 64-bit era and the only gracious step into technology's inevitable shift from screens was to own franchises that crossed the movie/game border and developing the hell out of them. You don't buy Lucasfilm for one film every four years.
While I hope this means an ascent to new art and ways of enjoying talent and storytelling, it may not be from familiar names and characters, kind of like Star Wars would have been to most in the 1977.
Mandalorian and Book of Boba Fett have taught me that the director of an episode is absolutely CRITICAL to its quality.
And, as a favor to the world and all future episodes of any Star Wars content, neither Robert Rodriguez nor Bryce Dallas Howard should ever be allowed to direct, ever again.
I haven't even bothered to watch it, but I got bored at the 2nd season. I think they had a good one-season story and it could have ended there, but that's not how franchises work. Star Wars in general has taught me how to head canon away bad sequels instead of getting upset. I love the original trilogy and Rogue One, ADORE Andor, and find parts of the rest watchable or not. The kind of thing that upsets me is when there is still a story to tell and they blow it lazily. I don't have to put any thought into things like Obi Wan or Boba Fett or the last two seasons of Mando because the people who made them didn't put any thought into them.
New Star Wars content seems to follow the pattern of the prequel trilogy, in which it has to endure a period of hazing, sometimes way over the top in vitriol, by the fandom until those who grew up with the newer content are old enough to enter the discourse.
The fact that I can never go back to a state of childlike wonder and watch the new stuff is disappointing for sure, but to turn that angst against the creators is misplaced, and frankly doesn't feel healthy. Because there is nothing anyone could do to replace the memories I have of watching the original trilogy.
That being said, I think The Mandolorian suffers from Disney's need for original content for Disney+. Its 30-45 minutes episodes with 8 in a season, so it has a quicker turnaround time, but I think that hurts the storytelling. Could it be better? Yeah. But if this registers on a list of things to be upset about, then I think your life is going pretty well.
This is far closer to the truth than many here (and elsewhere on the internet) will be willing to admit.
The show has always sucked. Does that help?
April 10th, 2023 at 12:24 AM ^
Star Wars is a cash grab for Disney. They bought it and made another trilogy for middle schoolers.
If they made a SW movie that was actually edgy and for adults. I believe they would have a fire cooking for us, but down side for them is they want the most bang for their buck, and this is how it goes with fans vs. Money making.
Overall not happy with Disney period. Bigger is not always better. That's basically what we are getting from them.
April 10th, 2023 at 11:34 AM ^
First season, epic. Second season, picked up where it left off but steadily started to regress back to the (Star Wars Expanded Universe) mean. Third season? Laughable descent into Book of Fett incoherence.
I would like to know if writers and show runners were all drugged or replaced this season. I haven't had the time to vet who is still involved in the project other than the Mouse money machines.
This weeks episode was AWESOME!! What I have been waiting for.