MovieChat Forums > The Book of Boba Fett (2021) Discussion > No identity for this show, just a mishma...

No identity for this show, just a mishmash of nostalgia and a very thin plotline

posted 2 years ago by sati_84 (441)
4 replies | jump to latest

I did not really like The Mandalorian - it was at times fun to watch, and had some nice pieces of world buliding, but this all was overshadowed by the main issue which was the fact that it had no standalone story. 90% of the episodes were about sidequests which was very annoying.

The last episodes Season 2 were a bit better, The Mandalorian seemed to find solid footing, thanks to the "take back Mandalore" plotline which is at least an actual plotline, so there is that. I hoped they are going to notice this and not make the same mistake with the Boba show, but they kind of did.

This show is also without identity and without plotline. It takes place almost 100% on Tatooine, so the end result is 95% nostalgia bait, and 5% new ideas that are executed in a mediocre way. If you asked me before I've seen the show if I want to see punk cyborgs in Star Wars, I think I would've said "that's risky!". It all depends on the execution, and the Mods are... mediocre. They don't really have individual characters, you can only tell them apart because of their well... mods. Upon seeing them I didn't shout "Get outta here with your Blade Runner bullshit!" at the TV, so they are decent I guess, but by no means are they well executed.

The main storyline is a run of the mill western story - spice traders ("Get outta here with your Dune bullshit!") are terrorizing the town, the sheriff resists and convinces the locals to fight for their own interests, and with some collaboration, the baddies are defeated. Well, that's a plotline for you, but honestly? YAWN. I expected way more from the show, if not on plot level, but on character level. There were some great character moments, don't get me wrong, but they were few and far between.

It was fun to watch these eps, because it's always fun to see Tatooine shenanigans with plenty of callbacks to the OT. Just when I started to get sick and tired of this constant loop of "Remember this? Well here it is with a miniscule addition, and we'll now call it a day, ok?" when the series ended, so it didn't overstay its welcome. However, I'm sad that this spice trading syndycate storyline was played so safe and so straight, only that last episode epic spectacle could save it somewhat. The last episode had its problems as well - Luke would never send Grogu to Tatooine without being absolutely sure that Mando is there and able to protect him is one of them - but was overall fun to watch.

I don't expect Breaking Bad / The Wire level of writing here, but if you want to play a tired and old western storyline this straight, and don't want to put in adequate work for the world building, then write better characters. Summary: Mediocre.

[–] Otter (24464) 2 years ago

I loved "The Mandalorian", which was 75% fan service, and which starred two new characters I could really care about. And IMHO the show has an overarching story, and it's the story of Mando and Grobu forming a "clan of two", a family. No overarching galactic politics, no saving the universe from a threatening monster, just the story of a relationship, and of love changing a person and his life (and proving the Jedi wrong again).

But yeah, I agree about "Boba Fett", it's just not good, the fan service doesn't make it worth watching, and I just don't care about the central character. I'm inclined to agree that he should have died in the Sarlac Pit, but kinda changed my mind when he showed up on "Mandalorian" and was cool... but it turns out that he works best in small doses. I just don't give a rat's ass about his quest to take over Tattooine, the people who live there would probably be better off if they at least had stable bad government instead of constant fighting. It's just not well done, the new ideas don't work (I hate the cyberpunks), I've stopped liking Fett after seeing this much of him, see the other thread for thousands of words about how they botched Luke's appearance, the final "we're so outnumbered" battle was ridiculous, and well, nothing works. They should just quietly stop making new episodes.

[–] sati_84 (441) 2 years ago

Yep, the fanservice was also mediocre. Fett's quest to take over Tatooine and rule it is a bit out of the blue to be honest, it wasn't really justified in any way, it wasn't consistent with his earlier character. Of course character development could exist, but suddenly dropping everything from his behavior that made him a bounty hunter in the first place was ridiculous.

But let's accept that - his characterization still was extremely weak. As was the characterization of all the other characters, as I mentioned. There were no running jokes, laughs, callbacks, heated discussions... nothing on the character front. The first 4 episodes are almost 100% spent on the tusken raider camp flashbacks, and man, how boring it was. I mean flashbacks are only justified if they connect to present day in an interesting or unexpected way - here it was just "that's what happened to Boba, here it is". YAWN.

Besides Luke's characterization, which had to align with his "bitter old man" persona from Episode VIII (shudder), the problem with the last episodes was the complete sidelining of Boba in his own show. I mean he wasn't that interesting as a character, but the show is still named after him! What an odd choice to have Mando and Grogu - literally - steal his show, especially throughout the last episode!

This is especially sad because the SW universe is so vast, so diverse and has so much potential, that it's horrible to see how they managed to create 2 SW shows with such miniscule creativity...

[–] BourbonKing (5612) 2 years ago

TBoBF strayed from "the book" of unraveling Boba Fett's life and goals. As you stated, the very Western-lite story elements made this look like a college film class exercise in blending Star Wars with Old Hollywood Westerns like High Noon and Shane. it made its point but it didn't give us anything special. I have no problem linking the Mandalorian story-line but the execution was weak and it felt shoe-horned in more than anything.

Worst of all, they killed off Jennifer Beals' character! Boooo!

[–] Otter (24464) 2 years ago

The use of Western movie cliches worked in "The Mandalorian", which was like I said mostly fan service, with the rest largely riffs on pop culture cliches, including yes - lots of things we remember from western movies.

Well IMHO "The Mandalorian" carried it off, because it had two central characters I could care deeply about, and it was all written and directed with style, wit, cleverness, and real feelings. All that is missing from the "Boba Fett Show", and so when they tried the same thing... it all falls flat.