Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu

The Mandalorian and Grogu marks the first Star Wars film to hit cinemas in seven years following the release of The Rise of Skywalker. Unfortunately, it's not beating the allegations that it’s little more than a few episodes of the scrapped season 4 of The Mandalorian rolled into one disappointing movie.

Written by the Disney+ show’s co-creators Jon Favreau and Dave Filoni with Noah Kloor, and directed by Favreau, the plot follows the bounty hunter and his adorable Jedi sidekick cleaning house for the New Republic by seeking out the remaining Imperial warlords still conspiring to return the Galactic Empire to greatness. The result is an almost no-stakes Star Wars story. One that offers no significant connection to the wider narrative established by the plethora of live-action series, and that strips its eponymous heroes of any character development.

Din Djarin (Pedro Pascal) might be Grogu’s surrogate father, but he still treats his Force-sensitive apprentice like a dog, giving commands like ‘heel’ and ‘stay’. This was funny in the first season of The Mandalorian, when the bounty hunter begrudgingly took the foundling under his wing, but six years later, and paired with Pascal's emotionless performance, it only undermines their bond. It's no easy feat to articulate vulnerability when you spend most of the film under a helmet, but even after a cutesy-yet-overly long sequence where Grogu saves Mando from death by poison, Daddy Din's response is as flat as the planet Crait.

It's certainly not a great look when CG-enhanced puppets, including The Rise of Skywalker’s tiny droidsmith Babu Frik and friends, are outperforming everyone in the line-up. Sigourney Weaver's Adelphi Rangers leader Colonel Ward, Steve Blum's creature pilot Zeb (from the animated Rebels series), and Jeremy Allen White's Rotta the Hutt deliver their lines like they turned up to set with a hangover every day.

Two cameoing Star Wars directors act like they are filling out their tax returns

Here, Mando and Grogu must rescue the son of Jabba the Hutt in exchange for information about the whereabouts of an Imperial despot. Rotta is under contract as a gladiator and he, too, feels sorry for himself, giving not one but two emo speeches about why it's just so hard being the son of the notorious crimelord.

Martin Scorsese voicing anxious Ardennian shopkeeper Hugo might be the exception; his sweet cameo is the only one to make a case for directors popping up in these films. Filoni, Rick Famuyiwa and Lee Isaac Chung (who directed episodes of The Mandalorian) appear as Rangers in a final air battle but act like they are filling out their tax returns, not piloting X-Wings.

The mundane performances aren't helped by a script that seems more fitting for a ride at Disneyland’s Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge, with some janky first-person chase sequences to boot. It also fails to make the case for future live-action films being shot entirely in California using photorealistic LED screens. The sludgy, static and artificial feel of the Outer Rim does not look any better on IMAX screens, forcing you to question whether this $144.5 million endeavour was even worth the effort.

The Mandalorian and Grogu is out worldwide on May 22.