Official summary: The Mandalorian and the Child continue their journey through a dangerous galaxy.
Trivia
The city of Calodan on the planet Corvus seems to share some architectural designs with those seen on the planets Teth (The Clone Wars movie) and the gate on Jakku (The Force Awakens). This is probably because they are all inspired by Ralph McQuarrie’s Jabba’s palace paintings.
And we finally get to see Rosario Dawson as Ahsoka Tano, striking a couple familiar poses during her lightsaber battles throughout the episode. She wears a cloak that seems to be the same, or at least very similar, to the one she wears when she walks the graveyard at the end of The Clone Wars, episode 7×12. Beneath the cloak is clothing that very much match her Rebels appearance with the sleeves and vambraces over the arms, yet bare shoulders, and the belt with the circle ring. The top seems different, and there is no longer an armor piece there.
And of course she wields the same two white lightsabers. During Celebration Chicago Ashley Eckstein was given realistic versions of Ahsoka’s lightsabers, they claimed it was a preview to the ones who were to be added to the Dok-Ondar lightsaber collection that you can buy in Galaxy’s Edge. Looking back now, they may have been introduced for this, but they were probably designed for this episode first.
We are also introduced to a couple new characters, and for a change they have all been named! We start off with Magistrate Morgan Elsbeth who is responsible for the destruction of many worlds and was instrumental in building the Imperial Starfleet. Working for her is Lang, a character played by Michael Biehn. Rumors of Biehn turned out to be true after all! Biehn of course is well-known for his roles in Aliens (Corporal Hicks) and The Terminator (Kyle Reese). Characters with the surname Lang have existed before, one of them a Rodian and two of them Imperials, but they seem to be unconnected to this Lang.
The third name comes courtesy of the end credits: Governor Wing, the male villager who we seen throughout the episode and who in the end gets the cloak.
The two droids with Elsbeth are identified as HK-87’s, which obviously is a reference to HK-47 from Knights of the Old Republic. The higher number seems to indicate that many upgrades have been made in the years since. The highest we have had before in Legends was HK-77, which were developed by the Confederacy of Independent Systems during the end of the Clone Wars and saw action during Imperial times in the game Star Wars: Galaxies. While the headpiece looks different from HK-47, they do sport his red coloring for the legs and lower arms.
Talking about droids, when the Mandalorian first enters the city he can be seen walking past an 8D-series smelter droid. They were first seen in RotJ like EV-9D9 and are now also used again by Filoni in The Mandalorian.
When the Mandalorian and the Child are in the forest, right after he says that they are close, Morai can be seen. Morai is the convor friend who watches over Ahsoka and can be seen in TCW and Rebels whenever Ahsoka appears.
A lot of information comes when Ahsoka meets the Child, who from now on we call by his name Grogu, but more interesting are the things she does not tell like who the masters are that trained Grogu and who saved him from the Purge and kept him hidden? Probably answers for a later time to find out.
Ahsoka mentions that she only knew one other being of Grogu’s species and of course means Yoda. However that means that she either forgets about Yaddle (it could be that Ahsoka was too young at the time when Yaddle was on the Council to remember her and Yaddle did retreated from active duty since the Naboo invasion) or that she means that there was only one that she really knew as a person. This does seem right considering her friendship and bond with Yoda in TCW. A small snippet of Yoda’s theme can be heard when he gets name-dropped. Ahsoka’s theme can also be heard in the episode.
And of course Ahsoka’s reluctance to train Grogu, that she has seen what fear can do to even the best of them, comes from finding out that Anakin became Darth Vader as seen in Rebels.
“A Mandalorian and a Jedi? They never see it coming.” Runs somewhat ironic considering that both TCW and Rebels had many team-ups between the Jedi and Mandalorians, with even Ahsoka fighting alongside Mandalorians like Bo-Katan, Satine, Korkie, Amis, Lagos, Soniee and Sabine with her entire Clan Wren. This makes the look she gives him in response fitting with her old nickname, Snips.
A tooka can be seen, which is not as surprising as Dave Filoni is a big cat lover.
Ahsoka namedrops Thrawn, who is the master of Elsbeth. While we do not know if she told her where to find the famous Chiss, this does show that Ahsoka is already searching for him. Considering she acts without Sabine and does not wear the white cloak and staff we assume that the epilogue of Rebels regarding them has not yet happened in the timeline.
Ahsoka tells the Mandalorian to go to Tython, where he will find the ancient ruins of a temple that has a strong connection with the Force. This temple is at a mountain with a seeing stone on top. There Grogu can reach out with the Force and be found by other Jedi. While this location sounds like a new one, Tython is not new at all. First making its appearance in the novel Darth Bane: Rule of Two, Tython was mentioned as the birthplace of the Jedi Order and a planet strong in the Force. Players of The Old Republic certainly remember this world as it is the place where the Jedi Consular and Jedi Knight classes started their campaigns. With The Last Jedi’s Ahch-To taking its place as the world where the Jedi Order started in the new canon, it became a bit vague which planet was the true homeworld of the Order. Jedi Scholars keep debating this issue with Tython, Ahch-To, Jedha, Coruscant or Ossus as possibilities. Whatever world may be the first, Doctor Aphra #40 already showed us a Jedi Temple in one of the polar regions of Tython.
Newly introduced but without a name: the alien species of Elsbeth’s guards, their blasters are new but named (A350 blaster rifle) and the towering creatures in the forest.
