#tbobf critical

[trashquisitor-shirozora]

You mentioned before that you didn't like the reactionary character growth for Din between s2 and end of BOBF, can you elaborate more on that? It's ok if you don't want to, I'm just curious.

(Tumblr ate my first attempt, so here's hoping this one gets through)

Bear with me, Anon, because it's a while since I thought seriously about these things. I swear I know what post you're referring to but I can't find the ask or text post, and if it's something I put in the tags then fucking rip to me lol.

I don't know if I was talking about the lack of introspection and/or exploration of Din's relationship to his creed and covert post-Season 2 or if I was just raging about the decision to reunite Din and Grogu in TBOBF and discard any opportunities for transformative character growth. I have to believe I was talking about the latter because it's the one decision that I feel changed the direction of the show for the worse. Jon Favreau, Lucasfilm, and Disney, in some combination or another, decided that the dynamic duo had to reunite immediately because why ruin a good thing and why lose their profits audience?

To me, they're too scared to push the story-telling boundaries and potential, and so they'd rather unspool the previous 2 seasons in order to restore the status quo, to return the story to something safe, staid, and familiar. They don't want Din and Grogu to change in meaningful and/or interesting ways that could impact their personal growth, their relationships with each other and with allies and enemies around them, and with the larger galaxy.

I have to believe that's what I meant by "reactionary character growth". I hope this answers your question. And thanks for stopping by!

[oreolesbian]

“just watch tbobf if you want to catch up to the mandalorian s3…it’s not that hard, you just want to complain”

honey bunches of oats, idk about you, but I watch TV for entertainment value. it’s just straight up bad writing to have there be required reading/viewing for your media to make sense unless it is a direct sequel to another project. even adaptations of books, games, etc. understand this fundamental rule that they have to have some basic form of entry point for a viewer who’s never consumed the source material.

the mandalorian was a stand alone project from day one, no one should have to watch something completely separate, just to have a basic comprehension of a story.

seriously—imagine you aren’t a die-hard sw fan (which most of the ppl who watch mando are not), and you casually watch the mandalorian cause you think it’s cool. maybe you’ve never seen even a millisecond of other sw projects. you watch grogu go w/ luke at the end of s2, it’s a whole moment, and then boom he’s suddenly back w/ mando w/o any explanation come s3.

the mandalorian was successful because it was on its own. new fans didn’t need to know anything to enter the story. unfortunately, come s2, a lot of the “cameos” started leaning towards an expected knowledge of shows like tcw, but it still ultimately wasn’t too distancing for newer fans.

but to have a MAJOR PLOT POINT of your show (grogu going back w/ mando, his whole little adventure which now leads into the plot of s3, etc.) takes place IN A DIFFERENT SHOW, how the fuck do you expect the fans of the mandalorian to not be confused when the first episode of s3 completely neglects anyone who hasn’t watched tbobf? tbobf was not nearly as successful as mando was. sucks for boba, genuinely, cause he’s a great character, but that’s what bad writing will do. and no—a little “here’s what you missed” at the beginning of the episode will not suffice. it’s one thing to do a time skip between seasons and slowly put the pieces together (which many shows and films have done successfully), and a complete other thing to skip over major plot beats between episodes w/o any context outside of: watch this other show to find out more!

you’re just buying into disney’s ip-dominant strategy of making you watch every single mediocre project they can pump out on an assembly line so they get more watch hours, subscribers to disney+, and money. 🙃 marvel has the exact same problem

so yeah—i’mma bitch about it ✌🏼

[cacodaemonia]

For the ship game: Bobadin

Hello!

Don't ship it.

1. Why don’t you ship it? I think Din is a really interesting character but I have never once cared about Boba Fett.

2. What would have made you like it? Probably if Boba wasn't a mass murderer at the age of 12, haha. There's also the fact that Vader, of all people, had to tell him to chill out with disintegrating people in the OT, so that tells you a lot about what kind of person he was. I think if Disney had let him remain a villain while also making him interesting (no, I haven't nor will I ever read this or that legends comics etc. about him so don't at me XD) in TBOBF, I could have been intrigued. But instead they decided that ten years inside sarlacc made him into some personalityless, vaguely heroic dude who inexplicably wants to run a town he knows nothing about. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

3. Despite not shipping it, do you have anything positive to say about it? I've seen some lovely art!

[technoturian]

Fennec Shand was so much cooler in her first episode than she was ever allowed to be again. Her reputation, her skills, the way she clocked that kid immediately and started working on him. Then she just became a personality-less yes woman for Boba Fett... The things we could have had.

[gaymakima]

hi! I was wondering if u could tell me your opinion on book of boba fett? the only mention I ever see of it on tumblr is that it's bad but nobody ever says why. at least, I haven't seen any explanation or discussion abt it. would love some insight. feel free to ignore this also, no pressure. thanks for your time!

Hi there!

Admittedly, I haven't seen BOBF - I'm still working my way through TCW, which means it'll be a bit before I get to BOBF content. However, I am opposed to a post-ROTJ Boba Fett show in general, so I'll try to explain why, and what I've seen from friends, discord chats and tumblr, that make me apprehensive to watch it. I will watch it anyways! And my opinion on the show will probably change when I watch it - if you like it yourself, that's great! I have no doubt that it's a fun show, but there's elements of it that I don't like.

Namely, the idea that BOBF is "The Mandolorian season 2.5", which is a problem I have with Star Wars in general; the idea that it's becoming MCU 2. Not everything needs to be connected, and to have 2 episodes of you 7 episode show not include your titular character at all, besides a cameo? It's not what fans want, and it's not what they expect going in. A Boba Fett show should be about Boba Fett, cause, y'know, it's kind of in the title. Instead, they used it to promote Mando s3, rather than just. Make their own show.

Also - and this is definitely a personal gripe of mine - having the show take place after ROTJ is kind of a wasted opportunity. I get that Boba survives in Legends and Canon, and I don't mind that, but think of what we could've had if the show took place around the same time as the OT. Hearing allusions to those movies, but never directly interacting with the characters, save for key moments post ESB. Casting new actors to play old characters rather than using CGI deepfake. Explore the world of Star Wars during the OT, the stuff we don't really see. We already know what post-ROTJ Star Wars galaxy is like, thanks to Mandolorian. We don't really know what it was like during that time period.

There's also elements of the show that I've seen people say "don't feel like Star Wars" and I do think that's kind of a silly argument cause the Star Wars universe is massive and really, anything could happen. And that mentality can cause the writers and creators to just recycle old plots and shit bc they're afraid to take risks. Sometimes risks don't turn out well but that's okay. Trying something different is what matters.

Hope that answers your questions, anon! I'll probably have more opinions™ on it when I get around to watching it for real, but for now I'm still on s1 on TCW and simping for Obi-wan my beloved,

[antianakin]

I genuinely felt like TBB and TBOBF were the worst of the recent Star Wars shows we've gotten, but I was wrong.

TBB and TBOBF have many of the same issues as the Ahsoka show in terms of things like structure and pacing and character development, but neither of them have taken several of the massive worldbuilding blocks that built this entire franchise and chosen to shatter them into dust. Neither of them has so far looked at the themes and messages that Lucas put into the Skywalker Saga and decided to directly contradict all of them. Neither of them took three of the BEST female characters in the franchise and completely and utterly butchered them into emotionless monstrosities who only exist to be anti-Jedi mouthpieces.

Never thought that the Ahsoka show would make me almost GRATEFUL for what we were given in TBB and TBOBF.

[short-wooloo]

It is truly bizarre how that Rey Jedi Order movie has become the upcoming SW project that I am the least worried about

[sabines-wrens]

“the mandalorian is a blanket term, it doesn’t have to be about din!!” 

okay cool totally get that by the way the book of boba fett would like to talk 

[baronessofmischief]

I think Tarzan also has one of the best setups for a villain who monologues their true intentions at the end of the movie.

Clayton’s introduction is someone we hear before we see, spending the entire time hacking through the brush bragging about his accomplishments as a safari hunter. He lives for the thrill of the hunt and the recognition, praise, and notoriety those exploits garner. It means when Tarzan is restrained at the end on the boat, it’s entirely in character for Clayton to brag about exactly what he plans to do in betraying them and capturing the gorillas. He doesn’t even have to do it for long, just long enough to break the spirit of the hero before throwing him to the lowest point he’s been in the story.

If you’re going to have a character monologue it can’t feel out of place or disrupt the flow and pacing of the movie, and it definitely can’t be out of character for that particular character to give it. Too often monologues can sound like they were written for the satisfaction of the writer instead of serving the story, and when that’s the case it’s a “kill your darlings” scenario; every word in a monologue has to be necessary, or else it needs to be cut out

[wild-karrde]

NEW WEEK, NEW RECS! START SENDING YOUR FAVORITE FANDOM CREATIONS FROM THIS WEEK IN FOR ME TO QUEUE UP FOR FRIDAY!

The goal of Fandom Friday: provide a place where people can shout-out their favorite creators from the week, whether it's a piece of fan art that made you smile or a fanfic that moved you. Drop a link to your favorite creations this week into my ask box along with what you loved about it, and I will give them a shout! It doesn't have to be Star Wars either! If it's on another website (AO3, Twitter, etc.), please be sure to state that as well.

This happens each week, so don't feel like you've got to get out everything in one week. Just keep track of them throughout the week or send me an ask whenever you find something, and I'll drop them all on Fridays (or throughout the weekend if I get a lot). You may submit for this week through the end of the day Friday.

This week's submissions will start posting on Friday, September 2.

Rules and additional details under the cut!

Rules:

In your ask, please include the creator's handle, a link to their work/post, and what you loved about it!

The creation does not have to have been posted this week! It can be something older. Just looking to celebrate things that made an impression on you this week, whether you've seen it before or not!

NSFW is alright! Just make sure you note it in the ask so I can flag appropriately! Since I'm including 18+ material, minors may not participate. 18+ posts will be tagged with NSFT/lemon/lemony lemon (trying to cover all my bases).

No incest, underage, cl*necest, master/padawan (or similar power dynamics), non-con/rape. There are a few others that I also won't share due to my discomfort with them (i.e., Rexsoka), so if you're not sure, ask.

Try to avoid commentary in your ask that might make others feel bad ("the only person who knows how to write XXX correctly..."). It's important to be able to appreciate creators without making others feel bad, so let's try to keep the commentary complimentary without being off-putting for other creators.

Self recommendations are allowed and encouraged! Shout out your own hard work! You deserve the recognition!

*Rules may change as I figure things out, so always double-check them

**If you have any questions about any of the rules, don't hesitate to DM me!

In addition to sending me asks, I highly encourage you to go either leave a comment on and/or reblog someone's work (tag me or use the #Fandom Friday tag if you do!). Let's get the interaction back up on this website and show the creators that work so hard on their stuff some love!

[lukeskywalking]

filoni needs to have everything spoon fed to him? what's going on?!

Underneath the cowboy hat there’s a little creature puppeteering him like ratatouille but instead of serving food he’s serving brainrot takes. I’m revoking his Luke Skywalker privileges indefinitely

[browneyesbrighteyes]

The Mandalorian season 3

Ok so it’s been a week since the season ended and I’ve had time to let my thoughts sit with the show. 

My final opinion is essentially that yeah, I liked it.

But it is absolutely no where near the first two seasons for me. Those two seasons mean everything to me. They are my favorite TV show.

And season 3 was good. Really good at times even. Good enough for me to enjoy. I’m excited for where the show is going to go next and I loved the ending. 

But I will never be able to get over the potential we had at the end of season 2. Because I know what I WANTED for season 3. And all of my criticisms didn’t change as the season finally finished. I still have them.

(rest under the cut because this got long)

I stand by the fact that we could have had the same plot but written better. Because what SHOULD have happened, is that Din and Grogu should have still been separated when the season started. We should have seen Din struggle with his choice to remove his helmet. Because if it was never an issue, if he never had any doubt about his creed? If it wasn’t meant to be a question on whether he would try to “redeem” himself? He never would have taken his helmet off in the first place.

So I would have liked to see him grapple with that. I would have liked to see him get rejected from his covert, like he did in tbobf (they never should have put that episode in another show). And then suffer with the loneliness and have THAT lead him to want to see Grogu again. And sure, get turned away just like in tbobf. It could be exactly the same.

And after he’s turned away by his covert, and then by Ahsoka/Luke, I wanted to see him grapple with the fact that he was truly alone. And I think that could have been a good reason for him to turn fully back to his creed. Reconnect with it and realize he wanted to redeem himself in the waters. You can even have Bo Katan be there, and even have Din need her help on Mandalore, and maybe even have Grogu return to him then. It would have been a great midseason episode to have their reunion AND the mythosaur reveal in one! Can you imagine?

Only it would have all been through a more Din-focused lens. It would have been a good half season to pursue through that idea. And then, Luke offers Grogu the same choice, and Grogu chooses Din, and they get reunited. But not until at least halfway through the season. Any my god, more emotional than it was in tbobf, because having the reunion scene for a few seconds in the middle of a battle? I didn’t like that even then. 

And the second half of the season could have still pulled back from Din a bit and focused on the Mandalorians. Just with a bit more focus on WHY Din doesn’t want the darksaber. on WHY he struggles to wield it (we really never went back to that. Shame). It could have still led to Bo getting the darksaber, and the ultimate battle with Gideon, and the darksaber getting destroyed.

But the show didn’t feel quite the same as the first two seasons. They really stole the weight of the season 2 finale away. It really doesn’t hit the same anymore, because they undercut it before we could even make it to S3. And I’m not upset about the plot points. But they set up a potential that never got realized, and it feels like losing something.

So yeah. I liked season 3. It was good. But I LOVE season 1 and 2. And I hope going forward it feels like that magic again.

[corellianhounds]

This whole time everyone assumed Bo-Katan’s smug menacing line to the kid (“Did you think your dad was the only Mandalorian?”) was a veiled threat, and/or a way to say that there are other Mandos who don’t live the way he does or whatever

The line is obviously useless and dumb because the kid met Bo-Katan before, as well as the two other Mandos with her, AND the whole covert literally the episode previous, and also she’s aware that the kid doesn’t/can’t talk. What response was she expecting?

Anyway that line comes up in the second episode, but 1. It has absolutely no bearing on the plot of the episode or the series as a whole BECAUSE 2. It comes after she kills some random monsters that attack her in the mines

She basically kills three cave trolls and says “Did you think your dad was the only fighter in Tamriel?”

This script is nonsense, the plot is laughable without actually being humorous, and the characters and established story are being done an incredible disservice. It’s disappointing.

[dailydragon08]

I hate the “no attachments” rhetoric so much and I hate that both Ahsoka and Luke in Mando and TBOBF fell straight back into it. Cuz they especially should know more than anyone that the feelings of isolation, feeling like you’re not in a safe space to healthily process your emotions—which requires actually feeling them and being in an environment where you’re allowed to feel them—and feeling like you have a support system where you can speak your feelings without judgment to get guidance and support is REQUIRED for Jedi to stay on the light side. Cuz loneliness, feeling like a burden, feeling like if you have one bad emotion it makes you all bad because of rules around feelings that are unrealistic and too rigorous makes you way more susceptible to the dark side.

Trying to beat bad emotions out of people completely is unrealistic. Expecting literal children to not feel those feelings and just know what to do with them cuz you’ve created a space where those feelings are forbidden is unrealistic. Pushing feelings and emotions down and “burying” them (re: obi wan telling luke “bury your feelings deep down” in ROTJ) and expecting those people to be perfectly healthy is unrealistic. Wanting this level of control over people, their thoughts, and their emotions, and this black and white thinking is not only toxic and dangerous, but is akin to cult culture. The PT era Jedi were extremists in this way and just too blind and couldn’t accept any criticism enough to see it because for some reason, a bunch of old guys decided evolution was not allowed and they’d just keep running the system the same way they always had with no room for change and that would somehow be this foolproof path to survival—which is a complaint a lot of people have about our current irl political system and is causing a lot of damage, btw.

Like wasn’t that the whole point of showing the Jedi’s fall? And doesn’t clone wars especially show how this thinking created all these cracks in the system that Palpatine was easily able to exploit and manipulate and Anakin was just someone who wanted change in the order and he was ostracized for it, so Palpatine latched onto him and Anakin was like “oh finally someone values me,” just to be manipulated and abused and have his whole life blown up to the point that he thought the empire was his only option (obv not excusing the atrocities, just saying I can see how he got to where he did mentally by ROTS)? Like he literally tells Luke that they can team up to overthrow the emperor and in ROTJ, when Luke tries to get him to run with him pre-throne room battle, he says “it’s too late for me,” so he KNOWS this is bad and only going to get worse, but has resigned himself to it.

Like wasn’t the whole point of the OT and the “I can’t kill my own father/there’s still good in him/I can turn him back to the good side” meant to prove that Jedi DO NEED healthy connections in order to thrive and stay on the light side? If they wanna forbid anything, they should be forbidding possession and control, but the PT Jedi Council instead used that for their own benefit and lacked any self awareness to see they’d just become what they were preaching against.

Like give me a post-OT Jedi council who teaches healthy connection and letting things go that aren’t meant for you to control and that friendships and relationships can be powerful things that bring you back to the light in your darkest moments, and a more Legends-esque New Jedi Order that values emotional health and well-being and is a safe space for not only the galaxy, but Force sensitives, no matter how they’re built instead of trying to force everyone into the same box. This is the order I wanted to see Luke cultivate in canon and I will forever be salty that this isn’t what we got.

[technoturian]

Okay, well, I watched Ahsoka.

I didn't have much investment in the plotline, as someone who DID watch Rebels but didn't enjoy it, I can't imagine how it was for people who never even watched Rebels. If you don't know or care about Ezra, Hera, Thrawn, the dathomir witches, etc, the Ahsoka show doesn't give you much reason to nor does it bother with more than a cursory explanation. Thrawn is especially a problem because they're setting him up like some SW Thanos and there was absolutely nothing about him that wasn't every other Imperial officer angling for succession. At least Gideon has his silly, narcissistic darktrooper obsession to make him stand out. Thrawn's just a chilly British guy who says "for the Empire" a lot. Groundbreaking.

Sabine was one of the few parts of Rebels that really stood out to me and they flattened her so much. Where's the artist? Where's the tech genius that was making superweapons in her early teens? How does it take until the last episode or so to talk about Mandalore? Her plot with Ahsoka happened so much off-screen that it lacked emotional punch. The only really exciting part of her storyline was when she chose to go with the enemy, and I was disappointed with how little conflict resulted from that. I loved that they went there at least, very unexpected considering Rebels' goodie-goodie "every episode must end with a heavy-handed moral lesson" thing that drove me up the wall.

As for Ahsoka herself... She felt like a generic jedi character for most of her screentime. That said, the visions of Anakin were some of the only stuff that landed emotionally for me and were definitely the highlight.

Ezra's actor did an amazing job, especially since I found Ezra to be a bit obnoxious in the cartoon and I found him so likable in Ahsoka, while still being very recognizable as the same character. The problem is the whole plot of finding him relies so heavily on the relationships and storylines built in a different show. I kept wondering how people who hadn't seen Rebels felt about this guy who has no backstory showing up with such obvious "main character" energy being put into him.

Also just an aside, wish they'd left out the contact lenses. It's not worth messing up the actors' eyelines and focus to match a cartoon character's eye color, I'm sorry but it's just not. Actually I feel like this is indicative of this whole experience: It was so important that all of the most minute details from Rebels made it in unchanged, regardless of how it hampered the show we were watching.

The only original -- at least, in that it didn't require investment in Rebels or Clone Wars -- idea this show presented that I was really invested in were the fallen jedi duo, who seemed full of potential... Until they ended up leading into a tease for the Mortis Gods, which is a plot I have less than zero interest in.

The show really just felt very flat, but in the exact opposite way The Book of Boba Fett was. TBoBF was all style and no substance, it didn't give me anything to care about. Ahsoka had a lot of substance and a lot of lore and just... a lot... happening, but it expected me to already care about it and skipped the part where it gave me a reason to.

If you're a Rebels fan you probably enjoyed it. (Maybe? I haven't really looked at reviews.) Which would make sense, because it was just a new half-season of the cartoon that inexplicably was made live action for no other reason than because these characters need to get some buy-in from the general audience before they show up in a team-up movie with the Mandalorian characters. I don't believe it makes a convincing argument for that buy-in.

PS: Also just as a KOTOR fan, the continued disrespect on the HK designation is intolerable. Justice for HK-47 and death to those personality-less pretenders.

[trashquisitor-shirozora]

Was browsing through early BOBF/Mando S3 criticisms on Tumblr and WOW, 93% of S2’s viewership dropped when S3 finished airing for an extremely understandable reason. As someone who got into Dinluke after all the dust settled I can only imagine what it was like becoming invested in Din’s story and being floored by the S2 finale only for it to get totally swerve-balled after a long-anticipated wait. How did you avoid the disappointment and burnout?

Spite is an incredibly powerful motivator, let me tell you.

I'm halfway joking about that, btw. I could say I'm used to disappointment and I also worked really hard not to take things too personally after being disappointed time and again year after year by fandoms I was in. Imo the healthiest attitude is that no show/movie/book/videogames/etc will ever play out the way you want/think it should so take what you can get and trash the rest. By the time I started watching The Mandalorian, I'd been burnt badly by Star Trek AOS, the Sequel Trilogy, the MCU, and the Disney machine, and I had to figure out how to accept that I like what I like, I can't change what I can't change, and I can/will run the fuck off with what I can change, which is making wildly fun and fulfilling transformative shit like fanfics and fanart.

I was actually excited about TBOBF and was utterly betrayed by the executive decision to throw him and Fennec to the side in order to absolutely trash the Season 2 finale of the Mando Show by having Din and Grogu reunite just like that. I guess I got lucky in that I had a long-running fic series that I was heavily invested in and I was not about to let Disney stop me from finishing it. Instead of letting my frustrations kill my interest in the show and fandom, I turned it into motivation to keep telling the story I wanted to tell based on the fallout of Season 2. It also helped that Andor happened.

I quit Season 3 of the Mando Show after the 1st episode and it was the best decision I ever made. I had a really rough time with it and was encouraged to step away if it was giving me too much stress. I'm glad for that. Less time and energy picking about Filoni&Favreau and Disney Lucasfilm's decisions and disappointments, more time and energy spent writing and drawing the dinluke I want to see. The nice thing about Star Wars is that it is an old and vast sandbox. Plenty of room here to build whatever sandcastles and dig however many holes you want while canon goes floundering by.

I think also that it really helped to find spaces to share with people who vibe on the same wavelength, so I'm not alone to my thoughts and spiraling myself out of a fandom I enjoyed (like what happened with TLJ but I shan't go there bc this response is long enough). Those posts about having friends you can shit-talk things with? Valid af. You need outlets to vent your grievances without setting bridges on fire, and it'll help your enjoyment of things in the long run.

I didn't avoid the disappointment but I figured out how to make something of it, so I'm still writing dinluke, I'm still drawing dinluke, I'm still getting giddy over dinluke. I actively choose to do what I want with them, and nothing Disney Lucasfilm puts out is ever going to stop me.