SPOILERS coming!!
Part of the reason The Mandalorian was so eagerly devoured on the first day of Disney+ is that nobody really knew much about it. The first episode wasn't screened, details had been kept slim, and we were promised a big Star Wars reveal that would shock fans. Boy, did it deliver.
The end of the first episode revealed the existence of a baby Yoda-like figure. I call it a baby but it is really 50 years old because this species ages much slower than others. The baby Yoda is what Pedro Pascal's Mandalorian is hired to find and return either dead or alive. This is a huge deal. We know so little about Yoda's species that we could be in store for literally anything, and that is very exciting.
In a since deleted video transcribed by Collider, Jon Favreau spoke to Variety at the world premiere of The Mandalorian's first three episodes, and says we can expect this character to have a big role going forward...
“I wanted to surprise people, and I wanted to—well there are bigger arcs that go through the whole season and the whole throw of the show. So as fun as it is to reveal new characters and surprise them, it also fits into a larger narrative about what’s going on in the galaxy after the revolution, and this is an important character.”
Favreau continued by expressing his surprise they were able to keep this secret for so long...
“What I’m most proud of is that we surprised people. You know how hard that is to do that nowadays? And what type of commitment it took from everybody who was on set and from the studio to hide all the clues that people, especially Star Wars fans, normally tap into? Looking into toy catalogues, looking into marketing materials, looking into style guides, photography, and the fact that that secret was kept is incredible. It is exciting. It’s fun, because people are so happy when they’re surprised. They’re not used to being surprised now—not in a good way (laughs).”
I have some ideas about what this baby's presence could mean, and you can check out as part of my first episode recap here.
