With a new week comes a new episode of The Mandalorian. The fourth episode of the third season follows Din Djarin (Pedro Pascal) as he returns to the Mandalorian covert and goes on a new mission while Gorgu is trained in the ways of the Mandalore. Unfortunately, “Chapter 20: The Foundling” is a weak episode. Blessedly brief, this installment feels like a reminder that the new season has no direction for where it is leading, with each episode feeling like a stand-alone event without a clear storyline underneath it all.
The episode begins with tribe members on Mandalore training in combat. Then, Djarin takes Grogu to participate in a match allowing him to train to be an apprentice. It’s interesting to see Grogu learn how to be a Mandalorian, and he wins the duel against Ragnar by Force-jumping and shooting three darts at him. Suddenly, a reptavian creature arrives and snatches Ragnar, and a group of Mandalorians pursues the beast. While it’s all good fun to have a large number of creature antagonists, which this show has never had a shortage of, this season has relied so heavily on the creatures that it forgets to have one main villain that isn’t simply a hungry animal.
As Grogu joins the Armorer in the Forge, we have a flashback to Order 66 from Grogu’s perspective. This is another revisit to a pivotal moment in Star Wars when most of the Jedi are massacred. Further installments of the series have shown us alternate perspectives of how it went in Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith. This episode shows us how Grogu meets Kelleran Beq, played by none other than Ahmed Best. Best is no stranger to the galaxy after playing Jar-Jar Binks in the prequel trilogy. It is great to see Best in not only another acting role but one where he can play the badass Jedi he can be.
Beq and Grogu take off in a speeder, leading to an exciting action sequence on Coruscant. The scene feels spiritually and visually similar to the chase scene from Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones. However, as fun as it is to see the action on planets we’ve been familiar with for decades, this scene currently feels pointless. The fact that Grogu witnessed Order 66 was already an established part of his backstory, but this scene adds little. Unless Beq returns later in the season, this scene is irrelevant, especially to anything set up in the prior episodes.
While every TV show sets up threads to be picked up later in the season, The Mandalorian Season 3 has been filled with loose threads with little tying it all together. Djarin’s goal of finding redemption by bathing in the waters of Mandalore was resolved by the beginning of the third episode, and the show now lacks a looming threat to keep viewers interested. Even though there is a bit of fun action directed by Carl Weathers (who plays Greef Karga), it feels like it was too easy for our heroes to save Ragnar from the raptor. As a result, this episode is more of a stand-alone side quest than a meaningful contribution to the series.
SCORE: 4/10
As ComingSoon’s review policy explains, a score of 4 equates to “Poor.” The negatives outweigh the positive aspects making it a struggle to get through.