Review: ‘The Mandalorian’ Chapter 23 – ‘The Spies’ Brings Back the Full Might of the Empire
After a brief detour in Chapter 22, where Din and Bo-Katan play droid crime detectives, it’s great to have The Mandalorian return to the main plot. I was lucky enough to see the opening scene at Celebration, and there’s nothing like watching your favourite Star Wars show with thousands of other fans where it is perfectly acceptable to scream “Yeeeees!” whenever something cool happens. Watching the remainder of the episode in my living room is a bit of a comedown, but Chapter 23 was no less thrilling to watch at home!
While The Spies seems like an odd title given that, aside from the opening scene, it features very little espionage, it is an epic episode that centres around the exploration of Mandalore — perhaps The Scouts would be more fitting? The episode really builds up the tension and pays off hints that have been given over the course of three seasons, while also letting loose with some insane action and amazing sequences. The build-up to this point has been a little strange at times, but most of the threads come together, and if a few little detours are the price to pay for this episode, then it’s all worth it.
Spoilers ahead…
The episode opens with our favourite Imperial spy Elia Kane, who sneaks through the streets of Coruscant to pounding electronic music and encounters an Imperial probe droid that scans her face as seen in Obi-Wan Kenobi before. She reports back to Gideon on the outcome of the pirates’ attack on Nevarro. This confirms Carson Teva’s theory that someone was behind it — the Imperial Remnant are clearly sponsoring these pirates to make the New Republic seem weak so that the citizens will turn back to the Empire for protection. This was a nice payoff and, while the pirate episode was fully enjoyable on its own, it’s nice to see it connect to the bigger picture.
Gideon is disappointed to hear the pirates failed, but Elia is quick to point out that her intelligence was correct: the New Republic did fail to act, and they would have gotten away with it too if it wasn’t for those pesky Mandalorians! Gideon ends the call and, with a swish of his cape, marches through his base, giving us a glimpse of some of his projects as he walks through some Phantom Menace-style laser gates and past some soldiers I first thought were new battle droids but are later revealed to be Imperial troopers. Perhaps these are Phase 2 dark troopers that still have the human element after Gideon lost his Phase 3 droids?
Gideon also passes some strange figures in tanks as seen in Chapter 12: The Siege before he walks into the briefing room of the Imperial Shadow Council. This scene made the hall at Celebration erupt as we meet none other than Thrawn’s right-hand man Pellaeon! Gideon asks for assistance with his Mandalorian problem and calls out the absence of Thrawn. The council also includes General Hux’s father, who’s busy with Project Necromancer (another cloning project!) and was played by Brian Gleeson, Domhnall’s brother. The members are initially reluctant to send more troops to Gideon, but eventually agree to reinforce him against the Mandalorians. Long live the Empire!
Jump back to Nevarro, with a re-hash of the opening scene from Chapter 21, only this time it’s Mandalorians in their captured cruiser. We get some beautiful shots of the fleet, now decked out in a mythosaur paint job. As they land, the two groups meet, the covert in their mishmash of colours and the privateers in blue. It’s a tense moment when the privateers all remove their helmets, but it’s the Armorer who diffuses the tension, offering their new guests a home and a meal.
After that, Greef Karga gives Grogu a voice (sort of)! In possibly the most laugh-out-loud scene of The Mandalorian so far, Grogu is given an IG-11 (now IG-12) exosuit and quickly takes to walking around in it. I wasn’t a fan of the IG-11 subplot in Chapter 17, but all is forgiven now as Grogu walks around using Taika Waititi’s voice to yell “No!” at his daddy. I’ve no doubt this is set up for an awesome battle sequence later on, but for now it was just pure fun!
Bo-Katan leads a collaboration of the two groups to scout out Mandalore. It felt a little rushed to be leaving the planet as soon as they got there, but it was great to see members of both factions come together to fight for their home. I did roll my eyes slightly at having the entire leadership of the Mandalorians leave Nevarro — let’s hope the two factions can get along without anyone to keep them in check. The Mandalorian fleet arriving at their home planet was a beautiful visual sequence that is on par with many other remarkable ship-centric scenes we’ve seen so far in Star Wars. The Mandalorians bond as they look over their ravaged home — this common loss brings them together.
As they explore the surface, they are greeted by a new group riding a wheeled sail barge that seems like it was lifted straight out of Mad Max. I was tensing for a fight, but the occupants turn out to be more Mandalorians who survived the Purge and have been stranded on their home planet. As the three groups merge, Bo-Katan reveals how she lost the Darksaber. She surrendered it willingly to Gideon in the hopes of saving what remained of her people, but she was betrayed. This gives us a bit of a timeline as it’s made clear that the Night of a Thousand Tears and the Purge are two separate events. It also gives Din a moment where he states that he doesn’t care about the Darksaber; it’s her honour which he is willing to follow after their journey together this season.
The groups presses on without the Armorer, who leaves back to the fleet with sick and wounded Mandalorian survivors. There’s some tension which is hilariously resolved by Grogu, but then of course there’s another monster attack which drives them underground — can these guys ever catch a break?! They run underground and find the Great Forge, which is an impressive sight. They are cut short by more jetpacks, only this time it’s the Imperial troops we saw at the beginning of the episode who quickly have the Mandalorians pinned down. Eventually, the Mandalorians rally and have the Imperials on the run, but as they pursue, they head into an Imperial base equipped with TIE Interceptors and Bombers. It’s a trap!
After leading the charge and putting up quite a fight, Din Djarin is captured — these troops are well-trained in Mandalorian gadgets as they use their whipcords to pin him down. I expected them to remove his helmet, but it seems that will have to wait a week. We’ve gone seven episodes without seeing Pedro Pascal’s face, and I highly doubt that we’ll go the full season! Moff Gideon also jetpacks in, wearing dark trooper armour with a Darth Maul-style Mandalorian helmet — honestly, can this guy get any cooler? Of course, he has to make a grandstanding speech about how he is going to take the best of the cloners (notice the camera pan to Grogu), the Jedi, and the Mandalorians to create the ultimate army. It’s also safe to assume this is the same base we saw earlier in the episode.
Gideon demands the return of the Darksaber, but instead Bo uses it to cut through the door behind the group (why didn’t you think of that earlier?!) and gets the rest of the Mandalorians to safety. She gets them all out bar Paz, who stays behind. In a fist-pumping scene, he wipes out the remaining Imperial troops, but is outmatched by the arrival of the three Praetorian guards on loan from Brendol Hux. We are definitely starting to see the bridge between trilogies here as the Praetorians are a nice hybrid between the royal guards from Return of the Jedi and Snoke’s sentinels from The Last Jedi.
It seems that all is lost, and I can’t wait to see what happens next week. Let’s hope that at least one Mandalorian gets to the fleet in time!
A teacher from Wales in the UK, Aled has loved Star Wars ever since that Star Destroyer flew over his head and blew his mind.
