‘The Mandalorian’ Counts Down to Season 3 Finale With New Promo, Character Posters, and a Look at Some Fan Theories
As of this posting we are two days away from the season finale of The Mandalorian hitting Disney Plus. After Chapter 23 left us salivating for more, the Mandalorian himself (one of the men under the armor), Brendan Wayne, warned us on social media that the final episode might make us regret wishing for more.
To announce that there are only a few hours left in the countdown for the finale, Lucasfilm released a 30-second promo titled “One Episode Left” over the weekend that took a look back at some of the highlights of the season so far, and teased big moments ahead (though with no new footage; we still haven’t seen a single frame from Chapter 24):
The studio has also released three new character posters from Chapter 23, which include Moff Gideon in his Mandalorian armor, Grogu riding the newly-created IG-12, and the three Praetorian guards that show up at the end. Check them out:
(WARNING: From this point on, we will be discussing some fan theories. While none of this has been confirmed or is based on any leaks, viewers who want to go into the episode completely blind might want to tune out and come back on Wednesday.)
There is a lot going on in this episode, and we’ve been promised some surprises. Brendan Wayne’s Instagram post made it sound like a character is going to die, but maybe an equally-tragic twist is coming. A lot of people have been speculating on social media that the Armorer could have changed sides and formed an alliance with Moff Gideon and his new army of Mandalorian-like stormtroopers. Emily Swallow, who plays the character, even hinted on social media that something big is happening on Wednesday.
The Armorer has been an interesting character to watch throughout the entire run of The Mandalorian and The Book of Boba Fett. There is still a long gap between the season 1 finale of The Mandalorian and Chapter 5 of The Book of Boba Fett. We still don’t know what she was up to, and while her behavior has never been exactly normal, she’s had some odd moments this season. Some of us thought it was part of a larger character arc, but maybe there’s more than meets the eye.
In Chapter 23, she was quick to escape the battlefield right before her Mandalorian friends were ambushed by Gideon and his army; also, they were all wearing beskar armors that someone had to have forged. Her motivations remain unclear, but Mandalorians fighting each other and even forming alliances with the Empire has been a consistent theme of their history. The fact that we can’t figure out why she would side with Gideon is the biggest flaw of the theory, but there is clearly a lot going on that we don’t know about yet.
The Nite Owls left behind on Mandalore, whose injuries were the reason why the Armorer went back to the ship, are also prime candidates to have signed with the remnants of the Empire. Not only they were really fast in pledging their allegiance to Bo-Katan despite their rocky history, but they were also already on Mandalore, where Moff Gideon has apparently been hiding for a while and setting up his own base. Do we really believe they hadn’t met before?
Another interesting prospect for this upcoming episode is whether Grand Admiral Thrawn will show up or not. There is a legitimate argument to be made about Favreau and Filoni saving him for his introduction in Ahsoka, yet that series’ trailer hinted that he’s not exactly hiding in the dark. The Shadow Council at the beginning of Chapter 23 teased that they were all waiting for Thrawn to show up, so if Chapter 24 is indeed going to wrap up everything the show has set up so far, is there a better way to do it than to introduce the series’ phantom menace? One could also argue that it was no coincidence that a handful of people just got their first look at Lars Mikkelsen as Thrawn in live-action during Star Wars Celebration, and that Lucasfilm is not going to wait another three months to reveal him in full to the rest of the audience.
There is a lot up in the air going into this episode, and there are plenty of theories going around. Who were the title spies in Chapter 23? Are we going to get Boba Fett back in the show, perhaps summoned by Grogu to help him and Bo-Katan rescue Din? Is Sabine going to make her live-action debut ahead of Ahsoka? What about Dr. Pershing and Elia Kane? How are they going to factor into the finale? Speculate away in the comments, and come back on Wednesday morning for our review and discussion of the finale!
You can check out Aled’s review of Chapter 23 here.
Miguel Fernández is a Spanish student that has movies as his second passion in life. His favorite movie of all time is The Lord of the Rings, but he is also a huge Star Wars fan. However, fantasy movies are not his only cup of tea, as movies from Scorsese, Fincher, Kubrick or Hitchcock have been an obsession for him since he started to understand the language of filmmaking. He is that guy who will watch a black and white movie, just because it is in black and white.
