Felipe is a writer who is an avid film and TV fan, with superhero movies and series being his biggest passion. He graduated from college in 2019, having studied Journalism. Before college, he spent a month studying at the Oxford English Centre. His superhero knowledge expands to the comics, with his undergraduate thesis being "Politics Reflected In American Comics. "
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That gave Disney and Lucasfilm the idea of changing formats, picking up Din Djarin and Grogu and putting them on the big screen. As such, the fan-favorite characters were used to continue the Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu ended up only grossing $345.8 million worldwide against a reported budget of $165 million, which barely put it in the needed breakeven range when accounting for marketing and other expenses. Additionally, the 2026 Star Wars movie only holds a decent 60% critics' score on Rotten Tomatoes after 330 reviews, though it has a high 86% audience score.
⚡The SithRule of two
⚙️The RebellionA new hope
🪓Bounty HuntersThis is the way
👑The EmpireOrder 66
The original Star Wars film — later retitled Episode IV: A New Hope — opened in just 32 American theatres and proceeded to become the highest-grossing film of its era, redefining what summer blockbusters could be. In which year did it premiere?
✗ Wrong. The answer is 1977. 1975 is when the script was being shopped around. 1979 is when Star Trek: The Motion Picture released as a Star Wars-shaped countermove. 1980 is The Empire Strikes Back. The original Star Wars is May 25, 1977.
A New Hope’s writer-director was a then-32-year-old American Graffiti veteran who’d struggled to get the project greenlit and famously took back-end profit and merchandising rights in lieu of a higher salary — the deal that would build a billion-dollar company. He returned to direct the prequels but stepped away from the original-trilogy sequels. Name him.
✗ Wrong. The answer is George Lucas. Steven Spielberg was Lucas’s close friend (and the godfather of his post-A-New-Hope career) but never directed a Star Wars film. Coppola was Lucas’s mentor at USC and at American Zoetrope. Irvin Kershner directed Empire Strikes Back. The original is Lucas’s.
In 1980’s The Empire Strikes Back, Darth Vader delivers cinema’s most-misquoted line at the climax of his Cloud City duel with Luke Skywalker. Vader severs Luke’s hand and reveals their relationship. The exact line is — for the record — “No, I am your father.” What relationship does it confirm?
✗ Wrong. The answer is that Vader is Luke’s father, Anakin Skywalker. The whole foundation of the Skywalker saga collapses to this single twist: Anakin (the Jedi prodigy of the prequels) becomes Vader after his fall. Luke and Leia are revealed in Return of the Jedi to be his twin children, separated at birth.
Yoda — the green, ear-twitching Jedi Master — was puppeted and voiced from his Empire Strikes Back debut through the prequels and the sequels by a single Muppet-show-veteran performer who also voices Miss Piggy and Fozzie Bear. Name him.
✗ Wrong. The answer is Frank Oz. Jim Henson was Oz’s mentor and collaborator (he created the Muppets) but didn’t voice Yoda. Steve Whitmire took over Kermit after Henson’s 1990 death. Brian Henson is Jim’s son and runs the Henson company today. Yoda is Frank Oz’s.
In a deal that reshaped Hollywood, Disney acquired Lucasfilm Ltd. for $4.05 billion in cash and stock — bringing Star Wars, Indiana Jones, ILM and Skywalker Sound under the Disney umbrella. The deal also kicked off the sequel trilogy production. In what year did Disney close the acquisition?
✗ Wrong. The answer is 2012. 2009 is when Disney acquired Marvel ($4 billion). 2010 is the year before Lucas began signalling exit plans. 2014 is when production proper began on The Force Awakens. Lucasfilm joined Disney on October 30, 2012.
The Mandalorian launched as Disney+’s flagship original on November 12, 2019 — the day the streaming service itself launched. Created by Jon Favreau and run by Dave Filoni, the show centres on a helmeted bounty hunter who reluctantly becomes a foster father to “The Child” (Grogu). What is the Mandalorian’s real name?
✗ Wrong. The answer is Din Djarin. Boba Fett is the famous bounty hunter from the original trilogy, with his own Disney+ spinoff (The Book of Boba Fett, 2021). Cobb Vanth is the Tatooine marshal played by Timothy Olyphant. Bo-Katan Kryze is the Mandalorian princess played by Katee Sackhoff. The Mandalorian himself is Din Djarin.
Order 66 — the secret directive that turns the Republic’s clone troopers against their Jedi commanders and effectively ends the Jedi Order — is dramatised in the climactic third act of which prequel film?
✗ Wrong. The answer is Revenge of the Sith. Phantom Menace ends with Qui-Gon’s death and the unveiling of Darth Maul. Attack of the Clones ends with the Clone Wars beginning. Rogue One is set just before A New Hope, after Order 66 has long since happened. The Order 66 sequence is the climax of Episode III.
Andor (2022–25) is widely regarded as the most adult, politically literate Star Wars project ever made — a slow-burn prequel to Rogue One charting Cassian Andor’s radicalisation against the Empire. The series was created and showrun by a writer/director best known for the original Bourne trilogy and Michael Clayton. Name him.
✗ Wrong. The answer is Tony Gilroy. Rian Johnson directed The Last Jedi (2017). Jon Favreau created The Mandalorian and is Lucasfilm’s Disney+-era animation/live-action lieutenant. Dave Filoni runs the Filoniverse (Clone Wars, Rebels, Ahsoka, the upcoming Heir to the Empire film). Andor is Tony Gilroy’s.
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Jedi Master — or moisture farmer on Tatooine?
8 The Star Wars Movie Could Have Been A Couple Of TV Show Episodes
The earliest realization one might have when rewatching Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu on Disney+ is that the sci-fi movie's biggest criticism was right. In honesty, there is nothing that happens in the movie that feels like it specifically asked for the big screen. The Mandalorian and Grogu's plot could have worked as a two to three-episode arc on the Disney+ series.
You only needed an episode to set up where Din Djarin and Grogu are now, in terms of working for the New Republic, with the same action beats in the movie and ending with the reveal that the target is Rotta the Hutt. Then an episode on the gladiator planet, with the final one to end the arc on Nal Hutta against the twins. The movie just felt like a standard mission from the series.
7 The Mandalorian And Grogu Does Not Have A Compelling Main Villain
However, the Star Wars movie's main villains are the Hutts. Sadly, they are not really in much of the movie to make a mark, and when they do appear, the characters lack the needed complexity to make them stand out. Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu uses its villains simply as action figures to bash against Mando and Rotta, in entertaining fashion, I might say, but in shallow form.
6 Star Wars Needed An Epic Story For Its First Movie In 7 Years
While not the best Star Wars movie, it still had an epic scope, with incredibly high-stakes, shocking deaths, and more. Instead of taking a case-of-the-week approach for Star Wars' cinematic return, The Mandalorian and Grogu should have been the big Mandoverse crossover movie Dave Filoni is developing, even if that meant waiting a little longer.
5 Disney Played It Safe With Star Wars Again
Image via LucasfilmStar Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu is guilty of playing with those same elements through a few characters' returns and cameos. Additionally, no one felt like Pascal's Din Djarin was in any danger of actually dying in the film. Yet there was The Mandalorian and Grogu trying to give off that impression, only for Mando to be alive and well, obviously. Finally, at the end of the movie, the characters had not really changed, the status quo remained intact.
4 Rotta The Hutt's Voice Stripped Away Jeremy Allen White's Performance
Not only that, but it sounded like a robotic monotone, stripping it of the nuances and intensity we know from projects like The Bear that White can bring. You could virtually put any actor in as Rotta and the role would likely go along the same lines. This aspect of the Star Wars movie is even more disappointing on a rewatch, as the novelty of the Rotta character and voice has worn off.
3 There Is Too Little Pedro Pascal In The Star Wars Movie
Alien franchise star Sigourney Weaver is also severely underused in the movie.
2 The Mandalorian And Grogu Suffers From Tonal Whiplash
The Mandalorian and Grogu also alternates between John Wick-like fight sequences, with Din Djarin taking out several mercenaries in a bar or Stormtroopers inside AT-AT walkers, and slower comedic beats somewhat frequently. At times, I found myself wanting the movie to lean more into one tone than another, only for a shift to swiftly come, which becomes even clearer in a Disney+ Star Wars rewatch.
1 Star Wars Once Again Banks Too Much On Nostalgia
It just feels like the studio looked at the divisive reception to 2019's Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker and decided to bank on characters fans already knew and loved instead of players the franchise actually had a compelling story for in Star Wars' cinematic return. Don't get me wrong, I had fun with Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu, but this is an easy to forget entry in the franchise after you are done watching it, and upon rewatching the space opera on Disney+, these harsh realizations become too loud to ignore.
- Release Date
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May 20, 2026
- Runtime
- Director
132 minutes
Rotta (voice)