The Mandalorian Season 3: Star Wars Fans React to Weird Episode 3 Story
After a rocky start to Season 3 that saw viewership tumble, Star Wars series The Mandalorian was back for its third episode this week on Disney+, and things got very Andor-y.
“The Convert” initially picks up right where we left off in episode 2, “The Mines of Mandalore“, with Bo Katan quizzing Din Djarin on what he saw during his swim in the Living Waters. After noting that Din hadn’t in fact seen the actually very real Mythosaur on his way down to Drown Town, Bo decides to keep that information to herself, and the two end up making their way back to Kalevala, entering into a skirmish with TIE interceptors.
Thinking they might have bested the interceptors but soon coming face to face with a large squadron, Bo watches helplessly as her castle is bombed back to the Stone Age. It looks like Bo and Din are stuck together, adoptive parents to a little green sprog who is now trying out Mando’s catchphrase, “this is the way”, for himself – with mixed-but-cute results.
At this point, we leave Din and Bo behind for a while as “The Convert” aims to create layers to its episode title. We find ourselves in Coruscant, where Dr. Pershing (Omid Abtahi), the clone engineer who wanted to experiment on Grogu for Werner Herzog aka The Client back in Season 1, is trying to start a new life within the New Republic. Pershing is part of an amnesty program that grants him a limited amount of freedom to be a “good guy” who doesn’t do disturbing, clone engineer-y things, but he still really wants to be a disturbing, clone engineer-y kinda guy, so when he meets fellow Amnesty member and ex-Moff Gideon officer G68 (Katy O’Brian) hanging around his new Coruscant quarters, he slowly forms a friendship with her almost entirely based on their combined love of biscuits and being extremely dodgy.
With G68’s help, Pershing decides to go on the nick in a decommissioned Star Destroyer to retrieve his old cloning research, which he does shortly before the whole scenario is exposed as a trap. G68 has framed him as a traitor for the New Republic, and he is placed in a mind flayer-adjacent device that will correct his way of thinking. Clearly that’s not enough punishment for G68 aka Elia Kane, because she decides to turn that device all the way up to 11 and destroy his brain.
We’re then finally back with Din and Bo, as Din returns to the Watch with proof that he bathed in the Living Waters, and he is judged as being redeemed. As Bo also swam in the waters and hasn’t removed her helmet since, she is also redeemed, and the clan welcome her into their fold. Even through a metal helmet, we can tell that Bo isn’t sure what the hell she should do next.
It’s a strange episode for The Mandalorian because Star Wars usually likes to focus the show on Mando and Grogu. At this point, we do not know why we took a diversion to Coruscant and Dr. Pershing’s story, but it will likely become clearer later on. In the meantime, viewers took to social media to express their various frustrations and delights with the very odd third episode.
Here’s what Star Wars fans were chatting about…
