The Mandalorian is completely wasting Grogu this season

The Mandalorian used to be my comfort show. In our house, it was simply called “The Baby Yoda Show” for most of its first season, and a good deal of the second. Ever since that little green guy popped up at the end of the series premiere—and kudos to the Lucasfilm team for somehow managing to keep him under wraps until then—we’ve been hooked on the adventures of Mando and his young charge. It was fun following them as they explored new corners of the Star Wars galaxy together. I especially enjoyed the episodic, space-Western take on the lone wolf and cub trope. In this third season, though, that comfort has often been replaced with frustration. My family is still watching—whether out of habit, nostalgia, obligation, or some combination of all three—but I’m not getting the same satisfaction out of The Mandalorian that I once did.

I’m not alone in that. Ratings for the third season have significantly fallen in comparison to the first two. The reasons for that drop are as varied as the audience, but a few critiques have been consistently cropping up in our recaps and the greater discourse surrounding the show. The storyline is unfocused; the tone is inconsistent; it’s trying too hard to be Andor; the celebrity guest stars are distracting—all of these complaints have been rightly leveled against The Mandalorian in recent weeks. For me, though, it comes down to the way the show has used—or hasn’t used—its greatest asset: Baby Yoda himself, aka Grogu (I’m slowly, begrudgingly coming around to the name, but hey, even Pedro Pascal himself slips up sometimes).

The storyline of the first two seasons centered around Din Djarin (voiced by Pascal, with stunt doubles Brendan Wayne or Lateef Crowder usually performing underneath the mask) initially protecting Grogu, then searching for Grogu’s people, the Jedi. At the end of season two, the Jedi were the ones who found him. Specifically, one Jedi in particular—Luke Skywalker—came to the rescue when Grogu was captured by Imperial bad guy Moff Gideon (Giancarlo Esposito). By that point, Din and Grogu had bonded as Clan Mudhorn, “a clan of two.” Season two ended with a sad farewell between them, as Din made the heartbreaking choice to let Grogu go so he could train with Luke and fulfill his destiny as a Jedi. Although Luke’s surprise cameo was controversial among fans, I personally dug seeing him in action again (through the power of suspension of disbelief), and I could relate to the conflict within Din as he struggled to balance his own attachment to his foundling son and doing what he believed was right for him. That’s the kind of storytelling I signed up for; it’s what got me invested in the show in the first place.

That’s where it all kind of fell apart, though. The next time we saw Din and Grogu was in an episode of The Mandalorian spin-off The Book Of Boba Fett. While that series had some intriguing aspects, it was narratively all over the place. Nothing illustrated that more than the fifth episode, “The Return Of The Mandalorian.” After four episodes of pretending they had something new to say about Boba Fett, the writers gave up trying and brought back Din Djarin in an episode that barely featured the show’s title character. What does it say about the quality of a show when its best episodes center on characters from a completely different series? Nothing good.

The next episode, “From The Desert Comes A Stranger,” continued the side-quest storyline, and we got to see Grogu training with Luke. Din drops off a little beskar chainmail shirt for him, but reluctantly leaves without speaking to his son. After Luke gives Grogu the choice to stay and complete his training or go back to his dad, the two reunite in the season finale, “In The Name Of Honor.” Considering The Book Of Boba Fett had a much smaller audience than The Mandalorian, I wonder how many viewers went into season three without knowing any of this (though I suppose that’s what Google is for).

You’d think the lesson showrunner Jon Favreau would have taken from this is that anytime you add Grogu to a story, he just naturally makes it more interesting. Apparently not, because the playful young lad has barely been a factor in season three. He’s just been tagging along on his dad’s adventures, cooing, disrespecting boundaries, and casually using the force to spin around in chairs and jump into people’s arms. It’s cute, but hardly consequential. The only time he’s actually made a difference in the plot was in episode two, when he fetched Bo-Katan (Katee Sackoff) to rescue Din from that crab-droid creature in the mines of Mandalore. Grogu was just the messenger, though. It’s not like he was the one doing the rescuing. Ever since then, it’s been the Din and Bo show, with Grogu reduced to a background character, no more important than a pet and less useful than a droid.

It seems the writers have become more interested in Bo-Katan’s quest to reunify and rule Mandalore than in the characters we started with. Considering that Din’s decision to adopt the kid rather than collect the bounty for handing him over to The Client (Werner Herzog) was the inciting incident of the entire show, that’s quite a swerve. Especially when you remember Grogu’s face spawned a thousand memes and generated millions of dollars in merchandise sales.

I think a lot of the issues fans are having with this season could be fixed by returning Grogu and Din, and their evolving relationship, to the center of the narrative. He may or may not be part of the cloning plot that was integral to episode three, but despite a reference in the most recent episode, none of that has paid off yet. If Grogu has outgrown his usefulness as a MacGuffin, at least they could give him an arc with some character development. We learned a little about his past, but how about his future? Let’s see him struggle with the dueling allegiances of Jedi and Mandalorian. One day, he may grow up to become a powerful force user. That journey has already begun, and it’s one I’d like to see continue. Now that would give me great comfort.