Bounty hunters of The Book of Boba Fett, unite—you don’t have anything to lose however your ahead momentum!

After final week’s episode left The Book of Boba Fett’s flashbacks behind as a way to deal with the inevitable battle between Boba’s burgeoning forces and the armies of the Pyke Syndicate, “The Gathering Storm” as soon as once more slammed the brakes on what little momentum the sequence had as a way to dive again into the previous. But at the very least the sequence lastly gave Ming-Na Wen extra to do than stand round and be Boba’s private hype-woman, delving into how and why Boba went by way of the difficulty of saving her from demise in The Mandalorian season 1. And lastly, greater than midway by way of the sequence, we lastly get some reason why Boba desires to be against the law lord within the first place.

The reply, at first, appears to be vengeance. Coming throughout the flare-lit battle that just about did in Fennec again in The Mandalorian season 1, Boba takes her physique and will get her cybernetically patched up. It’s an indication of his personal change, and the teachings he discovered after turning into nearer to the Tuskens over the course of the primary three episode’s flashback sequences, however he’s not precisely unscrupulous about it: Boba’s mad, and he wants assist to have the ability to really have interaction with that frustration. He wants an ally like Fennec, who is just reasonably grateful that she’s nonetheless alive, to assist him sneak into the Fortuna-operated Jabba’s palace and retrieve his previous ship, giving him the instruments to exorcise some previous demons.

One shootout—and a surprisingly goofy galley droid chase—later, these demons grow to be clear. The first is the Kintan Striders, the biker gang that worn out the Tuskens, who Boba and Fennec can now fortunately mow down after re-acquiring The Ship That Will Not Be Named. The second is the sarlacc itself, because the duo returns to the place of Boba’s near-demise in an try to reclaim his armor, solely to finish up having to kill the creature and scour its stays when it tries to eat him yet again. But with each issues handled, Fennec needles Boba over a meal among the many literal ruins of his previous life—the scattered remnants of Jabba’s sail barge—about what he desires to do now that these preliminary impulses have been acted upon. He’s had his vengeance, and has to understand that now that his previous armor is gone, a brand new man is left beneath its vanished masks.

It serves as one thing of a catalyst at the very least for each of them, even when Fennec is rather more skeptical in regards to the conclusion Boba involves than he’s: Why are each of them losing time taking jobs and being pushed round by individuals who don’t know any higher than they do? Why do hunters, craving independence by not coming collectively amongst their very own, search out contracts and fealty with bosses that can solely get them killed (even when, in Boba and Fennec’s case, they each bought higher?). “You can only get so far, without a tribe,” Boba warns his new companion, giving The Book of Boba Fett a solution to its most lingering query: Boba desires to be much less of against the law lord, and one thing extra akin to Star Wars’ thought of a labor advocate. There’s energy in numbers, even for former bounty hunters.

Back within the current—hilariously framed by Boba getting out of his bacta tank and being instructed that he’s fully healed now, as if what it actually took to get better from the sarlacc was being dipped in Backstory Juice till he was all full up—Boba appears to be taking his dialogue with Fennec to coronary heart. He instantly reaches out to Black Krrsantan after letting the wookiee go final week, hoping to place apart their “so you were hired by the Hutts to kill me” grudge and work collectively. He arranges a dinner with the opposite native crime lords in an try to unite their strengths towards the Pykes. He’s extra reasonably profitable with the primary—Boba’s pitch for particular person hunters discovering loyalty and neighborhood with one another works a lot better than the one the place he has to persuade criminals already efficiently profiting off the previous methods supplied by the Pyke’s resurgence.

But it’s fascinating that Boba’s intimidation can solely get him to this point. All he can do to persuade the opposite lords is to at the very least—or at the very least he hopes—keep out of his strategy to cope with the Pykes, and stay impartial slightly than turning towards him. It goes to indicate that, for all its claims coming into the sequence that this was a present about Boba Fett turning into a hardened prison empire mastermind, he’s nonetheless distinctly uncomfortable within the function. Boba might repeatedly inform us he’s achieved being a lone operator, taking jobs for idiots caught within the previous methods, however to this point within the present it’s the sector he’s proved handiest: He bought his vengeance for the Tuskens that means, he made an ally of Fennec and now maybe Krrsantan that means. He bought his ship again that means!

Perhaps, although, there’s one thing liberating in Boba deciding that’s now not the way in which he desires to get issues achieved, even when it’s labored for him previously. There’s no extra room for The Book of Boba Fett to deal with previous grudges or reflections now. Its backstory is about as crammed out as it may be, and even when the explanations it discovered to place the reborn Boba as a crime-lord-come-freelance-activist aren’t solely convincing, they’re cause sufficient to set an fascinating distinction between the previous bounty hunter and his would-be foes. Can Boba’s hope for hunters to return collectively in their very own pursuits overcome the previous methods of the Pykes? Can he discover therapeutic and objective in having a easy foe to face, over navigating the messy politics of Jabba’s previous world? Does that acquainted pressure of Mandalorian music on the climax trace at a possible crew up? Can, as Fennec deadpans on the finish of the episode, money really be exchanged for goods and services?

We’ll discover out subsequent week. If solely as a result of, hopefully, The Book of Boba Fett has nowhere else to go at this level.

Wondering the place our RSS feed went? You can choose the brand new up one right here.