The Book of Boba Fett: Some Thoughts.

If you asked me at the age of seven why I thought the taciturn bounty hunter Boba Fett was so cool, I probably couldn't come up with more than, "He's got a rocket pack!  And a flame thrower!   And his helmet doesn't look like Darth Vader or an off the assembly line stormtrooper's!"  He only had a few brief appearances in The Empire Strikes Back, but I had high hopes for the character.

In Return of the Jedi, he exhibited more of his strong but silent character.  But at last during the rescue of Han Solo, we got to see him actually use his jetpack!  I remember the audience oohing and aahing at the spectacle.  We got to see him use his whipcord!  We got to see him actually look--

Aaaaaand then we were let down by his embarrasing "death" at the hands of a blind Han Solo.  Solo whacks Boba Fett's jetpack at a sensitive point, send him flailing into the air, smashing against Jabba the Hutt's sail barge, and tumbling into the maw of a creature called the sarlaac.  For those not familiar with a sarlaac, just imagine a huge vagina dentata with tentacles.

I guess you could say it was poetic justice that Boba Fett was done in by his iconic jetpack, but some of the kids in theater -  or at least, I myself - were a little crestfallen.  Not enough to not enjoy the rest of the movie, but it was a minor blemish on an otherwise fun film.

Jump ahead from 1983 to 2002.  In the prequel episode Attack of the Clones, we are introduced to young Boba Fett (Daniel Logan) and his father, Jango Fett (his name no doubt a tribute to the Django series of spaghetti westerns, but I digress).   We got to see Jango fulfill most of the promise his son could not with his expert use of his jetpack, his back mounted missile, his whipcord, some melee blades and other bells and whistles while combatting the legendary Jedi Knight Obi-Wan Kenobi (Ewan McGregor).  As an additional treat. we got to see the Fett family's starship Slave I engage Obi-Wan in a dogfight.  Fett's starship had a few bells and whistles of her own, the most prominent being a deadly seismic charge which pulverized asteroids that obstructed Obi-Wan's path.

Jango's end was a lot more dignified than his son's in the original trilogy.  He was beheaded by the Jedi Master Mace Windu (Samuel L. Jackson).  The legacy of Jango was viscerally handed over to Boba as he cradled his father's Mandalorian helmet.

Jump ahead from 2002 to 2020.  The hit Disney Plus series The Mandalorian features a bounty hunter who wears a helmet very similar to Boba Fett's:  A shell head with a T-shaped visor.  Again, he executed the promise Boba first held by kicking ass, taking names, and protecting a wee young alien fondly known far and wide as "Baby Yoda."  I was content with The Mandalorian, having made my peace with Boba's embarrassing death some years ago.

But as a certain character would say later on in The Mandalorian, "Fate sometimes favors the wretched."  On the ancient planet of Tython, a mysterious man with a bald, scarred head dressed in a black tunic and cloak and armed with a gaffi stick (think of a long staff with a dagger at its end) confronts the Mandalorian.  He politely asks The Mandalorian - with a hint of menace - for his ancestral, battle scarred armor. 

When overrun by two platoons of stormtroopers, the mysterious man dons the familiar, iconic armor of the Fetts and does what he was not allowed to do so many years ago in 1983:  Use diverse and intricate ways of beating the shit out of anyone who stands in his path.  As an encore, he used the back mounted missile to take down two airborne Imperial troop transports.

In case you haven't figured it out, this mysterious man with mad combat skills is Boba Fett, back from the dead.

I am delighted, and somewhat embarrassed to say, that the nine year old inside of me shot to his feet and whooped with joy to see his favorite Star Wars lawful evil character make his unexpected, triumphant comeback.  He was back and he was here to stay.

At the end of the second season of The Mandalorian, I was greeted with another surprise.  An epilogue scene where Boba Fett approaches the throne of Jabba the Hutt.  Fett personally kills Jabba's usurper Bib Fortuna and takes the seat of the legendary crime lord.  A simple title card appeared.

THE BOOK OF BOBA FETT - COMING DECEMBER 2021

Needless to say, I shrieked like a little girl at a BTS show.

So, after that long preamble, let's move on to The Book of Boba Fett.

SPOILERS.

The unarmored Boba Fett (Temuera Morrison) slumbers in what is called a bacta tank (a fluid chamber that tends and heals third degree trauma).  He is troubled by flashbacks of his father's death, his torture inside the guts of the sarlaac, and his ingenious way of escaping the all consuming monster.  He is roused from his fitful sleep by Fennec Shand (Ming-na Wen) - an assassin who Fett rescued from certain death on the sands of the planet Tatooine.  Fett and Shand set about winning the favor of the warring clans that vie to fill the power vacuum left by Jabba the Hutt.   Fett exhibits some unusual naïveté when he says, "Jabba ruled by fear, I intend to rule by respect."  The loyal Shand, ever covering Fett's back, responds by saying that in unstable times, fear is an effective weapon.  No sooner does she say that when they are surrounded by a gang of well armed assassins.  Fett shows his fighting skills which are based on actor Temuera Morrison's Maori background and his facility with the taiaha.  Shand almost steals the show with a parkour battle on the rooftops of the lawless town of Mos Espa.  Injured in battle, Boba Fett retreats to his bacta tank and one again recalls the ordeal after his escape at the hands of scavenging Jawas and the ruthless desert people that are the Tuskens.

For an initial episode, I was mightily impressed.  The space spaghetti western of The Mandalorian has been replaced by organized crime for this series.  I was a little impatient to see Boba Fett make an indelible mark on the rival gangs, but the story is only beginning.  Fett has observed the strategies used by the top tier gangsters he once worked for.  However, experience is the ultimate teacher, and Fett has a lot to learn.

While he has an unsteady start as a crime boss in the present day timeline, the flashbacks show the determined survivor that gained him the reputation of an ass kicker.  Victory and respect does not come to him easy, but neither did it come to more valorous heroes like Luke Skywalker.  Boba Fett has a reputation as a formidable bounty hunter and warrior (in universe and in real life).  Now he has the opportunity to show how he earned that reputation.

Director and showrunner Robert Rodriguez and screenwriter Jon Favreau have shown they can create fantastic action sequences and underworld intrigue in previous projects (like Rodriguez' El Mariachi).  They have also shown a great understanding and respect for Star Wars lore, in contrast to the directors and writers of the latest Star Wars trilogy who didn't know which way was up.

My judgement may be clouded by being a fan of Boba Fett and Star Wars in general.  I'm also curious to find out what the casual viewer may think of The Book of Boba Fett.  I have concerns that the series may lose steam as it progresses, but I am not a soothsayer.  I'll see if fate still favors the wretched.

-  JJB 

A new episode of The Book of Boba Fett premieres every Wednesday on Disney Plus.