The Mandalorian finally made good on this season’s dangling plot thread

During this season, many great events have taken place The Mandalorian. After our hero Din Djarin took a bath because he is dirty, filthy renegade (boo!) and rejoining the loving embrace of his fellow Mandalorian cultists, the season devoted an entire episode to exploring the bureaucratic banality of evil and the “difficult” (not That difficult) question or all are space Nazis badand hey, even everyone’s favorite big furry Lasat star pilot of star wars rebels, Garazeb “Zeb” Orrelios, appeared in the fifth episode! Everyone loves Zeb!

Another big shakeup happened at the end of this week’s episode, “Guns for Hire,” which predicts big moves for Mandalore’s future. Let’s talk about the mythosaurus in the room.

[Ed. note: This piece contains spoilers for The Mandalorian season 3, episode 6, “Guns for Hire.”]

Bo-Katan Kryze, former leader of the Nite Owls Mandalorian unit and now clearly a member of the Mandalorian religious sect the Children of the Watch, is the rightful owner of the Darksaber and leader of… all of Mandalore? Who could have seen that coming?

A laser sword backstory: In the Star Wars Extended Universe, the Darksaber is a black-bladed lightsaber created and wielded by Tarre Vizsla, the first Mandalorian ever inducted into the Jedi Order. Passed down through the generations of Vizsla’s family, the Darksaber was used to unite the warring factions of Mandalore under one banner. Whoever wields the Darksaber is considered the rightful heir to the throne of Mandalore, but to obtain the weapon one must defeat the previous user by killing them or otherwise convincing them to surrender. However, as shown in “Guns For Hire”, there seems to be a loophole in the rules of that particular urban legend.

When I wrote about Bo-Katan and the Darksaber weeks ago, I falsely stated that she took possession of the weapon in this season’s second episode, “The Mines of Mandalore.” As several commenters on that article pointed out to point out I was wrong, there was actually a short scene where Din Djarin is seen clipping the Darksaber back onto his belt after being rescued by Bo-Katan. My apologies for misleading readers into believing at the time that Bo-Katan was in possession of the legendary Mandalorian-forged lightsaber at the time.

What should I do not apologies for is that, despite my mistake, my argument was still correct! Bo-Katan became the rightful owner of the Darksaber after saving Din Djarin from that awesome, creepy Phil Tippett-ass monster. As we see at the end of this week’s episode, it seems that even Din himself seems to agree with that argument.

“While exploring Mandalore, I was captured and this knife was taken from me,” Din tells the former members of the Nite Owls on Plazir-15. “Bo-Katan saved me and killed my captor. She defeated the enemy who defeated me. Wouldn’t this knife be hers?”

Image: Lucasfilm

The Nite Owls seem to agree, with Ax Woves – their just defeated leader – verbally acknowledging the correctness of his argument. Din Djarin hands the knife to Bo-Katan, who then activates the knife before the episode reaches the credits. This episode revealed a vital piece of information obscured in “The Mines of Mandalore:” that Din himself knew that Bo-Katan had used the Darksaber to save him in the bowels of Mandalore. That means Din knew she was the rightful heir to the weapon and yet chose to carry it with her all the time. Dick move!

As Moff Gideon said in the season finale of The Mandalorian‘s second season, “The Darksaber has no power; the story does,” and when no one is around to see the story, it’s as if the story never happened. But with Din conscious enough to testify to that story, Bo-Katan’s path to claim the throne of Mandalore and unite the fractured Mandalorian tribes is now finally clear. All she has to do is return to Mandalore, tame that not-so-mythical Mythosaurus and start planning her coronation. Simple!

At the end of the day, I think we can all agree on one thing: the “rules” regarding the Darksaber are murky at best and absolute ad hoc nonsense at worst. It’s just one of those lines that adapts to the story, like Leia having memories of her mother Return of the Jedi when Revenge of the Sith shows Padmé’s death right after giving birth, or Poe Dameron’s infamous line “Somehow, Palpatine returned” from 2019 Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker.

If the third season of The Mandalorian so far has taught us all, it’s that the best and worst thing about Star Wars is that its creators – in this case executive producers Jon Favreau and Dave Filoni – don’t Real have a plan and make up this mess as they go along.