The Mandalorian Chapter 6 “The Prisoner” Analysis

The Mandalorian is back with a kick-ass episode, full of action and excitement; I was on the edge of my seat the entire time. We finally get to meet Bill Burr’s character and a bunch of new other ones. They get together to do a job and things don’t go quite as planned. Mando is a desperate search for some sanctuary that has landed in an old friend’s ship.

This is one of the best episodes yet, we get to see a soft side of Mando and a tough side, too. He’s an interesting character who conveys a lot of emotion from behind that mask. He’s a brilliant fighter and strategist who proves himself as one of the greatest fighters in the galaxy, like a true Mandalorian.

THE LANDING ZONE

Mando gets aboard the ship of an old friend, Ran. They used to do jobs together, but they don’t have the best relationship. He even admits the only reason he allowed Mando onboard is that he can use him for the Razorcrest. They need to get a member of their team back who got picked up by the New Republic police. Mando’s not so eager to get back out there and do a job for him but money is money and he’s got to pay to bills, he’s a single father now, it gets expensive.

The team is a bunch of degenerates who are good at what they do. Some of the best mercenaries in the galaxy. The team consists of: Xi’an, the Twi’lek; Mayfeld, Burr’s character, who is an ex-scout trooper; Burg is the fellow with the horns who looks like a smaller version of Hellboy, the muscle of the group, he’s a mean guy; the droids name is Zero, unfortunately for Mando, he’ll have to work with a droid on this one.

Zero checks out the ship and what it’ll be handling for the job. We see it fiddling in the cockpit being able to pull up only some of Karga’s message to bring back the child. It’s snooping around, probably smart of Mando not to trust droids. After running some analysis they’re off to complete the job.

Mando is weary the entire time he’s there. You can tell he doesn’t fully trust these guys and he’s smart to do so. He’s a loner in the galaxy and it seems to have worked that way for him and he’s keen to keep it that way. Mando knows he must trust some people now and again, so here he is.

OFF THEY GO

The team is off in space and you can see how Mando doesn’t trust Zero at all. It has to assure him that it can handle flying, after all, it’s what it is programmed to do. His interactions with the team show how much he doesn’t trust them, he’s uneasy and hesitant. He finds Burg snooping through his stuff and shows off some of his fighting skills, being able to throw around such a strong character.

The band of misfits tries to get Mando to take his mask off and of course, he doesn’t. That wouldn’t be the way. Instead, he fights off Burg again and shows everyone why the Mandalorians are the most famous warriors in the galaxy. This is where he finds the child, who immediately catches everyone’s attention. They don’t know what the hell it is and they are intrigued. Mayfeld picks him up, but before things can get too crazy they hop out of lightspeed and need to get the job done.

The Razorcrest can stay out of the censors because its such an old ship. It should have been impounded by the Empire, but he somehow managed to keep it out of their hands.

INTO THE SHIP

They’re on the ship and this is where things begin to get wild. We get to see a lot of Mando’s personality in this episode. He’s an emotional person behind that mask and all the killing, plus he hates droids. They get in and as they walk through, they encounter their first scuffle. They get pinned in an open area by a couple of security droids and don’t know what to do. Mando to the rescue. He comes sliding in taking out a droid and then the rest. He uses a bunch of his gadgets as help and goes HAM on them. You can just feel the hatred he has for these droids. If he was force sensitive, he’d for sure be tempted by the dark side every time he sees a droid.

Everyone doesn’t want to seem impressed, but they are. They’re jealous of Mando and his skills. Anyone would be. After he takes out those droids they’re off to the control room to find the cell of the prisoner they need. This is where we get to see Mando’s soft side. He has an appreciation for life, a trait that is surprising to see because he pretty much kills people for a living.

He tries to fight for the life of the Republic worker. He’s innocent in the whole thing and Mando realizes this, he knows he doesn’t deserve to die for their job. Mando goes as far as getting into a standoff with the misfits for this guy’s life. *Sidenote, the actor who plays this Republic guard is the man who voiced Anakin Skywalker in The Clone Wars.* As he sticks up for this guys life, we see more than what we do with The Child, of course, he wants to stick up for this baby, I would jump in front of a blaster for him, but to stick up for this random guard is a huge act of kindness. Extremely shocking, but well received.

This guard is holding a distress beacon that will let the Republic know he’s in trouble. If he hits it he they’re all doomed. Xi’an just throws a dart and takes the poor guy out, unfortunately when he falls he hits it and the timer begins. As they run out in a rush to find their friend, Mando stops and looks at the dead guard, although we can’t see his face, we can feel his emotion for this guy.

THE PRISONER

They finally get to who they need, Qin. Mando left him behind on a mission and that’s how he got locked up. Ironic that he’s coming back to save him, right? They think so, too and it was all a trap *Cue Admiral Ackbar*. The first thing that popped into my head was, wait, what about the child? These strangers are going to be on his ship with the child and they know about him. This can’t be good. Plus that snooping droid found a message that exposes exactly what the child is.

Mando uses a droid’s arm that he got after killing it, from inside his cell, to get out of his cell. This is when things get exciting. He’s on the loose, he wants revenge on the misfits who threw him in a cell to rot. Plus, he needs to get back to the child ASAP. Zero is onto something and I don’t have a good feeling about this.

It’s a ship of horror with Mando on the search for the misfits. He kills the lights and this makes everything interesting. He’s cut off communication so they’re on their own here. An intense fight with Burg, Mando comes out victorious with another clever use of the door, times two. The first one looked like the shot from Return of the Jedi when Luke finally killed the Rancor, except this monster came back up with the door. So fire can’t burn him and doors can’t smash him? What’s Mando to do? Door – pt. II. He smashes Burg as the Ewoks did to the AT-ST.

Now he’s got to find the others and get back to his ship. He locks the rest up, unsurprisingly, considering he is the most superior fighter in the galaxy. When he came to Mayfeld I jumped out of my seat. It was something out of a horror film. The way he can move so swiftly is a testament to how talented of a fighter he truly is. The entire setting of Mando coming for the misfits was incredible. It had ominous vibes that kept our Jawa clan so into it we couldn’t breathe. He was able to get himself out of this pinch.

DELIVERY

Living up to his great reputation he delivers the Qin to Ran. He gets paid handsomely and he’s off. Easy right? It’ll never be easy for Mando. Ran already plotted to kill him after the job was done and Qin was more than willing to do it. We saw this coming and so did Mando. He didn’t trust them from the beginning.

Remember when Mando looked at that innocent soldier’s body? He picked up the tracking beacon and planted it on Qin. He’s plenty of steps ahead of Ran. As Mando leaves a few X-Wings to come in to clean up the scum of the galaxy. They blow Ran’s place to oblivion and Mando gets away smoothly. He didn’t have to do any of the dirty work there. *The X-wing pilots were directors, Filoni, Chow, and Famuyiwa.* A cute moment with Baby Yoda and we’re left wondering what will come next week. Will we see who walked up to Shan’s half-dead body? Will we see the misfits break out of jail?

I HAVE SPOKEN

This was one of the best episodes yet. They have outdone themselves this time. The action and suspense was incredible. I did not expect an episode like this. The shots of space were amazing and the music was, too. Everything for this episode worked so perfectly.

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