The Mandalorian - Season 2 Ep 4: The Siege
disney+The Mandalorian Chapter 12: The Siege, disappointingly, is a regression of the show in nearly every sense. Serving as Carl Weathers' directorial debut with the series, Chapter 12: The Siege brings The Mandalorian (Pedro Pascal) and The Child back to Nevarro, reuniting him with Greef (Carl Weathers) and Cara (Gina Carano) from the first season. As his ship gets repaired, he assists them in blowing up a local imperial base, but once the group arrives, it becomes clear to them that there is more happening at the base than they originally expected.
The choice to return to Nevarro at this stage in the show is a confusing one. Coming off of one of the stronger multi-episode arcs the show has seen up to this point, it seemed like the series was moving on to a bright new direction with a clear path towards the future. To immediately follow this momentum up with an ultimately meaningless side adventure is incredibly disappointing. It is this mindset when it comes to direction that sucks the life out of episodic shows. The most confusing aspect of this is the decision to order this episode so early on in the season. The main way this episode would have stuck out in a positive sense is the sense of nostalgia that is meant to be felt from seeing these characters reconnect. The issue here is that it has only been a handful of episodes since they said goodbye in the first place. There really is no impact seeing the group back together at this point and, if anything, it hurts the potential for this reunion in the future.
The justification of this reunion comes at the end of the episode that, without giving away spoilers, features a set up for future conflict that ultimately also just feels clearly more boring than the show wants it to. Already, the season has set up intriguing new conflicts for these characters to face off with and it feels like the narrative has simply moved on from this conflict from the past. Again, if there was more distance it could be legitimately exciting but as is, this reveal and setup simply feels like an unwanted story being dragged on from the first season. Season 2 of The Mandalorian has done quite a fantastic job setting up a new and focused story and these elements feel like the show getting sidetracked more than anything else.
If there was one major positive from this episode it would be the direction from Carl Weathers in the director's chair. Whilst the story and plot might be all around uninteresting, Weathers showed a clear understanding of these characters and what makes their dynamics work, which helps ground the episode and gives him a core to hold onto as he ambitiously jumps into directing an action-packed piece of the Star Wars universe. While, at the same time, there might be a lack of anything super impressive here, plenty of other directors with much more experience would have failed where Weathers shows at least competence.
Chapter 12: The Siege clearly stands as the most frustrating episode so far in the season. Though it is hard to say that the episode was outright terrible, it simply resorted back to the safe and uninspired ideas of how to continue the story that doesn't push the narrative in any intriguing way. Hopefully the season moves on from here, but ultimately this stands as a clear mishap in direction for the season.
