SPOILERS: The Mandalorian Season 2 Discussion

[MisterPenguin]

So, 2 things come to mind for me. 1, Kennedy was just wrong about season 3. Makes her look terrible, but its very possible (especially considering it sounds like the same production crew for both). The other (which is not mutually exclusive from 1) is that they never really did believe there was such a thing as star wars fatigue, and they finally see the chance to really ramp up the product line.

And Avatar 3 2 comes out at Christmas.

Disney plans to own Christmas!!

 

[Tony the Tigger]

And Avatar 3 comes out at Christmas.

Disney plans to own Christmas!!

Did I miss Avatar 2 already?

 

[erasure fan1]

is that they never really did believe there was such a thing as star wars fatigue, and they finally see the chance to really ramp up the product line.

There wasn't/isn't star wars fatigue. That was an excuse they put out there because they weren't going to say, we're slowing down production because of our inept handling of the franchise and we don't know what we are doing. There is a difference between fatigue and people just not liking what you are doing. If there was actually star wars fatigue, the Mandalorian would not have done as well as it has.

 

[MisterPenguin]

Did I miss Avatar 2 already?

Oops. The shifting dates has me confused. I think avatar 4 should have been this year!

 

[TheDisneyDaysOfOurLives]

So, 2 things come to mind for me. 1, Kennedy was just wrong about season 3. Makes her look terrible, but its very possible (especially considering it sounds like the same production crew for both). The other (which is not mutually exclusive from 1) is that they never really did believe there was such a thing as star wars fatigue, and they finally see the chance to really ramp up the product line.

Favreau stated he asked to keep the Book of Boba Fett a secret and they honored that. So I don't think Kennedy was necessarily wrong, but not being completely open so as to keep the new series a secret. I think Book of Boba Fett will dovetail into Mandalorian Season 3. Maybe Fett will come aware of an attack coming in on Luke/Grogu with his new role.

 

[doctornick]

Whence the conclusion that "Season 3 will follow"?

Since they called tBoBF a "series", I guess we would presume it would have at least six episodes. So even if it starts the first week of December, then Season 3 of Mando, which we were told would also be in December, would be concurrent with tBoBF.

That still raises the question of "Seriously? Two Star Wars series at the same time?"

Disney+ has changed release dates around already. Witness WandaVision being announced to release in 2020 but then shifting to Jan 2021 only a few weeks later.

 

[MisterPenguin]

Disney+ has changed release dates around already. Witness WandaVision being announced to release in 2020 but then shifting to Jan 2021 only a few weeks later.

Well, it'd be interesting to see where Mando lands if he's moved up or back or remains concurrent with BoBF.

 

[LSLS]

Favreau stated he asked to keep the Book of Boba Fett a secret and they honored that. So I don't think Kennedy was necessarily wrong, but not being completely open so as to keep the new series a secret. I think Book of Boba Fett will dovetail into Mandalorian Season 3. Maybe Fett will come aware of an attack coming in on Luke/Grogu with his new role.

Which is fine. That doesn't really change my statement though. If they move season 3 because of the Fett show, why didn't she just announce the correct date for season 3 in the first place? It's not like if she said "Plan on Season 3 dropping in January 2021" people would have gone "Wait, it's not in December? Are they spoiling something?"

 

[MisterPenguin]

Which is fine. That doesn't really change my statement though. If they move season 3 because of the Fett show, why didn't she just announce the correct date for season 3 in the first place? It's not like if she said "Plan on Season 3 dropping in January 2021" people would have gone "Wait, it's not in December? Are they spoiling something?"

Indeed. We would have assumed that Ahsoka or Rangers would be premiering in December instead.

It's odd to announce both for December within a week of each other. OTOH, KK's presentation was taped ahead of time... we don't know how far ahead of time. So, putting BoBF into December could have been a decision made after taping.

Then again, even pre-pandemic, Disney withheld dates for their top tier content on D+ that they're producing. With theaters, they need to claim dates well ahead of time. With their own streamer, they seem to feel they can be loosey-goosey with dates.

 

[Disney Analyst]

Has anyone found a reason why they have made such short episodes? It’s the one thing that makes my partner super angry haha. “Cheap Disney” he says.

 

[NateD1226]

Here is the full interview from GMA. Some cool things he stated:

• Dave Filoni is in the middle of writing the Ahsoka show
• BOBF was intentionally not announced at Investor Day to surprise fans at the end of Mando
• Favreau was worried that the Luke cameo would leak just like all the other casting had
• The Mando team even says Baby Yoda instead of Grogu or The Child
• And like discussed earlier, BOBF is separate and filming right now

 

[MisterPenguin]

Has anyone found a reason why they have made such short episodes? It’s the one thing that makes my partner super angry haha. “Cheap Disney” he says.

Personally, I find the short episodes refreshing in that there's no padding.

I watch almost nothing live, and I now have an automatic reflex to hit fast forward when a character enters an empty building to look around. Ugh... two minutes of slowly wading through darkened rooms and slightly jumping at a false alarm until they finally get to whatever it is they're there for. It's not suspenseful if it happens in every single action/drama series... in almost every episode.

The Mandalorian has been refreshingly absent those moments. If there's a speeder in the dessert, I trust I'm only going to get seven seconds of it until the next scene starts. The pacing is excellent, IMO.

#stopthepadding

 

[Disney Analyst]

Personally, I find the short episodes refreshing in that there's no padding.

I watch almost nothing live, and I now have an automatic reflex to hit fast forward when a character enters an empty building to look around. Ugh... two minutes of slowly wading through darkened rooms and slightly jumping at a false alarm until they finally get to whatever it is they're there for. It's not suspenseful if it happens in every single action/drama series... in almost every episode.

The Mandalorian has been refreshingly absent those moments. If there's a speeder in the dessert, I trust I'm only going to get seven seconds of it until the next scene starts. The pacing is excellent, IMO.

#stopthepadding

Can they do what they are doing... without padding... but make it longer? Haha

 

[MisterPenguin]

Here is the full interview from GMA. Some cool things he stated:

• Dave Filoni is in the middle of writing the Ahsoka show
• BOBF was intentionally not announced at Investor Day to surprise fans at the end of Mando
• Favreau was worried that the Luke cameo would leak just like all the other casting had
• The Mando team even says Baby Yoda instead of Grogu or The Child
• And like discussed earlier, BOBF is separate and filming right now

He also seems to imply that KK's December announcement was indeed referring to BoBF and that Mando would follow it.

 

[MisterPenguin]

Can they do what they are doing... without padding... but make it longer? Haha

They can show two chapters back-to-back!!

 

[erasure fan1]

Has anyone found a reason why they have made such short episodes? It’s the one thing that makes my partner super angry haha. “Cheap Disney” he says.

The logical thing would be to keep cost down. I know the show is expensive if we believe the numbers that were given before season 1 came out. I will say I was a bit shocked season 2 didn't add a couple episodes or at least average 40min without intros and credits. Especially since it was a hit from the first episode and baby yoda.

 

[Giss Neric]

Has anyone found a reason why they have made such short episodes? It’s the one thing that makes my partner super angry haha. “Cheap Disney” he says.

I think, as we can obviously tell, the budget for these episodes are more like movie budget than TV budget even though it is for TV. So I guess to compensate for that, they shortened the episodes. I really like it short cause it goes straight to the point most of the time.

 

[TeddyinMO]

I think, as we can obviously tell, the budget for these episodes are more like movie budget than TV budget even though it is for TV. So I guess to compensate for that, they shortened the episodes. I really like it short cause it goes straight to the point most of the time.

Or it’s just they take as long as they need to tell each story. As the show is as close to universally popular as anything this year, it seems like the episode lengths are allowing them to do that.

 

[hopemax]

Has anyone found a reason why they have made such short episodes? It’s the one thing that makes my partner super angry haha. “Cheap Disney” he says.

The average network "hour long show" is only 39-42 minutes, these days, so they probably don't think the episodes are that short. The premiere was 52 minutes, the Ahsoka episode was 45. The Tragedy was the shortest this season at 32 minutes. The average of the 8 episodes is 40 minutes.

 

[erasure fan1]

The average of the 8 episodes is 40 minute

Except the run times include the recap and intro and the end credits The intro with recap is 1.5 to 2 min and the credits are 5 minutes. So now the show is only 33 to 34 minutes on average. That is a bit short for a second season considering how successful the show is. Personally I don't want or need every episode to be an hour of content. But you had an episode that barely broke 25 minutes this season. I get the first season because they weren't sure how it would be recieved. But before filming started on season 2, it was already considered a major hit series. So I do get why it could be considered being cheap by some. And who knows, Disney might have said to Jon, hey we want 10 episodes for this season. And he came back and said we don't have enough content to do that. Maybe it comes up in the making of series that comes out on Christmas.