The Mandalorian Vs. Boba Fett, Round 2: Party Edition
The second episode of the new Disney+ Star Wars series "The Book of Boba Fett" has now premiered, giving us a little more of a window into the journey of the famous bounty hunter-turned-warlord. This week, good ol' Boba takes a hot five minutes to deal with the repercussions of almost getting murdered on Tatooine before we're thrown into the past for the rest of the episode. From a plot standpoint, maybe that's disappointing (or maybe it's what you're looking for) ... but from a party standpoint, it's exactly the episode we needed.
Last week, I took an initial look at comparing Boba Fett and Din Djarin (AKA Mando) to see who is really the better bounty hunter in the first entry of a weekly series. We'll be adding new weekly comparisons after each episode of the Boba Fett show, and this week has given us a deeper look into Fett's embrace of the high-fashion party culture of the deserts of Tatooine. Here's Round 2 of our weekly The Mandalorian vs. Boba Fett battle, and this time it's a Party Edition! Cue the Space EDM.
Mando Keeps the Shiniest Armor in the Galaxy
I get it, I get it: The life of a bounty hunter means you're always under threat. On an average day, you're shot at, attacked by a monster, or suffer a ship crash on the regular ... it comes with the territory. That means every day, your armor's getting smacked around, impaled, shot, stabbed, slashed, crushed, burned, acid-scarred, monster-eaten, or worse. What's a bounty hunter to do? Boba Fett's armor, passed down from his father Jango Fett, is typically an absolute mess. In the original trilogy, it was scratched, pierced, and weathered, and that's before it was momentarily digested by a Sarlacc. It's pretty obvious that armor care isn't Boba Fett's thing, and "The Book of Boba Fett" shows that he took a long time hanging out with the Tatooine locals without even caring about his armor. Fett gains his freedom among the Tuskens and just sort of hangs out instead of pursuing it, too embroiled in their drug-addled party culture to care. While he later recovered and repainted it after his encounter with Mando in "The Mandalorian," it's fair to attribute that repainting to the peer pressure of hanging around with someone who has the best armor in the biz. This is why we can't have nice space things.
By contrast, Mando's armor is a point of pride. As early as his second episode, he gets absolutely regulated by an angry Mudhorn and it completely dismantles his armor. As soon as he gets enough Beskar, however, he gets a shiny new set that he continually adds to, keeps up, and otherwise improves. And it is shiny, probably the most chrometastic armor in the galaxy. Trash his armor? He'll get the best armor in the galaxy to show you up. While Boba Fett seems entirely blasé about his own armor, Mando loves his so much he won't even remove his helmet. A spaceman's armor is his castle, and Mando keeps his in tip-top, shiny shape. Point: Mando.
Boba Fett as an Under the Tusken Sun Fashionista
You can't deny Boba Fett's lack of concern over his missing armor in the first two episodes of "The Book of Boba Fett," but you also can't deny that he's far more of an overall fashionista than Mando. Mando loves his armor, sure, but his hesitancy to take the armor off means his travels around the galaxy never involve a mid-90's rom-com clothing montage. He never samples the local wares and has yet to be visibly concerned with the galaxy's best fashion, and Mando rarely sticks around one planet long enough to embrace the local fashions.
Boba Fett, by contrast, is extremely fashionable. We start his series' second episode with a brief acknowledgment that he was nearly killed before quickly moving to his "Under The Tusken Sun" path of self-discovery. If it wasn't clear before why a supposedly fearsome bounty hunter would be so cool with a group that captured him, it is now: He wanted their spiffy duds. He helps them take down a train so he can get further in their good space graces. Boba Fett risks his life and ignores all the train's treasure so the Tusken Raiders can get him high on a Dream Lizard. In his drugged out party state, he fetches a large stick, after which they give him a stunning set of new Tusken robes. He forges a pretty cool gaffi stick out of that branch he found, and even goes to a lovely Burning Man-style desert rave with the gang, showing off his new outfit in all its Tatooine high-fashion splendor. Fashion-wise, Boba Fett is so 9 ABY throughout the series, so he gets the point this round.
Boba Fett Goes Bounty Hunter S. Thompson with the Space Drugs
As we've established before, Mando is a great single space dad. He's steadfast, responsible, to the point, and all about providing for his lil' green guy (for whom he always finds a babysitter). He clearly comes to love the little egg eater, but one sad side effect of all that responsibility is that he never really puts himself out there. He doesn't date, doesn't get nights out on the town with the raiders ... his personal calendar is pretty dull. Most important for our discussion, however, is that he absolutely does not share Boba Fett's commitment to the Gospel of Andrew W.K. — namely, "when it's time to party, we will party hard."
Boba Fett, however, is all about that party life. As we see in the second episode of "The Book of Boba Fett," he is looking to prove himself as a cool kid and steals some bikes for his new Tusken friends. In the process, he starts a big 'ol barfight, but before he leaves he grabs and downs a drink. That's a killer 007 move, and it just comes naturally to him (he's definitely never even seen a Bond film). Fett helps the Tusken Raiders steal a train and, as we discussed, he's rewarded by getting high as balls by snorting a Dream Lizard, where he has a hallucinogenic Lizard-snorting dream (or LSD, as they undoubtedly call it) before coming back with that neato branch he found. It's very Bounty Hunter S. Thompson of him, and everyone's so glad he survived and found a sweet stick that they all give him fancy clothes and party hard, which he's clearly into. No offense to Mando the Square, but it's clear Boba Fett is the life of the space desert party. Point goes to Boba Fett, who wins this round — and this week's match.