Star Wars: Compare and contrast: Phasma vs. Fett

Photo credit: Star Wars Resistance/Disney, Image acquired from Lucasfilm

Boba goes down pretty ingloriously, indeed one might even label his death as comedic. About to make his first on-screen kill, he instead gets his own equipment used against him by a blind guy.

I recall sitting in the theater in 1983 a little dumbfounded that having just seen the Mandalorian-clad warrior engage his jet pack for the first time, we almost immediately see him careening out of control across the sky with arms and legs flailing. As he issues an almost Wilhelm-ian couple of screams, he impacts the side of Jabba’s barge like a mynock on a canopy. He rolls into the coarse and ubiquitous Tatooine sand below, and is consumed by a belching Sarlacc. Gah. That’s ugly.

Phasma puts up more of a fight. After the Holdo Maneuver cripples the mega destroyer The Supremacy, flames erupt in the hanger where she was about to order the beheading of Finn and Rose. She takes on her former soldier, armor deflecting blaster bolts, and seemingly bests him in combat. The shifting deck turns the tide against her though, and hissing a memorable final line against Finn (and setting up a heroic retort) she then falls into the flames below to…

Wait a minute, we don’t see a body. We don’t see EITHER of their bodies. Are? They? Dead? The old Expanded Universe had no qualms saying Fett fought his way out of the Sarlacc’s maw. Even George Lucas seems to support the idea Fett survived.

And Phasma? We just saw her armor protect her from directed energy bolts moments before; surely a little fire isn’t going to finish someone with her survival instincts.

After all, there’s still a whole TV series about Mandalorians set post Episode VI coming up this year, and in December 2019 Episode IX could offer a platform for a villainous surprise.

Advantage: Both are disqualified due to eligibility for return. (We hope.)