Let The Armorer and Bo-Katan Kryze fight it out in Mandalorian season 3

In Chapter 5 of The Book of Boba Fett, Din Djarin and The Armorer spend a great deal of time discussing the history of Mandalore, particularly the Darksaber’s involvement in the planet’s destruction. Though we haven’t seen Bo-Katan Kryze in this particular show yet, she did get an ominous name-drop, implying more of her story could be told in The Mandalorian Season 3.

“Bo-Katan Kryze is a cautionary tale,” The Armorer told Din, which immediately sends up a dozen red flags to anyone who knows Bo-Katan’s side of the story, or rather, what the former ruler of Mandalore has told us happened from her point of view.

Up until this episode, there was a significantly large historical gap between Star Wars: Rebels and The Mandalorian in terms of Mandalore and its people. When we left Bo-Katan, she had just received support from the various clans of Mandalore to become its official leader, raising the Darksaber over her head in a symbol of unity. By the time we saw her again in The Mandalorian Season 2, she had long since lost the Darksaber — and Mandalore — to the Empire.

Learning more about the Night of a Thousand Tears confirmed some of what we already knew — that there had been a purge of most Mandalorians and that very few of them remained in the galaxy by the time the New Republic was established.

As unreliable of a narrator as The Armorer may be, one thing is clear: the Empire attacked Mandalore with forces the people of the planet could not withstand, and the casualties changed the massacre’s survivors forever.

Bo-Katan’s exact role in the Great Purge of Mandalore is not clear. But to force blame onto her for what happened — to call her possession of the Darksaber a curse and imply she wasn’t deserving of the influence it provided her — isn’t something Bo is going to be happy about.

The Mandalorian Season 3 could force these two warriors to meet and confront their demons whether they like it or not. And if the two don’t physically fight — though, as Mandalorians, it would be quite surprising if they didn’t at least try it — maybe they’ll at least get to talk it out. The Armorer seems to blame Bo for Mandalore’s fall, but really, both are on the same side. Empire = bad. Imperials destroyed their shared homeworld, not Bo-Katan.

However, where the Darksaber fits into all of this … is probably another story.

The Book of Boba Fett is streaming now exclusively on Disney+.