Din Djarin should never return to Mandalore

The Mandalorian Season 3 is over, and we have no idea when we’ll get the next season of the series. In the meantime, it’s normal for fans to speculate about what’s to come and discuss the latest season. At the end of Season 3, Din and Grogu left Mandalore and didn’t even stay to watch the lighting of The Great Forge. They were gone in a hurry. Maybe that’s not such a bad thing after all. The best thing for the show and its main character going forward would be if he doesn’t return to Mandalore, especially not in the near future.

While this latest season of the show was highly anticipated, its payoff wasn’t as satisfying. A lot of it has to do with there being only 8 episodes per season. By the time things became truly interesting, the season was over. Din Djarin ended up with the Darksaber only to never learn how to use it. He was told stories about Mythosaurs from Kuill and The Armorer, only to end up passing out when he was underwater with one. It’s a bewildering choice by the writers, considering that Bo-Katan could still have ended up as the leader of Mandalore, even if Din got to see the Mythosaur too. Imagine being a Mandalorian, being within a few feet of a creature thought to be extinct, and not seeing it.

Not just that, but the episodes lacked any proper development for Din as a character. After going through everything he did, it seems he went back to his old ways of keeping his helmet on. There’s no inner conflict. He doesn’t weigh the pros and cons of his decision to keep it on. Even his declaration that he will adopt Grogu only comes about because The Armorer explains the technicalities behind the child going from a foundling to an apprentice. That’s a real disservice to his character, who deserved to think about how much he loves the small guy and arrive at the conclusion that he wishes to adopt him on his own.

But we’ll blame all of the character development blunders on the writers having been totally bamboozled by the overarching plot of redeeming Bo-Katan and reuniting Mandalorians. He had the Darksaber and carried it around for years, apparently, only to never learn how to use it. Yes, we understand that he doesn’t want it, but you could easily argue that even Sabine didn’t want it, but she still took the time to learn its history and learn how to use it from two different Jedi.

However, now that the Darksaber is seemingly destroyed, and the other issues have been resolved too, it would probably be best if Din and Grogu don’t end up on Mandalore again. The appeal of these characters lies in their bond with each other, and the growth which resulted from their powerful attachment to one another. That got watered down for the most part in Season 3 when Din became a part of a much bigger plot. The fun moments of the show involving Din always came in the form of him walking in a room and leaving everyone in awe of his shiny armor and precise gunslinging abilities, but on a planet like Mandalore there are dozens of others like him, and nothing which makes him stand out anymore, apart from the child in his arms.

It’s good a good sign that the writers are holding firm to the fact that Din loves Grogu and is now officially a father, but apart from that, Jon Favreau and Dave Filoni should allow Mando to grow as a character and give him a meaning and purpose apart from parenthood, and hopefully that will not require him to revisit Mandalore.

The Mandalorian is streaming now on Disney+.