This might be the first actually good episode of The Mandalorian this season. Though it's still pretty deeply flawed at least it focused on these Mandalorian people doing Mandalorian things.
I winced when I saw Katy O'Brien, Imperial officer lady showing up at the beginning, fearing another Andor/Rogue One episode but she was just talking to Moff Gideon so whatever.
With that said I wasn't enthused about Moff Gideon. I don't think he's a good villain and in the far better Seasons One and Two, he never struck me as particularly competent or anything. I liked the presentation or reveal of the Shadow Council of Imperial Warlords and it's nice to know Pellaeon is still around and wasn't killed offscreen by space whales in the climax of Rebels. Disappointed however no one brought up how utterly filled with fail Moff Gideon is but it's fine, all on the same team and everything. Him being surprised that Spinach the Hutt and his band of pirates failed certainly didn't elevate my opinion of the Moff though.
I have no real complaints with the rest of the episode. I was almost annoyed that it looked like Nevarro had a problem with security when a giant Imperial Cruiser showed up and I was fearful that Karga was far too stupid to rule Nevarro after neutering its defenses almost as effective as Queen Lizzo did. But it was the Mandalorians showing up so that was averted.
IG-12 is adorable and great for kids but I found it to be eyerolling in the extreme. Grogu breaking up the two Mandalorians fighting was nice but I'm a bit worried that after like ten thousand years Mandalorians don't have a formalized form of dueling for grievances they can settle upon beyond SUBMIT OR DIE at a moments notice.
Most of my problems came towards the end of the episode. So not only did Moff Gideon get his forces seemingly wiped out at the end of Season Two to the point he could've died, and all of his Darktroopers were destroyed by Luke Skywalker, but apparently that was all just a minor setback. He is so smart he had contingencies in place not only to escape (since he apparently lucked out having infiltrated the New Republic with a POW who enmeshed herself into high levels of Republic leadership in a few weeks/months.
But also Moff Gideon had a whole different secret base on Mandalore the whole time. This base existed in complete secrecy I guess since the Fall of Mandalore and was filled with highly trained Imperial Jet Troopers or whatever they're going to be called who are almost as good as Mandalorians are in combat, and are completely covered in beskar armor, and they have a fully operational base with berths for dozens of elite troops and starfighters and everything and it was located in almost the same place as the Great Forge and despite living on the planet surface ever since the destruction the Nite Owls never had an inkling of an Imperial Presence there. I'm assuming the Imperials never encountered the Mandalorian Quaggoths or knockoff General Grievous or the giant f'ing monster that apparently lairs nearby which (as an aside) almost conveniently almost wiped out the Nite Owls entire group one day after reuniting with the Mandalorians.
Other then that, Moff Gideon has been setup as an excellent nemesis in my opinion. *coughs*
Next time Paz, just close the blast door in front of you, not behind you.
Or ya know, use your jetpack to escape
Rockets... Grenades... Thermal Detonators... Whistling Death... I dunno. That goes for everyone else as well.
Despite all of this, and a lot of it is nitpicky, pretty decent episode, especially for this season.
I think most of my issues in regards to this episode reinforce my feeling that The Mandalorian was rewritten post-Season Two. Grogu was never intended to be a major character after that S2 finale and most of this season is just filler. The Mandalorian is supposed to be what we're seeing in this episode finally, Din Djarin being a big player in helping reunite the Mandalorians but they're still tripping over themselves in trying to find appropriate adversaries and big bads.
