Crossing the Desert is Dangerous
Wow. Even in this era of more cinematic television, last night's new Book of Boba Fett episode was surprising--and amazing--in its scale. This is director Steph Green's first work on a Star Wars production but she's had a pretty long career directing episodes of TV series and was even nominated for an Academy Award for a short film. That's a far cry from the randos Disney so often hires for middle episodes. I suspect Robert Rodriguez made some contributions as well in capacity as executive producer because, just like the first episode, the second Book of Boba Fett chapter integrates the actors much better with the LED virtual sets than The Mandalorian ever did.
So much of it was a surprise, too. Who'd have guessed we'd be seeing Boba and the Tusken Raiders taking out a train?
It's a great action scene and watching Boba and the Tuskens leaping from exploding speeder bikes onto the train it was hard to believe this was television and not a big budget film. The choreography and effects were flawless.
The flashback story dominated the runtime of the 50 minute episode, leaving only about 15 minutes for present day. The story of Boba Fett being accepted among a tribe of relatively passive Tuskens (they may take slaves but they evidently don't raid unprovoked as often as other tribes) before becoming a very useful "guide" to them is reminiscent of a lot of other stories. Dune and A Princess of Mars most obviously come to mind but the train sequence, especially the aftermath the Tuskens pillaging the wreckage, strongly brings Lawrence of Arabia to mind.
It's what's usually called the "white saviour narrative". But since Temuera Morrison isn't white, what do we call it? The "human saviour narrative"? In any case, this puts the show quite in line with how Lucas originally wrote Star Wars, finding ways of using the kinds of plots you'd see in adventure serials of the '30s, '40s, and '50s without the awkwardness of running afoul of changing political perspectives.
Speaking of the original Star Wars, there's another nice action scene when Boba Fett puts the hurt on a biker gang making trouble at the one and only Tosche Station, that place Luke never went to pick up some power converters waste time with his friends as soon as his chores were finished. Except, in a deleted scene, he did.
Click to viewAnd Luke's old friends, Camie and Fixer, are still there, not getting off of this rock, now played by different people.
The present day stuff was good, too, however brief. I really liked the scene where Boba confronts the mayor who turns out to be shrewder than I'd have thought. He sounds quite reasonable talking to Boba and, really, you can hardly blame him for not immediately latching onto Boba's regime, not when "The Twins" are in town.
This is all great stuff but now I'm really itching to see just what the day to day operations are for the criminal organisation formerly presided over by Jabba. Okay, Boba takes protection money and tributes. So does that mean if there's a raid on Jennifer Beals' establishment, Boba will defend it or get retribution? Does he really have the resources? Does the town have an official security force? There used to be a lot of people hanging out in Jabba's palace. Is there gambling? Slave trading? Jennifer Beals clearly has some prostitutes on her payroll.
Anyway, my complaints are still really minor and have more to do with things I want to see than things the show has outright done wrong.
By the way, what I really want to see is Beals do the famous bucket of water dance to "Lapti Nek". I know Beals didn't do her own dancing in Flashdance so this could be a way to redeem herself and "Lapti Nek" at the same time.
The Book of Boba Fett is available on Disney+.