The Book of Boba Fett, episode 1, review: intergalactic damp squib aimed squarely at fanboys
Disney had been rather coy about the plot of The Book of Boba Fett, the latest Star Wars spin-off to crash-land on the House of Mouse’s streaming service Disney+. But perhaps that vagueness had less to do with the studio’s well-established obsession with secrecy than with the fact not even the makers of this series seem to have a clear idea why it needs to exist. Aside, that is, from the obvious, very lucrative imperative to feed fan-hunger for nostalgia-heavy reboots of characters they fell in love with as children.
Boba Fett, if you remember, was the monosyllabic bounty hunter from The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi. Back in the Eighties, he was renowned for his minimal conversation skills and buttoned-down fashion sense. He did little beyond wear a natty face-guard, stand to one side of Darth Vader and courier Han Solo’s frozen remains to Jabba the Hutt. Imagine Clint Eastwood’s The Man With No Name concealed within a weaponised tuna can.
But, having been resurrected in The Mandalorian, Fett has now been given his own seven-part drama, his zero-gravity boots once again filled by Temuera Morrison. The New Zealand actor popped up previously as Fett in The Mandalorian and portrayed Fett's father, Jango, in 2002’s Attack of the Clones, which achieved the remarkable feat of being by far the worst of George Lucas’s terrible prequel films.
What’s it all about, Boba? That answer is unfortunately not forthcoming in a underwhelming, terse – and, at under 40 minutes, criminally fleeting – opening instalment. It carries on where season two of The Mandalorian left off, with Fett back on the desert planet Tatooine. He has taken over the criminal empire that once belonged to Jabba, the man-slug who is long dead and, worse, has been cancelled after dressing Princess Leia up as a slave girl in Return of the Jedi.
Fett is lord of all his surveys. Sadly all he currently surveys is a crumbling palace and a few acres of sand. To establish his bona fides, the new warlord will need to bring local rivals to heel. Yet neither writer Jon Favreau nor director Robert Rodriguez are particularly captivated by the criminal capers of Fett and his sidekick, Fennec Shand (Agent of Shield’s Ming-Na Wen).
They are more interested in the character’s origin tale. And yet this surely verges on overkill, as we’ve already encountered a pre-teen Fett in Attack of the Clones and were brought up to speed with his subsequent excursions in The Mandalorian.
But no, apparently there’s no such thing as too much Boba backstory. And so it’s back down the timeline to the immediate aftermath of Return of the Jedi. In that film, Fett had seemingly been bumped off when he was fed to the Sarlacc, a ravenous space-worm who just sits in the one spot stuffing its face (Disney+ subscribers who haven’t shifted from the couch since Christmas Eve will empathise).
Return of the Jedi was unambiguous about dooming Fett to spend the rest of eternity travelling through the Sarlacc’s many stomachs. The Book of Boba reveals he in fact clambered free not long after Luke Skywalker and pals cleared off – only to be kidnapped by Tatooine’s native tribe, the Tusken Raiders. There is also a cameo by Flashdance’s Jennifer Beals but, with almost every character concealed beneath layers of latex, spotting her amounts to an intergalactic game of Where’s Wally?
Episode one of The Mandalorian concluded with the reveal of Baby Yoda – a twist that resonated across geekdom. The Book of Boba Fett is, by contrast, more of the same: more Tatooine, more battle-scarred helmets, more shameless attempts to capitalise on Star Wars fans’ desire for storytelling that recaptures the magic of Lucas’s original trilogy. Of course, that was a long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away. And, after a shoulder-shrug of an opening chapter, there are genuine grounds for worrying that Boba Fett’s adventures in the desert will turn out to have been built on sand.
