Boba holds court.
Boba Fett and Fennec Shand step into Jabba’s position in Tatooine’s underworld, but how did he survive the Sarlacc?
Original Air Date: 29 Dec 2021, Streamed on: Disney+
Surviving the Sarlacc
The episode opens with Boba Fett in a bacta tank. His dream flashes memories of Kamino, the planet of the cloners, and of picking up Jango Fett’s helmet — the helmet in which his severed head still lingered — after his death at the hands of the Jedi Knight Mace Windu.
His dream flashes into the belly of the Sarlacc, where he struggles to move. Fett locates some kind of weak membrane and punches through it before lighting up whatever is on the other side with his flamethrower. We next see Fett crawl up out of the sand — by somehow tunneling through it; trust me, don’t try that at home — where he passes out, exhausted.
Jawas find him there, and they quickly begin harvesting his beskar armor. Fett tries to stop them, but he is far too weak to put up a fight.
Sand people find him next, and they revive him, leash him, and then march him through the desert as a prisoner. When Fett finally collapses again from exhaustion, they drag him the rest of the way to their settlement.
Escaping the Sand People
He wakes to find himself tied up, just before the children of the settlement proceed to beat him until he again passes out.
When he wakes up, he finds the strength to attempt an escape, but some kind of watchdog lizard has its eyes on him. A quick tussle and Boba Fett is able to cut his ropes with the animal’s teeth. Another prisoner, a red Rodian, rats him out to the sand people, so he takes off running. The animal chases him with the sand people close behind.
When they catch up, one squares up to Boba Fett and demolishes him. He passes out… yet again.
Holding Court
Fennec Shand wakes him from the bacta tank, summoning him to hold court in what used to be Jabba the Hutt’s palace. He puts on his repaired and very clean armor, while some very dramatic music plays.
The first sign of friction comes from the mayor’s majordomo, in a play for power now that Fett lays claim to what was once Jabba’s.
He goes out to meet the people of Mos Espa and let them know that Jabba and Bib Fortuna are no longer in the picture.
The pair is attacked by six assailants carrying shields and batons. Fett’s two new (and rather tall) Gamorrean guards show up and turn the tide. Four are killed or otherwise defeated, but two retreat. Shand pursues them is a rooftop chase. She catches up to them, killing one and taking the other alive.
The Gamorrean guards rush the injured Fett back to the palace and into the bacta tank.
Back in the Tank
Fett is again dreaming. Conveniently, his dream picks up where he left off, back in the sand people settlement, tied to a stump.
A young sand person unties Fett and the Rodian and escorts them through the desert. After witnessing the raid of a moisture farm, their escort forces the two prisoners to dig for some kind of cactus gourds that are full of water.
While digging, the Rodian uncovers some kind of crazy six-armed/legged sand monster that was sleeping just beneath the surface. It wakes up angry and wastes the Rodian in short order. The fight continues until Boba Fett strangles the monster to death with his ankle chain, Leia-vs-Jabba style.
The pair triumphantly takes its head back to the settlement where they couldn’t be happier to see a severed head.
A sand person elder hands Fett a cactus gourd, and a very thirsty Boba Fett takes a drink.
What do I think?
The escape from the sarlacc left too much to the imagination. It seems like a pretty pivotal moment for the character, something that people want to see, but it felt like the show tried to work around the absence of a good idea. This is easily the most disappointing part of the episode.
The monster fits awkwardly, at least in appearance if nothing else, and until the sand people celebrated its death, I didn’t realize why they used prisoners to dig.
If you can set aside a nearly dead man marching through the desert and suffering beatings repeatedly without eating or drinking anything, you won’t find much else wrong with the episode.