Entertainment
Baby Yoda

A 'Mandalorian' Spinoff Series Could Happen, Because We Need More Baby Yoda

by Ani Bundel
Lucasfilm

When Disney+ launched in November of 2019, it did so on the strength of nearly a dozen original series. But one stood above the rest: Lucasfilm's The Mandalorian. Not only for Star Wars' first live-action TV series a hit, but it also contained a character who spawned a thousand memes, Baby Yoda. By the time The Mandalorian finale rolled around by year's end, Disney+ had 26.5 subscribers. A second season was a given, with numbers like that. But it turns out a Mandalorian spinoff series could happen, too.

Fans already knew The Mandalorian was greenlit for a second run of episodes even before the streaming service launched. Filming is currently underway, and the production is on track to have a new season slightly earlier than anticipated. Despite most fans assuming The Mandalorian Season 2 would arrive in November, a year after the first season, it turns out it will come sooner than that, in October of 2020. Moreover, though the series hasn't been given an official nod for Season 3, The Hollywood Reporter states the show "will run beyond season two."

But if that wasn't enough to satisfy fans of Baby Yoda and his Mando, Disney CEO Bob Iger revealed the streaming service is considering doing a spinoff series as well.

But which characters would be granted a series in the Star Wars universe? Iger didn't say. But his statement suggested there were multiple ways a spinoff series could go, "including the possibility of infusing it with more characters and taking those characters in their own direction in terms of series."

Of course, the first character that springs to mind is Baby Yoda himself, who had 50 years of adventures before Mando and will almost certainly have centuries of them after. But that's the tip of the iceberg.

The Mandalorian is structured in a way that's given the show ample opportunities to introduce guest star actors playing famous Star Wars characters from the novels and comic books in one-and-done episodes. Actress Ming-Na Wen, for instance, appeared as the assassin Fennec Shand, a Hutt mercenary.

Though her time on the show was brief, Wen is the sort of actress Disney+ would love to structure a show around. (She's already a multi-time Disney franchises player, starring in the original Mulan, and co-starring in Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.) And Shand is the sort of character built for a Star Wars spinoff.

And Ming-Na Wen isn't the only one. Natalia Tena, from Game of Thrones and Harry Potter, could anchor a spinoff as her Twi'lek character, Xi'an. And fans have a lot of questions about Emily Swallow's "the Armorer," who has far more experience than she lets on.

But until a Mandalorian spinoff is officially announced, fans will have to wait. The Mandalorian Season 2 arrives in October of 2020.