Top 10 Things You Missed in The Mandalorian Season 3 Episode 4

At this rate, Grogu might be the first of Yoda’s species to become a Mandalorian. In fact, there’s one moment that connects him further with the Mandalorian. As the Armorer forges new pieces for Grogu, the stimuli harkens him back to his experiences from Order 66. This isn’t the first time the forge has conjured up some traumatic memories, as Mando goes through something similar in Season 1 Episode 3. As the Armorer forges his new beskar plating, Mando travels back to his own childhood to when his own people were decimated. Sheesh, at this point, the Armorer’s forging sessions should come with an in-house therapist.

However much Grogu becomes a Mandalorian, he’ll always have a little Jedi in him, as evidenced by this scene. During training, Grogu is pitted against the newest Mandalorian Ragnar in a darts match. While Ragnar seems to have the advantage, Grogu goes all Yoda on him and does a couple impressive flips. Afterwards, Bo-Katan asks who taught him that, to which Mando can’t take credit. As you’ll recall, Luke helps Grogu get off his feet with a training remote in “The Book of Boba Fett.” While Grogu’s gotten a lot better since, it’s clear he still learned a lot from his brief Jedi master. Maybe Mando should go back to Peli and finally answer her question.

While we see a lot of unidentified Jedi during Grogu’s flashback to Order 66, only one gets his time to shine: Kelleran Beq. As Kelleran got Grogu to safety, we realized he was familiar in more ways than one. While we’ll be getting into who played him a little later, let us first focus on the character. Surprisingly, younger audiences may be more familiar with Kelleran than older ones, as he served as the host for the kids game show “Star Wars: Jedi Temple Challenge.” The show aired a season in 2020 on the StarWarsKids website and YouTube channel. Kelleran’s actor previously said he’d have a purple lightsaber, whereas here he has green and blue. But he kicks ass all the same.

The chase sequence on Coruscant may go by fast and furious, but that can’t stop us from finding easter eggs. At one point, Kelleran uses a train tunnel to escape persecution, which immediately had us harkening back to “Attack of the Clones.” There, Anakin and Obi-Wan chase the bounty hunter Zam Wesell after she tries to assassinate Padmé. Wesell at one point also takes a detour through a tunnel, which is admittedly much wider and used for general traffic, but you can see the comparisons. Back in the episode, Kelleran and Grogu resurface right in front of the peak of Umate, which we of course got a better look at just a week ago. We’re starting to wonder if this peak is gonna be important…

Despite the flashback taking place on Coruscant, there were more than a few Naboo influences to be found. Specifically, when Kelleran and Grogu dock, they’re greeted by members of the Royal Naboo Security Forces, with uniforms straight out of “The Phantom Menace.” As if we needed more of an indication, they let Kelleran escape on their Nubian yacht, whose silver coating is unmistakable. The same type of aircraft can also be seen in “Attack of the Clones” being operated by Padmé. We’re not sure if these Nabooians have any connection to Padmé, but we know where she’s taking her own skiff around this time.

After Bo-Katan tracks the raptor that snatched Ragnar to a large peak, the Mandalorians discuss a game plan, with Bo-Katan name dropping a new location. While we haven’t seen Kyrimorut yet, just know that it’s a stronghold on Mandalore that had long sheltered defectors. It’s where clone troopers would escape the Empire - not to mention the preceding Republic - in addition to any surviving Jedi. It’s heretofore only been featured in novels written by Karen Traviss, but maybe Bo-Katan would like to give us a tour. In any case, her mentioning the peaks during the planning meeting at least made us think of Luke discussing womp rats in “A New Hope.”

Immediately after Bo-Katan’s reference to Kyrimorut, the Armorer gives Paz Vizsla and the Shriek-hawk training team an assignment. While we haven’t seen an actual shriek-hawk before - and no, it’s not the technical name for the raptor that drives the plot - but it does make sense why the team would be named after it. Namely, the shriek-hawk is the emblem for Clan Vizsla, going all the way back to “The Clone Wars” TV series. Since Vizslas were instrumental in forming the Death Watch, a violent splinter group, it makes sense that the latter would also adopt the image. Meanwhile, the Children of the Watch are an offshoot of Death Watch, so it all comes full shriek-hawk.

After the Mandalorians’ trench run pursuit of the raptor runs out of steam, Bo-Katan whizzes by in her ship. The subsequent shot of both the ship and the raptor against the backdrop of the sun will look familiar to both “Star Wars” fans and cinephiles as a whole. On the “Star Wars” side of things, this kind of image was previously used in “The Force Awakens” as TIE fighters approached Maz Kanata’s castle. Still, even this was a reference, as back in 2015 people were likening it to shots of helicopters from “Apocalypse Now.” It’s a beautiful shot that’s bound to be emulated in media forever, and we’re certainly not ones to complain.

While “The Book of Boba Fett” proved largely underwhelming for most fans, Temuera Morrison’s portrayal of the character has been a welcome addition. We haven’t seen the Daimyo of Mos Espa since then, but Morrison did return here as the voice of the Clone Troopers seen in Grogu’s Order 66 flashback. This makes sense, seeing as Jango Fett’s genetic code was used to create the clones. It seems Disney is committed to having Morrison continue to play the clones in live-action after popping up as a washed-out one in the “Obi-Wan Kenobi” series. Of course, Dee Bradley Baker is still voicing the clones on the animated side of things, but this is a nice nod to the OG.

The biggest easter egg of this episode was hidden in plain sight, and most viewers probably didn’t realize. The aforementioned Kelleran Beq is played by none other than Ahmed Best. That name sound familiar? Well how about the “Star Wars” character Best played previously, Jar Jar Binks? That’s right, the guy behind Naboo’s most famous Gungan and this new Jedi are one in the same. Over the years, Best has been pretty vocal about how the fan backlash to Jar Jar negatively impacted his life. So we couldn’t be more pleased to see him in the flesh here in all his “Star Wars” glory. And who knows, maybe we’ll get another flashback showing us what Grogu and Kelleran did next.