StarWars.com creates all content from the Star Wars Universe for fans to view, ranging from important news to entertainment posts. From a Certain Point of View is a blog series on the website that offers fans an entertaining collection of different viewpoints in a point-counterpoint post which covers all the biggest, and most fun, Star Wars issues. The discussion for this round of points and counterpoints relates to the first season of The Mandalorian. The article takes the points from Associate Editor Kristin Baver and Lucasfilm’s senior content strategist of online, writer, and editor of StarWars.com, Dan Brooks. Kristin Baver enjoyed the episode “The Reckoning” for its set-up for the finale, while Dan Brooks personally enjoyed the episode “The Prisoner” for his belief that it was the series’ best strength and most original episode of the series. Both writers have differing opinions and what the episodes mean to them. For Kristin Baver “The Reckoning,” it sets up the episode for that it strategically inches some final pieces into place to give the ending its proper punch (StarWars.com, 2020).

Kristin Baver believes that the episode is the kind of story that Star Wars was meant to tell. Her thoughts are that there is a ragtag group of people fighting for their own reasons but towards a common goal. Each character has a well-drawn development that progresses through to “The Reckoning;” until before the last episode. For the ending, Kristin Baver states that “The intensity director Deborah Chow captures in Kuiil’s desperate blurrg ride is delicately balanced with the stillness of the final moment, an eerily quiet scene that unfolds bit by bit, the viewer’s creeping dread growing into a painful realization (StarWars.com, 2020).” However, Dan Brooks has a counterpoint on why “The Prisoner” has a much deeper meaning to the show itself.

Dan Brooks believes that “The Prisoner” is the one episode that instills originality and comes off as memorable and fresh. He states that the show is clearly rooted into a western theme and feels like a 70’s or 80’s T.V. classic of a one-and-done adventure. He states the episode he chose is an example of such, as well as “a refreshingly simple plot and, within that, “The Prisoner” is filled with rich character moments and twists and turns (StarWars.com).” He explains that the story always puts the viewer on their heels with the plot and the characters. He explains that the best part of the story is how it turns from hunted to hunter. The way that each of the characters are dealt with becomes a very interesting play into the characters’ weaknesses. Brooks expands on the episode saying that “It’s a smaller, more intimate episode that shows how you can tell a different kind of story with Star Wars, while still rooted in the galaxy we know and moving the overall series forward (StarWars.com, 2020).”

Each episode has its individuality while keeping its overlaying plot, but some are deeper than others. The show brings in a new type of storytelling but keeps a lot of the same influential pieces of the Star Wars universe. This point and counter-point blog post creates a fun argument of what the show really entails and how deep the connection of character and plot development are. Each episode has its own plot but remains a part of the whole narrative which gives the show its own original place in the whole of the Star Wars universe.