The Mandalorian

In the US: Fridays, Disney+
In the UK: Available on Disney+ from March

I’m not sure what’s more interesting: the fact that all the giant US media mega corporations are starting their own streaming services, most of which will inevitably end in closure in a couple of years’ time; or what shows they’re choosing to launch their networks with – and when.

Apple has recently given us Apple TV+. With the likes of See and For All Mankind, it’s a combination of extremely good-looking, under-specced, American-centric TV shows that Apple assumes will be so desirable, everyone will just want them. WarnerBros is launching HBO Max soon, but only in territories where it can’t make money more easily by simply selling the shows to existing networks. CBS and NBC are launching or have already launched streaming services in the US, with no plans of launching them anywhere else.

And now we have Disney+. That’s coming out in phases, with the US first, the rest of the world next year, with the UK getting its bite in March.

What’s on it so far? Pretty much everything that Disney has ever made – the older stuff carrying a warning that it might be culturally insensitive. It’s done that by removing pretty much everything that it’s ever made from other services, including Netflix, in case you were wondering where it had all gone to.

But in terms of new shows, it’s going to be a while before much shows up. Because mock Apple for its four new TV shows all you like, Disney+ has a glorious one new show – one for adults, anyway, and I personally would never have counted High School Musical: The Musical: The Series, simply because of the number of colons in its title.

Naturally, it’s starting with one of its existing franchises. Yes, it’s a Star Wars show.

Not a manatee

Time was when three Star Wars movies was enough. Then we had six – and wished we still only had three. Now we’re on our way to nine movies in the main storyline, the three new ones wiping most of the bad taste of the prequels away, and two others – Rogue One and Solo – just sort of sitting there, hoping you’ll watch them because they have Star Wars in the title.

The Mandalorian sort of sits in the latter camp. Written by Jon Favreau (Iron Man), The Mandalorian is set five years after Return of the Jedi and ostensibly stars Pedro Pascal as a ‘Mandalorian’, a sort of religious bounty hunter who dresses a bit like Boba Fett, but isn’t.

I say ostensibly, because he never takes his helmet off so it might as well be Michael Crawford under there – which is odd because his boss is played by noted film director Werner Herzog, a man you’d normally hire to play a part purely because of his voice, not because of how he looks.

Herzog hires the Mandalorian via Weathers to go and kill a specific target on a desert planet that definitely isn’t Tatooine but might as well be. Off he trots and after bumping into another bounty hunter (voiced by Taika Waititi this time), he finds his target isn’t quite what he thought and ends up protecting him/she/it.