“Chapter 10 – The Passenger” was written by Jon Favreau and directed by Peyton Reed. Still searching for more Mandalorians, Din Djarin (Pedro Pascal) is tasked to reunite a “Frog Lady” (Misty Rosas) and her offspring with her husband. Things do not go as planned when they crash land on a frozen planet.

At the beginning of this episode, we pick off where we left off… kind of. Mando is still riding on his speeder back to Mos Eisley where his ship, The Razorcrest, is located. However, we do not see Temuera Morrison at all this week. That was more than likely a tease for an episode weeks ahead because it doesn’t look like Mando will be returning to Tatooine anytime soon. Peli Motto (Amy Sedaris) gives him information about where he may be able to locate more of his kind, as Cobb Vanth was not a real Mandalorian. When back at Motto’s hangar, an amphibious woman and her eggs need passage back to her husband, conveniently located on the planet where all of these supposed Mandalorians are. In return for the information of the location, Mando offers to bring her. 

On the way, The Razorcest is tracked down by New Republic X-Wings pilots who have been looking for him ever since episode six last season; there have been warrants out for his arrest ever since the New Republic prison ship was breached. Here, Dave Filoni reprises his cameo as one of the X-Wing pilots that blew up the enemy space station in that very same episode. The Razorcrest out-maneuvers the pilots; however, and ends up crashing on an ice planet. I love the wide range of settings Star Wars has, meaning just because you see a planet with snow, it doesn’t automatically mean you’re on Hoth. Just because you’re on a planet with sand, doesn’t automatically mean you’re on Tatooine and so on. This really goes back to what I said last week, they just continue adding layer, after layer to many things we’ve slightly experienced before. 

After being stranded in the cave for a while, the “Frog Lady” wanders about and finds some kind of hot tub in which she warms her eggs. After Mando and The Child search for her, The Child discovers hundreds of eggs from spider-creatures called Krykna. The Krykna also appeared in “Star Wars: Rebels” and was a rejected design for a creature on Dagobah in “The Empire Strikes Back.” The Child has been eating the amphibian eggs the entire time and Mando finally catches him which leads to him eating these spider eggs. The horror and mystery-like vibe given reminded me a lot of “Alien.” After eating the one Krykna, all of the eggs hatch and the creatures chase after our protagonists. They are trapped in the cockpit of the crashed ship until the X-Wing pilots luckily find and save the group by killing the creatures. The New Republic lets him go free, dropping him of all charges after finding evidence that he was the one who defended the lieutenant piloting the prison ship who was killed.  

I found this episode to be a nice little sidequest, but, at this point, we really have to get the story moving along. Two episodes may not seem like much, but we’re already a quarter of the way into this season and the only progression we’ve had so far is something might happen between Mando and Boba Fett. I thought this episode was surprisingly funny for featuring almost no comedians or guest actors. The score by Ludwig Göransson is still mesmerizing, and I’m glad he keeps developing it and not just copy-pasting it from season 1. I know there’s still much to happen, and many new and old faces to show up, but these “filler” episodes are just tiring. The majority of season 1 was dominated by filler and it got old and investing fast; I trust them to not go down that path to the dark side again. They haven’t revealed who would be directing each episode this season which I felt was a good move. During season 1, they showed you who would be leading each episode. I’d rather be surprised than know exactly what to expect. I did predict Peyton Reed was the director this week about halfway through, he did both “Ant-Man” movies and this felt very small-scale like those movies, no pun intended. I’m curious to find out which stories will be helmed by Dave Filoni, Carl Weathers and Robert Rodriguez; all of whom have confirmed they are directing at least one this season.