Fan theories are running rampant as we approach the finale of The Mandalorian. Which Jedi heard Grogu’s call at the seeing stone on Tython? The better question perhaps is: does it really matter when there’s no way Disney will break up the core relationship of the show?
That said, with someone surely having heard Grogu’s call and dead characters tending to come back to life in Star Wars, the latest Jedi theory suggests that it’s Mace Windu (Samuel L. Jackson) who will come to the child’s rescue. The theory has grown in popularity so much that an Instagram user even created a mock up a Mandalorian-style fan poster for the venerable Jedi Master.
So could Mace really be the next cameo on The Mandalorian?
First of all, this is all speculative. The ultimate internet-breakage for a fan artist is for your work to get a wide enough audience that people start writing articles about it. But, on the other hand, there are just as many reasons Mace could still be alive as there were for the nearly unkillable Darth Maul, who had several story arcs after his apparent death in The Phantom Menace. Maul was cut in half by Obi-Wan Kenobi but still managed to save himself from falling to his death by grabbing onto something at the last second. He ended up on a junkyard planet where he managed to fashion spider legs for himself out of scrap. Anything is possible in the galaxy far, far away.
As a member of the Jedi Council during the Old Republic era, Mace was one of the Jedi who oversaw Obi-Wan Kenobi’s mentorship of Anakin Skywalker. He had a reputation for being grim and serious, and clung tightly to Jedi ideals of compassion and diplomacy. Along with many other Jedi, he served as a General during the Clone Wars but was conflicted about the Jedi taking on the role of soldiers. Mace met a young Boba Fett — now a The Mandalorian fan favorite himself — and was an effective and impressive fighter against the enemy battle droids.
Mace’s death marked a major point on Anakin Skywalker’s fall to the dark side. In Revenge of the Sith, Mace and Anakin confronted Chancellor Palpatine aka Darth Sidious together. When Mace and Palpatine fought, Anakin had to choose to help one (Mace and the light side) or the other (Palpatine and the dark side). He chose to save Palpatine and cut off Mace’s hand, allowing Palpatine to throw Mace out of a skyscraper window with a lash of Force lightning. That was the last we saw of him alive in canon.
But we never saw a body.
Were Mace to return in The Mandalorian, he wouldn’t be the first character thought dead to do so. Just this season, Boba Fett returned to the Star Wars universe after decade of being thought dead in the belly of the sarlacc. His companion, Fennec Shand, was also left for dead, shot in the gut by a bounty hunter in the Tatooine desert, but she survived too, with strange droid parts replacing some of her innards.
While Mace didn’t sustain the wounds on screen that some of his predecessors did, his survival in Revenge of the Sith would still have taken a lucky break and some space magic: he lost his hand, was hit with bolts of Force lightning, and was thrown out of one of the highest skyscrapers on Coruscant, a city-planet made up of thousands of levels — meaning that it’s likely that the Jedi Master fell a very long way down… But he’s also a Jedi Master, trained for combat and the gravity-defying maneuvers he’d need to perform to survive such a fall. He’s also strong with the Force, which has granted Jedi and Sith the power to accomplish even greater feats. If anyone could survive that fall on the strength of will and ability, it would be one of the Jedi Council’s foremost masters.
But even if he did survive his fate in Revenge of the Sith, the fall of the Republic happened almost 30 years before the events of The Mandalorian. The Mace we’d meet on the Disney+ series would be much older than the other resurrected characters we’ve seen so far. Allegedly born in 72 BBY, according to Wookieepedia, would be 81 years old on The Mandalorian, and age doesn’t even account for the injuries he likely sustained after his final scene in the Prequel Trilogy. Would Mace really be in fighting form so many decades later?
A living Mace Windu also presents some of the same problems facing other Jedi in the era of The Mandalorian, too. Where was he during the Galactic Civil War? Why wasn’t he there to help Luke and the Rebellion fight Palpatine and the Empire?
One possible answer is that Mace chose exile just like Yoda and Obi-Wan Kenobi did after the destruction of the Jedi Order, only choosing to reveal himself when the time was right. Or maybe his weakened state prevented him from doing much more than survive the Jedi Purge, hiding out on a remote planet. It’s also possible that he became disillusioned with the Jedi way and simply chose to no longer participate in galactic affairs.
That said, if The Mandalorian wants to keep bringing in cool saga characters, it’s hard to find someone cooler than Samuel L. Jackson with a purple lightsaber. If Mace Windu were to find Grogu, the little Jedi padawan would likely be in good hands.
Keep up with all of The Mandalorian season 2 news here.