‘Star Wars’ Month: ‘Star Wars’ The Black Series Mandalorian & Grogu Is An Interesting Exercise In Contrasts

This week, Star Wars returns to theaters with The Mandalorian and Grogu. The duo have transformed the galaxy far, far away with their adventures, diving deep into both the seedy side of the galaxy as well as deepening Mandalorian lore.

To get ready for the movie, we got our hands on Hasbro’s Star Wars The Black Series Mandalorian & Grogu figures released in conjunction with the movie.

Din Djarin was a young foundling adopted by the Mandalorian Death Watch cult in his youth. He’s since grown up to become one of the fiercest and successful bounty hunters in the galaxy, up to the moment of being hired for one more fateful bounty. That job found him caring for the Jedi Padawan Grogu, a survivor of the Jedi Purge and a massively powerful Force user. The two have since found themselves growing together as a family, and a pair of warriors, determined to tear the Imperial Remnant down, piece by piece.

So this figure was an exciting thing to get in hand. I was hooked on The Mandalorian since the night of its premiere, seven long years ago. The character journey as well as the story’s cinematic action has been a highlight of a, frankly, weak era of Star Wars storytelling, more obsessed with looking backwards rather than forwards.

I was incredibly excited to possess this figure. If you’ve been following my action figure reviews for a while, you might see that I have three categories that I look at — the design, posing and accessories. I’m happy to report this is excellent in two of those three, but the flaws in that third category are pretty big.

First of all, this figure is simply Din, without question. The design perfectly captures both the look and spirit of the onscreen character. Even in a neutral pose, it’s got the swagger and attitude of the no-nonsense warrior at the heart of today’s Star Wars universe. There’s an intense level of detail, and that really makes the figure stand out.

For posing, he’s almost universally perfect. This is the first figure with shoulder pauldrons I’ve ever owned where the armor didn’t get in the way. I was able to hit both “museum” and action poses easily, with the more passive museum poses not even needing my stands. The only area it struggled is … it’s thanks to the final area I was looking at.

Simply put, the accessories here stink.

I’ll start with Grogu. Instead of being, essentially, a smaller figure packed in with his father figure/travelling companion/warrior mentor, the diminutive Jedi is simply an accessory with three points of articulation. Even worse, he can only attach to Din in one specific way, hanging onto a spindle on his jet pack, and can only pose hanging onto him.

Looking at the other accessories though, I’m frustrated. The only weapon of the four included that’s decent is the short sword. The blaster pistol is thin and awkward to place in his hand. The rifle is even worse, featuring an incredibly strange grip that was difficult to position. The thin knife is so small, I didn’t even bother to remove it from the package. And there’s only one alternate hand, which I think is supposed to hold the knife, but I’m not sure…

With a figure this good, it needed some better weapons, and honestly, it is lacking alternate hands and an un-helmeted head. For the premium price — $10 US more than a standard Black Series figure — that should be the standard. It’s not enough to ruin the figure, but it was frustrating.