Star Wars: The Clone Wars introduced us to some of the internal and external conflicts that have plagued the planet of Mandalore throughout its history, and now it looks like The Mandalorian season 3 will finally show us what Mandalore was like before it was totally destroyed by civil war.
In a season 3 sneak peek released on Sunday, we can see a ship flying toward a domed city that looks an awful lot like the Mandalorian city of Sundari from The Clone Wars. However, one major difference between Sundari and the city we see in the trailer is the lush greenery surrounding it.
By the time we visit Sundari in The Clone Wars, the surface of Mandalore has already been transformed from the vibrant green we see in the trailer to a desert-like wasteland after years of Mandalorian wars. After the death of the first Mandalorian Jedi, Tarre Vizsla, surviving members of house Vizsla stole his Darksaber from the Jedi Temple during the fall of the Old Republic. Because Tarre had used the Darksaber to unify Mandalore under his rule, his house sought to do the same, even if that meant enraging the Jedi.
The war with the Jedi that followed resulted in a cataclysmic event that rendered the surface of the planet uninhabitable outside of the hermetically sealed dome cities. For a while after the war with the Jedi, rival Mandalorian clans did their best to coexist. However, because of their violent and destructive history, many Mandalorians decided to become pacifists rather than traditional warriors. This launched Mandalore into a war between the non-violent New Mandalorians, led by Duchess Satine Kryze, and the Death Watch, led by traditionalist Pre Vizsla. Any habitable surface on Mandalore that may have survived the cataclysm was decimated by this civil war as clans fought for the right to rule the planet and its people.
Based on the greenery we see surrounding the domed city, it seems like we may finally get to see what Mandalore was like before the planet was completely ravaged by violence. This would be a massive addition to the onscreen lore of Star Wars. Although the movies don’t go into much detail about Mandalore beyond Jango Fett’s backstory in Attack of the Clones, the planet and its people have long been a big part of the Star Wars lore that exists beyond the films, key to many of the major events that shape the larger universe of TV series, books, and comics. To those who have tuned into the expanded universe stories, Mandalore will undoubtedly feel as important to the galaxy far, far away as Tatooine and Coruscant.
Like The Mandalorian, The Clone Wars and Rebels have introduced plenty of Mandalorian lore into Star Wars canon, further expanding upon the world that George Lucas created. Because of these shows, we generally know what happens to Mandalore and its people during the heights of both the Republic and the Empire, but we haven’t seen much of what the planet was like before that or why Tarre Vizsla was the first and only Mandalorian Jedi.
Given Bo-Katan Kryze’s (Katee Sackhoff) connection to the New Mandalorians vs. Death Watch conflict, her quest to reunite Mandalore with the Darksaber, and the fact that Grogu could become the next Mandalorian Jedi, it makes sense for the series to finally take us into this era of Mandalore’s history, even if it’s just for a brief flashback.
The Mandalorian season 3 hits Disney+ on March 1.