100% Agree And Will Throw In My Two Cents That It's Gotta Be Maul That Turns Him Somehow. The Closest

still cannot get over the fact that ludwig goransson basically invented a whole new musical culture for the mandalorian. like, that soundscape just. did not exist before. bass recorder plus electric guitar?? in star wars??? who even thinks of that???? mind blown.

i love you fictional vehicles that become a main character in the story by extension, i love you ships with iconic names that turn into a home for the characters, i love you humanized modes of transportation with imagined personality quirks, i love you sapient starships with real personality quirks, i love you inherent human ability to emotionally bond with literally anything

fans: how did padme die?

george lucas: she died in childbirth

fans: oh that's so s—

george lucas: of heartbreak

fans: ...

i am firmly convinced that din djarin is aro-spec and asexual.

(quick disclaimer: i speak for myself. not all aros and aces share my experiences with aromanticism and asexuality.)

one thing that's always struck me about din is how much he values platonic relationships. cara and kuill aren't any less important to him than omera. that's not necessarily an a-spec thing, but it's rare for straight characters on tv. it's even rarer for the focus of the show to be a platonic, father-son relationship rather than a romantic one. aro-coding? definitely.

i've also noticed that a lot of allos, especially straight allos, seem to sort people of their target genders into boxes of "potential s/o" and "not a potential s/o". even if they're happily single, there's still this idea that "i just want to be friends, but i'm fine if it evolves into something more". like, the idea of a romantic/sexual relationship is always in the back of their mind, they’re just choosing not to pursue it.

(second disclaimer: i'm not allo. all i know about allo-ness is what i've observed from the outside.)

din doesn't do that. it's like the "romantic" and "sexual" relationship boxes don't even exist for him most of the time. his only boxes are "enemy", "ally", and "friend/potential babysitter". he's never even considered that cara could be anything other than a friend. i can't describe it quite right, but this mentality towards relationship categories was one of the things that convinced me i was aroace and not just an allo who "hasn't met the right person yet".

and then there's din's relationship with omera. it didn't seem sexual to me, for one thing. second, i'm romance-repulsed, and this is the only romantic tension i've ever seen that i wasn't squicked out by and actually even liked. i just kept thinking, "if i were in a relationship, this is what it would be like." they both felt like they could be happy together, but also like their lives would still be fulfilling if they were single. no theatrics, no cheesiness, just two people who knew they could love each other if only they had the chance. but they didn't. so they moved on.

i don't know exactly what it was. it just gave me a-spec vibes.

all interpretations of din are valid. personally, i think he's asexual and some variant of aromantic - maybe grayro, maybe demi, maybe oriented aro. not sure.

even if he turns out to be a regular ol' hetero, i'm super happy with how this show is combatting amatonormativity. literally the only character in the show with an s/o is frog lady. none of the single characters are portrayed as broken or defective or missing someone. i love that i can watch this show and feel safe from aphobia. thank you, jon favreau and dave filoni.

the debtor

rating: g (word count 598)

https://archiveofourown.org/works/32755144

The Mandalorian watches her do the dishes sometimes. Omera isn’t sure why; she wonders for a while if he’s just lonely, but he never speaks or announces his presence. She figures it out when he joins her at the washbasin one day and picks up a bowl.

“Have you been trying to learn how to wash dishes this whole time?” she asks with a smile, handing him a soapy rag.

He tenses.

“I’m not making fun of you,” she clarifies. “It’s—” Sweet. “Appreciated.”

“I don’t have dishes on the Razor Crest,” the Mandalorian says after a moment. “Mostly I eat ration bars.”

“You must be sick of them by now.” Ration bars have all of the nutrients and none of the taste of real food; Omera can’t imagine eating them on a regular basis.

“They suit my purposes.”

He really doesn’t like empathy, does he. She hands him a wet plate and starts scrubbing at the next one. They work in silence for a while, scrubbing the dishes with soap and then setting them aside to rinse later. Eventually, the stack of dirty dishes she’s already run water over dries up, so they rinse off the soapy dishes and set them aside to dry in the sun before getting the dirty ones wet again. Omera picks up her scrub brush and starts on a cup.

“You’ve been very kind to me,” the Mandalorian says, breaking the silence.

She inclines her head. It’s hard to keep a smile from her face, hearing the way this hardened warrior shyly shapes politeness. “You’re my guest.”

“I know my presence is—hard for you. I take up space. And I frighten the children.”

“You don’t,” Omera says, though she’s not sure which part she’s responding to, taking up space or frightening the children. He doesn’t really do either. Only Winta was ever afraid of him, and that faded quickly. The Mandalorian is stiff around children, like he’s afraid he’ll break them if he makes the slightest move, but he is always gentle. No one in the village fears him anymore. And he takes up little space, so little that sometimes she wishes he’d take up more.

“I owe you.”

Is that why you learned how to wash dishes? “You don’t,” she repeats. “Besides, this is your payment for helping us with the raiders, remember? You asked for lodging.”

The Mandalorian’s head tilts toward her before turning back to the washbasin. “You’ve given me more than lodging.”

Not much, she thinks. Just extra bedding and warm food and an ear to listen on occasion. She wonders what his life has been like, that such basic kindness is a luxury. “Hasn’t anyone ever done something for you just to be nice? Without expecting anything in return?”

The Mandalorian’s head scythes towards her, his chest rising and falling sharply. Omera meets his gaze. The question hangs between them: too forward, probably, but she can’t take it back now. She doesn’t bother disguising the mingled nervousness and curiosity on her face, though she does hide the sympathy. She knows he wouldn’t appreciate it.

“Once,” he says.

She hesitates, wondering if he wants her to ask further questions. He doesn’t seem like the sort of person who likes to talk about his past, but sometimes—

“It’s why I swore the Creed,” he says before she can work out a response. His head slants away from her, staring at the last plate in his hands. “I will never be able to repay that debt.”

The Mandalorian sets the plate out to dry and ducks out of the hut.

this reminds me of chapter 8 when it’s revealed that all the mandalorians in din’s covert were forced to take off their helmets after saving din. the armorer, who in the show represents the ultimate moral authority on the creed, appears to approve of their decision because they were prioritizing one aspect of the creed over another (i.e. helping fellow mandalorians > keeping the helmet on). she considers it a tragedy but not a sin. this is evidenced by the fact that she says “we were forced to reveal ourselves” rather than morally separating herself from the others by using they/themselves.

I keep seeing people say that Din broke his Creed in Chapter 15 but I think that is a misread of the scene and the show overall. I think what happened was that Din re-ordered the collection of tenets his follows so that the child’s safety supersedes all else.

The two most important parts of the Creed (as represented in the show) are wearing armour and protecting foundlings. In Chapter 3, Din is faced with a moral problem - does he protect this foundling or reclaim his peoples’ armour? His chooses the latter, and then goes back on that decision to rescue the child. That episode is titled The Sin for this exact reason - he made the incorrect moral decision, but he was no less of a Mandalorian for it.

In Chapter 15, he is then presented with the exact same problem, but this time he chooses the child over the armour. This is why that episode is titled The Believer - Din is in the process of reorganising his religious priorities, not abandoning them. Just as he was a Mandalorian when he decided to forsake the child, so too does he remain a Mandalorian when protecting him.

yeah, i agree that was definitely the main reason he was upset. i think in bo-katan's case there was also an element of anger that she didn't follow the creed, but most of what set him off there was her attitude towards his beliefs rather than the things she herself believed.

(i'll make sure to tag you in my prejudice post once i get around to writing it!)

i don’t think we should be quick to trust anything bo-katan says about the children of the watch.

the main thing i’m suspicious of is her claim that they’re a fringe group. maybe they were in the clone wars era, but they’re clearly the dominant mandalorian faction right now. we know this because literally everyone in the show, not just din, thinks all mandalorians never take off their helmets. that perception wouldn’t be so widespread if the helmet thing were only practiced by a small group of religious zealots. i mean, this is galaxy-wide common knowledge. it’s not just din being sheltered by a cult.

Keep reading

STAR WARS REBELS 2.06, Brothers of the Broken Horn

noticing a pattern of unusual instruments being used in the soundtracks of the disney+ tv shows. bass recorder and electric guitar in the mandalorian and theremin in loki. it’s so different and fascinating compared to the standard john williams orchestral soundtracks and i love it

so i noticed something when rewatching mando s2e3 - when din's (crash)landing at the start of the episode, the razor crest's screen reads 'landing gear offline' (www(.)cap-that(.)com/starwars/the-mandalorian/203/1080/images/mandalorian2x03_0217(.)jpg), then next shot it says this - www(.)cap-that(.)com/starwars/the-mandalorian/203/2160/images/mandalorian2x03_0291(.)jpg - i could be wrong, but i'm pretty sure that says 'of course (i?) still love you' ?? is the crest trying to tell din something??

first of all, you are the sharpest-eyed, biggest-brained person on this website. has no one ever noticed this??? I'm truly mindblown! second of all, you're 100000% correct.

here are some zoomed in screencaps and gifs I made which show the 3 messages the razor crest's screen displayed in s02e03:

first, "stabilizer error":

second, "landing gear offline":

THIRD!!!! "OF COURSE I STILL LOVE YOU"!!!!!! :

(edit: note that the “I” on the Crest’s screen is backwards to denote a capitalized letter. I didn’t capitalize it in my subtitles which is why it looks like a 1)

then right back to "landing gear offline":

now, while the headcanon of a semi-sentient razor crest is very interesting... (although, wouldn't that be so sad considering the tragedy? I pretend I don't see it) (also, that would remind me of L3-37 in solo being uploaded into the falcon)

the easter egg is more likely related to the SpaceX spaceport drone ship called "of course I still love you":

it's docked in long beach, ca and floats on the ocean surface as a large landing platform, similar to the dock on Trask where Din was trying to land the Crest. I think it's probably just a fun nod from a couple of fellow space nerds haha.

but isn't it nice to think that some of the last words the Crest — Din's only sanctuary for years — said to Din were "of course I still love you"? 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭