Recap The Mandalorian Chapter 13 Ahead of Friday’s New Episode; Prequels and Ahsoka Explained

The Mandalorian Chapter 13 was everything we ever dreamed of so let’s jump in and talk about The Jedi finally arriving! In this article (or in the video above), we are about to dive into the latest episode with full spoilers, Easter eggs, the zillions of ties to the prequel trilogies, the animated shows in Clone Wars and Rebels, and more. So, buckle up because this Recap to the Rescue is going to be a lot to take in because we start right out of the gate with one of the most exciting Star Wars moments in years!

Immediately launching the episode, Ahsoka is thrown into action. She’s terrifyingly awesome, slicing some enemies down in this foggy, barren forest on the planet Corvus. She’s played by Rosario Dawson for live-action, which gives me mixed feelings because my heart kind of breaks for Ashley Eckstein who voiced the character for years and didn’t get to play the live-action version, especially after Katee Sackhoff got to do both the animated voice of Bo-Katan and the live-action version in Mandalorian. But Rosario does a phenomenal job embodying Ahsoka, so props to her and the team for getting the character right.

We have a real Game of Thrones feeling standoff at the gates of Calodan with Ahsoka setting an ultimatum.

Before we know it, boom, we’re in space with Mando and Baby Yoda. The Child uses the Force to get his favorite little knob toy from the dashboard, showing that he’s getting a bit more confident with the Force because now he’s literally unscrewing the knob, instead of simple moves like just stealing his classmates snack.

In Calodan, people are literally silenced by Magistrate Morgan Elsbeth. We see this as Mando is lead to her. Long story short, she sucks but she has a spear made of Beskar which almost makes her offer of killing Ahsoka tempting.

On his way out of Calodan, a Convor is seen on the top left corner of the screen perched in a tree – this owl-like creature is Morai, a piece of Gods of Mortis which has been with Ahsoka ever since she was resurrected on Mortis.

Mando meets Ahsoka in the woods and they have a really epic duel for a moment, and they’re a good match for each other because Mandalorians literally design their armor to combat Jedi – but a name drop of Bo-Katan essentially saves Mando’s life and Ahsoka is quick to recognize The Child and the he looks like Yoda. Am I the only on who got geeked when she name dropped Yoda? Impossible.

Mando tells Ahsoka that the Magistrate has HK-87 Battle Droids, which are known from the Knights of the Old Republic video game and that the soldiers have A-350 rifles, which are from the same A-300 line of guns we saw used in Rogue One and Solo: A Star Wars Story.

If you think those details show us that it’s all connected, just wait until I tell you that Ahsoka outright references Anakin Skywalker when she refuses to train The Child. She cites his sort of emotional attachment to Mando as something which can lead to a downfall and she says she’s seen it happen to “the best of us” — aka Anakin Skywalker, aka Darth Vader, and Ahsoka saw this up close. When she was a rambunctious little youngling, she was Anakin’s padawan.

Finally, we know The Child’s real name! Baby Yoda, no longer, the little green being is officially named, “Grogu,” as revealed by Ahsoka who clearly has some sort of previous tie to the character. The prequel ties are strong in this one, because Ahsoka points out that Grogu escaped the massacre of the Younglings by being abducted while Anakin slaughtered everyone. It’s unclear how Grogu got away, where he want, and who he went with.

While Ahsoka was explaining all things about the Force to Mando, she tells him the Force is “an energy field created by all living things.” This is just like Obi-Wan told it to Luke in A New Hope, so that’s cool.

When Baby Yoda (yes, I’m still calling him that!) summons his favorite gear knob with the Force, Mando is the ultimate proud dad. But there is no time for celly. Mando and Ahsoka are teaming up to take on the Magistrate — which Mando thinks should come as a surprise given the Mandalorian and Jedi rivalry but Ahsoka has teamed up with other Mandalorians in the past on the animated shows, so this is really nothing new for her.

Morgan Elsbeth had her people massacred during the Clone Wars and built her own business in trading weapons and resources which ultimately helped build the Imperial Starfleet. Like I said at the beginning, she sucks. Ahsoka slices through more henchman, begging the question of how many trees and other objects have to die so that we can’t see these violent slicing-in-halves on Disney+?

At one point, Ahsoka lines up her lightsabers to look like one single beam, and that’s the same move she showed off when she fought her former master Darth Vader. Nowadays, she’s really no one’s master and has no master, because she left the Jedi after being framed and ultimately doesn’t really operate as a Jedi or a Sith.

During the action in Calodan, we see a loth-cat, a creature created by Clone Wars and Rebels genius Dave Filoni. Samurai fight, which is awesome, watch it again on the show, and a good old fashioned standoff wit Mando and the head of Elsbeth’s security, a face that might look familiar because that Michael Biehn who played Kyle Reese in the OG Terminator! But, he is not going to be back for Chapter 14 after Mando guns him down.

The last big reveal is Ahsoka demanding the whereabouts of Grand Admiral Thrawn. Remember when I said Elsbeth sucks? Thrawn really sucks (as a person but as a character he’s super fun to watch). He’s a big bad blue guy who rose up after the fall of the Empire and also helped build up the First Order, which might further that one theory from last week where that blue tank could be creating Snoke for the sequel trilogy or recreating Palpatine because that was never even remotely explained. Thrawn is a worthy opponent for the Jedi and Mandalorians because he has studied them so thoroughly, hee was given the rank of Grand Admiral by Palpatine himself, and he was last seen with Ahsoka’s friend Ezra at the end of Rebels. That would explain why she’s looking for him and my guess is that another Star Wars show is on the way to tell that story.

To end the episode, Mando has fulfilled yet another side quest and unlocks the Beskar spear weapon as a new weapon going forward. It looks like he’s going to say goodbye to Grogu and my emotions run higher than Wiz Khalifa on April 20 but Ahsoka won’t take him. She sends Mando and Grogu to Tython, the origin of the Jedi in Star Wars legends but that was changed when this canon made the Jedi birthplace Ahch-Too. At a minimum, a trip to Tython is going to dive deeper into Jedi history than ever before but it could also give Grogu a full-on purpose and possible bring other well-known characters into the mix to help train him.

And, of course this episode was directed by Star Wars genius Dave Filoni. Awesome prequel ties, even more awesome Rebels and Clone Wars threads being tugged on, and I can’t believe we only have 3 episodes left in The Mandalorian Season 2.

What Easter eggs and references did you catch in The Mandalorian Chapter 13? Share your thoughts in the comment section or send them my way on Instagram.