Temuera Morrison on Boba Fett's Rebirth and Revealing "What's Under the Robes"
"Jabba ruled with fear. I intend to rule with respect," says the reborn bounty hunter Boba Fett (Temuera Morrison) when starting his next chapter in The Book of Boba Fett. Left for dead in the Dune Sea, Fett escapes the Sarlacc pit and finds a new clan among a tribe of Tusken Raiders in the era of Return of the Jedi. Five years later, in the time of The Mandalorian, Fett and Master Assassin Fennec Shand (Ming-Na Wen) are the "wretched" rescued from the sands of Tatooine. No longer a hired gun, Fett adopts another identity when he takes the throne of Jabba the Hutt by force: crime boss Lord Fett, the new Daimyo of Mos Espa.
"I think this is about a rebirth and finding out a little bit more, stripping away the robes, of what this guy is really about," Morrison told E! News. "Now we see his influence from the Tuskens and the sands of Tatooine and where he's had to hang out and endure these last few years. When he joins up with Fennec Shand [in The Mandalorian], they've both had a bad experience, both almost died. So now he's looking for company, he's looking for support, whereas before he's always been alone. Now he's joined together, joined forces, there's strength in numbers now."
As they consolidate power over Jabba's crime empire, Boba Fett and Fennec Shand perilously navigate the galaxy's underworld of scum and villainy — putting themselves in the crosshairs of The Order of the Night Wind, the territorial Hutt Twins, and their Wookie enforcer, the bounty hunter Black Krrsantan.
According to Morrison, The Book of Boba Fett is about unmasking the mystique and revealing "what's under the robes" of the born-again Boba, baptized in the belly of the beast five years earlier.
"We never saw or heard too much about the history and what Boba actually does [in the original Star Wars trilogy]. All we knew was that he was one of the most fearsome bounty hunters in the galaxy, but we didn't actually really see much besides being thrown into the Sarlacc," Morrison said. "So now we're revealing what's under the robes, and I think he's just going through a new sense of belonging to a tribe and a new sense of discovery in terms of his own identity."
Added Wen, "I think we're both survivors, both Fennec and Boba. Look at Boba, [surviving] the Sarlacc, beaten up by the Tuskens, and he still comes out victorious and strong."
New episodes of The Book of Boba Fett premiere Wednesdays on Disney+.
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