The Mandalorian's Katee Sackhoff Thought Bo-Katan Would Be Recast With Someone Like Scarlett Johansson

The Mandalorian star Katee Sackhoff was convinced that Bo-Katan would be recast with Black Widow star Scarlett Johansson, or someone like her, if the Star Wars: The Clone Wars character ever made it into live-action. She was thrilled to be proven wrong -- as she tells Michael Rosenbaum on an episode of the actor/host's Inside of You Podcast -- because becoming a part of Star Wars has been a dream of her's since she was a child. "When I was a little kid, I idolized male action stars because there were not a lot of female ones in the '80s," she says. "We had the Sigourney Weavers, and we had the Linda Hamiltons and Lucy Lawless, but we also had Princess Leia who was smart and feisty and gorgeous and a ball buster and capable and caring and so well-rounded.

"So from a young age, I loved Star Wars. I always joked that when I first moved to California, 'Now look, there's only one thing I'll always do. If they call me to be a rock in a Star Wars movie, just say yes. I'll be a rock just to be in this world."

A decade ago, she got her chance when Dave Filoni contacted her about voicing the Mandalorian warrior in Star Wars: The Clone Wars. "I jumped," she recalls. "It wasn't even like a think twice. I was like, 'Of course. That's amazing. A female Mandalorian warrior? Uh, hello, of course.'"

From early on, she and Filoni would joke about bringing Bo-Katan to live-action, but she always assumed if the character made the jump that the role would be recast with a higher-profile star. "I always joked with him just thinking, 'Of course they'll recast it, they'll probably hire Scarlett Johansson or something like that,'" she says.

When she saw Filoni at Star Wars Celebration after Disney announced The Mandalorian, she needled the producer about live-action Bo-Katan, reminding him that she's "been playing characters like this for 15 years" but still "just sort of joking." She had a hard time wrapping her head around reality once she found herself in a room talking to The Mandalorian creator Jon Favreau about bringing Bo-Katan to the show.

"It took me halfway through that meeting to realize that he was actually talking about me doing Bo-Katan," she says. "I'm still pinching myself, not only that they have the thought to do this but that they believed that I could and that they ultimately let me."

The Mandalorian's first two seasons are streaming now on Disney+. The show's third season enters production in April.