The Book of Boba Fett Episode 1: Stranger in a Strange Land Review

Credit: Sean Ferigan @seanferiganphotography - Unsplash

He’s back. The coolest character in the Star Wars canon, the legendary bounty hunter finally has a show to call his own – The Book of Boba Fett. Brought to life by the same creative team behind the critically acclaimed The Mandalorian, we re-join the galaxy’s favourite anti-hero in his own spin-off show as he takes a bacta-induced trip down memory lane.

The first episode ‘Stanger in A Strange Land’ gives us a brief glimpse into the various challenges Fett (Temuera Morrison) and his partner Fennec Shand (Ming-Na Wen) will face now that he has seized control as Tatooine’s premier crime lord. While some of the planet’s wretched hive of scum and villainy are all too eager to pay tribute, the smarmy insolence of a Twilek ambassador of “The Mayor” hints at future conflict.

Temuera Morrison attending the "Dune" UK Special Screening at Odeon Luxe Leicester Square. Credit: Karwai Tang, Gettyimages

The present day is bookended by Fett’s dreams of what happened to him in the immediate aftermath of Return of the Jedi, where he was last seen tumbling into the monstrous Sarlaac pit.

The mystery of how Fett escaped is finally definitively answered – no thousands of years of slow, tortuous death by digestion for our Boba. The guts of the Sarlaac are as nightmarish as could be imagined but it is no match for the enterprising bounty hunter. Perhaps, wisely, director Robert Rodriguez and writer Jon Favreau don’t linger on any particularly complicated explanation of just how he did it, realising that it’s pointless to quibble over the details when we already know that Fett lives.

Stripped of his iconic armour and left for dead by Jawa scavengers, Fett is rescued by a group of Tusken Raiders. An escape attempt is foiled after a duel with a warrior Tusken which, although engrossing, is slightly undermined by the fact that we know he survives – the same can be said for the battle at the episode’s end, fitting in a knowingly grisly call back to the demise of a certain Hutt that Star Wars fans will no doubt appreciate.

Back in the present day, Fett and his crew take a walk around the streets of Mos Espa where, similarly to The Mandalorian, the startling menagerie of extravagantly costumed extras and set design is as spectacular as we’ve come to expect. An assassination attempt by a gang of parkour practitioners (seemingly a contractual obligation for any action sequence these days) is barely foiled, showing that Fett won’t be getting everything quite his own way – however the old adage of “hokey religions and ancient weapons are no match for a good blaster at your side” certainly rings true here.

At a tight 39 minutes, some might quibble at the relative brevity of the opening episode, but ‘Stranger in a Strange Land’ does a solid enough job in setting the scene for the rest of the series, new episodes of which will be available every Wednesday on Disney+.