The Mandalorian dragged Star Wars into a new era. The series served as a fresh take on the universe mere weeks before The Rise of Skywalker brought the sequel trilogy to an underwhelming conclusion, and the episodic saga of a bounty hunter and his young charge made live-action TV the clear future of the franchise and cemented Disney+ as part of the streaming landscape.
Five years later, however, the focus is shifting back to the big screen. Four Star Wars movies are currently in development, and collectively they span the entire timeline, from years after The Rise of Skywalker to millennia before the prequels. Among these movies, Mandalorian theatrical spinoff The Mandalorian and Grogu has an important opportunity to explain a massive Jedi mystery before an entire movie is dedicated to it.
Lost Legends is an Inverse series about the forgotten lore of our favorite stories.
Tython is where the Jedi were born in the non-canon Legends comics.
Modern Star Wars canon doesn’t tell us much about how the Jedi came to be. James Mangold’s upcoming movie, which has the working title Dawn of the Jedi, will provide answers, but The Mandalorian and Grogu could set the stage with a key part of Jedi lore. In The Mandalorian Season 2, Din Djarin and Grogu travel to Tython so young Grogu can send out a call to all the surviving Jedi, a call Luke Skywalker eventually answers.
In the 2012 non-canon comic book series Dawn of the Jedi, we see the planet Tython over 30,000 years in the past. There, a fleet of pyramidal spaceships departs on a journey all over the galaxy to find Force-sensitive beings in the first wave of recruitment for the Jedi Order, then known as the Je’daii Order (Je’daii meaning “mystic center”).
The full story, involving ancient alien species and precursor organizations to the Jedi, is a lot to include in one movie, which is where The Mandalorian and Grogu comes in. The last time we saw the pair, Grogu had just been initiated as a Mandalorian named Din Grogu, but was still working on his Jedi training too.
Grogu meditating at an ancient temple on Tython.
The Mandalorian Season 3 contained a surprising number of flashbacks, even showing us how Grogu survived Order 66, so it’s possible the upcoming movie could do the same with ancient Jedi lore. We’ve already seen the planet where the Jedi were born, and Grogu’s Jedi powers haven’t disappeared just because he picked a Beskar shirt over a lightsaber. Why not return to Tython to further Grogu’s training in a way that tells us more about the ancient past?
The Mandalorian has always been used to seed ideas that Star Wars would later use in a bigger way; it’s where we first saw Force Healing only a few days before it was used in Rise of Skywalker. With a movie like Dawn of the Jedi, which is separated from the rest of the timeline by millennia, a few references to beloved Star Wars properties would help connect the distant prequel to the rest of the franchise. We’re not asking for impossible cameos, but knowing these ancient events have meaning would make the film worth investing in.
Maybe it’s a stretch to suggest The Mandalorian and Grogu should jump back thousands of years. but Grogu will presumably continue his Jedi training, and given how long-lived his species is it would be a fitting way to explore the history of the Force. Star Wars could make Mando’s movie important to the franchise’s broader story, while also building excitement for Dawn of the Jedi. Besides, we want to see weird pyramid ships on the big screen.
The Mandalorian and Grogu premieres May 22, 2026.
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