Warning! SPOILERS for The Book of Boba Fett.

Disney+’s The Book of Boba Fett reintroduced the Tusken Raiders in the world of Star Wars before slaughtering them again in episode 3 - yet, compared to Anakin Skywalker's violence against them in Attack of the ClonesBoba Fett's encounter was handled more respectfully. While the Tuskens aren’t new to the Star Wars universe, as they’ve been present and talked about since the beginning in A New Hope, their stories have only recently been treated with due respect. The Book of Boba Fett handled this particularly well, even going as further as focusing much of season 1's second episode on exploring how their society worked on Tatooine and how considerate they were to their prisoner Boba Fett (Temuera Morrison).

The Book of Boba Fett season 1 focuses on two different time periods: the present, wherein Boba Fett tries to establish himself as Daimyo with the help of assassin Fennec Shand (Ming-Na Wen) by taking Jabba the Hutt’s palace in the underworld of Tatooine, as well as the past. Through his dreams of the past, Boba Fett remembers his escape from the Sarlacc and subsequent capture from the Tuskens, with whom he had to live and from whom he learned a lot. Thanks to the flashbacks, not only can viewers learn a lot about the Sand People’s daily life but this presents the opportunity to portray the Sand People more fairly - not just as "animals" or savages, like in the original trilogy or the prequel films.

Related: What Happened To Boba Fett After The Tuskens Were Killed

Although slaughtered in Attack of the Clones and The Book of Boba Fett episode 3, the Sand People's violent encounter is quite different in the latter. While Anakin’s brutal killing of the Tuskens was extremely violent and savage, with himself explaining to Padme afterwards that “they were animals and he slaughtered them as such,The Book of Boba Fett’s massacre happened after the viewers could learn more about them. By getting to know their habits, seeing the protagonist sympathize with them and help protect their community, the audience has a more acute sense of the loss of life that occurred with the Sand People's slaughter in The Book of Boba Fett.

Boba Fett in The Book Of Boba Fett

The Book of Boba Fett marked a shift from the usual narrative about the Sand People. By showing the more mundane details of daily Tusken life, as well as the respect and fairness the Tuskens displayed towards their prisoners, especially after Boba Fett proved instrumental in saving and helping them, Star Wars has finally treated them as deep characters rather than narrative devices. Throughout The Book of Boba Fett episodes 1 to 3, an appreciation and kinship between the show’s protagonist and the Tuskens became increasingly clear, with Boba Fett going as far as defending them from the train’s leader calling them “uncivilized raiders” in episode 2.

By making Boba Fett state that they are people who deserve a toll being paid to them if freighters were to pass in their territory, as they laid an ancestral claim to the Dune Sea, Star Wars finally treated them with the due respect they needed since the beginning, instead of defining them as uncivilized savages over and over. Despite still ending up as casualties of the interests of powerful people, The Book of Boba Fett’s Tusken Raiders were finally treated as characters with an agency that could provoke emotion in the viewers, making their deaths more crucial and better managed, at least in comparison with Anakin's slaughter in Attack of The Clones.

Next: Boba Fett Episode 3 Asks 7 Big Questions About Tatooine, Hutts & Tusken Raiders

The Book of Boba Fett releases new episodes Wednesdays on Disney+.