The writers of The Mandalorian have focused on telling Mando and Grogu’s story, but they’ve also found plenty of opportunities to fill the show with Easter eggs referencing different parts of Star Wars lore. The first season had a ton of fun nods to the saga – from acknowledging the existence of Gungans (a huge deal after Jar Jar’s backlash) to mentioning “the high ground” – but the second season significantly raised the show’s Easter egg quotient.
With returning characters like Luke Skywalker, Boba Fett, and Ahsoka Tano, season 2 was crammed full of even more Star Wars references than season 1.
A Simple Man
When Obi-Wan arrives on Kamino to question Jango Fett in Attack of the Clones, the bounty hunter tells the Jedi, “I’m just a simple man, trying to make his way in the universe.”
This has become one of the prequel trilogy’s most popular quotes, and in The Mandalorian, Boba Fett paraphrases his dad when Mando similarly asks him about his identity: “I’m a simple man making his way through the galaxy, like my father before me.”
Cobb Vanth Rides A Pimped-Out Podracer
When Mando travels across the Dune Sea with Cobb Vanth to pay the Tusken Raiders a visit, Vanth can be seen riding what appears to be a pimped-out podracer engine.
In fact, it looks eerily similar to the podracer used by nine-year-old Anakin Skywalker to earn his own freedom in the Boonta Eve Classic.
“I’ve Seen What Such Feelings Can Do To A Fully-Trained Jedi Knight.”
Ahsoka Tano made her live-action debut in The Mandalorian episode “Chapter 13: The Jedi.” Mando brought Grogu to her in the hopes that she would train him, but she refuses, saying, “His attachment to you makes him vulnerable to his fears. His anger.”
Mando counters, “All the more reason to train him,” but in a poignant reference to Ahsoka’s old master Anakin, she tells him, “I’ve seen what such feelings can do to a fully-trained Jedi Knight. To the best of us. I will not start this child down that path. It’s better to let his abilities fade.”
M-Count
One of the coolest things about The Mandalorian is that it embraces all eras of Star Wars instead of picking and choosing which parts to acknowledge like the sequel trilogy did. In season 1, Gungans and Canto Bight are both mentioned by Mayfeld.
In season 2, there are a number of references to Grogu’s “M-count,” presumably referring to his midichlorians. The ability to measure somebody’s Force sensitivity with a number was a controversial addition to the canon in the prequels, but The Mandalorian isn’t shying away from it.
Dark Troopers
In the previous canon, the Dark Troopers were an elite squad of cyborg clones that did the Empire’s dirty work. In the new canon, these are just Phase Zero of the Dark Trooper Project.
Three phases followed with fully robotic Dark Troopers that are essentially Star Wars Terminators before landing on the near-indestructible design that abducted Grogu in “Chapter 14: The Tragedy.”
Gamorrean Guards
In the season 2 premiere of The Mandalorian, Mando pays a visit to a crime boss who’s watching two axe-wielding Gamorreans fight to the death. Gamorreans are the green-skinned pig-men that guarded Jabba’s palace in Return of the Jedi.
Apparently, when the Rebel Alliance defeated the Hutt’s criminal empire, the Gamorreans were left without a job and resorted to fighting to the death for the entertainment of gangsters.
Sabacc
In “Chapter 10: The Passenger,” Mando wanders back to Mos Eisley Cantina to ask Peli Motto for the location of some fellow Mandalorians. When he approaches her, she’s in the midst of a game of Sabacc, the card game that Han Solo used to win the Millennium Falcon from Lando Calrissian.
Motto finds out where some Mandalorians are, but the condition is that Mando has to give the Frog Lady a ride home to fertilize her eggs.
Krayt Dragon
When C-3PO is trekking across the Tatooine desert alone at the beginning of the original 1977 Star Wars movie, he wanders past the gigantic skeleton of a dragon-like creature, later identified as a krayt dragon. A live, substantially bigger krayt dragon appeared in The Mandalorian this past season.
The season 2 premiere, “Chapter 9: The Marshal,” directed by series creator Jon Favreau, follows the traditional fantastical narrative framework of a journey to slay a dragon with Mando’s quest to destroy a krayt dragon that’s been terrorizing the locals.
Grand Admiral Thrawn
When Ahsoka bests Imperial Magistrate Elsbeth in a lightsaber-on-beskar duel, she presses her opponent to reveal the location of her master: Grand Admiral Thrawn.
One of the most iconic villains from the de-canonized Expanded Universe, Thrawn is seemingly being primed as the big bad presiding over The Mandalorian and its spin-offs.
Luke Skywalker
Just when Mando and his Grogu-saving platoon were losing hope and the Dark Troopers were pounding down the door, a lone X-wing arrived. Cara Dune joked that a single starfighter wouldn’t be enough to rescue them, but Star Wars fans instantly knew who was flying it.
As a cloaked figure emerged from the ship with a black glove on one of his hands and started slaying the Dark Troopers with a green lightsaber, fans rejoiced at the return of a more familiar Luke Skywalker than the bitter pessimist found in The Last Jedi.