As much as starships and lightsabers have played a significant role in “Star Wars,” so have the famous philosophical sayings. “May the Force be with you” is the one everyone knows, obviously, but also “Do or do not, there is no try” and “I’m one with the Force, the Force is with me.” More recently, “The Mandalorian” made hay with “This is the way.”
The new film“The Mandalorian and Grogu”(in theaters now) introduces another memorable quote into the mythology: “The old protect the young, then the young protect the old.” It’s fairly simple and straightforward, but powerful in both the context of the movie and the way it may hitlongtime “Star Wars” fans.
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The Mandalorian (Pedro Pascal) says the line to Grogu, his young adopted son who has an appetite for snacks and a sensitivity to the Force. For three seasons of “The Mandalorian” series, Mando has protected Grogu on their many adventures and even in the movie, makes sure his armor is on tight before heading into a sticky situation. But Grogu gets his chance to return the favor and care for his space dad when something bad happens to Mando.
Pascal admits he was “very moved” when he read the line in the script but it also “transcends ‘Star Wars’ in a relatable way for audiences. For obvious reasons, it's such a true evolution to so many human relationships, especially that of parents and child. It's an incredible principle: We are meant to protect the young, and, therefore, earn their protection in return when needed. That's the way it should be.”
Forco-writer and director Jon Favreau, what makes “Star Wars” enduring is “how much people feel connected to it still,” he says. Everything’s “cascaded down” from George Lucas’ original films, and then just as now, fans see themselves in it.
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“When you're young and you're watching Luke looking up at the binary suns and wishing that he could get off the planet, that's a feeling that audience members felt in their life,” Favreau explains. “That’s part of what those mythic stories are. It's what we struggle with in our normal pedestrian lives put in this large scale, so that you could appreciate it and study it, and then you could learn from the lessons of the generations that preceded you because it's presented to you in such a fantastic way.”
But now, “as we get older as 'Star Wars' fans, we're not looking up wondering what's it like to get off this planet,” Favreau says. “A lot of us are parents. A lot of us have aging parents. We're in a much different place in our lives, but we still connect with ‘Star Wars,’ and we still connect with these stories to add context to it.”
Favreau feels the relationship between Mando and Grogu is what connected multiple generations to “The Mandalorian” show: “The young people will watch it through the eyes of Baby Yoda, of Grogu, and the adults will be looking at it like, ‘Hey, there's a cool dad.' "
The movie also embraces the intergenerational exchange in a deep way, especially with that one line.
“We’re not going to be here forever. Our kids are going to be here when we're not,” Favreau says. “Of course, it's heightened and stylized in this, because (Grogu’s) going to live for centuries. But we all feel a version of it.
“These things that we're dealing with, when we see it portrayed in the context of a fable or a story, it engages us more. That’s what I think George set out to do and why it's still relevant today.”
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY:'Mandalorian and Grogu' adds new 'Star Wars' quote to mythology