Jon Favreau Reveals How The Mandalorian and Grogu Was Inspired by The Phantom Menace

Starting on June 5, The Mandalorian and Grogu celebrated its third week of release with the debut of a new way to watch the first new Star Wars movie in seven years. TheaterEars collaborated with Disney and Lucasfilm to release The Mandalorian and Grogu: The Director’s Experience, allowing audiences to hear director, co-writer, and producer Jon Favreau’s commentary timed precisely to the movie as it plays in theaters.

TheaterEars offers The Mandalorian and Grogu: The Director’s Experience for free to moviegoers. Simply download the TheaterEars app, select your showtime, bring some headphones along, and listen to Jon Favreau’s insights as the exciting sci-fi adventure film in a galaxy far, far away unfolds.

Director commentaries are fairly commonplace in Star Wars, but this marks the first time that Star Wars fans can listen to the filmmaker’s detailed thoughts about a Star Wars movie mere weeks after it hit theaters. Throughout the commentary, Favreau offers all manner of fascinating insights about the movie, including how he crafted certain sequences, what was required to bring specific moments to the big screen, and how he was influenced by a variety of other projects in engineering the project.

In the commentary, Favreau mentions a number of movies that he was inspired by, including Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Apocalypse Now, Top Gun, Blade Runner, Hard Boiled, The French Connection, and The Blues Brothers. But the Iron Man filmmaker also reveals that he was inspired by Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace in overseeing one of his movie’s most ambitious sequences.

The Mandalorian and Grogu Directly Connects To The Phantom Menace

During the second act of The Mandalorian and Grogu, Din Djarin and his adorable little green companion hatch a plan to break Rotta the Hutt out of containment and, in turn, liberate him from the clutches of the villainous Imperial warlord Janu Coin. Things don’t go as planned, however, as Rotta alerts the guards, leading Coin’s forces to pump the room full of a gas that renders Din Djarin and Grogu unconscious.

When Din Djarin wakes up, he notices that his array of Mandalorian weapons are gone. As he finds his footing again, the former bounty hunter walks forward and into a gladiator arena. There, Rotta the Hutt waits for him for a bloodthirsty duel that Janu Coin, Hogsbreth, and the hundreds of spectators are eager to enjoy.

Obviously, anyone in that situation would probably want to turn around and run away from the gargantuan, six pack-brandishing Hutt, and the myriad of terrifying creatures that soon enter the arena after him. However, Coin quells any means of escape by triggering red laser barriers that block anyone entering or exiting the arena.

In describing how he conceptualized this ambitious fight sequence, Favreau revealed that he was inspired by a critical moment in Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace. Specifically, Favreau and his visual effects team referenced the red barriers, termed laser gates or electron walls in canon, that separate Darth Maul, Obi-Wan Kenobi, and Qui-Gon Jinn away from one another during the iconic “Duel of the Fates” sequence.

In Episode I, these red laser barriers play an integral role in Qui-Gon Jinn’s tragic death. The barriers, which switch on and off throughout the duel, prevent Obi-Wan from teaming up with Qui-Gon against Darth Maul, leaving the Jedi Master to fend for himself against the Zabrak Sith Lord. Obi-Wan subsequently watches from behind one of these laser gates as his master is slain.

Interestingly, the laser gates from The Phantom Menace are connected to a Naboo myth. According to the DK Publishing reference book Star Wars: Complete Locations, a legend among Naboo locals holds that Chaos, a term that is synonymous with the Void or Hell in Star Wars canon, was a massive pit made difficult to reach by six impenetrable gates. The six red laser gates in the Theed Royal Palace in The Phantom Menace directly reference this legend as the seemingly bottomless core of the royal palace’s power generator is also contained behind six laser gates.

In The Mandalorian and Grogu, all hell breaks loose when these same kinds of ominous red laser gates are inadvertently destroyed. After Rotta the Hutt throws a creature at one of the laser gates, the monsters in the gladiator arena that were once attacking Din Djarin and Rotta the Hutt briskly spread to the crowd and spill into the streets of Shakari to cause further mayhem.

The Phantom Menace Influence Reflects Jon Favreau’s Reverence for the Prequels

Favreau’s integration of visuals from The Phantom Menace into The Mandalorian and Grogu is just the latest example of the filmmaker’s willingness to repurpose elements from George Lucas’ prequel trilogy into contemporary Star Wars stories. Grogu’s origins, for instance, tie back to Order 66, the tragic event initially depicted in Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith that entailed the deaths of most Jedi.

Favreau’s clear reverence for the prequels extends even further than more overt references like Order 66. For instance, Super Battle Droids, which first appeared in Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones, were among the Separatist forces responsible for the deaths of Din Djarin’s parents in The Mandalorian season 1.

Throughout the series, Din Djarin’s Razor Crest and N-1 Starfighter receives repairs from pit droids, which first appeared in The Phantom Menace in Watto’s workshop and during the Boonta Eve Classic.

Doctor Pershing, meanwhile, wears attire that features the Kamino cloning facility’s emblem on it as he experiments with Grogu.

Star Wars is Finally Accepting the Prequel Trilogy

The Mandalorian and Grogu drawing such direct inspiration from The Phantom Menace speaks to a larger shift in the discourse surrounding the Star Wars prequel trilogy. When Disney purchased Lucasfilm and started development on the sequel trilogy, the prequels were more widely derided by Star Wars fans. As such, filmmakers like J.J. Abrams largely avoided referencing anything to do with the prequels in their Star Wars projects.

Now, however, the landscape of Star Wars fandom has drastically changed. The prequels, in particular Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith, are among the most beloved Star Wars projects, especially among fans who grew up with these movies. This is reflected in the recent box office performances of the 25th anniversary re-release of The Phantom Menace and 20th anniversary re-release of Revenge of the Sith.

Over the 49 years since the original Star Wars hit theaters, Star Wars books, comics, games, and movies have continually referenced the most minute of details from previous projects. The Mandalorian and Grogu is the latest project to lean into the rich tapestry that is the Star Wars galaxy as Favreau found a clever way to repurpose an iconic visual from The Phantom Menace in his new movie. As George Lucas once said, “It’s like poetry. It rhymes.”

Release Date

May 20, 2026

Runtime

132 minutes

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