I've given this show three weeks... I just don't think I can do it anymore.
A bit of background... I am a fanatical Boba Fett fan and have been since I was 6 and my older brother gave me his Kenner Boba and a 12" Fett missing an arm and a leg (still have them). I was hooked on the mystery and "Man With No Name" aura of the character. In the early to mid-ninties, I was obsessed with the comics, the novels, anything Fett. I dreamed of the day I could see him in action on the screen again.
Then Attack of the Clones happened. I was disappointed with Lucas' choice to make Boba a clone (something that would come back to haunt the franchise 20 years later it seems). The whole franchise kind of lost its lustre after the PT and I walked away.
Fast forward to The Mandalorian. The show had me hooked. It was everything I wanted to see Boba doing and more. I love the show, warts and all. Din Djarin (sans Grogu) is what I envisioned Fett to be all those years. Cue Season Two and the long awaited reappearance of the original Mandalorian! The episode wasn't great from a plot or directing point of view (we'll get back to this), but Boba was back! I actually enjoy his look in this, I can certainly find commonality in the dad bod. But we're back to pigeonholing him as a clone of an actor that is now way older than the character and it kind of shows. But it was okay! I liked the updated look, I like his code of honor, I loved seeing Slave I in action, life is great!
Book of Boba Fett is teased in the finale and I'm over the moon. A year of waiting for something I've been hoping for since I was a child is coming true, I just have to wait a year!
December 29th, first episode. What. The. Hell. That was bad. The plot was bad and rushed, the dialogue was poor, the scenes and action were poorly shot.
We finally received an answer that we have been waiting to see for over 30 years and it's just kinda glossed over. We see him emerge somehow from the Sarlaac by... digging out 20 feet from the maw? What? The digestive juices are so strong that his armor is badly damaged, the paint has been stripped, the visor has melted but uhh... his flightsuit us basically fine save for being bleached and a couple holes in it. This dude has been partially digested, he's dying of dehydration and yet somehow 24 hours later he's conscious, not in absolute agony and not only tries to make an escape but spars with Tusken Raiders...
Bad writing. Bad directing. Bad action. Bad plot. It has Robert Rodriguez's fingerprints all over it. Who in their right mind thought that the guy who created Spy Kids and Machete was fit to direct a Star Wars episode, let alone an entire series. Wha..What...
I write off the first episode as just setting the pace (poorly). Second episode comes out a week later and it's markedly better than the first. Granted, it's still not great but it begins to set up a large picture featuring not only the Hutts and Pike Syndicate, but a really bad ass character in Black Krrsantan. The continuing Saga of Dances With Tuskens is still mind numbingly bad, especially with the Boba of Arabia plot, but the current setting seems much better...
... and then it all went in the trash the next episode. The threat of the Hutts? Gone! Oh, but here's a plot device in the visage of a Rancor which is now apparently a big dog? Black Krrsantan? Defeated! By a bunch of intergalactic teenage Mods who simultaneously are poor and yet have fancy space vespas which look like something out of Spy Kids more than Star Wars. Boba Fett's Swiss Knife armor that can easily punch through a blast door, catch a Land Speeder doing what? 20 miles an hour? All useless. This supposed warrior gets beat to hell by the Wookiee, shows no actual prowess and has to be rescued by rejects from Cowboy Beebop. Oh, but now we get to look forward to him riding a friggin Rancor
I'm sorry for the rant. I just... I've been looking forward to this moment for so long but instead of feeling excited, I feel like I got punched in the gut. It's bad. It's really bad.
The thing that kills me is that they have so much old source material to pull from, both the EU novels and Dark Horse comics that they pick and choose to use and a LOT of it features Boba Fett himself and yet... they give us this. They could have easily and successfully grabbed source from something like Twin Engines of Destruction but this is what we get... Jesus Christ.