The saga of the planet Mandalore is spread across '90s comic book series Tales of the Jedi,
the animated series The Clone Wars and Star Wars Rebels,
and the live-action series The Mandalorian. Here is the history of Mandalore explained.
After the runaway success of the original Star Wars in 1977,
the future was wide open for sequel The Empire Strikes Back. Among the many abandoned concepts
for the second part of the original trilogy was an army of Imperial Super Troopers, armored badasses
from the Mandalore system. As conceived by George Lucas and designed by visual effects supervisor
Joe Johnston and concept artist Ralph McQuarrie, the Super Troopers would have an ancient grudge
against the Jedi and an array of weapons integrated into their suits to combat them.
These concepts would end up forming the basis of Mandalorians as we know them much later,
but at the time, the budget simply didn't exist to manufacture dozens if not hundreds of these new
costumes, which were much more intricate than the stormtrooper outfits created for the first film.
The idea of Super Troopers was scrapped, but the design was undeniably great and a new, individual
character was conceived to wear it — the bounty hunter Boba Fett. The costume was given some color
and some wear to give it a sense of history and to distinguish it from proper Imperial attire.
Like "Sith" or "Palpatine," the words "Mandalore" and "Mandalorian" are never
uttered in the original trilogy, but fans came to know it and associate it with the armor through
the wealth of ancillary material released about the film universe throughout the 1980s and '90s.
"You may take Captain Solo to Jabba the Hutt after I have Skywalker."
"He's no good to me dead."
The fact that Boba Fett says and does very little in his first two film appearances
did nothing to dampen fan enthusiasm to learn more about him and the origin of
his slick armor. The original Star Wars Expanded Universe — comprised of novels,
comics, video games, and tabletop RPG sourcebooks published between 1978 and 2014 — offered an
enormous amount of information about the bounty hunter and the culture from which he hails,
the Mandalorians. Their homeworld of Mandalore became the setting of many stories
and home to an army of characters wearing variations on the beloved costume design.
Mandalore is established to be a planet on the Outer Rim of the galaxy,
and the namesake of an entire sector of space. A temperate, Earth-like world,
Mandalore is notable for being the exclusive home of a near-indestructible metal called beskar,
from which its resident warrior culture constructs their armor.
The Mandalorian religion demands war and conquest,
and Mandalore becomes the seat of an expanding empire during the Old Republic era,
thousands of years before the Skywalker Saga. This leads to war against the Sith, the Jedi,
the Republic, and frequently themselves, as Mandalore lacks a central government.
In the year 738 BBY, the Jedi and Republic resolve to preempt the
threat of Mandalorian expansion by bombarding their core worlds,
including Mandalore itself. The Mandalorian Excision leaves their empire in ruins.
By the time of the Clone Wars, the surface of Mandalore is a barren desert,
its remaining cities are housed beneath giant domes,
and generations of resentment still exists between the Mandalorians and the Jedi.
However, this may not have always been the case, as at least one Mandalorian served the Jedi Order
a thousand years earlier, around the height of the Old Republic. This Mandalorian Jedi,
named Tarre Vizsla, invents a unique lightsaber called the Darksaber that becomes a legendary
totem — a sort of Mandalorian Excalibur. After Tarre Viszla's death, the Darksaber is entombed
at the Jedi Temple on Coruscant, but is later "liberated" by his descendants and returned to
Mandalore, where for generations its wielder commands the respect of all Mandalorian clans.
The blade is either passed down through inheritance or won through single combat.
While there is only one Darksaber, traditional armor is also built specifically to mimic or
counter the abilities of the Jedi: its repulsors mimic a Force Push
while its flamethrower is difficult for Jedi to parry with a lightsaber.
The beskar used to create this armor is, likewise, passed down and recast across generations.
A generation before the Clone Wars break out across the galaxy, Mandalore is wrenched by a
civil war of its own, devastating the population. When the war is over, a peace movement builds
momentum across the planet, leading to the birth of a new pacifist government. Mandalorians who
still wish to follow their warrior tradition are exiled from the planet to its moon, Concordia,
where they rally behind the Darksaber and form a rogue fighting force called Death Watch.
The pacifist New Mandalorians are led by Duchess Satine Kryze and appointed Prime Minister Almec,
whose reforms reshape Mandalore into a society more closely resembling that of peaceful and
prosperous worlds in the core of the Galactic Republic. When war breaks
out between the Republic and the Confederacy of Independent Systems, Satine insists that
Mandalore remain neutral, and becomes the leader of the Council of Neutral Systems.
"As the designated regent of 1500 systems,
I speak for thousands of worlds that have urged me to allow them to stay neutral in this war."
This decision allows the New Mandalorians to remain pacifist, but it also ends up costing
them in other ways, as it strains her diplomatic relationship with the Republic
nearly to its breaking point, and both sides in the Clone Wars bar Mandalorians from using their
space lanes for trade. The public is forced to rely on an expensive black market for goods,
a practice for which Prime Minister Almec is eventually arrested and removed from office.
The Death Watch's leader, Pre Vizsla, sees the new, pacifist Mandalore as weak and disgraceful,
and seeks a way to return to the homeworld and seize power. However, Death Watch's ranks are
thin and Satine is a popular leader. Vizsla finds an ally in Count Dooku,
leader of the Coalition of Independent Systems, and they hatch a plot to turn
the public against Satine and open the door for his triumphant return to Mandalore.
Dooku and Vizsla arrange a bombing on Mandalore, prompting Satine and visiting Jedi Obi-Wan Kenobi
to investigate. They discover that Death Watch is behind the bombing and that the CIS may
be involved, which prompts the Republic Senate to consider installing a military
presence on Mandalore — against Satine's will — in order to keep the planet out
of Separatist hands. This is all part of Dooku's plan, since a Republic occupation
would be enormously unpopular among the Mandalorian public.
Death Watch would return to rid the planet of the invaders, throw Satine under the bus,
and take charge with the full support of the people.
Satine, Kenobi, Anakin Skywalker, and Padmé Amidala manage to unravel this plan and
dissuade the Senate from approving this invasion. After this failure,
Count Dooku cuts ties with Pre Vizsla and Death Watch retreats deeper into the Mandalorian sector.
During their travels across space, Death Watch happens upon a craft carrying two
wounded passengers — former Sith apprentice Maul and his own charge and brother, Savage Opress.
Like Vizsla, Maul hates the Jedi and holds a bitter grudge against Obi-Wan Kenobi. Sensing
an opportunity, Vizsla invites Maul to team up and retake Mandalore, which would provide Maul
an opportunity to take revenge on Kenobi. Maul accepts, and formulates a plan similar to Dooku's
— arrange for a massive crime wave on Mandalore that is beyond Duchess Satine's peacekeepers'
capacity to repel, therefore allowing Death Watch to return as conquering heroes.
Pre Vizsla endorses the plan, offering Death Watch as muscle to force the galaxy's three
biggest crime syndicates to cooperate. The scheme goes off without a hitch,
as the crime wave turns the public against Satine's pacifist leadership
and gives Pre Vizsla the opening he needs to clean up the mess and win their support.
"Death Watch is here to save you from these intergalactic
gangsters that threaten our great city."
Once he's thrown Satine in jail and taken the throne for himself,
Vizsla attempts to dispose of Maul and Opress, but finds he's underestimated them — Maul always
planned to consolidate the syndicates and to use Mandalore as the seat of his new criminal empire,
and to him, it's Vizsla who's outlived his usefulness. Maul kills Viszla in ritual combat,
winning the Darksaber, leadership of Death Watch, and the Mandalorian throne.
Maul keeps his newfound power a secret from the public,
reinstalling Almec as his puppet Prime Minister.
While much of Death Watch falls in line behind their new leader,
Pre Vizsla's lieutenant Bo-Katan Kryze efuses to follow an outsider,
and leads a splinter group against Maul. Bo-Katan springs her sister Duchess Satine from prison,
who in turn summons her star-crossed lover Obi-Wan Kenobi to Mandalore. This, too, plays into Maul's
hands, as it affords him the opportunity to kill Satine in front of Kenobi, simultaneously
eliminating a political rival and punishing his Jedi arch-nemesis. The attempt to quickly remove
Maul from power is unsuccessful, and Kenobi and Bo-Katan's squad are forced to flee Mandalore.
Months later, Bo-Katan convinces the Jedi Council to lend her a battalion to help
her unseat Maul as ruler of Mandalore. Aided by clone Commander Rex, ex-Jedi advisor Ahsoka Tano,
and a segment of the 501st Legion, Bo-Katan's remaining loyal warriors lay siege to the capital
city of Sundari. They are met by Maul's Death Watch, led by Gar Saxon of House Vizsla. Ahsoka
Tano captures Maul after a hard-fought lightsaber duel, while Bo-Katan easily takes the throne
room from relative pushover Almec. With their leadership removed and their forces overwhelmed by
the combined might of Bo-Katan's Mandalorians and the Republic's clones, Maul's forces surrender.
The Republic names Bo-Katan the new Regent of Mandalore, nominally granting the planet
the self-determination they crave as they escape from under the boot of Maul's Shadow Collective.
The Siege of Mandalore ends mere days before the fall of the Republic and its reformation into
the Galactic Empire, which quickly shatters any illusions of Mandalorian independence.
When Bo-Katan refuses to follow Emperor Palpatine's orders, she is stripped of her regency
and replaced by a new Imperial Governor — Maul's former right hand, Gar Saxon. Saxon creates a new
army of Mandalorian Super Commandos, repurposing the armor and traditions of Death Watch to serve
the Empire and to punish any Mandalorian clan that doesn't fall in line behind the new order.
One group of warriors, the Protectors, is permitted to go about their own affairs and
carry on Mandalorian traditions, as long as they are in tune with Imperial interests.
"Why would I fight the Empire when obviously destroying you is so much easier?"
When they're discovered allowing the Rebel Alliance to use their hyperspace lanes,
the entire clan is wiped out.
Mandalore also plays host to an Imperial Academy,
which not only trains stormtroopers and potential Super Commandos, but also conducts research and
development for new weapons and technology. One Academy student, Sabine Wren, develops a weapon
called the Arc Pulse Generator, which fires bursts of energy that seek out beskar armor,
superheating it and incinerating anyone inside, while leaving any other combatants totally
untouched. Eager to prove her brilliance, Sabine builds a working prototype, but when
she realizes that the Empire might actually use it against Mandalorians, she destroys it
and leaves Mandalore to become a bounty hunter and, eventually, a leader in the Rebel Alliance.
Mandalore spends nearly two decades tightly under Imperial rule,
its once-proud clans brought to heel by Gar Saxon and his Super Commandos. Saxon makes
an example of Clan Wren after Sabine's defection — Sabine's father is imprisoned and her brother
Tristan is conscripted into the Super Commandos in order to assure Clan Wren's cooperation.
"How can you wear that armor, Tristan? How could you join them?"
"You shouldn't have come back, Sabine."
Meanwhile, Sabine herself has been fighting the Empire as a member of Phoenix Squadron.
During their travels, her team happens across the Darksaber, which has been missing for decades.
Sabine learns to wield the saber as a weapon, but feels ill-suited to use it for its symbolic
purpose — to rally all Mandalorians to her command. She brings the weapon back to her mother
Ursa Wren's home on Krownest in the hopes of recruiting Clan Wren into the Rebel Alliance.
Gar Saxon intervenes, but he is defeated in single combat by Sabine
and then killed by Ursa before he can shoot Sabine in the back.
Clan Wren begins to openly oppose the Empire, which brings other clans to their aid,
including Clan Kryze, still led by Bo-Katan. Together with Sabine's Jedi friends Ezra
Bridger and Kanan Jarrus, Clans Wren and Kryze return to Mandalore and defeat a
plot by its new Imperial Governor — Gar's brother Tiber Saxon — to use Sabine's Arc
Pulse Generator against Mandalore. After this victory, Bo-Katan accepts the Darksaber and
a number of clans pledge loyalty to her and her fight to free Mandalore from the Empire.
Little is yet known about the fate of Mandalore after the start of Bo-Katan's rebellion,
but it does not appear to have gone well. A decade after the clans unite to oppose the Empire,
Mandalorians have been all but wiped out after an event referred to as "The Great Purge,"
during which the Empire slaughtered countless Mandalorians and forced the remainder into hiding.
The Mandalorian's first season reveals that a small tribe of Mandalorians live in secret on
the planet Navarro, leaving their underground home only one at a time in order to hide their
numbers — or perhaps, lack thereof. This tribe, which may be one of many, practices a much more
strict form of the Mandalorian religion than that demonstrated by other Mandalorians seen to date,
not permitted to reveal their names or even remove their helmets except in private.
"This is the way."
Further evidence of the damage to Mandalore and its people is the Empire's raiding of its
prized resources. Officers of the now-fallen Empire now possess large quantities of beskar,
stolen from either fallen warriors or the planet itself, which they sell back to
Mandalorians in exchange for their service as bounty hunters. As seen in the season 1 finale,
the Darksaber itself has landed in the possession of Moff Gideon.
During the second season of The Mandalorian, Mando's quest to return the Child to his people
leads him to Trask, a watery moon where he and the Child almost meet their doom before they're
saved by a trio of Mandalorians led by Bo-Katan. Mando is shocked when his saviors immediately
doff their helmets, revealing themselves to be adherents of a very different sort of creed,
but they're able to set aside their disagreements long enough to make a deal:
If he helps them raid an ex-Imperial ship and steal weaponry, they'll put him on the right path
toward a Jedi who can potentially train the Child.
Mando's new allies have more in mind for the raid than they're letting on, of course — as Bo-Katan
reveals when she accosts the ship's commander and demands to know where Moff Gideon's holding the
artifact she needs to claim her rightful place at the Mandalorian throne. But the commander
kills himself before he can be forced to reveal any information. It's a disappointing setback,
although with Gideon hunting Mando and Bo-Katan searching for Gideon, it's more than likely
their paths will cross again — and reveal more about the history and current fate of Mandalore.
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