Jon Favreau’s impact on pop culture over the last decade or so simply cannot be overstated, and he’s now become firmly embedded in the fabric of Disney as a result. Despite coming straight off the back of box office bomb Zathura fifteen years ago, Marvel Studios hired Favreau to tackle their first independent feature, and he fought hard to ensure that Robert Downey Jr. was cast as Tony Stark in Iron Man despite some question marks surrounding the actor’s reputation at the time.
As well as directing the movie that launched the Marvel Cinematic Universe, it was the $966 million box office haul of Favreau’s The Jungle Book that convinced Disney that live-action blockbuster remakes of their animated back catalogue would become a regular feature of the release schedule, and in 2019 alone, four such titles hit theaters, including Favreau’s The Lion King, which raked in over $1.6 billion to become the seventh highest-grossing movie ever made.
He then went on to create The Mandalorian, which instantly became one of the most popular TV shows on the planet, generating almost universal acclaim and has now firmly established itself as the undisputed jewel in the Disney Plus crown. The 54 year-old hasn’t forgotten his roots, though, and having already referenced Iron Man in the season 2 premiere, this week’s episode featured another nod to the MCU, which you can check out below.
😉😉. #loosefollow pic.twitter.com/cnDBwHMqPe
— Brian (@Brianlanders) December 4, 2020
As you can see, The Mandalorian‘s latest callback is pretty meta, with Boba Fett using the same line in a show created by Jon Favreau which had previously been spoken by an actor who was cast and directed by the filmmaker in the MCU, aimed at a character played by the man himself in Spider-Man: Homecoming, a movie that Favreau was only involved in as an onscreen talent.
