Season 3 of The Mandalorian has been going strong, even if the show has failed to grab the cultural zeitgeist of the previous installments. The series confused some fans with its abrupt tonal shift in episode 3, and the change of pace has some wondering if the perceived shift is due to a now-defunct Star Wars series, Rangers of the New Republic.
The show was set to follow Gina Carano’s character, Cara Dune, as she recruited disenfranchised fighters from across the galaxy to create a found family to help snuff out what remained of the Empire. It was rumored to include a number of other fan favorites ranging from Cobb Vance (Timothy Olyphant) to Migs Mayfield (Bill Burr). While no scripts were finished for the series, speculations have still painted a decent picture of the world we could have seen. It’s been said that the Rangers storyline was set to pull a Netflix style meet-up — just as the streaming service did with Marvel heroes like Daredevil, Luke Cage, and Jessica Jones teaming up in The Defenders. Star Wars aimed to have The Mandalorian, Ahsoka, and Rangers culminate in a crossover event for the ages, perhaps on that showed the heroes facing off against the fan favorite villain, Grand Admiral Thrawn.
Unfortunately for fans, the concept never got the chance to come to fruition after Gina Carano blew her chances by making stupid comments on the internet and then failing to respond to the backlash in any meaningful way. The controversy led to Carano being ousted from the Star Wars universe and her character, Cara Dune, being shelved in what seems like perpetuity all the way back in 2021. The actor’s sacking led to copious revisions to the plan Lucasfilm had laid out for the future of its many series, and a recent convo on Reddit suggested that her actions may have cursed the entire current season of the show.
Kathleen Kennedy — longtime president of Lucasfilms — has been very candid about the company’s redistribution of the storylines intended for Rangers of the New Republic. She told Empire magazine that the stories conceptualized for the series would still come to light though The Mandalorian at the very least. It doesn’t seem like too much of a stretch to assume that an entire series worth of ideas is too much to squish into Mando and Grogu’s journey. Luckily for fans that are feeling the weight of the missing Rangers series in The Mandalorian, the pacing of the upcoming Ahsoka series is unfamiliar enough that they hopefully won’t feel the intrusion as deeply.
In a way, fans are right about the spirit of Gina Carano, but we’d hesitate to give the DailyWire actor any credit. The Mandalorian will inevitably be dotted with pieces of story that were meant for someone else – the ghosts of what Rangers of the New Republic could have been. That isn’t to say that what The Mandalorian has offered so far this year hasn’t been entertaining. While the emphasis on Dr. Pershing feels a bit out of place the change of pace and the sudden intrigue was exciting for most fans, and it smacked of Andor – one of the most highly praised Star Wars television installments so far.
In the end, it won’t be a bad thing for Star Wars to cut the Rangers of the New Republic for now. If anything, it gives the showrunners the chance to try something new, and hopefully they have learned from the somewhat confusing Mandalorian break during The Book of Boba Fett. As for Cara Dune, it doesn’t seem like the producers are very concerned about her departure. Dave Filoni himself has been as firm as anyone in Hollywood can be, saying that with all of the amazing characters out there in the galaxy, Star Wars has no need for Dune in any form going forward. Indeed, with all of the animated characters making their way to live-action in the coming year, it really doesn’t make sense for a shoehorned Carano inclusion.
At this point, the ghost of Gina Carano and her five apologists can scream and rattle their chains for all we care. The Mandalorian is doing just fine without them.