In the "Guns For Hire" episode of The Mandalorian, we visited a planet called Plazir-15 where we met its rulers...The Super Mario Bros. Movie star Jack Black (Captain Bombardier) and Grammy winner Lizzo (The Duchess).
Those cameos, while a lot of fun in many ways, were a tad divisive among Star Wars fans. Complaints have ranged from them being a distraction in this "filler" episode to an argument that this Chapter of the Disney+ series felt too much like George Lucas' prequels.
During a recent interview at Star Wars Celebration (via SFFGazette.com), The Mandalorian executive producer Jon Favreau weighed in to finally explain how and why these A-List cameos came to be.
"Lizzo and Jack Black got involved because, honestly, one of the things we really like about working on the show is we like to bring people in who are fans themselves," he explains. "Lizzo and Jack Black were both very active on social media."
"I know Jack from way back but he was doing Mandalorian things on Instagram or TikTok and Lizzo was dressing up like Grogu and my kids were showing me all these videos of how into it Lizzo was. We had an episode that was going to have this really eccentric royal couple in a court like something that felt out of Alice in Wonderland so we reached out and they were like, 'We'd love to.'"
"There's something really fun about being on the set with people who are excited to meet Grogu...people, when they hold that little puppet, it's like they're dealing with a real character," Favreau continued. "It was really fun and exciting on the set. A lot of pretty heavy, serious stuff happens this season, so this planet gave us permission to have a lot of fun with it."
We can definitely see where Favreau is coming from here, though bringing celebrity fans on set to shoot cameo roles like these could prove to be troublesome for The Mandalorian down the line. After all, we'd be lying to say that Christopher Lloyd's role in "Guns For Hire" was among the best acting we've seen in this Galaxy Far, Far Away!
Check out the full interview with Favreau in the player below.